They are in some ways like the tree people told in tales across the world. They are able to live for so long because time affects them the same way it affects real trees. What is a long period of time to non-Ent creatures, is but a few minutes in the Ent world. Ents are very large and strong but their otherwise laid back nature usually prevents them from showing it off. However, when they attack Isengard in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, we see the full potential of their power. Despite their strength and impenetrable bark shells, they are, in a way, a dying species given that there are only male Ents left in Middle Earth.

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Ents are separate but similar to Huorns, who came about as a result of the Ents living among the trees. Though they were not as mobile as the Ents, Huorns developed the ability to communicate through language. The original language of the Ents, Old Entish, was a very slow-paced and difficult to pronounce language. It’s believed that beings that weren’t of Entish descent could not properly pronounce the language. The difficulty of speaking Old Entish made it to where the only creatures the Ents could effectively communicate with were the Huorns. As a result of their interactions with the elves, the Ents picked up on their language, but still spoke in the Entish dialect, creating New Entish.

Treebeard, based on Tolkien’s friend, C.S. Lewis, is the Ent that audiences are most familiar with as he plays a big role in Two Towers. In the film, he explains much of the existence of Ents to Pippin and Merry, even claiming that he’s the oldest creature on the Earth. Nonetheless, his explanation gives few details to where the Ents come from.

To understand the background of the Ents helps to put into perspective how grand an act their attacking Isengard was. To fully understand it requires looking to Tolkien’s writing and examining their history. The story of the Ents begins with the regular trees of the Great Forests, who, during the Ages of the Stars, were under threat. As a result, great spirits, created by Eru lluvatar upon the request of Yavanna, came to the forests to live among the trees and protect them. They later came to be referred to as Ents.

They appeared in Middle Earth around the same time as the Dwarves, as it was the Dwarves who threatened the trees. The more time that passed from then, they came to look like the trees they watched over. The Forest of Fangorn is the last remaining place where the Ents dwell by the time that the trilogy timeline takes place.

Tolkien, having resented industrialization, likely wrote the Ents into the story as a physical representation of nature fighting back against the damage that technological advancements and mass production cause to the Earth. Tolkien used Yavanna sending the Ents to protect the Trees and plants, quite literally, as a godsend for the planet.

The biggest missing piece of the puzzle of their beginning– that even Tolkien doesn’t have a clear answer for– is the Ent Wives. The Ent Wives left the part of Middle Earth where the male Ents remained, as a result of preferring different lifestyles. The Ent Wives chose to live in peace among men, teaching them the ways of horticulture.

Though for a while the Ent men did visit the Ent Wives, Sauron’s darkness soon destroyed the region where they lived, and the Ent men have not seen them since. There is lore among the elves that someday the Ent males and Ent Wives will be reunited. Their story in the Lord of the Rings trilogy even ends with Aragorn presenting Treebeard with the notion of the Ents now having the ability to spread across Middle Earth, in search of the Ent Wives.

Being divinely derived, it’s safe to assume that some element of the Ents will be present in Middle Earth, even after they’re gone. Whether they find the Ent Wives and repopulate the forests with Entings, or they develop their language skills and share it with the creatures of Middle Earth, the spirit of Ents will always be there. Their existence in Middle Earth is far too woven into the history of the world to ever fully disappear.

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