Golden Berry

Goldberry (Goldberry in the original in English), called the «Daughter of the River» ("River-woman' s daughter" in the original), is a fictional character who appears in several texts by J. R. R. Tolkien: in the poem "The Adventures of Tom Bombadil", published in the book The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and other poems from The Red Book; and in the chapters "The Old Forest", "At Tom Bombadil's House", and "Fog in the Barrow Gullies" of the first volume (The Fellowship of the Ring) of the novel The Lord of the Rings. She is happily married to Tom Bombadil with whom she lives on the eastern edge of the Old Forest, on the banks of the Tornasauce River, from which she comes.

Names and etymology

The English name Goldberry could be a Western derivation of the Sindarin Golodh-bereth, which would mean 'queen of flowers'.^{[citation required]}

Goldenberry's nickname, «River Woman's Daughter», has been translated into Spanish in The Lord of the Rings only as «Daughter of the River", which loses an important element: the existence of a "Woman of the River", or "Lady of the River", who would be the mother of Baya de Oro.

History

In The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and other poems from The Red Book

The first poem in the book, titled by the same name, Golden Berry appears playfully, throwing Tom into the river, and then returning to the dark cave at the bottom of the Tornasauce where he lived with his mother. After a series of more or less unconnected adventures of Bombadil, the poem narrates the "capture" of Goldberry by Tom Bombadil to make her his wife and begin a joyful life together.

In The Lord of the Rings

In the plot of The Lord of the Rings, Goldberry and Tom meet the hobbits on their way to Rivendell to take the One Ring there. Tom and Goldberry help them and feed them.

Uncertain origins of the character

Her origins are not certain, and it is speculated that she is not actually a mortal woman, but rather a spirit of the Tornasauce River in the Old Forest. She is similar to the many river spirits of English folklore such as Peg Powler of the River Tees, although much gentler. < sup > [ < i > citation needed ]

Another explanation is that she was originally a Maia who "went native" by uniting with the river, similar to Melian marrying Elu Thingol.

It is speculated that she is Yavanna in person, wife of Aulë (under this theory Tom Bombadil would be Aulë himself).^{[citation required]}

All of the above remains at a speculative level, Baya de Oro and Tom Bombadil are great enigmas in the internal coherence of the legendarium by Tolkien.^{[citation required]}