Key facts
- Aliases
- Wormtongue, Worm
- Race
- Men of Rohan
- Book s
- The Two Towers (1954) , The Return of the King (1955) , Unfinished Tales (1980)
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- literary character
- Gender
- male
- Occupation
- adviser
Show 5 more facts
- ethnic group
- Rohirrim
- from narrative universe
- Tolkien's legendarium
- present in work
- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
- narrative role
- henchperson
- name in native language
- Gríma Wormtongue
Sources (1)
via Wikidata · CC0
~9 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Gríma, called (the) Wormtongue, is a fictional character in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. He serves as a secondary antagonist there; his role is expanded in Unfinished Tales. He is introduced in The Two Towers as the chief advisor to King Théoden of Rohan and henchman of Saruman.
To some psychologists, Wormtongue serves as an archetypal sycophant. Tolkien scholars note that Tolkien based Wormtongue on the untrustworthy character Unferth in Beowulf. He is presumptive, behaving as if he already rules Rohan, and exemplifies lechery, as correctly guessed by Gandalf; he hopes to become rich, and to take Éowyn as the woman he desires.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Gríma Wormtongue” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.