so 3e Gypsy-Halflings really are Tolkienesque then...

[Tonguez]

My brother has just purchased the new edition of LOTR (Book) and at the beginning it has a brief introduction to the History of the Hobbits and how they came to the Shire (its at his house so haven't got it here for reference).

Anyway it states something along the lines that prior to coming to the Shire the hobbits undertook a 'great migration/exodus' from their original homeland - and I couldn't help but get the notion that this migration took generations (rather than years) to complete with generations of hobbits born on the wagons.

So enter 3e Halflings - during this migration emphasis would be placed on those risktaking, rougish types (the 3e Halfling) which could lead the clans through adversity, those born on the wagons would know no other lifestyle and thus develop a distinct culture.
Only after the crossing of the Brandywine bridge into the Shire would emphasis (and leadership) pass into the hands of those more dependable stolid types who could lead the settlers to prosperity.

So we have two options

1. 3e Halflings are based on the Migratory Hobbits BEFORE they crossed the Brandywine Bridge
Or
2. after a few generations (only two are needed)when those orignal rogueish leaders had become mere legends and the stolid dependable homebodies ruled those few hobbit/halflings who retained the risktaking adventurousness of their ancestors up and left (they would have been viewed as unruly troublemakers anyway - much as Bilbo was)
This group could have then travelled to parts unknown and fallen outside the scope of the events related in LOTR

Did anyone else read this and get a similar notion?
What am I actually talking about?

 

[Rune]

Very, very interesting...

That'll be a particularly useful bit to ponder in my next campaign, as a matter of fact. (I'm using the Tolkien literature as holy texts--an idea I stole from someone on these boards--and halflings are going to be the oppressors of the world--a twist on my usual take on halflings as the "children playing at being grown-ups"). Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

 

[UD]

Very, very interesting...

That'll be a particularly useful bit to ponder in my next campaign, as a matter of fact. (I'm using the Tolkien literature as holy texts--an idea I stole from someone on these boards--and halflings are going to be the oppressors of the world--a twist on my usual take on halflings as the "children playing at being grown-ups"). Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Nice twist....

 

[Desdichado]

Lord of the Rings makes no mention of perennially migratory hobbits. Sure, the hobbits did spread into Eriador from the vales of the Anduin, but that was because Sauron as the Necromancer settled in Southern Greenwood (causing the forest to be renamed Mirkwood) which created a climate very unsuitable for hobbit lifestyle.

Following that tainting of their original homeland, most of the hobbits moved into Eriador in a one-time move, not a period of migrations. There they settled in a number of settlements much like Bree, where they coexisted with Big Folks. Much later, in the last days of the Kings of the North, Marcho and Blanco got their writ enabling them to settle the Shire.

The Stoors were a bit more on the move: they originally settled in Dunland, some of them went up toward the Shire and some later went back to the Vales of the Anduin.

 

[Rune]

Nice twist....

Thanks! I have one more twist, as a matter of fact. I'm using The Sunderer's (formerly known as Monkey-Trained-to-Type) Sundered Sky setting, because I just really like it.