I hope you don't mind that I join in... Personally, I don't think Balrogs had wings. Tolkien describes things very well, and I think if he had meant it to have wings he would have said so. Secondly, if it did have wings, why did it fall? And what use are in-functional wings? Why would an author choose to give a creature wings that did not work? It's not like we're supposed to be pitying him. If he had wings, he would have balenced, again, so he would not have fallen. If Tolkien wanted wings, he could/would have said something about 'a fiery dragon'. Here is the description of the Balrog in my Silmarillion Index of Names and creatures.
]Balrog: 'Demon of might' SIndarin form (Quenya Valarauko) of the name of the deamons of fire that served Morgoth.
"For the Maiar many were drawn to his splendor in the days of his greatness, and reamained in that allegiance down into his darkness, and others he corrupted afterwards to his service with lies and treacherous gifts. Dreadful among thses spirits were the Valaraukar, the scourges of fire that in Middle-Earth were called Balrogs, demons of terror" THe silmarillion, Valaquenta, Of the Enemies.

"And in Utumno he gathered his demons about him, those spirits who first adhered to him in the days of his splendor, and became most like him in his corruption, their hearts were of fire, but they were cloaked in darkness, and terror went before them, they had whips of flame. Balrogs they were named in Middle-Earth in later days." ~ Silmarillion, Chapter 3, paragraph 2

"Far beneath the ruined halls of Angband, in vaults to which the Valar in the haste of their assault had not descended, Balrogs still lurked, awaiting ever the return of their Lord, and now swiftly they arose, and passing over Hithlum they came to Lammoth as a tempest of fire. With their whips of flame they smote...." ~Of the Flight of the Noldor, Silmarillion

"And there came Balrogs, and dragons, and Glaurung father of dragons." So the Balrog is NOT a dragon! (Silmarillion, Of the Fifth Battle)


Those were all quotes from the Silmarillion. I would go get my LotR, but I have to go start school now.

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For the most part your quotes don't really say much.

Not all Dragons could fly, in fact most could not becuase the original types were wingless and Glaurung the Father of Dragons was chief amoung them. Only in the War of Wrath did Morgoth finally reveal the winged Dragons. So comparing Dragons to Balrogs does not achieve much.

Secondly you seem to be basing much thought on 'If they had wings they would not have fallen of the cliff and died'.
This has a fatal flaw:

If I was to drop a Hummingbird off a 2 meter ledge backwards it would easily stabilise itself.
If I was to push a Golden Eagle backwards of a 2 meter ledge, chances are it could not balance itself in time for avioding impact.

Thirdly the Balrogs that Ecthelion, Glorfindel and Gandalf slew by falling off cliffs that were in tunnels and mountain ranges. The Balrogs might not have been able to stretch there wings far enough to gain balance becuase there might have been obsticles in the way.

Lastly I DO NOT think Balrogs could fly. I believe they simply had wings to appear more intimidating to there enemies. Remember when they descended into Ea they could choose whatever form they wished and wings would have made them appear larger and more frightening.

But why would they have chosen to have wings and not fly?

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Concerning this quote:


When editing the Silmarillion, Christopher Tolkien had Guy Gavriel Kay help him with some of the passages. The actual words that JRRT wrote were:


They are similar, but not quite. 'Arose' does not mean "ascend into the air", but "climb up from the depths of the earth to ground level". "Passing... over Hithlum" can be interpreted as "across" Hithlum, and "winged speed" can mean "speed like that which could be attained with wings", and doesn't mean that they had wings. Tolkien uses 'pass over' for Fingolfin's horse going over Anfauglith. Does that mean his horse could fly? No.

You can see my point. There is no quote which is concrete enough to be conclusive. We could volley with quotes and theories all day long but get nowhere.

Opinions are all we have on this subject. Personally I beleive that Balrogs quite likely had wings (even if only shapes devised by there surrounding shadow) but I do not think they could fly.

I agree that they couldn't fly and they had "wings" of shadow, but no physical (whatever the rest of their bodies were made of) manifestation of wings; it wasn't part of their hroa.

Perhaps not but the shadow imaybe simply part of the hroa. As the Valaraukar could choose shapes to there own taste, as could all the Ainur, it is likely that they were only made up of Shadow and Flame, and might not have had actualy tangleble bodies (although this does seem to contradict the idears of slaying them).
Therefore perhaps there actual hroa was the shadow and flame (IE it was more tangeble than there Fea).

Referring to a previous post, perhaps the balrogs wings were a cloak of shadow to make the balrog seem more intimidating?

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What if they could just change shape? And if they choes to have wings, wouldn't they have chosen to be able to fly? Tolkien never outright says 'Balrogs have wings' or 'And the balrog, winged flame and shadow...' etc...! So unless Tolkien were still alive, I would say there's no real way of us coming to a conclusion we all agree on and we all believe, right?

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Im certain we resolved the idea of Shape shifting somewhere in this topic. Now where did I put that discussion with lord of All??

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That was in another thread I think.

Here is aa guide for you all:

If there is no quote - Assume it doesn't exist (for example there is no quote of Balrogs shape shifting). UNLESS there are many other similarities that support the idear.

If there is indirect quote/s (some which may seem to contradict eachother) - up to opinion.

If there is an outright quote - check to see its source. Quotes from HOME are less relaible as they are often Tolkien's original idears of his world. If the quote is from a more recent book (The Hobbit, LOTR, The silmarillion) then it is acceptable to follow it.

You're still avoiding my 'Why would balrogs choose to have wings and not be able to fly?'

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Perhaps becuase they only had wings made up of the shadow and flame, not actual tangleble wings. Thus they would be incapable of using them for flight.
Also know that the Balrogs took these shapes when descending into Ea from the Void. And as they would not have needed flight in the Void it may be they thought they would not need them there.

Also due to the absense of flying things in the very first part of Ea perhaps the idear of flight had not even entered they minds.

I just had an idea for researching this. I will tell you when I find anything out.

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Shoot, it didn't work. Forget what I said. Go back to our conversation.

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That kinda backfired didnt it Lailathnindil? You thought u would be dealing the killer blow to Lord of alls argumet but it didnt quite work. Sorry and all that like.

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"This is the hour of the Shire-folk, when they arise from their quiet fields to shake the towers and counsels of the Great. Who of all the Wise could have foreseen it? Or, if they are wise, why should they expect to know it, until the hour has struck? "