heget | Silmarillion Sigil Set 11 (Reply)

Disclaimer: Here is a blend of Original Tolkien creations (aka my best efforts at recreating the author’s drawing), modifications on the original, and designs completely from cloth. Previous Entries can be found under the sigil tag. Please credit if use.

In order:

Finrod-Nóm, Finrod, Orodreth, Angrod 01, Angrod 02, Aegnor, Galadriel

Notes:

Yes, I'm reposting these once more. Because if people in the Silmarillion/Tolkien fandom continue to use them, I want nice official links to them. And so another crosspost from tumblr project is born.

For my favorite set of Finwions, making sigils for them was a royal pain. Suffice to say, my difficulties with designing and crafting these sigils mean I’m not as happy with the end result as some of the other endeavors. Still, they work well for my purposes.

The color scheme for the offspring of Finarfin take their cues from the only Tolkien Originalfor any of them that I have to work with: Finrod Felagund’s sigil, made after he discovered the Edain, and obviously something constructed by humans instead of elves.

I differentiate between Finrod’s human-derived sigil and the one he must have had before his little discovery by calling that one Finrod-Nóm, after the Bëorings’ name for him. It was a sigil I put off making for a long time because it isn’t made of symmetrical geometric shapes. And after a few years of doing these, breaking away from the pattern was intimidating.

For Finrod pre-Edain, I tried to make something floral, or to hearken back to the ring of his father (the one with two golden snakes with emerald eyes, one wearing a floral wreath, the other eating it). I struggled, and failed, and in the end just did that very curving Art Nouveau mess. But the underlining structure is from Finarfin’s, and I think perhaps you can make a character extrapolation. As a young man Finrod is interested in everything and everyone, and he doesn’t have a rigidly defined passion. Anyways, his Nargothrond banners will switch to Nóm early on.

Orodreth I tend to imagine as the second brother, just because he gets hit with the middle-child, second-born always in the shadow of his siblings and wants to keep the peace syndrome- which does feel like him. The sigil is heavier on the white (fittingly) and the flower comes from Eärwen. Was another one of those “eh, not so terrible I won’t mind it in my game.”

Angrod has two variations not for any story-based reason but because I can’t decide which I like better. I’m very pleased with the clean geometry of his, and the black circle of Angrod 02 is a reference to his name “Iron-grip”.

Aegnor was from playing around with what I’d done for Orodreth. The small golden xat the end of each arm make me think of crossed blades, which fits my image of him as a rash warrior.

Galadriel was one I had made a sigil for but was unhappy with. Then I took inspiration from what I liked about Angrod and did a strongly geometric design in the same colors as her brothers. When she comes to Beleriand, she comes as their equal as a prince, so she needs to be able to use the same banners. The center has design elements from her Grandfather Olwë and is also an oblique ‘braided gold wreath’ reference. Rings, as well.