If you are a Tolkien fan, you know what day it is today! September 22nd, the birthday of both Bilbo and Frodo Baggins – the very long-expected party with which The Lord of the Rings began. And while, of course, we all know what trick Bilbo pulled off at the end of the party which set the plot of the book in motion, we’re not going to talk about that today. What interests me now is the way hobbits celebrate their birthdays.
We all know life in the Shire was inspired by Tolkien’s positive sentimental view of the English countryside – and, indeed, we could imagine it in practically any European countryside. Idyllic green hills and fields, pretty houses (or in this case, hobbit holes), people going about their daily business without any major problems in their life, children playing.
In those surroundings, Mr Bilbo Baggins is the old eccentric rich gentleman, with his adventurous past and dwarven gold that people whisper of. And Bilbo’s party for his eleventy-first and Frodo’s thirty-third birthday is a miracle of extravagance by Hobbiton standards: lavish decorated pavilions, lots of delicious food made by cooks coming from afar for this occasion, and, of course, Gandalf’s legendary fireworks. But one thing that he does just like all hobbits do is give gifts to others:
Bilbo met the guests (and additions) at the new white gate in person. He gave away presents to all and sundry – the latter were those who went out again by a back way and came in again by the gate. Hobbits give presents to other people on their own birthdays. Not very expensive ones, as a rule, and not so lavishly as on this occasion; but it was not a bad system. Actually in Hobbiton and Bywater every day in the year was somebody’s birthday, so that every hobbit in those parts had a fair chance of at least one present at least once a week. But they never got tired of them.
A Long-expected Party, by Inger Edelfelt (source: Tolkien Gateway)
Of course, Bilbo’s presents at this party were particularly luxurious, but that was because of his wealth and the very special occasion. And some of them were jokes and jabs directed at people for some minor wrongdoings – such as an empty bookcase for a hobbit who “was a great borrower of books, and worse than usual at returning them”, or silver spoons for Bilbo’s infamous cousin Lobelia Sackville-Baggins, who had already stolen a number of his spoons while he was away on his travels. But, again, Bilbo was going away forever and intending to let everyone know what he thought of them – both the good and the bad.
But let us look at the regular hobbit birthdays. Usually, then, they would throw a small birthday-party for their friends and family, and give gifts to their guests. As Tolkien writes in one of his letters (Letter 214), that doesn’t mean that they didn’t receive birthday presents: the head of family (interestingly, nor parents) was expected to give a gift to the birthday-hobbit (called a ribadyan or byrding), as were cousins who lived nearby – within a 12-mile-radius, according to Shire customs. Interestingly, they were expected to give presents in private, individually, so everyone would give a gift according to their abilities, and nobody would be embarrassed because they brough a modest gift while a richer friend or relative brought something extravagant. Bringing gifts to the party itself was considered to be in very bad taste, and a form of insulting “payment” for the food and party gift.
The party gifts handed out were often just of symbolic value, tokens of attention: in the case of younger hobbits, it would often be something self-made, from flowers picked by smaller children to give their family members, to produce of gardens or workshops of older hobbits. Adults gave purchased gifts, too. Some obtained or made new gifts for every birthday, while some regifted things they obtained and didn’t need: it is stated in The Lord of the Rings that “there were one or two old mathoms of forgotten uses that had circulated all around the district”. (Mathom was the hobbit word for something one had no use for, but didn’t want to throw away. Thus, a likeable but essentially useless thing – from cute mementoes received as gifts to museum exhibits.) Bilbo was among those who usually gave new gifts and kept those he received, except in the case of his eleventy-first birthday, when he shared a number of his earlier belongings among the closer guests.
Birthday Party of Baggins, by Breath-Art (Source: DeviantArt)
Doesn’t it sound wonderful? Whether Tolkien had some inspiration in an old custom, or invented this tradition of gift-giving, I do not know. (If someone does, I’ll be happy to find out!) However, it does wonderfully tie in to the traditions of hospitality and celebration. Just like you would make a birthday cake (and other food) to serve to your guests, you prepare gifts of more personal than monetary value, for them to remember the birthday by. When I was very little, we used to make small “lotteries” on a child’s birthday party, where all guests would draw cards with numbers, and little gifts were handed out, usually small, inexpensive toys or sweets. Sometimes it was really random, and sometimes the parent running the lottery would rig it so that children got appropriate gifts – calling out the number and waiting to see who had it before showing (i.e. quickly picking) the prize. It was a fun time, and the hobbit gift-giving tradition seems like a more mature, but equally magical version of the same idea.
While I never started giving guests gifts for my birthday, my family used to celebrate the Hobbit Birthday, as we called it for short, for a number of years until we stopped during the Covid-19 pandemic. We’d make a lot of tasty food (never forgetting mushrooms – hobbits’ favourite treat), invite our Tolkien-loving friends and prepared gifts for them all. Just like hobbits – and it’s common sense, really – we never aimed for grand and expensive, just something the person would like, something that would suit them in particular, whether we bought it or made it. There would be a lot of talking and laughing (and eating), as at any good party, and those who wanted to might recite some of Tolkien’s poems, usually from The Lord of the Rings. It was a very good time!
We intended to continue the tradition this year, but, alas, a combination of work and some of us catching a cold (it’s not too bad, thag you very buch for asking) thwarted those plans. Still, we’ll have a small party within the family circle. A few gifts, a few snacks, and maybe a joint reading of The Hobbit – for the first time, for our daughter. What else would one need? Happy birthday, Bilbo and Frodo!
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