Skip to main content

What is Bard's reward for killing the dragon in The Hobbit?

What an interesting question! Bard's immediate reward for killing Smaug, the dragon, is the freedom of Dale, his city. However, forthcoming events transpire which allow Bard the ability to restore both Dale and Laketown to their former glories.


To recap, immediately after Smaug's death, the men of Laketown clamor to make Bard king of Esgaroth (or Laketown). However, the Master of Laketown isn't too keen on this development. He argues that Laketown has always "elected masters from among the old and wise, and have not endured the rule of mere fighting men." Bard moves on, but he eventually meets with Thorin to bargain for part of the treasure Smaug had hoarded when he was alive.


Bard reasons that since Smaug had stolen much of the wealth from Dale, the people of Dale deserve some part of the treasure that the dwarves now claim for themselves. At this point, Bard also speaks up for the people of Laketown, whose city was destroyed by the dragon. Bard's position is that both the people of Dale and Laketown could use some of the treasure to rebuild their cities and their lives. More importantly, since he was the one who killed Smaug, Bard wants a twelfth of the treasure; for his part, Thorin Oakenshield, the leader of the dwarves, isn't too eager to share his hoard of gold and silver.


Things change, however, when Bilbo hands over to Bard the Arkenstone of Thrain, an heirloom of Thorin's house. With the Arkenstone in his possession, Bard is able to force a bargain from Thorin. In exchange for the Arkenstone, Thorin will give Bard a fourteenth share of the hoard in silver and gold.


It is this fourteenth share of the treasure that Bard uses to rebuild both Laketown and Dale. So, you can say that, after he kills the dragon, Bard is richly rewarded. First, his city is freed from assaults by Smaug. Second, his own act of courage gives him the leverage to bargain for part of the treasure the dwarves have laid claim to. With his fourteenth share of the treasure, Bard is not only able to help Laketown rebuild, he is also able to return Dale to its former splendor. Additionally, his reputation grows so well that men from the Lake and other areas look to him as their new leader.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more