Edith Mary Tolkien (née Bratt; 21 January 1889 – 29 November 1971) was the wife of the academic, philologist, poet, and novelist J. R. R. Tolkien. She served as the inspiration for his fictional Middle-earth characters Lúthien Tinúviel and Arwen Undómiel.
Edith Bratt was born in Gloucester on 21 January 1889. Her mother, Frances Bratt, a governess, was 30 years old, unmarried, and was the daughter of a local shoe and bootmaker.
According to Humphrey Carpenter, Frances Bratt never married, and the name of Edith's father is not listed on her birth certificate. Even so, Frances is reported to have always preserved a photograph of him and his name was known within the Bratt family. Edith, however, was always deeply conscious of having been conceived out of wedlock and never told her own children the name of their grandfather. Subsequent research has identified Edith's father as Birmingham paper dealer Alfred Frederick Warrilow, who had previously employed Frances Bratt as governess to his daughter, Nellie Warrilow. When Warrilow died in 1891, he named Frances as his sole executrix in his will.
Edith was brought up in Handsworth, a suburb of Birmingham, by her mother and also her cousin, Jenny Grove (related to Sir George Grove). According to Humphrey Carpenter, the circumstances of Edith's birth were frequently the subject of neighbourhood gossip.
Frances Bratt died when her daughter was 14 and Edith was sent to the Dresden House boarding school in Evesham. The school was run by the Watts sisters, who had studied music in Dresden. Although the school had a very "strict regime", Edith was always to remember it fondly. It was at the Dresden House School where Edith "first developed her great love, and talent, for playing the piano."
Following school, Edith was expected to become a concert pianist or at the very least a piano teacher. While she considered how to proceed, Edith's guardian, solicitor Stephen Gateley, found her rooms at Mrs. Faulkner's boarding house at 37 Duchess Road, Birmingham.
The boarding house at 37 Duchess Road "was a gloomy, creeper-covered house, hung with dingy lace curtains". It was owned and operated by Mrs. Faulkner, whose husband Louis was "a wine merchant with a taste for his own wares". Mrs. Faulkner was also a Roman Catholic and "an active member" of the parish attached to the nearby Birmingham Oratory.
Mrs. Faulkner hosted musical soirées which were often attended by the Oratory's priests. She was delighted to have, in Edith, a pianist to accompany the soloists. Whenever Edith attempted to practise, however, Mrs. Faulkner "would sweep into the room as soon as the scales and arpeggios began", and say, "Now, Edith dear, that's enough for now!"
In later years, Edith told her children that her life at 37 Duchess Road was "rather restricted". Once, Edith, who "had a lifelong enjoyment of the theatre", announced that she was going to a matinée at the Theatre Royal. In response, Mrs. Faulkner told her that, "she must take a book to read in the interval to avoid the risk of being talked to by strangers!"
Edith first met Tolkien early in 1908, when he and his younger brother Hilary were moved into 37 Duchess Road by their guardian, Fr. Francis Xavier Morgan of the Birmingham Oratory. At the time Tolkien, known within his family as Ronald, was 16 years old and Edith was 19. According to Humphrey Carpenter, Edith and Ronald took to frequenting Birmingham teashops, especially one which had a balcony overlooking the pavement. There they would sit and throw sugarlumps into the hats of passers-by, moving to the next table when the sugar bowl was empty. ...With two people of their personalities and in their position, romance was bound to flourish. Both were orphans in need of affection, and they found that they could give it to each other. During the summer of 1909, they decided that they were in love.
However, before the end of the year the relationship had become known to Tolkien's guardian. Viewing Edith as a distraction from Tolkien's schoolwork and bothered by her Anglican religion, he forbade any contact between them until Tolkien became a legal adult at 21.
Tolkien grudgingly obeyed this instruction to the letter while Father Morgan's guardianship lasted. Edith's legal guardian, solicitor Stephen Gately, arranged for her to move to Cheltenham to stay with a family friend, solicitor C. H. Jessop and his wife.
Edith lived in relative comfort in the Jessops' spacious house and was waited upon by servants. Unlike at Mrs. Faulkner's house, she could play to her content upon the Jessops' grand piano.
Edith also played the organ at her local Church of England parish, which she later blamed for her subsequent lifetime of back problems. She also joined the Primrose League and attended local Conservative Party meetings. Aside from the local vicar, however, the Jessops hosted few visitors and, aside from her school friend Molly Field, Edith felt starved of companionship of her own age.
Even though Edith affectionately called her hosts "Uncle Jessop" and "Auntie Jessop", Edith later told her children that her host was "a martinet with a strong temper and a weak heart. He dominated his wife, who in turn begged Edith not to cross him. Edith said she would often work out her frustrations on the piano, playing something powerful and stirring, such as a Schubert Impromptu or a Beethoven Sonata. She also spent hours copying music meticulously. One or two of her albums still remain, showing her taste ranging from Classical music to the lighter ballads of the time."
However, on the evening of his twenty-first birthday, Tolkien wrote a letter to Edith, which contained a declaration of his love and asked her to marry him. She replied saying that she had recently become engaged to her friend Molly's brother, Warwickshire farmer George Field, but implied that she had done so only because she felt "on the shelf" and believed that Tolkien had forgotten her. Within a week, Tolkien journeyed to Cheltenham, where Edith met him at the railway station. That day, Edith returned her ring and announced her engagement to Tolkien instead.
According to the couple's children John and Priscilla, "Their respective guardians were not enthusiastic, although Father Francis eventually gave his blessing."
John and Priscilla Tolkien later wrote that while their father was attending Oxford University, "Father Francis sometimes came to visit from Birmingham, once chaperoning Edith. She remembered the train stopping at Banbury and Father Francis insisted upon buying Banbury cakes – the local delicacy – which were very greasy. The grease got everywhere and caused considerable confusion."