Origins, Biology and Life Cycle Of Orcs In Middle Earth

Orcs were the primary foot soldiers of the Dark Lord's armies and sometimes the weakest (but most numerous) of their servants. They were created by the first Dark Lord, Morgoth, before the First Age and served him and later his successor in their quest to dominate Middle-earth. Before Oromë first found the Elves at Cuiviénen, Melkor kidnapped some of them and cruelly deformed them, twisting them into the first Orcs.

[paimonisfood]

The fact that humans and orcs can interbreed makes sense since men and elves can interbreed as well. This is ofc considering that Orcs are corrupted elves as Melkor cannot create life and can only corrupt existing ones therefore Melkor corrupting some of the elves that remained on Middle Earth when most of them were taken to Valinor.

[thethemperoroftheholybri]

I personally think the size of Orcs and Goblins is determined by diet just like with humans, the smaller Orcs and Goblins typically live in caves or mountains where food would be scarce, they're not opposed to cannibalism but don't typically eat their own "gangs".

[rexjrd]

Even if orcs can live hundreds of years I think it's more likely that most of them don't live past 30 because of all the fighting and infighting orcs do and that constantly breeding kept their populations up.

[haydenmorris]

My theory as to why Azog is so large is because we only really know him from Bilbos story, who was running from the orc the whole time, probably looked huge to a little hobbit fresh out of the shire and, most likely, Bilbo embellished the size of his foes while telling his tale.

[thomassmith]

I got the impression that the orcs had a Spartan type society, with males being exclusively trained for battle and related activities and females doing most everything else, with dominant males getting their pick of females as mates. The appearance of orcs was based on descriptions of Mongol warriors which got to western Europe during their invasions.

[AmarilioAlcantara]

After the army of Nargothrond went out to meet Morgoth's army led by Glaurung on the field of Tumhalad, some miles north of the citadel, they were defeated and routed. The Elves left in the city awaiting their return instead found the dragon and his Orcs crossing their bridge and entering the city, meeting little to no resistance. These people, including Orodreth's daughter Finduilas, were either captured and taken to Angband to be slaves or killed.

[thomassmith]

One thing that as far as I know Tolkien never addressed was what happed to orcs in the afterlife. He did not believe that orcs were irredeemable, being no worse than evil men. Supposedly if they were in fact corrupted elves they would go to the Halls of Mandos.

[KillrMonkey]

In the fellowship of the ring Saruman explains to the one Uruk Hai orcs were once elves but became twisted by darkness

[nanettesage]

It would be interesting to see a comparison of the ORC/ORK from other movies, games, and such.
For example, what an Orc/k in D&D is like, what an Orc/k in World of Warcraft is like, what an Orc/k in Tolken is like, what an Orc/k is like Warhammer Fantasy, and what an Orc/k is like in Warhammer 40K. Comparing them and perhaps do additional video's about each of them too.

[tristanburgos]

This was something I always wondered about when I was younger and watched lord of the rings constantly. Thanks for the video :)

[dietrichsteinwald]

I read somewhere that in addition to ordinary orcs, there were also powerful orcs. The Maiar, loyal to Morgoth, were embodied in their bodies. Sorry for bad English.

[kamilkrol]

Orcs are much more than meets the eye and you can't find enough information about them in the movies, which is a shame. Thanks for making this great video, and bringing in light on what orcs are/how they live their lives in the middle earth, this helped me understanding them a lot.

[xisigma]

Tolkien had two origins for orcs: corrupted elves, mud pit clones. Both are probably true. Gimli also joked about dwarves springing up from rocks.

[eulex]

Professor Tolkien addresses this in Letter 153 to Peter Hastings.

I suppose the chief difficulties I have involved myself in are scientific and biological - which worry me just as much as the theological and metaphysical (though you do not seem to mind them so much). Elves and Men are evidently in biological terms one race, or they could not breed and produce fertile offspring - there are two cases only in my legends of such unions, and they are merged in the descendants of Earendil

[oneyedthing]

3:35

meanwhile at a POW Camp

Melkor : Take him
Rohan Soldier : Finally, a warrior's death..
Melkor : Now kiss
Rohan Solider : Wait what?

[brucehamm]

I think the first goblinmen were created when goblins forced themselves on captured human women

[stoatnam]

The scariest idea is Morgoth creating the orcs but then Illuvatar breathing life into them as he did the dwarves.

[jean]

If i'm not mistaken, The Hobbit states that Goblin and Orc are the same thing, but in different language.

[aaronmurry]

LOL he said rings of power was Tolkien work coming back lol. No only thing rings of power has in common with Tolkien are names.

[theboywithadeer]

Change the "c" to "k" and we have a bunch of jolly mushroom Orks(plus the Ugly/Handsome too)