Enigmata Saxonica Nuper Inventa Duo

<poem style="font-style:italic; margin-left:20px;">

Meolchwitum sind marmanstane

wagas mine wundrum frætwede;

…

Milky-white are my marble

walls wondrously adorned;</poem>

<poem style="font-style:italic; margin-left:20px;">

Hæfth Hild Hunecan hwite tunecan,

ond swa read rose hæfth rudige nose;

…

Hild Hunic has a white tunic,

and like a red rose is her ruddy nose;</poem>

Enigmata Saxonica Nuper Inventa Duo is a Latin phrase meaning "two Saxon riddles newly discovered".

Enigma Saxonicum Nuper ‘Inventum’ is a Latin phrase meaning "Saxon Riddle Newly 'Discovered'".

Tolkien wrote the first of the two riddles no later than 26 June of 1922, when he sent a version of the riddle, with the title Enigmata Saxonica Nuper Inventa Duo to Henry Bradley for entertainment purposes. The second riddle was written around 1923. Both of them were modeled after traditional early English sources such as the ones found in the Exeter Book. They were both first published in June of 1923 on page 20 of A Northern Venture: Verses by Members of the Leeds University English School Association.

The manuscript of the first riddle appeared in a leaflet published alongside The Oxford Inklings, a 1999 exhibition by the Museum of Oxford. Both riddles were reprinted on pages 124-5 of The Annotated Hobbit in 2002, where Douglas A. Anderson suggested that the first riddle may be based on the rhyme known as 'In Marble Halls' while the second riddle seems to have been based on the nursery rhyme 'Little Nancy Etticoat / In a white petticoat'.

In 2024, the riddles were reprinted in September as entry 71 in The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien.

1. Esta ficha se ha importado inicialmente de TolkienGateway.net el día 25/05/2026.