But if Tolkien was merely the conduit (or, as he put it, ‘translator’)
of this material, then he may not have been fully aware of all its
implications. Or, on the other hand, maybe he was simply unwilling to
reveal all that he knew, because it is clear that Tom Bombadil is,
indeed, Eru Ilúvatar. Tom Bombadil – a somewhat frivolous name given to
him by Hobbits – was the oldest being in the world, and had been
dwelling in it since before even the Valar. Among his many names and
titles, all of which referred to his primaeval status, was one given to
him by the Men of Rohan – Orald – an Old English word meaning ‘most ancient’ and cognate with German Uralt and Frisian Wr-alda – this latter, in turn, being the name given to the creator-god in the 13th century Frisian chronicle known as the Oera Linda Book (it is also cognate with the modern English ‘world’). Furthermore, one of the titles the Oera Linda Book gives to Wr-alda is All-father, which is the exact translation of Ilúvatar, and is also a title of the chief god Odin (Woden) in the Prose Edda, the famous 13th century treatise on Norse mythology by the Icelandic scholar, Snorri Sturluson – and it was from Woden, as the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle tells us, that the ruling families of Northern Europe descended, including those of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.