Down the Hobbit Hole: Possessory Title to the One Ring

Rev'd Prof Helen Hall, Nottingham Law School https://www.ntu.ac.uk/staff-profiles/law/helen-hall

By Peter J. Yost - CC BY-SA 4.0

In The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien, the hero Bilbo Baggins is lost in the goblin tunnels deep below the Misty Mountains, when he finds a gold ring. This turns out to be an object of unimaginable power with a dark history and an equally sinister future, but at the time Bilbo has no way of knowing this. As far as he is concerned, it is just a shiny little trinket.

The ring had been brought into the caves, and lost, by Sméagol aka Gollum, a hobbit-adjacent creature who had acquired it centuries previously. His cousin Déagol had found it when they while they were fishing together. Sméagol attempted to emotionally blackmail Déagol into giving him the ring as a birthday present, but when this failed, strangled him and took the trophy. Gollum is exiled by the matriarch of his clan, and eventually ends up lurking in the subterranean halls of the Great Goblin, living on whatever he can catch and eat. He eventually guesses that Bilbo has found and pocketed his “preciousss” ring and wants it back.

If the Common Law of England and Wales applied in the Third Age of Middle Earth, who would have the better claim to the ring, Bilbo, Gollum or the Great Goblin?

Counterintuitively, Gollum did have possessory title to the One Ring, notwithstanding that he acquired it through theft and murder. Title in English and Welsh law is relative rather than absolute. A thief is of course in a far weaker position that the true owner, but as the Court of Appeal confirmed as recently as 2021 in R v Seed, a thief does hold possessory title good against everyone else.

Furthermore, in a contest between two people with possessory title, the prior holder will prevail. This was demonstrated famously in Armory v Delamirie, when a little chimney sweep found a ring with a jewels in it. He took it to a goldsmith to be valued, and the apprentice who was in the shop that day stole the gems. In an almost fairy-tale happy ending, the poor oppressed climbing boy had his claim vindicated by the courts.

However, this situation here is very different. Gollum was not in possession of the ring when Bilbo stumbled upon it and picked it up. Unlike the wicked man in the goldsmith’s shop, Bilbo had not stolen the ring, but discovered it lying on the ground. Did Gollum’s possessory title persist when he lost possession by virtue of accident rather than theft? The short but quite frustrating answer is that legal scholars disagree, and no clear precedent exists on the point.

There is also disagreement about the underlying justification for possessory title. One argument frequently put forward by judges and commentators alike is the prevention of violence (see for example Jeffries v Great Western Railway Co. (1856)). Whilst authors like Waghorn critique this as rather vague and unsubstantiated, it is possible to understand the underlying concern. If the law offered no protection to humans/hobbits/goblins in de facto possession of a chattel, unless they could establish title in some other way, opportunistic third parties might be tempted to grab whatever they could. On this basis, the anti-persistence viewpoint seems more persuasive when it comes to possessory title. If the reason to recognise Gollum’s title was to avoid incentivising others to take the ring from him by force or stealth, this only applies if he actually has the ring. Furthermore, a subsequent innocent finder of the property would be equally likely to fight for the treasure now in their hands or claws.

However, even if we conclude that as a subsequent possessor (rather than deliberate dispossessor) Bilbo can resist Gollum’s claim, what about the Great Goblin? The ring was lying around in one of the tunnels of his underground home. In this instance, Parker v British Airways [1982] provides some valuable insight. Mr Parker found a gold bracelet in the British Airways executive lounge. He handed it in, but asked that it be returned to him if it went unclaimed, leaving contact details to enable this. The original owner never came forward, and in a goblin-like move, British Airways ignored Mr Parker’s request, sold the item and snaffled the £850 profit. Mr Parker discovered this and successfully sued them.

The court ruled that Mr Parker’s rights could only be displaced by British Airways if they could show that as occupiers that there was an obvious intention to exercise such control over the lounge and chattels within in, meaning that the bracelet was in their possession before Mr Parker spotted in and took it into his. The actions of British Airways in restricting access to the lounge, and instructing employees about what to do with lost property were not adequate to demonstrate that they had taken possession of the bracelet. It was material that the policy in relation to lost property was not published to users of the lounge, and that they did not carry out searches for lost articles.

The Great Goblin did not appear to be sending out patrols to look for lost property. His halls were not a public place, but then neither was the British Airways Executive Lounge. It is also worth noting that like Mr Parker, Bilbo was there by invitation and not as a trespasser (he had actually been forcibly dragged in by goblin guards and accidentally dropped). Taking all of these things together therefore, it seems clear that he had a much stronger claim to the ring than the goblin ruler.

Further Reading

 R v Seed [2021] EWCA Crim 1198

Parker v British Airways [1982] QB 1004

Jeffries v Great Western Railway Co. (1856) 119 E.R. 680

Armory v Delamirie [1722] EWHC J94