I'm trying to understand all of the wood peoples mentioned in the Narnia books. Here's what I've come up with so far.
Walking trees in Narnia appear just like earth trees when they are asleep, but they can take on a creature form when they awake. In creature form, they have a humanlike appearance They have heads, and they can move their limbs and roots at will. There are male and female genders, and they marry. They can eavesdrop on talk in the forest. They can talk and take counsel together with talking beasts. They eat soil and enjoy its taste, though it is not known whether they eat with their mouths or by absorption through their roots.
Walking trees in their creature form are one type of wood people, but there is also another type: wood nymphs. Wood nymphs can shift at will between spirit beings living in trees to corporeal beings with a physical body. In their corporeal form, wood nymphs are somewhat tree-like in appearance, but are very much like humans and can even "know" humans in the biblical sense that produces children.
Male wood nymphs are known as wood gods or silvans. Female wood nymphs are known as dryads. Dryads seem to be more numerous.
Some wood nymphs can move freely from tree to tree in their spirit form. Others are tightly coupled to one individual tree, presumably because they share a spirit with it. Dryads of this nature are also known as hamadryads. A hamadryad can take on a corporeal body outside of its tree, but it cannot live apart from the tree for long. If the tree dies, so does the hamadryad.
Walking trees as well as trees that are tightly coupled with a wood nymph that can speak for it are sometimes known as talking trees.
Have I gotten anything wrong? Am I missing anything?
NarniaFanCEM
Visit my Narnia page at http://www.messageofsalvation.org/narnia/
Topic starter
Posted : September 27, 2025 4:26 pm
DavidD liked
In Narnia the trees are much like people. Mr. Beaver says in Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe that most of them are on the right side, but some of them would betray the Narnians to the White Witch. So the tree have souls like people and know the difference between right and wrong. Lewis made them more like real people than the nymphs and dryads in Greek mythology. For that he deserves credit for making them more believable than even in the mythology that they came from. It was a significant achievement.
Posted : September 29, 2025 1:54 pm
DavidD liked
@narniafancem I get the impression Lewis never really worked out a consistent scheme of what exactly the "wood peoples" in Narnia are — what different types there are, what characteristics they each have, and how they're related. As far as I remember, he never, for example, explains what the difference is between Dryads and Hamadryads. I also can't remember if "wood nymphs" are ever mentioned in a separate category. And we're not told whether the Walking Trees, with whom Lucy dances in Prince Caspian, are totally different from the Dryads, or whether Dryads can at times inhabit their tree and move it about, as well as act separately from the tree in the form of a person who looks tree-ish.
It's all rather mysterious, and it's coming from an author who is pretty much notorious for inconsistencies and discrepancies throughout the Chronicles, and who, when it came to planning out the whole background of his imaginary world, was very clearly NOT like Tolkien. So I honestly don't know if there is any absolute canonical version of the scheme you've set out above, and I suspect there isn't.
"Now you are a lioness," said Aslan. "And now all Narnia will be renewed."
(Prince Caspian)
Posted : September 29, 2025 2:50 pm
DavidD liked
Yes, your point about trees having souls is an important one that I omitted, so thank you for that. I assume it is only the talking trees that have souls, as I would assume that it is only the animals Aslan blessed with the gift of speech that have souls as well. For hamadryads, I assume they are one with their tree in both soul and spirit; the hamadryad is just an additional form the tree can take on. For other dryads, I assume they have their souls and spirits of their own; they just live in normal soulless trees.
You are probably right about Lewis not having worked out a consistent scheme for all of the "wood peoples" before he started writing. But now that the Narnia canon is complete, I think it is fun and appropriate to try to work one out from what he wrote.
This post was modified 23 hours ago by ValiantArcher
NarniaFanCEM
Visit my Narnia page at http://www.messageofsalvation.org/narnia/
You are probably right about Lewis not having worked out a consistent scheme for all of the "wood peoples" before he started writing. But now that the Narnia canon is complete, I think it is fun and appropriate to try to work one out from what he wrote.
Fair enough, but the problem is, if Lewis himself was neither clear nor consistent about the different types of wood peoples and their characteristics, then it's not likely that we'll ever be able to come up with an exact and unarguable scheme for them that fits all the information we're given across the seven books. It's almost as futile as attempting a logical reconciliation between the White Witch's background as given in LWW and Jadis's as given in MN. The author himself wrote contradictory things in different books, apparently without realising he'd done so, and therefore there's no way to make sense of them and no real use in trying to. (Unless we want to rewrite parts of the stories entirely — which Lewis, shortly before his death, stated that he'd like to do, in order to fix some of the details that he knew didn't add up. But because he never managed to do so, we'll never know exactly what changes he was thinking of making.)
"Now you are a lioness," said Aslan. "And now all Narnia will be renewed."
(Prince Caspian)
Posted : September 29, 2025 6:23 pm
DavidD liked