Title: The crossword puzzle and designs on The Times
Artist: J.R.R. Tolkien

9 August 1960

Tolkien was a keen solver of crossword puzzles. Whilst contemplating the clues, he would doodle intricate designs and patterns alongside them. Some of the designs were later incorporated into his legendarium and ascribed to artefacts from Númenor. MS. Tolkien Drawings 94, fol. 51. Reproduced with kind permission of The Tolkien Estate Limited for the Bodleian Libraries exhibition Tolkien: Maker of Middle-earth.

© The Tolkien Trust 2018.