In The Silmarillion, Oromë rides his white horse Nahar (which is shod with gold and shines like silver in the shadows).
White horses appear in the riddle game in The Hobbit -- the "Thirty white horses on a red hill" are teeth.
Passing lightly over what Bilbo's ostler may or may not have said to his tipsy cat, in The Lord of the Rings, white horses are closely associated with Rohan - for example, those entering Théoden's hall see a tapestry of Eorl the Young on a white horse; Rohan's banner is a white horse on a field of green; the king's mount Snowmane is (predictably) a "great white horse"; and after Théoden's death, the Riders of the King's House ride around his barrow on white horses singing.
And of course Gandalf shows off a bit at the Bruinen flood by conjuring up water in the form of "white riders upon white horses." Presumably this is partly for psychological effect, to counteract the Black Riders on black horses. It's also rather a fitting image, since Frodo has been "persuaded to mount Glorfindel's white horse" Asfaloth for the race to the ford.
But on twitter, @STORI3D_PAST and @alas_not_me look into this instance a bit further:
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1 comment:
It never struck me before - but there is a parallel (as well as contrast) between Gandalf's magical apparent white horses bashing the Nazgul and their mis-trained black horses and Merlin adopting the form of white wolf to bash the lycanthropic Lancelot in Williams's 'Son of Lancelot' poem (the big contrast being this is intended to be therapeutic for Lancelot and succeeds).
David Llewellyn Dodds
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