Names and Titles
Gandalf calls Tom Bombadil the eldest being in existence; this is evidenced by his Sindarin name Iarwain Ben-adar (Eldest and Fatherless). Dwarves called him Forn (Scandinavian, meaning "Ancient" or "Belonging to the distant past"), Men Orald (compare to German: uralt, original old, eldest). All these names apparently mean "Eldest". Treebeard calls himself the eldest living being of Middle-earth and says that he was there before anyone else. However, Tolkien remarked in another context: "Treebeard is a character in my story, not me; and though he has a great memory and some earthy wisdom, he is not one of the Wise, and there is quite a lot he does not know or understand."
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