
Originally Posted by
Harper_of_Gondolin
Firstly, I'll apologise for stepping on your toes, and on those of LethalLethality, who understood you better than I.
Frankly, I am surprised to hear anyone suggest that Smaug is that old, but only because the notion never (would have) occurred to me: to my knowledge, nothing of this is declared by the author, nor is there any appearance of Smaug in narrative or reference before 3rd Millenium T.A.. Of course, Smaug had to be mentioned in LoTR appendices (and Unfinished Tales, too, I believe) simply in connection to the preludes to the War of the Ring but, otherwise he's only "a character in The Hobbit": on the one hand, I can not insist that he was not alive at the time of the War of Wrath; nor can I characterize 'his absence' in other narratives/chronicles as being 'suspicious'.
On the other hand, I can not conceive of why it would occur to anyone that Smaug could be that old, either. LethalLethality quotes Smaug himself, "warriors of old ... strong, strong, STRONG", but I do not see any implication here, either: Glaurung, 'father of dragons', first appeared (we do not know when he was hatched) in F.A. 455; in F.A. 472 fled the field with a bad dwarf-dagger-induced tummy-ache; in F.A. 495, he installed himself at Nargothrond, and was subsequently slain. However old he was at the time of his death, his 'participation' in the War of the Jewels lasted only 40 years. Ancalagon, 'mightiest of dragons', only appears in the defence of Angband, over Anfauglith, and only during the assault of the War of Wrath, in (presumably) F.A. 587; perhaps Ancalagon, 'mightiest of dragons', was not 'strong, strong, STRONG' but he was evidently 'strong enough' at that time, less than 150 years after the first sighting of the 'father of dragons', to break Thangorodrim when he fell. In FotR, Gandalf mentions that not even Ancalagon could have destroyed the Ruling Ring: Smaug would be 'closer to home' for both Frodo and Gandalf, but Gandalf uses Ancalagon as his example; if Smaug had lived 5000+ more years than both Glaurung and Ancalagon, he sure started out as one heck of a wimpy dragon ...