Orcs Art Collection Part 2

This image and those below are among the first I can remember seeing on orcs. They were included in a book called the Tolkien Bestiary that was first published almost thirty years ago. The artist, Ian Miller, may be familiar to GW fans, since he did some work for them in the very early days, including some illustrations in the Realm of Chaos books.

These illustrations perhaps best encapsulate for me how an orc should look, though finding a description by the author in any of the books is a hard task. They are described variously as elves corrupted by the enemy, as men twisted by cruel devices, or simply as beasts like men but with swarthy features. For those interested in this type of thing, I can recommend this detailed article on Tolkien orcs. I am not even sure if the latter two images are meant to represent orcs, which perhaps is fitting given Tolkien's ambiguity on the matter.

The images are used without permission, no infringement of copyright is intended.