AULË was the maker of many beautiful and shapely works. He had a knowledge of the Earth and all it contained; he knew the lore of all craftsmen and he was called upon by those who seek the understanding of wood and the working of metals. He also had knowledge of tilling of the fields and keeping of crops, but that in that kind of knowledge, his spouse, YAVANNA KEMENTÁRI had more. She knew about all the things that grow and bear fruit.
In the beginning, Aulë had a great desire for the coming of the Children of Ilúvatar. He longed for beings to which he could teach his crafts. He was so impatient that he did not wait for the fulfillment of the designs of Ilúvatar, but fashioned beings of his own in secret. He designed them to be like the Children of Ilúvatar but he did not have a clear picture of them in his mind. He knew that these beings should be strong and unyielding because MELKOR still walked the Earth. In this fashion, Aulë made the Seven Fathers of the Seven Dwarves.
When Aulë had finished and was pleased with his work, he began to instruct his Dwarves in the Speech he had devised for them. In that hour, ILÚVATAR, who knew what had been done, spoke to him. "Why hast thou done this? Why doest thou attempt a thing that is beyond thy power and authority? For thou has from me a gift of thy own being only, and no more; and therefore, the creature of thy hand and mind can live only by that being, moving when thou thinkest to move them, and if thy thought be elsewhere, standing idle. Is that thy desire?"
Aulë immediately repented and answered that he did not desire such lordship over any being. He offered the dwarves to Ilúvatar as a child would offer a gift to a father, acknowledging the impatience that made him want students of his craft so badly. As Aulë spoke, he picked up a hammer to destroy the Dwarves. At the sight of the hammer, the Dwarves shrank from it afraid, begging for mercy.
Ilúvatar said "Thy offer I have accepted even as it was made. Doest thou not see that these things now have a life of their own, and speak with their own voices? Else they would not have flinched from thy blow nor from any command of thy will."
Ilúvatar went on, and finally said, "But I will not suffer this: that these should come before the Firstborn of my design, nor that thy impatience should be rewarded. They shall sleep now in the darkness under stone, and shall not come forth until the Firstborn have awakened on the Earth; until that time thou and they shall wait, though long it seem. But when the time comes I will awaken them and they shall be to thee as children; often strife will arise between thine and mine, the children of my adoption, and the children of my choice."
Then Aulë took the Dwarves and laid them to rest, then he returned to VALINOR to wait. The Dwarves turned out to be strong to endure as Aulë had wished, but they are also stone-hard, stubborn, fast in friendship and in hate; they suffer toil and hunger more hardily than the other peoples; they live long, beyond the span of Men, but they do not live forever. Among the Elves it is said that in dying, the Dwarves return to the stone from which they were made, but their own beliefs hold that Aulë (called Mahal by the Dwarves) gathers them to Mandos in halls set apart; that they will be given a place among the Children of Ilúvatar in the end. Then their part will be to serve Aulë and help with the remaking of Arda after the Last Battle. It is also said that the Seven Fathers of the Dwarves return to live again in their own kin and bear their ancient names, of whom Durin was the most renown, and father of the kindred most friendly to the Elves, and whose mansions were a! t Khazad-dűm.
After Aulë returned, he opened his heart to Yavanna and told her of what had come to pass. But Yavanna told him "Because thou has kept this thought from me, thy children will have little love for the things that I love. They will love first the work of the things made by their own hands. They will delve in the earth, and things that grow and live upon the earth, they will not heed. Many a tree will feel the bite of their iron without pity."
Yavanna was grieved and went to MANWË. Without telling him of Aulë, she asked how her trees and plants could protect themselves from the Children. "Is it not enough that Melkor should have marred so many? Shall nothing that I have devised be free of the domination of others?"
Manwë asked her what was most dear to her; she answered that it was the trees she valued most. She also pointed out that in the GREAT MUSIC, she lifted up branches of some trees to Ilúvatar, and the trees also sang. As Manwë listened, deep in thought, he heard the Music again and became part of the vision, seeing things he had never seen before. And after the Music had swept around him and entered, he understood many wonders that had eluded him before. When he was done thinking, he went down to Yavanna who sat beneath the Two Trees.
He told her that before the Children would awake, the Eagles would take flight and roost in the high passes of Middle Earth...and in the forests would dwell the Shepherds of Trees.
When Yavanna returned to Aulë she found him in the smithy, pouring molten metal. She told him what had happened and said "Now let thy children beware, for there will walk within the forests a power whose wrath they will rouse at their peril."
"Nonetheless, they will have need of wood," said Aulë, turning back to his work.