Melilot Brandybuck

	Marmadas Brandybuck
Merimas Brandybuck	Mentha Brandybuck	Melilot Brandybuck

The younger daughter of Marmadas Brandybuck, Melilot was thus a descendant of the Masters of Buckland, though through an obscure line (her great-grandfather Orgulas had been the younger son of Master Marmadoc the Masterful). She was thus a distant cousin of Frodo Baggins and Meriadoc Brandybuck, who were both also descended from Master Marmadoc, but through the elder line.

At the age of sixteen, Melilot was invited to attend Bilbo Baggins' famous Birthday Party, along with her father, her brother Merimas and her sister Mentha. When Bilbo paused during his long Farewell Speech, Melilot mistakenly thought that the speech was over and, climbing onto a table, began to dance a Springle-ring with Everard Took. The dance came to an abrupt end when Bilbo blew three hoots on a horn to indicate that he had not, in fact finished his speech.

Melilot Brandybuck was not the first of Tolkien's characters to be given the name Melilot. Decades before her appearance in The Lord of the Rings, during the earliest phases of the writing of the Lay of Leithian, Melilot appeared very briefly as the name of the character much better known as Lúthien Tinúviel.

It is not known whether this earlier use influenced the name of Melilot Brandybuck in any direct sense (in the very earliest drafts of The Lord of the Rings, she was 'Melissa Brandybuck', but this was quickly replaced by the flower-name 'Melilot'). It is perhaps notable that both Lúthien and Melilot Brandybuck are dancing when they first appear in their respective narratives, which seems a curious coincidence. So, just possibly, the dance of Everard Took and Melilot Brandybuck represents the lightest possible foreshadowing of the tale of Beren and Lúthien, which Frodo and his companions would later hear from Strider.