Gollum first appears in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit as the keeper of a mysterious ring.
Bilbo encounters Gollum beneath the Misty Mountains after becoming separated from the dwarves. Gollum challenges him to a riddle game, and Bilbo eventually escapes using a magical ring that he has found in the tunnels.
In The Hobbit’s first edition, the ring is presented as a useful invisibility ring. Tolkien later revised the chapter for The Lord of the Rings, making the ring the One Ring and changing the backstory of Bilbo’s discovery. This revision transformed Gollum from an eerie cave dweller into a central figure in the history of the Ring.
Gollum was originally called Sméagol. His divided speech and obsession with the Ring reflect the long physical and moral damage caused by possessing it.