Also known as: Aiwendil
Radagast the Brown, whose Elvish name was Aiwendil, "lover of birds," was a Maia of Yavanna and one of the five Istari sent over Sea in the Third Age to contest the will of Sauron. Chosen at Yavanna's request to go with Saruman, he came as a master of shapes and hues and of the speech of beasts, with deep knowledge of herbs and living things, and made his dwelling at Rhosgobel on the western eaves of Mirkwood, near the Gladden Fields.
But his love of the wild things of Middle-earth -- of birds and animals above all -- drew him away from the affairs of Elves and Men, so that he became absorbed in the natural world and neglected the chief purpose of his errand. All unknowing, he served Saruman's treachery by bearing the message that lured Gandalf to Orthanc; yet that same errand, by which Radagast was to send the beasts and birds as Saruman's spies, brought Gwaihir the Eagle to the tower in time to bear the imprisoned Gandalf away. He did not return over Sea with the others at the end of the age, and his ultimate fate is not recorded; the Wise judged that in some measure he had failed in his task.