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In J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth legendarium, lembas, also called waybread in the Common Speech, is a special food made by the Elves. The cakes are very nutritious, stay fresh for months when wrapped in leaves, and are used for sustenance on long journeys. Lembas is a brownish colour on the outside and a cream colour on the inside. The secret of lembas is closely guarded, and only on rare occasions is it given to non-Elves. Like other products of the Elves, it is offensive to evil creatures; Gollum refuses outright to eat of it.

Melian, the queen of Doriath, was the one who originally held this recipe. Later it was passed to Galadriel and other Elves.

Galadriel gives a large store of it to the Fellowship of the Ring upon its departure from Lothlórien. One of the elves comments "[...] we call it lembas or waybread, and it is more strengthening than any food by men, and it is more pleasant than cram, by all accounts." Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee subsist on it through the majority of their journey from there into Mordor.

Tolkien may have based lembas and cram on hard tack, a biscuit that was used during long sea voyages and military campaigns as a primary foodstuff. This very un-magical bread was little more than flour and water which had been baked hard in the shape of crackers and would keep for months as long as it was kept dry. However, Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa wrote in his book Libri tres de occulta philosophia (Book 3, Chapter 13) of a herb from Scythia that allowed people to go for twelve days afterward without any need for food or water. It is also possible that Tolkien based lembas on this description in Agrippa's writings.

It is also possible that the Catholic Tolkien chose to incorporate some Eucharistic theology in the idea behind lembas. Two of the more important clues leading to this conclusion are the statements that lembas is 'offensive to evil creatures' and that the more one relies on lembas alone, the more powerful its effect on the one who consumes it. Further, Eucharist is sometimes called viaticum, a Latin term meaning 'for the way,' literally the spiritual food for the Christian's arduous journey through earthly life to heaven. The term viaticum was more commonly heard in Tolkien's day than today. Gollum's rejection of the lembas is also reminiscent of those among Jesus' followers who rejected his Eucharistic teaching about 'eating his body'.

In Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings film trilogy, the term "lembas bread" is occasionally used. Technically, this is a redundancy and therefore incorrect usage; but because the gift of lembas at Lothlórien is not included in the theatrical release of The Fellowship of the Ring (though the scene is included in the "extended edition" DVD of the film), the redundant term "lembas bread" was probably chosen in order to immediately identify the substance to filmgoers at the beginning of The Two Towers.

In the extended cut of The Fellowship of the Ring, Legolas remarks that one bite of lembas is enough to keep a man satisfied for an entire day.

Lembas plays an important role in The Return of the King film, in that Gollum uses crumbs of the remaining waybread to frame Samwise Gamgee for consuming all the rations, causing his separation from Frodo Baggins prior to his encounter with Shelob. This sequence does not appear in the book version.

In the DVD commentaries, director Peter Jackson notes that the prop lembas used in the trilogy was a sort of unsweetened shortbread, which Jackson himself nibbled on occasion during takes of the Frodo / Sam / Gollum sequences.

[edit] Cultural References

In the Discworld series, there is a parody of lembas made by the Dwarves. It is a magical sort of bread that adventurers take on journeys to sustain them. It is made out of used kitty litter, rocks, and other disgusting ingredients and chiefly works by making whoever is carrying it so disgusted at the thought of food that they no longer feel hunger.