How real is Tolkien's world?

[Olmer]

Everybody knows about the recent discovery in South Africa of a hobbit-like humanoid, nicknamed "the Hobbit".

Now it's another discovery of the giant eagles.
Huge eagles dominated NZ skies
Just stop for a minute and visualize the enormous size of the bird.
Such "Thorondors" in american measurement had 10-foot "truncated" wingspan in flight, which is considered an angled span for flight purposes.

Wonder if anything else could come out?
Probably,the discovery of the remnant of "elf" is not in so distant future?

[Earniel]

Curious news fact about the giant eagle. With a weight of 10-14kg I'm inclined to believe this extinct eagle still wouldn't be a match for Middle-earth Eagles who could carry dwarves and wizards. Although carrying abilities would probably more determined by wing muscle mass and wing span than weight, but I confess I don't know enough of this. Still, it's interesting, if this Haast's eagle was large enough to dominate his environment, than Tolkien's Eagles should have had a greater impact on their environment as well.

I'm not waiting until they find an Elf, their skeletons should be too similar to humans to see a difference. Even those who believe in the pointy-eared variety of Elves would find nothing as soft tissue doesn't preserve, unless it's a bog body or something. Although I am curious whether they'll ever discover Tengwar writings in some old tomb in England.

I could be wrong but I thought the Hobbit-like hominid was found in Asia, not Africa.

[inked]

Would that be an Asian eagle or an African Eagle? Rather like the swallows in MONTY PYTHON AND THE HOLY GRAIL, eh?

Actually, I'm holding out for an Orc skeleton myself. Though I suppose one could say that all the archeologists have missed the point about the actual origins of what they consider pre-human hominids.

[Curubethion]

Originally Posted by inked

Actually, I'm holding out for an Orc skeleton myself. Though I suppose one could say that all the archeologists have missed the point about the actual origins of what they consider pre-human hominids.

I thought that was Piltdown Man?

[Olmer]

EärnielI could be wrong but I thought the Hobbit-like hominid was found in Asia, not Africa

No, it discovered in Africa.If you will be interested, here is a part of the text from some scientific journal, which miracluously still remained amongst my old files.

One of our oldest ancestors was recently discovered in Central Africa. It goes back to 7 or 6 million years ago and it was named Sahelanthropus tchadensis, nicknamed "toumai"; but very little is known about him. He lived during the Miocene...
You're likely to remember that dinosaurs disappeared 65 million years ago, which closed the Cretaceous Period. It was then followed by the Tertiary Period, ruled by giant mammals. Nowadays, we're living the Quaternary Period... ruled by Man. The Tertiary Period was divided into smaller epochs: the Paleocene, the Eocene, the Oligocene, the Miocene (from 25 million years to 5 million years ago) and the Pliocene. And it was in the Miocene that hominids started developing. Since the end of the Cretaceous, though, the climate kept changing: first it got colder, killing off much of the tropical forests where dinosaurs had lived; millions of years later it got hot again; and then colder...
Around 3 million years ago, hominids had divided into two different groups: one more sturdily built, possessing strong teeth and jaws, and the other a bit more gracile, possessing smaller teeth and jaws
The Chad discovery reinforces the widely held belief of anthropologists that human evolution was complex and, in a commonly used term in the field, "bushy." This means that, on the way from the common ancestors of chimpanzees and human beings, nature evidently experimented with many kinds of pre-humans and apes. And that, of the two branches that led finally to chimps and humans respectively, many trials failed and disappeared into the mists of time.

Quite a while ago I read an interesting (but scientific) book " The Extinct Humans", written by two anthropologists;
according to their researches on the earth at one time existed about 15 types of hominids. (Thanks inked for correction )
So, maybe inked is right in his suggestion that archeologists have missed the point about an actual origin of prehistoric men

There is "Forbidden Archeology", a very interesting book on this subject written by Michael Cremo and Richard Thompson, where they presented acheological evidence, which is not accepted or ignored by the scientific community since this discoveries are contradicting the dominant views of human origins, suggesting that Homo sapiens existed on earth millions of years ago. Like the discovery of the parts of human skull which shows all characteristics of the skull of contemporary man, but chemical and radiometric analyses astonishingly manifested that ths kind of men had been living 11 millions years ago!!!
Hey,Eärniel it could be your elves!

[Earniel]

Originally Posted by Olmer

No, it discovered in Africa.If you will be interested, here is a part of the text from some scientific journal, which miracluously still remained amongst my old files.

Oh, you're talking about Toumai! No wonder, I thought you were refering to the find of the Homo Floresiensis whose recent discovery made it all over the world wide news. It's that find that has been referred to as Hobbits, but I've never seen the word linked to Toumai.

[Olmer]

You absolutely right! I meant Homo Floresiensis from South Pacific, but have got mixed up. It happened sometimes at 3:00 at night Sorry for misleading.

Here is another interesting relic. Remnants of Treebeard??

On a wild Tasmanian mountain there is a magnificent, recently discovered stand of Huon pine trees that has been called the world's 'oldest known living organism'. Newspaper reports have claimed that what looks like hundreds of trees densely covering one hectare (2.5 acres), is all part of the one tree, since all these 'trees' appear to have identical DNA. Over the years, it is believed, ''snow has forced its branches to the ground, where they have taken root''(The Sydney Morning Herald, January 28, 1995, page 1.)

Talking about trees...
I remember some interesting comments about surviving Huorn, made be Jerseydevil. He even posted a picture of the tree with story how people have been caught by the tree.
I think his notes also belong to this topic.

Wonder, if any of mooters can contribute something to this discussion.
Come on, guys! Let's the thread keep going!

[Farimir Captain of Gondor]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6346939/

Heres another link about the "hobbit" that i found which talks about their relationship to homo sapiens. I remember seeing something on the Dicovery Channel awhile back that taked about the ancient creatures of New Zealand and it talked about the giant eagles that lived there. I did a google search and even went to the Discovery web site but couldn't find it. They were able to pick up humans and even hunted them. The people that lived there would send out one person to get water from a spring why another would watch the sky for this bird. They said it would sometimes swop down and pick up two people at a time and take them back to it's nest to feed its eaglets! It would be so cool if they found a troll skeleton in an ancient cave. Maybe one of a fell beast in the mountains.

[Old toby's wicked weed]

Originally Posted by Olmer

You absolutely right! I meant Homo Floresiensis from South Pacific, but have got mixed up. It happened sometimes at 3:00 at night Sorry for misleading.

Here is another interesting relic. Remnants of Treebeard??

Talking about trees...
I remember some interesting comments about surviving Huorn, made be Jerseydevil. He even posted a picture of the tree with story how people have been caught by the tree.
I think his notes also belong to this topic.

Wonder, if any of mooters can contribute something to this discussion.
Come on, guys! Let's the thread keep going!

not "Homo Floresiensis" from South park be?