How to take a Ring from an unwilling Ring-wielder? - crazy ideas

[jammi567]

Originally Posted by Gordis

The Nazgul are loyal at the end of the Third Age, because Sauron has their Nine Rings. They were loyal in the Second Age because Sauron had the One and they wore the 9.

But when Sauron had no hook for them, do you think they were loyal still? And why would they be? Out of love?

there is an couple of interesting questions from the link above:

Originally Posted by FAQ of the rings

E14. How could Sauron trust the Nazgûl not to claim the Ring?

They were utterly enslaved to Sauron and had no will of their own. The clearest statement to this effect that I know of is in “The Hunt for the Ring”: they were “his mightiest servants, the Ring-wraiths, who had no will but his own, being each utterly subservient to the ring that had enslaved him, which Sauron held.” [UT: HR (338)]

In other words, they were immune to the lure of the One Ring because they were so completely dominated by their own Rings, and they were dominated by Sauron because he held those Rings. These same factors also meant they could not be ordered to work against Sauron.

Originally Posted by FAQ of the rings

C7. Were the Nazgûl wearing their Rings at the time of The Lord of the Rings?

Evidence that Sauron had them
Most importantly, Tolkien says so in a lot of places:

“... Sauron, who still through their nine rings (which he held) had primary control. ...” [L #246 (331), also on the Web]

Gandalf tells Frodo, “the Nine [Sauron] has gathered to himself; the Seven also, or else they are destroyed.” [LotR I 2 (65)]

Galadriel tells Frodo that, looking in her mirror, “You saw the Eye of him that holds the Seven and the Nine.” [LotR II 7 (386)]

In “The Hunt for the Ring”, we read of Sauron’s “mightiest servants, the Ring-wraiths, who had no will but his own, being each utterly subservient to the ring that had enslaved him, which Sauron held.” [UT: HR (338)]

In another version of “The Hunt for the Ring”, again we read that the Ringwraiths “were entirely enslaved to their Nine Rings, which [Sauron] now himself held”. [UT: HR (343)]

From these quotes it seems fairly clear that Tolkien conceived that Sauron had direct physical possession of the Nine Rings, not indirect possession through having the Nine on the fingers of his slaves. I really don’t see any other way to read the quotes from Letters and the two versions of “The Hunt for the Ring”. Furthermore, the two quotes from The Lord of the Rings link the Seven and Nine as “held” in the same way, and we know for certain that Sauron had physical possession of those of the Seven that were still in existence.

Beyond quotes, some physical circumstances suggest that the Nazgûl did not wear their rings. These are merely suggestive, not conclusive in themselves:

The Nazgûl’s black robes were visible. If they were wearing Great Rings, we would have expected their clothes to be invisible too.

On Weathertop, after he put on the One Ring, Frodo could see the Nazgûl’s mantles, robes, hair color, helms, “haggard hands”, and swords, as well as the Witch-king’s crown and knife. [LotR I 11 (212)] There is no mention of his seeing their Rings. Yet we know that while merely carrying the Ring in Lórien Frodo could see Galadriel’s Ring: “it cannot be hidden from the Ring-bearer, and one who has seen the Eye,” she tells him [LotR II 7 (384)]. (Those who don’t accept this line of reasoning can point out that the attack at Weathertop occurred before Frodo had seen the Eye.)

When the Witch-king was destroyed on the Pelennor Fields, no Ring was found. Since the Nine Rings had gems, it would have sparkled in the sun; though of course it could have been missed in long grass.

Evidence that the Nazgûl still wore the Nine Rings
Only one citation goes that way, as far as I know, namely Gandalf’s remark at the Council of Elrond: “The Nine the Nazgûl keep.” [LotR II 2 (267)] In a previous edition of this FAQ I tried to explain the quote away as inverted word order for “The Nine keep the Nazgûl [in Sauron’s thralldom].” But I believe a simpler and better explanation is external: Tolkien intended at one time that the Nazgûl should still be wearing their Rings, but he later changed his mind and simply missed revising that sentence.

Conrad Dunkerson supports this view with textual evidence from The History of Middle-earth: “Tolkien wrote the ‘Nine the Nazgûl keep’ line during one of the drafts of the Council of Elrond. Then much later he wrote that the Nazgûl were increased in power before the Battle of the Pelennor Fields because Sauron had returned their Rings to them. If Sauron was only returning the Rings at that point then Tolkien could not have intended that they were wearing them at the time of the Council.”

Apart from texts, some have argued that the Nazgûl must have been wearing their Rings, or else they would have aged as Bilbo did. But the cases are not parallel: Bilbo had not become a wraith, and we have no reason to think that a wraith would age or change in any way, being no longer in the physical world. Also, Gollum was centuries older than Bilbo, but he showed no signs at all of aging in the seven decades after he lost his Ring. (For that matter, Bilbo didn’t age very much after giving up the One Ring, until after it was destroyed.)

Conclusion
While not quite one-sided, the textual evidence favors very strongly indeed the conclusion that, at the end of the Third Age, Sauron had physical possession of the Nine Rings. Physical circumstances also suggest this, though other explanations are possible. But the physical evidence is well reinforced by direct textual evidence, against a single quote that says the opposite. You decide!

(What is not known is just when Sauron took the Nine Rings back from the Nazgûl, assuming that he did. We know it was some time before the Nazgûl began hunting for the One Ring, but whether it was immediately before or much earlier we cannot tell. That Sauron, even without the One, could get the Nazgûl to give up the Nine Rings, there is little doubt, since no mortal could have withheld even the One from him.)