11-17-2008, 06:45 PM | #121 | ||||
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As for "young", please compare it to this quote: Quote:
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If Morgul-blade wraiths would likely be destroyed together with the Ring, the Houseless Elves, for instance, wouldn't be affected for sure. And I have a nasty feeling that the Silent Watchers of M.Morgul and Cirith Ungol were the Houseless, trapped within stone statues... After the Fall of Mordor, all this ghost company may have remained in the Morgul Vale. Last edited by Gordis : 11-17-2008 at 06:47 PM. |
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11-17-2008, 07:05 PM | #122 |
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I don't know - I didn't think that 'ghosts' or 'wraiths' stayed in one place, but just constantly wondered around, espcially when there's no-one to order them to stay in a particular place, like they were forced to at the Barrowdowns for around 1500 years.
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11-17-2008, 07:15 PM | #123 | |
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Minas Morgul was a real ghost-nest, yet in Mordor itself Frodo and Sam haven't seen or felt a single ghost. As for the Barrow-wights, I am almost sure that the destruction of the Ring hadn't affected them - they likely remained in the Barrows. |
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11-17-2008, 07:27 PM | #124 | |
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Same with the Dead of Dunharrow - that's where they died, and so that's where they remained. I was mainly thinking of those elves and other such races who had died, but who's original place of life or grave had disappeared for whatever reason, and so had no particular reason to be bound to a certain place. |
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11-17-2008, 08:00 PM | #125 |
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The material in History of Middle-earth indicates that the barrow-wights might be the spirits of Elves who, having died physically, refused the call of the Valar to come before Mandos for judgment. That puts them into a state of rebellion, leaving them open to a “counter-summons” and to enslavement by Morgoth or his servants, in this case Sauron, who is called the Necromancer, and the Witch-king, who is called a “great sorcerer.” Without going into any unpleasant details, necromancy is magic concerning death and the dead, and sorcery is properly the working of magic through the aid of evil spirits. Both practices are apt to summoning and entrapping the spirits of dead, rebellious Elves in the bodies of the dead Dúnedain: in the Appendices to the Return of the King, Tolkien says that the barrow in which Frodo and his friends were trapped was the tomb of the last prince of Cardolan.
If the wights in the barrows were animated through the power of the Rings, perhaps even indirectly through summons, then upon the destruction of the One Ring, these creatures would have ceased to function as barrow-wights: the bodies would have been merely dead, and the spirits consigned to whatever existence they could find for themselves. Tolkien warns (through the words of some sage: Pengolod, perhaps?) that they would seek converse with the living, presumably Men, whose bodies they might try to seize by overwhelming the souls of Men. The narrator in that section (Morgoth’s Ring, if memory servers me aright) warns that Men should avoid all contact with these spirits: real Elves who did not die but faded in Middle-earth could still present to Men the memory of their physical appearance, which would uplift the hearts of those who saw them; but the rebellious Elves could present only deceits, should not be trusted, and sought to deceive those with whom they came into contact. |
11-18-2008, 12:35 PM | #126 |
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Sorry, Alcuin, but it's difficult for me to believe that the evil spirits would have been those of Elves. Surely no Elf would have been foolish enough to rebel in the third Age? My suspicions are caused by the fact that I have never read such material. I'm a hu- no wait, an Elf. A sceptic one.
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11-18-2008, 01:01 PM | #127 | |
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But even so - what do you expect them (The Dead) to do? Go on package Holidays? ... Take the family for a few days with bucket and spades to the Beach at Dol Amroth? ........................ As to my take on the Barrow Blades, i think the side journey into their metallurgy or making is a dead end. Nor need they be specifically meant, made for, or designed specifically with wraiths or the King of Angmar in mind - but yet bound by Runes for their Enemies - - Happy indeed would they who made these Blades have been to know their fate - and for The Chief of their Enemies to fall to its Cutting edge! Yet, for all that, at this age, the very latter part of the Third Age, i don't doubt few, if any, Blades would have had the effect that Merry's Blade had - to cut through Wraith sinew and render a blow more deadly than other swords or Axes, but certainly never Mortal, to The Witch King - Though i would contest Anduril would have and Glamdring also- and certainly Sting too -Though Both Sting and Glamdring were Elven - and Glamdring of Great Antiquity - of Gondolin, was it not? - and A King's Sword too if i recall correctly? But we come back to Fate yet again - That sword woven with Runes made long ago - Serpents and jewels entwined - and as Gor rather interestingly conjectures - likely bound with the Elemental Power of FIRE - in the Hands of a Hobbit cringing down amdist a Field of War, wearing an Elven cloak, and Eowyn -Shield Maiden Of the Roihirrim standing before her Lord and Kin... Fey, and deadly, in Sunlight that the winds of fate had brought up on the wings of the Sea, dispelling the darkness afore time... Last edited by Butterbeer : 11-18-2008 at 01:03 PM. |
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11-19-2008, 07:28 AM | #128 | ||
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Well, he didn't - he only told it in a more comprehensible manner. Here is the quote: Quote:
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11-19-2008, 08:01 AM | #129 | ||||||
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Quote:
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And there is the quote Quote:
In the First Age wraiths were not such a problem as they have become in the Second and the Third Age. For the Calaquendi elves from the Silmarillion wraiths posed little threat, if any. Those who had seen the Light of the Trees dwelt in both Worlds and in both the Seen and the Unseen they wielded great power. Why bother to make some specific anti-wraith blades? |
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11-19-2008, 09:32 PM | #130 |
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Hmmm.
Barring the bucket and spade thing.... i fear i disagree. Whilst the East wind bears no tidings...what news from the Wind of the Dead? Is it, Gor..our part to remake Histories based on quotes - or to interperate what we read as was written? Which, think you, would Tolkien have prefered? Had Aragorn and Narsil, a Blade, mark you, that merely shattered at the cutting of the One from Sauron's finger back in the day..and reforged with spells and runes to counter his Evil - Had.. Tolkien written him in to that scene - think you it would have changed the narrative? Nay... Let us discuss with open minds, and not try to second guess a Dead man's work Last edited by Butterbeer : 11-19-2008 at 09:34 PM. |
11-20-2008, 12:31 AM | #131 |
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Hmmm... for discussion's sake, I suppose we could ask the question of whether JRRT was writing this in an 'omniscient, author' mode - or if these were the words of the halfling scribe who was chronicler of the event - and taking a rare opportunity to exalt his own.
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11-20-2008, 02:42 AM | #132 | |
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Thank you, Gordis, for the quote. I had not the time (nor inclination, after long days and nights in the Núrnen salt-mines) to look it up.
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11-20-2008, 03:46 AM | #133 | |||
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Butterbeer - about Narsil.
When Narsil had been forged by Telchar in the Dwarven city of Nogrod back in the First Age, wraiths were not a big issue, as I have pointed out. Orcs and Dragons and Barlogs were far worse. So it wouldn't be enspelled against wraiths specifically. Most likely there was some general spell against Evil, or maybe against all possible enemies (including Elves), and some runes of protection for the owner. When Narsil was reforged in Rivendell in autumn of TA 3018, wraiths were a big issue indeed, so undoubtedly the Elven smiths of Elrond would have had them in mind first and foremost. But, as I have argued earlier in this thread, the secret of forging the anti-wraith blades seemed to be lost with the Men of Cardolan. Elves never knew this spell, otherwise they wouldn't be churlish enough to keep it from the Dunedain of the North, their protegés, and from Earnur who was so keen on wraith-hunt. Thus I don't believe that Anduril would have been as deadly to a nazgul as a Barrow-Downs blade. Also the magick of the Elves differed from what the Men wielded: it was more a part of the Elves' nature than some elaborate spells. Men, in contrast, were not supposed to wield any magick and what they learned, was, sorry to say, always smacking of Morgul. Maybe it was wielded with good intent (like in the case of the Men of Cardolan), but still the spells on the BD blades were like counter-spells to those on Morgul-blades, and likely of almost the same nature, from the same grimoire, so to say. Simply speaking, it is not like Elves wielded Magick of the Seventh Level and Men only reached Third Level, no: it was an entirely different type of magick. That is my take on it. Alcuin I am almost sure that Isildur managed to cut Sauron's finger before his spirit had left the body. For one thing, Isildur said that it was he who delivered the killing blow (and this he said to Elrond and Cirdan who had witnessed the whole scene, so he couldn't lie): Quote:
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As for Sauron's body, I guess it has decomposed as swiftly as Saruman's - weren't they both incarnate Maiar? Maybe faster, because it was indeed hot and burning. Natural combustion-and there is nothing to dispose of. Last edited by Gordis : 11-20-2008 at 03:58 AM. |
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11-20-2008, 10:47 AM | #134 |
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Interesting take, Gordis. I think we may need a new thread: Who Really Killed Sauron in the Last Alliance?
Seems to me a lot of readers feel that Gil-Galad and Elendil killed Sauron's body and then Isildur cut off The Ring, and a lot of other readers feel that Sauron was still alive when Isildur cut off The Ring. I'm not sure there is a definitive answer since much depends on interpretation of the quotes already given.
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11-20-2008, 11:43 AM | #135 | |
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11-20-2008, 10:40 PM | #136 | ||
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11-21-2008, 12:26 AM | #137 |
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Alcuin - I just checked. It's in "Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age".
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11-21-2008, 02:07 AM | #138 |
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Thank you, Valandil. It certainly looked familiar, but I could not place it.
Then it would seem that Gordis is correct: Isildur delivered the “death blow,” at least to that incarnation or avatar of Sauron, It is not said that Isildur stuck him more than once or in any place other than his hand; yet the passage seems (at least to me) to indicate that Isildur’s cutting the Ring from Sauron’s hand might have taken place after Sauron was “dead,” an afterthought after the demon had ceased to move, and that implies that C*rdan and Elrond had been whacking him, too. But as regards striking a wraith, no incarnation of Sauron appears to have been a wraith. The wraiths – barrow-wights, Ring-wraiths, and lesser wraiths (as Gandalf told Frodo he might have become) – existed in the “wraith-world,” whatever that is (it seems to be identical, or at least visible to, the “other side” in which the partially faded Elves such as Glorfindel existed, which would explain at once both how the Rings slowed the fading of the Elves and how the lives of Men who used the Rings had their lives “stretched”; and in addition, this would almost certainly have been a “forbidden” art that tampered with the structure of Middle-earth and with the fates of both races of Incarnates). I strongly suspect that the shattering swords – in the barrow, on the Pelennor Field, and in other battles in which the Dúnedain faced the Nazgûl – was because the blade cut a creature that existed mostly in the “wraith-world.” I wish I were up for a more structured and coherent argument, but the salt-mines beckon. Last edited by Alcuin : 11-21-2008 at 02:20 AM. |
11-21-2008, 12:13 PM | #139 | |
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I wish I could read it, but I doubt it has been translated in Finnish. Have to keep looking though. Refresh my memory: what does "faded "Elf" mean? And please, start another thread for who-killed-Sauron-in BotLA.
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11-21-2008, 02:26 PM | #140 | |
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In the original design of Eru all Arda was supposed to be much like Valinor, suitable for Elves, where they could live happily till the End of Time. But Arda had been marred by Melkor, which broke the design of Elvish immortality: in Arda marred, Elves slowly and inevitably fade, their bodies gradually becoming invisible. First they appear like sad shadows of their former self, until at last they are naught but wraiths (much like the nazgul, in fact, but not evil). Only in Valinor can Elven fading be delayed, which is one reason all Elves have no choice but to go to Valinor in the end. One of the special abilities of the Elven Rings of Power was that they could delay time, and as such were used to prevent fading in Rivendell and Lorien. After the destruction of the One ring the ancient Elves had no possibility to stay in ME, so in the FA the Eldar left for Valinor. |
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