Who Really Killed the Witch King in ROTK??

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by Alcuin

or else the portion that says “when the Dúnedain were young” would mean that the manufacture of the blades was very early in the history of Arnor, before the days of Angmar, I would imagine.

I don't think so. Why would the Northern Dunedain start making anti-wraith (much less anti-WK) weapons before there was any wraith nearby?
As for "young", please compare it to this quote:

They heard of the Great Barrows, and the green mounds, and the stone-rings upon the hills and in the hollows among the hills. Sheep were bleating in flocks. Green walls and white walls rose. There were fortresses on the heights. Kings of little kingdoms fought together, and the young Sun shone like fire on the red metal of their new and greedy swords. There was victory and defeat; and towers fell, fortresses were burned, and flames went up into the sky. Gold was piled on the biers of dead kings and queens; and mounds covered them, and the stone doors were shut; and the grass grew over all. Sheep walked for a while biting the grass, but soon the hills were empty again. A shadow came out of dark places far away, and the bones were stirred in the mounds.

"Young Sun, new and greedy swords" referred to the period after the division of Arnor when Cardolan fought with its sister Kingdoms and with Angmar. "The towers fell", I believe, refers to 1409. Right after that "dead kings and queens" were buried. "Sheep walked for a while biting the grass" refers to period 1409-1636. "Bones were stirred" - the wights were sent to the barrows after the Plague of 1636.

Originally Posted by Alcuin

The phrase “when the Dúnedain were young” seems to me to refer generally to the days in which the North Kingdom still existed; and by inference, once it “died,” the Dúnedain (at least in the North) became “old,” perhaps in some ways comparable to their essential allies, the Elves, without whom they could not have survived.

I agree.

Originally Posted by jammi568

Maybe because it was so far gone and degenerated to the point that nothing would ever get rid of the stains it had recieved. Plus, there's the fact that a bad reputation is a very hard thing to get rid of, even if the things that caused it have gone forever.
It's just like the haunted houses in those cheap horror movies - they could easily know it down/rebuild it, but the reputation it gained in the mean time would make it very difficult to sell.

Originally Posted by Alcuin

Minas Morgul was polluted beyond redemption,

I am not sure about the type of this pollution: was it ecological, (like the unwholesome river Morgulduin and the meadows with a tendency to grow poisonous white flowers), or cultural (bed reputation, horrible memories connected with the place), or magical - the residual evil magic that Aragorn and K were unable to overcome. Maybe there were still a lot of wraiths and ghosts haunting the place - for real, not figments of imagination?

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.

[jammi567]

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.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by jammi568

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.

I think the ghosts/wraiths do have a tendency to stick to a particular place. The Dead of Dunharrow, for instance, always remained where they once lived - in the caves between Dunharrow and Erech, though there was nothing in Isildur's curse that ordered them to remain in this place.
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.

[jammi567]

Originally Posted by Gordis

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.

But then, I thought that they were the remains of the people who were actually burried there, and so wouldn't have been affected or bound to the ring in the first place - hense why they remained there.

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.

[Alcuin]

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.

[Noble Elf Lord]

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.

[Butterbeer]

Originally Posted by Gordis

I think the ghosts/wraiths do have a tendency to stick to a particular place. The Dead of Dunharrow, for instance, always remained where they once lived - in the caves between Dunharrow and Erech, though there was nothing in Isildur's curse that ordered them to remain in this place.

Actually this isn't what we are told - Ere the Muster of Rohan we are told that prior to the Grey Company taking the Paths of the dead a great Host of the Dead had ridden up and ridden through "as if to keep a tryst" ... and this was news from Dunharrow -

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...

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by Noble Elf Lord

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.

What do you imply, Sceptic Elf? That Alcuin has made it up?
Well, he didn't - he only told it in a more comprehensible manner.
Here is the quote:

It is therefore a foolish and perilous thing, besides being a wrong deed forbidden justly by the appointed Rulers of Arda, if the Living seek to commune with the Unbodied, though the houseless may desire it, especially the most unworthy among them. For the Unbodied, wandering in the world, are those who at the least have refused the door of life and remain in regret and self-pity. Some are filled with bitterness, grievance, and envy. Some were enslaved by the Dark Lord and do his work still, though he himself is gone. They will not speak truth or wisdom. To call on them is folly. To attempt to master them and to make them servants of one own’s will is wickedness. Such practices are of Morgoth; and the necromancers are of the host of Sauron his servant.

Some say that the Houseless desire bodies, though they are not willing to seek them lawfully by submission to the judgement of Mandos. The wicked among them will take bodies, if they can, unlawfully. The peril of communing with them is, therefore, not only the peril of being deluded by fantasies or lies: there is peril also of destruction. For one of the hungry Houseless, if it is admitted to the friendship of the Living, may seek to eject the fëa from its body; and in the contest for mastery the body may be gravely injured, even if it be not wrested from its rightful habitant. Or the Houseless may plead for shelter, and if it is admitted, then it will seek to enslave its host and use both his will and his body for its own purposes. It is said that Sauron did these things, and taught his followers how to achieve them. -Laws and Customs...

I advise you to read "Laws and Customs among the Eldar" in HOME X - it is a must for every Elf.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by Butterbeer

Actually this isn't what we are told - Ere the Muster of Rohan we are told that prior to the Grey Company taking the Paths of the dead a great Host of the Dead had ridden up and ridden through "as if to keep a tryst" ... and this was news from Dunharrow

That likely means that the original dwellings of the Men of the Mountains had encompassed a larger area. Not all of them were hanging around in Aragorn's passage.

Originally Posted by BB

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?

I expect them to stick to the place where they once lived, of course.

Originally Posted by BB

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 -

This opinion contradicts the following quote about the WK after Weathertop:

But above all the timid and terrified Bearer had resisted him, had dared to strike at him with an enchanted sword made by his own enemies long ago for his destruction. Narrowly it had missed him. How he had come by it – save in the Barrows of Cardolan.- RC page 180.

Originally Posted by BB

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?

The King's sword, Narsil, was made by a Dwarf - Telchar of Nogrod.
And there is the quote

No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter, cleaving the undead flesh, breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.

"No other" means not Anduril, not Glamdring, not Sting - just this one from the Barrow-Downs.
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?

[Butterbeer]

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

[Valandil]

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.

[Alcuin]

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.

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

Narsil did not shatter cutting the One Ring from Sauron’s hand. It broke beneath Elendil when he fell in the final battle with Sauron on the slopes of Orodruin. Tolkien’s description of the battle seems to indicate that Sauron was cornered on the slopes of the volcano by a sortie led by Gil-galad and Elendil supported by CÃ*rdan, Elrond, and Isildur. I would assume that he was attempting to make his way to the Sammath Naur, the Chamber of Fire, where the Ring was forged and where Gollum later fell to his death clutching the Ring after biting it from Frodo’s hand. (Sammath Naur seems to be the very center of Sauron’s power, the place where he diverted the power of the volcano to his purposes, including forging the One Ring.) Elendil and Gil-galad engaged Sauron in hand-to-hand combat; Elendil was slain, fell upon his blade, and it broke beneath him; Gil-galad skewered Sauron with his spear, Aiglos, but was burned so badly by the heat from Sauron’s body that he died. (In having a black and burning body after reconstituting himself following the ruin of Númenor, Sauron resembles traditional demons of literature and religious myth and also The Balrog of Moria.) Sauron’s physical form was so seriously damaged by Gil-galad and Elendil, however, that it was unable to maintain a housing for his spirit (cf. the damage to Gandalf after his fight with the Balrog, or the fate of the Balrog itself), and his spirit was unable to maintain itself there: it disassociated from the physical form that Sauron had built up in the same way that the fëa and hröa of incarnates are dissociated when they die. Isildur, taking the hiltshard of Narsil – the part with the handle – cut Sauron’s finger with the Ring on it from his hand in much the same way that Gollum bit Frodo’s finger bearing the Ring from his hand. CÃ*rdan and Elrond begged him to throw the Ring into the lava, but its malicious power began to work immediately on Isildur, who kept it “‘as weregild [death payment] for my father, and my brother.’â€� Elendil was eventually entombed atop the hill that the Rohirrim later called the Halifirien in Firien Wood; what became of Gil-galad’s body is not said, but it is possible that it was entirely consumed. An interesting question is what became of the rest of Sauron’s corpse, as there must surely have been one, since Isildur cut the Ring from it.

[Gordis]

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):

But Isildur refused this counsel, saying: ‘This I will have as were-gild for my father's death, and my brothers. Was it not I that dealt the Enemy his death-blow?'

2. then there is this quote:

But Sauron also was thrown down, and with the hilt-shard of Narsil Isildur cut the Ruling Ring from the hand of Sauron and took it for his own. Then Sauron was for that time vanquished, and he forsook his body, and his spirit fled far away and hid in waste places- "Of the Rings of Power..."

And what is most important, in the letter 211 Tolkien writes:

Though reduced to ‘a spirit of hatred borne on a dark wind’, I do not think one need boggle at this spirit carrying off the One Ring” back to Middle-earth after the drowning of Numenor.

So, if Isildur but waited a tad longer, the spirit of Sauron would have carried away the One Ring, leaving Isildur with no weregild!

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.

[The Dread Pirate Roberts]

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.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by The Dread Pirate Roberts

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.

I don't think the difference is that great, DPR. Anyway Sauron was already down, barely alive and offered no resistance to Isildur's blow. It definitely didn't happen the way it was shown in the movie.

[Alcuin]

Originally Posted by Gordis

...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):

Gordis, where'd this quote come from? The second sentence isn't in FotR; it isn't unfamiliar, and I think I've read it before, but I can't quite place it. I can't find it in Silmarillion or Unfinished Tales.

[Valandil]

Alcuin - I just checked. It's in "Of the Rings of Power and the Third Age".

[Alcuin]

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,â€� 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,â€� an afterthought after the demon had ceased to move, and that implies that CÃ*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.

[Noble Elf Lord]

Originally Posted by Gordis

What do you imply, Sceptic Elf? That Alcuin has made it up?
Well, he didn't - he only told it in a more comprehensible manner.
Here is the quote:


I advise you to read "Laws and Customs among the Eldar" in HOME X - it is a must for every Elf.

This sceptic Elf does not think that Alcuin made it up, just thought that it may be something like my memory of the Dark Knights of Minas Morgul.
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.

[Gordis]

Originally Posted by NEL

What does "faded Elf" mean?

Fading is the biggest Elven problem there is, much like early death is for Men.

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.