What Inflicted More Damage: The Silmarils or The Ring?

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

What does everyone here think. I personally think that the Silmarils did as it was because of the Silmarils and the Oath of Feanor that Doriath was destroyed and that Thingol and Dior were slain.

What does everyone else think?

[Nurvingiel]

I think the Silmarils did more damage as well, because of the Kinslaying. (Or were you referring to that already? My Sil knowledge is a little hazy... )

There are certainly arguments to be made for the Ring though, and sometimes the two (four?) are intertwined.

[Beren3000]

I think it's definitely the Silmarils, for the reasons you guys stated and more. The death tolls in each war would be enough to make this point.

[Count Comfect]

I'd say it is the Silmarils also, mostly because of the Feanorian oath, but also because it was Morgoth involved. He had a lot more power to create damage than Sauron. I mean, the Valar had to get involved directly. That's pretty bad. So I'd say it wasn't just the Silmarils, but who got them (and obviously, who lost them).

[Attalus]

The silmarils, defininitely. I think of them whenever I read that "wrought was woe" line in the riddle about Ents. Edit to add: "Ere iron was found or tree was hewn, When young was mountain under moon; Ere ring was made, or wrought was woe, It walked the forests long ago." Just because it's cool to say that.

[Lefty Scaevola]

The war of the Great Jewels inflicted a very tiny fraction of the casulaties that occured during the War of Elves and Sauron, the War of the Third Alliance, The various invsions of of Gondor, Arnor, and Rhovaion in the third age, and the War of the Ring. Furthermore, the Revolt of the Nolder and War of the Great jewels resulted in Morgoth being contained and brought down long before he otherwise would have been. Without them, he still would have rebeled and gone to Middle earth and could have brought immense death and misery to all Middle Earth for centuries longer, obliterating all the Sindaran and Laequendi kingdoms of Belariand, and everything beyond it. The casualties inflicted ong the Nolder would pale next to what he could have done without them in his way. The ring prolonged Sauron's stay in Middle Earth, without it he would have been at the end of the war of the Third Alliance, if not before. I give the grim score to the ring, by around two orders of magnitude.

[inked]

Tho' often accused of being too far to the right, I'm going to have to agree with Lefty on this and for the same reasons. The consequences of the Ring span ages and multitudes more than the Silamrils as Tolkein has given us the stories. Not that both were not desired, pursued, and used wrongly! The Ring's story clearly makes it the worser, if not the worst.

[Beren3000]

In answer to this point, I'd remind you (both) that Elrond says about the Last Alliance:

"I remember well the splendour of their banners, it recalled to me the glory of the Elder Days and the hosts of Beleriand, so many great princes and captains were assembled. And yet not so many, nor so fair, as when Thangorodrim was broken, and the Elves deemed that evil was ended for ever, and it was not so." (From The Council of Elrond)
So even if there were more battles in the War of the Ring, the size of armies in the Elder Days would make up for the difference in casualties.
Besides, you don't see tragical stories like Turin's or the fall of Gondolin or the sack of Nargothrond in the Third Age, do you?

[Durin1]

It must be a matter of perspective. If you take pure numbers and statistical data, then you may say that the Rings inflicted more damage, since its "war" spanned an age and a half; although one can equally say that the battles in the First Age were proportionately bigger: Dagor Bragollach, Nirnaeth Arnoediad, War of Wrath, not to mention the step by step overhaul of most of the main Elvish strongholds (Gondolin, Doriath, Nargothrond etc).

My question would be: What were the deeper implications of the creation of the Silmarils and of the Rings?

IMO, the creation of the Silmarils, and the subsequent events, led to the "weariness" that the Elves would feel in the mortal lands (note the Doom of Mandos and Eonwe's call to all Elves to come or return to Aman), which subsequently led to their desire to "have their cake and not eat it" (Tolkien), i.e. why they created the Rings in the first place.

Also, the residue of Morgoth's evil that he put forth into the very substance of earth outweighed the influence that Sauron had in terms of absolute inherent Power. He put much of his malice into the Rings and the One Ring; Morgoth dissipated his throughout ME.

For me, that was the major damage durig the war of the Jewels.

[Pytt]

i'll have to stick with the silmarills. beacuse of all the things you've said.
i think the rings caused minor damage, due to the silmarills.

[Telcontar_Dunedain]

And it was the Ring itself that destroyed Sauron.

[brownjenkins]

the silmarils... or, if you want to go back further... the valar bringing the elves to valinor

[Lenya]

The Silmarils - it caused the Elves to be cursed eternally.

[Beren3000]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

the valar bringing the elves to valinor

I disagree very strongly! You want to move this to another thread?

[brownjenkins]

moved to here

[Beren3000]

Originally Posted by brownjenkins

we had a pretty good thread on this point a while back

And to think I started a whole thread about it (I think I have to listen to BoP's advice next time: IT'S ALWAYS BETTER TO POST IN AN EXISTING THREAD THAN TO START A NEW ONE!!)

[BeardofPants]

I hope you shouted that in a nice psuedo-robotic voice, Beren.



Me: After much rumination, I'm gonna have to go with the Silmarils. The impact of them could be felt (and probably still can) through the ages. The ring however, the ring, only really culminated in the second/third ages. Besides, the ring was just a little plaything for Sauron to wreck havoc on the world. The silmarils on the other hand, drove a deep chasm between the elvish kindred for many an age....

[Radagast The Brown]

I agree about the Silmarils... as the Ring itself wouldn't be made without the Silmarils, the Noldor leaving Valinor and the fall of Melkor. So obviously... the silmarils had much more influence of how Middle Earth looked like in the end of the Third age, more than the Ring. (Not only Middle Earth - also Valinor, and the Halls of Manods.. that have more souls, I guess.)

[inked]

AAaahhhhh, I weep for lack of understanding amongst you all! The ring, the ring you say was only responsible for the 2nd/3rd age. Oh, the horror. Surely you know that had Bilbo not found the ring, and the publisher not demanded a sequel, we should never, Never, NEVER had known of the Silamarilli? Were it not for the One Ring, the whole of the expanse of Middle Earth would have been limited to the Shire and the Lonely Mountain! Indeed, without the One Ring to be found, pursued, and destroyed we should not know of Iluvatar or Ainur or Ea or Arda or.............ought but The hobbit, Bilbo.

[Halbarad of the Dunedain]

[I disagree Inked. While The Lord of the Rings created the popularity for tolkiens works, it was The Silmarillion that was first written. The Sillmarillion was not finished before The Lord of the Rings, but it was started before. Perhaps without The Lord of the Rings the Sillmarillion would not have been as popular but I think it still would have made an appearance.]

On the matter of the One Ring v. The Silmarils in destructive purposes, I think The One Ring is more destructive. First of all the ring was created by a very strong Maia of Aulë(Perhaps the strongest), where as the Silmarils were created by a great Elf. Second the initial purpose of the ring was utterly evil, the jewels were created for good and great beauty. Third, Beren 3k gave a quote from Elrond claiming there were more elves at the seige of Thangodrim but that does not mean more were slain. More elves to me would mean less casualties. The War of the Ring which includes all battles and wars from the beggining of the creating of the ring to it's destruction most likely destroyed more lives than the silmarils. But thats just my 2 cents...