Nimloth's fruit

[Alfirin]

This is another of my rather trivial threads, please bear with me.
Somewhere in this forum I was informed the Nimloth and its progeny (like the white tree of gondor) were cherry trees, which means that presumably what Isuildur brought with him to Gondor was one of the cherries or more likey one of its pits ( the actual cherry itself would presumably have long since rotted on the boat trip. My question is as follows, we know that that cherry is significant and important, but how "rare" do you think it was? What I am trying to get at is was Nimloth like a fruting type tree which produced a LOT of cherries of was it more along the lines of a flowering cherry, where fruit production is rare (indeed for many floweing cherries fruit production is considered a defect) . Obviosly It'd have to make some fruit or Isildur would have had nothing to pick. Also once you get past the mysticism the tree Aragon found (with Gandalfs help) was likey decended from a pit from the previos tree (this also might explain how the tree could be so young, a pit could remain dormant a long time in the ground before sprouting. But the reverence shown to the fruit and the way the story is told seem to suggest that fruit on nimloths and it's progeny is a rare occurance. But my real question is, if Nimloth's strain was in the former category, do you think people actually well.....ate the fruit. I can imagine this might be a rather ritualized (the ruler and nobles eat of the fruit of the tree that is the symbol of the kingdom, and thus meaphoically "bind" themselves closer to it. But on the other hand given how important those trees were, they might be considered too sacred for such a common use, and eating fruit from them might be tanatmount to blasphemy. Your opinion?

[Galadriel55]

It's possible that Nimloth was a cherry tree, but one that gave fruit very rarely. I don't think anyone would have the nerve to eat the fruit. They were too sacred.

Even when the tree gave fruit, it still probaby had very few cherries on it (well, like abot 1-5, in my opinion). Any fruit that were not planted were preserved, in order to keep the tree-line alive.

~IMO

[Nerwen]

1. I don't think Nimloth was exactly a cherry-tree– it merely resembled one in form. Thus, any information about the rarity or otherwise of actual cherries in M-e doesn't apply. While most of the plants Tolkien mentions can be related to actual species, I doubt all of them are literally those species– not the magical ones, anyway. Nimloth, apart from being extraordinarily long-lived, was ultimately a copy of Telperion, which glowed with its own light. So, not your average cherry.

2. We are told in "Return of the King" that "the fruit of the Tree comes seldom to ripeness (...) if ever a fruit ripens, it should be planted, lest the line die out of the world." So no, I doubt Nimloth jam was ever on the menu.

[Inziladun]

I don't recall seeing the argument that Nimloth was a cherry tree. What was the basis for that?

Anyway, I very much doubt the fruit of Nimloth, or its parent Celeborn would have been eaten. Even if palatable, the trees had such a symbolic value, being derived from the image of Telperion wrought by Yavanna herself, that any practical use of the tree, its fruit, flowers, or wood, would likely have been considered disrespectful.

x/d with Nerwen

[Galadriel55]

PS: the line of Numenorians is tied with the line of the trees. It would be ironical if a Gondorian king would try to eat himself in a symbolical way (exactly the same way as Pharazon chopped himself down ;)).

[Alfirin]

I don't recall seeing the argument that Nimloth was a cherry tree. What was the basis for that? x/d with Nerwen

It came up on the earlier "Flowers of Middle Earth" thread. Up until then I had alwaus though The White tree of Gondor looked the way it did on the flags in the Rankin Bass Movie i.e. sort of oak-like (though I suppose if it was meant to be oak like Tolkine would have said Isildur stole a nut, not a fruit.

Anyway, I very much doubt the fruit of Nimloth, or its parent Celeborn would have been eaten. Even if palatable, the trees had such a symbolic value, being derived from the image of Telperion wrought by Yavanna herself, that any practical use of the tree, its fruit, flowers, or wood, would likely have been considered disrespectful.

x/d with Nerwen[/QUOTE]

That seems reasonable, though I would point out that if you are talking about something like a cherry, eating the fruit and planting are not mutually imcompatible actions, unless you are in the habit of crunching up cherry pits (a bad idea for a LOT of reasons) I was just sort of thinking that the Numernorians might look at Nimloths sort of in the way that they looked at the mallorns, or for that matter all of the other beautiful tree species Numenor boasted. They clearly respected them (at least in the old days) but that did not preclude making use of their wood (Laurinque is specifically said to be good shipmaking wood) talismans (those Oiolaire bows) or food (Yavannamire's fruit would likely not be described as "luscios" if people were note eating it. But then again Nimloth was likey in a class of it's own.

[FlimFlamSam]

Inziladun spoke: [I don't recall seeing the argument that Nimloth was a cherry tree. What was the basis for that?]
I think they are referring to the blossoms of Nimloth as appearing to look like cherry blossoms. As a descendant of one of the two trees, where in various texts it is both described with blossoms like a cheery and leaves like a cherry tree. Nimloth is not described as such though in any text, but it did seem to glow? at times in at least one text form: HOME Peoples of Middle Earh; The History of the Akallabeth referred to as the night-shadows departing when in flower.

Earendil in some early versions of the Earendillinwe (as it eventually came to be so-named in Lord of the Rings See HOME Treason of Isengard) for the name), also carries cherry blossoms on his ship when he sailed to Aman, most likely in reverence to the Two Trees--he needed all the help he could get.

The final long-misplaced and later rediscovered version for Earendillinwe scheduled for inclusion in the book was published in Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion. Mr Tolkien couldn't locate the final form and used an earlier form of the poem. Just an mildly related aside here on this last point, and probably the only really new point of interest. :)