Hey! Lets kill Shelob!

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

Why didn't the Men of Gondor kill Shelob when they had the chance? They could have sent in a force or driven her out with fire. Surely it wasn't hard to see that a huge monster in spider form would be trouble one day?

[LePetitChoux]

Dunno, but why did Isildur keep the ring? Surely that would mean trouble one day too (and did, as did Shelob...) http://www.plauder-smilies.de/tiere/grommit.gif

[InklingElf]

hmmm interesting-I dunno-but it may be that it happened because that's how time intended it to be...

[Arwen Imladris]

Why didn't the Men of Gondor kill Shelob when they had the chance?

When did they have the chance? If they had the chance, why didn't they just enhabit all of Mordor so that Sauron couldn't get back in? Perhaps they didn't think that they had the chance and had other things to worry about. If they didn't want to get into Mordor, killing Shelob wouldn't help them any.

[TolkienGurl]

Did they even know she existed?

[Diamond18]

No, actually I don't think so. Remember that Faramir had foreboding feelings when Cirith Ungol was mentioned, but nothing specific. Why I don't know...the name means "Pass of the Spider" for pity's sake! But anyway, I figure that if Faramir knew what exactly was there, he wouldn't have told Frodo and Sam.

[Susan Delgado]

Why wouldn't he have told them? "Forewarned is Forearmed" after all; they could have prepared for what was coming rather than have a nasty surprise.

[Diamond18]

Oh, idiot that I am...I wrote that wrong. Dyyyyuuhhhhh, I'm just passin' by, doyee, just passin' by...

Anyway, I meant "he would have told them". smilies/rolleyes.gif

(edit by moderator: Please correct previous posts by editing them, not adding a new one.)

[ November 03, 2002: Message edited by: Estelyn Telcontar ]

[Kalimac]

The thing about Shelob is that she doesn't really move around that much - she's a real menace but if you stay away from her lair, it's not like she'll come out looking for you or sneaking in to steal people in their sleep, a la Grendel in "Beowulf." (Of course when she was young she was probably a bit more active, but we're working on the assumption that she's pretty much permanently established at Cirith Ungol by now).

This fact by itself probably wouldn't encourage the men of Gondor to go and smoke her out, so to speak; after all, if you live a good neighborhood, and there's a really bad neighborhood located a pretty fair distance from you, do you decide to to start a difficult and very dangerous crusade to clean up the bad neighborhood, or do you simply avoid going there? Someone who was very, very altruistic would probably feel they should fix up the bad neighborhood even though it did not benefit at all, but 99% of the population would probably just say "Don't go to that neighborhood and you'll be fine." They probably wouldn't see any reason to go fight and kill her, risking and losing lives in the process, when all she was doing was hiding out in an area almost nobody went to, guarding a land that nobody cared about visiting. Easier just to let it lie, they would think. She'll probably just die of old age one of these days.

This attitude would probably be encouraged by the fact that she probably moved in when there were some other fairly pressing troubles going on for Gondor; when creatures like Shelob make a run for the hills like that, there has to be something bad going on. Gondor would have had its hands full battling off the major threat and afterwards been too battle-weary to care about the minor one which had been established. Probably they didn't even talk about "the spider" - after a few generations, just stayed away from the place and told their children not to go there, rather in the sense of parents warning their children away from the Old Johnson House or the dangerous local dump. After a while, as it says in the LOTR prologue "history became legend" and people like Faramir stayed away from the place because - well, it was a place to stay away from. And on the principle of people who don't know if they believe in ghosts but wouldn't care to spend a night in a haunted house, neither he nor the others would have much desire to go up there to see whether their parents' warnings were actually true or not.

So to conclude - sorry this has been so windy - probably killing Shelob would have been the best thing to do, but it's easy to see how they could have just decided that discretion was the better part of valor and simply stayed away from her. After all, how were they to know that she'd live thousands of years?

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

It should be obvious why they didn't try and occupy Mordor. They were too few. And you are right about not knowing how old she was and the whole 'courage' factor.

I just think that there should have been at least one valiant Man of Gondor who wanted to become a hero and be the one to slay the giant monster. Remember, the Watch on Mordor slacked with time.

If Gandalf had been among them at that time I'm sure Shelob would have been dealt with.

[Melephelwen]

I think all I had to say about this topic pretty have been said already, so I'm not going to repeat everybody else, but there's just something I would like to comment.
If Gandalf had been among them at that time I'm sure Shelob would have been dealt with.
I completely agree, but I find it weird, that it always has to be Gandalf who has to get things done. People of Gondor couldn't see the reason for dealing with Shelob, but one of their own should have been as good to push them as Gandalf. At least if they didn't know about his "wizardry". If the public attitude was like "He's a wizard, he can make it happen", then he could be useful. I can't remember, wether Gondor still had a king by that time, but if they had one, and a good one, couldn't he as well realize what it would take to get rid of Shelob?
I'm sorry if I didn't put this clearly enough, but I hopr you get my point! smilies/smile.gif

[HerenIstarion]

If Gandalf had been among them at that time I'm sure Shelob would have been dealt with.

Well may be. Well may be not. Gandalf was always so cautious about showing himself to the Enemy via his wizarding activities, even miles away from Mordor. I doubt he would risk something capable of betraying his disposition to orcs in the tower

[michael8337]

well,1st of all it wouldnt exactily be a picknick getting to shelob would it? what with all the black gate guards watching silently around the clock. and how are you supposed to sneak in a sufficient amout of people to deal with shelob without being noticed...and if they were to make it to shelob's what makes ya think they could defeat her :-/

so! all in all i'd say the people of gondor didnt feel it was worth the trouble

[Melephelwen]

That's true enough HI, I see your point, but monsters has been killed without magic before. Gandalf could as well have told some men what to do, and simply support them morally(gr?). Off course not the version "You go do this and this and that, and then I'll sit here and watch that you do it carefully", but supporting them without magic. To some level he must be able to do so.

[Sapphire_Flame]

after all, if you live a good neighborhood, and there's a really bad neighborhood located a pretty fair distance from you, do you decide to to start a difficult and very dangerous crusade to clean up the bad neighborhood, or do you simply avoid going there? ...99% of the population would probably just say "Don't go to that neighborhood and you'll be fine." They probably wouldn't see any reason to go fight and kill her, risking and losing lives in the process, when all she was doing was hiding out in an area almost nobody went to, guarding a land that nobody cared about visiting. Easier just to let it lie, they would think.
How true is that? I completely agree, I mean, why should the men of Gondor put themselves at risk when the threat is (relatively) distant? They had a great sense of self-preservation is all. After all, fighting a giant spider (no matter how old she is) can't be very conducive to living a long life.

And, to another point, if they did decide to do something about Shelob, who's to say they could actually beat her? In TTT, the very last chapter when Sam is listening in on Gorbag and Shagrat, the orcs say that no one has ever injured her (or to use orc-slang, "stuck a pin in Shelob"). Apart from giving the impression that Hobbits are tough little creatures, this statement goes to prove that Shelob is extremely resiliant. I highly doubt, even if they did try to do anything, it would have much of an effect, except to give Shelob an exceptional amount of food to put in her "storeroom". smilies/evil.gif

[ November 06, 2002: Message edited by: Sapphire_Flame ]

[TolkienGurl]

Even if the people of Gondor knew about Shelob, maybe they did not want to 'stir up trouble' with the Black Land, and thought that if she didn't bother them, then they wouldn't bother her. People do that with rather unpleasant situations they encounter. "If we ignore it, maybe it will go away."

Shelob is a spider after all. Their exoskeletons are very strong. Multiply that by the thousands and thousands of times that she is bigger than a regular spider, and see if you would want to try and defeat her!

[ November 04, 2002: Message edited by: TolkienGurl ]

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

I realise that Shelob is one tough cookie. What some people are not realising is that I was talking about when Minas Ithil was first built and the land was part of Gondor. Sauron had been defeated for the first time. It's not as if there were still armies of Orcs ready for you. It was Gondor's own back yard.

[Laivine]

Thanks for saying that Eomer, I was wondering why no one was putting that fact into their posts!

The tower that was occupied by orcs when Frodo and Sam were in Cirith Ungol, were built by the men of Gondor to defend Mordor ages back, so that the destroyed Sauron wouldn't get back in, to put it like that.

I'm not sure whether they knew about Shelob at all, as they could have had other ways to move around, but it says in LotR that Shelob cannot be killed by the force of any man, and the only reason why Sam managed to stick his sword in her is because she was the one pressing down. Well, it was something along those lines anyway, I'm sorry that I can't give you an exact quote. Well, my point is that I believe Shelob couldn't be killed, as there was no one left in Middle Earth that had the power to kill her.

[Eomer of the Rohirrim]

I think it's dubious that no-one could kill Shelob. Didn't Beren kill a load of spiders? I'm not saying they were as great as Shelob but still...

Isildur could have done it I'm very sure. And a bunch of Men together could probably do it too.

[Helkahothion]

I have 3 theorys(they might already be posted but I don't read all those posts cause they could change my opinion before I utter it)

1.They did not know shellob lived there.
2.They did not have the currage( I mean, a huge spider is not a happy sight).
3. THey did not see the use of it.
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[red]

Such logic (not to mention spelling) boggles the mind.

[Rimbaud]

réd, you did not mention Belle in that post.