[Thenamir]

First of all, let me clarify what this post is. I had a long discussion of this thread with burrahobbit on the chat this afternoon. I really had not much interest in the question, but the debate was intriguing, and so I voiced an opinion, and burra and I spent a spirited hour discussing, and this post is the distillation of what I think based on that discussion.

The question, "Can an elf kill a Nazgul" is deceiving, becuase Nazgul exist, as burra has said, in two "planes" of existence.

I think it is possible for an elf, or anyone else with sufficient strength, skill and bravery could "disembody" a Nazgul -- render the physical form so badly damaged that the wraith could no longer function in it. That is one kind of "death", and I say that this kind of death is the kind that *anyone* could deal out. In this sense, I agree with burra. This is the kind of thing that happened at the Fords:

"the waves took the form of great white horses with shining white riders; and there were many rolling and grinding boulders"

This killed the horses outright, and rendered the Nazgul body-less, but not unable to re-body and return. That would seem to indicate that you cannot destroy a Ringwraith until and unless you sever the connection between it and its master. Their bodies could no longer sustain their spirits, being held and enslaved by Sauron by his power.

"'Eight out of the Nine are accounted for at least,' said Gandalf. 'It is rash to be too sure, yet I think that we may hope now that the Ringwraiths were scattered, and have been obliged to return as best they could to their Master in Mordor, empty and shapeless."

On the other hand, when *I* think of "killing" a Nazgul, I have in mind a more permanent arrangement, like what happened to the Witch-King after Merry and Eowyn came after him:

"a cry went up into the shuddering air, and faded to a shrill wailing, passing with the wind, a voice bodiless and thin that died, and was swallowed up, and was never heard again in that age of this world."

To accomplish this, you apparantly need special weaponry:

"So passed the sword of the Barrow-downs, work of Westernesse. But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-kingdom when the Dúnedain were young, and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorcerer king. 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."

The key words here being "no other blade", that is one specially made and imbued with the particular power for this one purpose. You can grind the body of a Wraith to powder, but as long as the power of Sauron and the Ring endured, the spirits of the kings of men could always be called back to Mordor, and be given new bodies.

"`I thought they were all destroyed in the flood,' said Merry.
'You cannot destroy Ringwraiths like that,' said Gandalf. `The power of their master is in them, and they stand or fall by him."

I'd like to think that is a pretty strong case. Could Glorfindel have disembodied a Nazgul? I think the answer to that is "certainly" -- if that was on pay-per-view, I'd be on the phone to Tom "Bookmaker" Bombadil with 50 gold coins on Glorfindel. But power was not in Glorfindel to defeat Sauron himself, or to destroy the ring outright, therefore he could not sever the connection between the wraiths and their master.

I'd also like to think that if the elves could take out the Nazgul anytime they wanted, as Burrahobbit asserts, they would have done so. Since these are fictitious characters anyway, to get all hot and bothered about what might or might not be possible in a world that existed truly only in the imagination of one man smacks of *someone* needing a life. But if you insist on trying to argue the point, at least do it from the texts he's written, and let's get on to more important questions -- like who would win the ultimate grudge match: Arwen versus Eowyn, mud-wrestling for the hand of Aragorn!