I am neither decided whether he was or wasnt a Nazgul, i would tend to think that he wasn't . Some of you guys have a very different view of what tolkien refers to as a lieutenant. Tolkien uses the term lieutenant as a term for someone's right hand man... NOT as a leaderships title. Ie. Khamul was the lieutenant of Dol Guldur... ie he was in a slight underling possition but was in command of the fortress... (not a good example but hey!)
I get from this that Gothmog was not a Nazgul... the nazgul live in minas morgul (if you could call it living) and the witchking is the 'king' of that haunted city, yet when the ringwraiths are all on an errand, there needs to be someone to command the forces of mordor/minas morgul. This is the lieutenant; Gothmog... that is why i believe he is NOT a ringwraith, whether he is a particularly capable orc or a Man i don't know... i'd lean to the latter. The sentence referring to him goes something like : "yet it was no orc brigand commanding the host of mordor, Gothmog lieutenant of Minas Morgul lead the Dark Lord's armies..." or something close to that...
Osse
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'A thinking tyrant, it seemed to Vetinari, had a much harder job than a ruler raised to power by some idiot system like democracy. At least HE could tell the people he was THEIR fault.'
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