Ealasaide,
In my earlier zeal to confuse the issue, I completely neglected to address this:
Quote:
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tar-ancalime - you also made a good point about the decline of technology in that no more Silmarils or Palantiri were made, no ships so strong as those made by the Numenoreans, etc, etc, but doesn't that also coincide with a decline in magic? It seems to me that LotR takes place at a time when magic is slowly giving way to the ordinary, the mundane, the world of men, as opposed to the world of elves and elven magic.
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I think that in the First, Second, and Third Ages, technology
is magic. You rightly note that the word "magic" is problematic, but it's no less so than the word "technology." What we need is a third word, one to describe things made or created by skill as opposed to things found naturally (Sting is "magic," but the metal it's made from is not, I think; likewise, Aragorn's healing skills are "magic," but athelas is not). If magic is giving way at the end of the Third Age, it's because of the long, slow decline (related to Galadriel's "long defeat," perhaps?) in technology/magic that started long before, arguably with the destruction of the Lamps. So yes, the decline in technology does coincide with a decline in magic, because the two are one and the same--"magic" is a word used by the hobbits to describe technology they don't possess.