[Alcuin]

Originally Posted by Gothmog, LoB

Actually, the Ósanwe-kenta indicates that Tolkien changed his view on Sauron's body. It was actually first destroyed (at least in known history) during his confrontation with Huan and Lúthien in the Lay of Leithian.

We also don't know whether Sauron was continuously embodied after that. We have no account on his role during the War of Wrath, after all, but we do know that he took on his fair hue when he presented himself to Eonwe. Whether this was done 'from scratch' (i.e. with him having no body before) or whether he just changed his physical body is unclear.

Assuming that Tolkien has not made a “slip of the pen”, that his son Christopher has somehow overlooked his father’s intention to change the story, and that Carl Hofstetter (for whose work I have great regard) has discovered the “correct” storyline, we are still left with the tale of Beren and Lúthien as it stands: When released by Huan (or his body was destroyed by Huan as you (and Hofstetter?)), propose Sauron immediately takes up the form of a giant vampire bat and flew off to Dorthonion (Taur-nu-Fuin) to terrorize folks there. (He did not, it would seem, return to Thangorodrim, since Lúthien had humiliated him: while he might not be unhoused before Morgoth, still his master would have long held him in contempt.) If Sauron immediately took up a form, and if it takes Ainur some time to resettle themselves into a form after being “unhoused”, Sauron must surely have been far stronger than any of the other Maiar!

On the other hand, maybe Sauron was not stripped of his form at Tol Sirion, and either the writing is not in accord with the rest of the mythos or its reporter (Hofstetter) has misinterpreted the document: For in fact as Note 5 in Ósanwe-kenta observes,

Some of [Morgoth’s] greatest servants … became wedded to the forms of their evil deeds, and if these bodies were taken from them or destroyed, they were nullified, until they had rebuilt a semblance of their former habitations, with which they could continue the evil courses in which they had become fixed

The paragraph immediately following the one with Note 5 at its end quotes Pengoloð: “This seems not to accord with the histories.” My citation is not quite fair, since Pengoloð is now discussion Morgoth’s ability to deceive and dominate the sámar (minds or intellects) of the Ainur and Children of Eru; but it seems appropriately placed for this discussion. It is also appropriate that Sauron was indeed unhoused – twice, even without any mischance to his hröa at the hand of Lúthien (or rather the teeth of Huan), in the wreck of Númenor and on the slopes of Orodruin – before the Ring was destroyed. Both times, it took him long to reshape a new hröa. It does not stand to reason, IMO, that Huan unhoused him at Tol Sirion: otherwise, he’d not have surrendered the fortress to Lúthien, and it would seem most unbecoming of the daughter of Melian to offer to release her enemy for the mastery of the tower and then slay his physical form after he did so.

You cite Ósanwe-kenta yet continue to ignore Letter 211:

Though reduced to “a spirit of hatred borne on a dark wind”, I do not think one need boggle at this spirit carrying off the One Ring, upon which his power of dominating minds now largely depended.

But perhaps you (and Hofstetter, I suppose) are right after all.

FWIW, I doubt Hofstetter misinterpreted the document. I do think what it says about Sauron being unhoused by Huan at Tol Sirion is not in accord with the rest of the published corpus, however; and that we should be reticent to accept it, since not only the story is told and retold without Huan’s wrecking Sauron’s hröa, but because it makes Lúthien a faithless negotiator, something I judge untenable in the mythos.

Originally Posted by Gothmog, LoB

…they probably didn't become Nazgûl on the island but there would have been there occasionally, and people should have realized that something was wrong with them. Say, they might have grown very ambitious, over-reaching themselves, uncovering secrets nobody should know and revealing knowledge nobody among the Dúnedain had any ideas about.

And depending how old they were when they got the Rings (if there were members of the Line of Elros among them they must have received later in life or else they wouldn't have yet been wraiths around 2251 SA) people around them must have realized that something was wrong with them.

Even if they spend most of their time in some Númenórean colonies in Middle-earth other Númenóreans would have been with them and reported stuff back.

This is exactly the point of the essay. At least one – and I suspect only one – of the Númenóreans ensnared by Sauron with a Ring was from the House of Elros. They had lifespans almost twice as long as other Númenóreans, about 400 years, whereas “regular” Númenóreans were living to about 250 years. A Númenórean born into the House of Elros about S.A. 1650 would have run his life expectancy by about S.A. 2050; like Bilbo, he’d have gone on a little longer, “like butter scraped over too much bread”, and soon returned to Middle-earth to complete his journey to the Dark Side and enter wraithdom. I doubt any of the Nazgûl-to-be were still in Númenor when the embassy arrived from Valinor to debate with Tar-Atanamir, an event I suspect happened in the second half of his reign, after 2120 or later. The Nazgûl did not appear for another century. In the meantime, Atanamir would “know” from personal experience that at least one of his kinsmen lived to very old age, perhaps 500 years or more, before that old but very vigorous and alert man returned to Middle-earth, where he vanished. (And besides that, if Bilbo and Frodo are any indication, the man would not look old.) Little wonder that as King of Númenor, he rebuffed the ambassadors from Valinor.

Originally Posted by Gothmog, LoB

Reading into your essay I think we can resolve the discrepancy between Minastir and Telperien resolve simply by making her the one who sent the fleet and Minastir the one who lead it as her heir and general. The idea that she of all queens was forced to do anything is very unlikely considering how she is described. And dating her death back decades would destroy what little we know about her age and strength of will.

We are not far apart on this. My suggestion is that from about S.A. 1700, Minastir served as co-regent with his aunt, Telperiën, who remained on the throne until shortly before her death. There was a case of this in Gondor: Narmacil I had little interest in affairs of state and so made his nephew, Minalcar, Karma-kundo or regent. Minalcar remained Karma-kundo when his father Calmacil succeeded Narmacil, finally becoming king in his own right as Rómendacil II. What I suggest is that Telperiën had little interest in building a fleet, but understanding the danger, handed all such matters over to her heir and nephew, Minastir, giving him authority to act as regent in Middle-earth and in all affairs regarding the war. This would make them co-rulers for many decades, perhaps a half-century or more. Minastir’s grandson Atanamir was the first to refuse to lay down his life, which means that Telperiën was a “good” Númenórean and left of her own free will (“gave back the Gift”, as Tolkien puts it) when her time arrived. You mention her “strength of will”, and I agree with you: remaining Ruling Queen until the very last makes it clear that she, not Minastir, was senior ruler during their co-regency. This also has the benefit of explaining the “Tale of Years” entry for S.A. 1700: “Tar-Minastir sends a great navy from Númenor to Lindon” – he sent it and was in royal command, and Tar-Telperiën was still on the throne for another 30 years.

This brings up one more item – again, off-topic – but Minastir could not have been a proud person. He was king, and he is rightly attributed a great military victory, even though it doesn’t appear as if Telperiën let him lead the expeditionary force to Middle-earth. His aunt seems wise enough to let him lead a mission that consumed massive resources in Númenor and must have taken many of its best men, some of whom did not return or returned grievously wounded: that is the nature of warfare. But he seems to have been willing to operate within the bounds Telperiën set, did this successfully, and achieved his aim. Later, his son Ciryatan constrained his father to give up the throne before Minastir was ready – and “the Shadow falls on Númenor”. Were Minastir a proud man, he would have refused.

Originally Posted by Zigûr

…I don't think there's necessarily a correlation between the Rings and the darkening of Númenor, and in some respects I think it's more thematically effective if there isn't - after all, Sauron himself is "but a servant or emissary", not the sole source of evil in the later Ages. We could also go down the "textual history" route of arguing that the Númenor story was invented before the Rings of Power story, but admittedly in early (1937) versions of Númenor the darkening did not really happen in any great degree (although there was some discontent) until Sauron himself came.

My position is that “the Shadow falls on Númenor” is Tolkien tying the events of Lord of the Rings through the three Númenórean Nazgûl into his older tales. Since you are the (about-to-be-published) Tolkien scholar, I’ll make a bet with you: I’ll bet that somewhere in those musty boxes in Milwaukee or Oxford, someone will find the old professor’s scribblings on the origins of at least the Lord of the Nazgûl.