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<img src="http://www.barrowdowns.com/images/posticons/bluepal.jpg" align=absmiddle> Re: Tolkien's Knowlege Of Constellations
The webpage Mellonath Daeron - Astronomical objects in Middle-earth provides the most accurate listing of Tolkien's astronomical names that I've found:
http://www.forodrim.org/daeron/md_astro.htmlwww.forodrim.org/daeron/md_astro.html</a>
Note that Borgil, despite some references to the contrary in some sources commenting on Tolkien, must be Aldebaran, not Betelgeuse. In the chapter "Three's Company" the hobbits see the Netted Stars (The Pleiades) and Borgil beneath them above the mists. Then the mists clear, and they see the constellation Menelvagor (Orion) climbing the sky. Borgil is therefore between Orion and the Pleiades, right where Aldebaran is, not part of Orion as Betelgeuse is.
From
The Book of Lost Tales 2, "The Tale of Eärendel", Notebook C:<blockquote>
Quote:<hr> ****Tuor and Idril some say sail now in Swanwing and may be seen going swift down the wind at dawn and dusk.<hr></blockquote>Is this possibly an equation of Tuor and Idril in Swanwing with Mercury, parallel to Eärendel their son in Wingilot as Venus? Mercury also appears only as a morning or evening star, never so far away from the Sun as is Venus, and much fainter. If Tolkien did intend this identification the concept does not seem to have stuck.
From a semi-scientific cosomology in
Morgoth's Ring, Part Five Myths Transformed, II, Note 19, Christopher Tolkien states:<blockquote>
Quote:<hr> In other scribbled notes (written at the same time as text II nd constituting a part of that manuscript) my father wrote that Varda gave the holy light received in gift from Ilúvatar (see p.*380) not only to the Sun and to the Two Trees but also to 'the significant Star'. The meaning of this is nowhere explained. Beside it he wrote
Signifier, and many experimental Elvish names, as
Taengyl,
Tengyl,
Tannacolli or
Tankol,
Tainacolli; also a verbal root
tana 'show, indicate';
tanna 'sign'; and
kolla 'borne, worn especially a vestment or cloak', with the note '
Sindikoll-o is masculinized'.<hr></blockquote>In these later writings the
Quenta Silmarillion is treated as a Númenorean legend-cycle somewhat garbled in its cosmology. Presumably the identification of the planet Venus with Eärendil in his ship would be such garbling. Is it possible that this 'significant Star' is Venus, associated with Eärendil in the legends? Only this Star and Eärendil's Silmaril of objects unlost would still shine with the pure, unstained light at the end of the First Age, and Tolkien might have intended that they were metaphorically linked and then identified in Númenorean legend.
But JRRT was never able to satisfacatorily merge the old legends with a new scienfically based view of the earth and its relation to the stars and other planets.
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Edited by: <A HREF=http://www.barrowdowns.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_profile&u=00000212>jallanit e</A> at: 9/16/01 1:41:10 pm