Eorling Mead Hall Planning/Discussion Thread

[Kath]

Well now if we combine these ideas we might be able to form some kind of tour for Nain and Kara.

We're going into town first so we could start with wandering that and looking at all the different trades going on. Nain is a craftsman (or dwarf) after all so might he be interested in that?

Then we could head out of town to some of these Gondorian ruins. Those would presumably be made of stone? Perhaps it could be like when you go to an old castle and all you can see of how it was is the small inch or so high remains of the walls.

By this time it would probably be lunch and so we could head to the more picturesque parts of Edoras with open plains and little waterfalls, and stop in some nice place for a bite to eat.

And then on the way home we could pass old burial mounds and Nain could have a wonderful time explaining the old customs and how tombs were shaped to Kara.

If this sounds like absolute rubbish please feel free to tell me.

[JennyHallu]

I'm back!

LMP, when is Eodwine going to address Marenil?

And what is the time of year, again? I'm lost, time wise.

[littlemanpoet]

I believe, without taking a close look, that it's late May. I'm going to have to start posting the date at the beginning of each new Day. I can see that now.

Jenny, since Eodwine is a rather unorganized chap, he does what comes into his head. If he happens to see Marenil about, he'll be sure to remember to talk to him. If he doesn't, he's apt to forget until something else reminds him. Every character has weaknesses, and absent mindedness is one of Eodwine's glaring ones.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by Kath

If this sounds like absolute rubbish please feel free to tell me.

Not like rubbish at all. Sounds like a plan to me. Which means that either you need to post, or I do (well, I guess it's my turn...).

Assuming that I'm going next, look to the computer screen ere tomorrow night (or later, you being in England).

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by Kath

Then we could head out of town to some of these Gondorian ruins. Those would presumably be made of stone? Perhaps it could be like when you go to an old castle and all you can see of how it was is the small inch or so high remains of the walls.

If this sounds like absolute rubbish please feel free to tell me.

Actually, just one piece of rubbish..... other than the rundown ruins themselves..... the ruins are Numenorean, not Gondorian. I imagine that this distinction might not be lost on the Dwarf.

[Formendacil]

Originally Posted by littlemanpoet

Actually, just one piece of rubbish..... other than the rundown ruins themselves..... the ruins are Numenorean, not Gondorian. I imagine that this distinction might not be lost on the Dwarf.

No, the ruins are Gondorian.

And the distinction would most certainly not be lost on Náin.

Númenoreans started settling in Middle-Earth in the mid-Second Century, but it is quite clear from the Appendices and extra-LotR writings that they didn't settle much beyond the Anduin delta, around Pelargir, and in Eriador, near the realm of Gil-galad.

Neither area includes Calenardhon.

It is only after the fall of Númenor, and the establishment of the realms of Gondor and Arnor under Elendil and his sons that the Dúnedain settle further inland. The hundred years or so under Isildur and Anárion is a time of great expansion and fortress-building in Gondor. (The Argonath, Minas Anor, Minas Ithil, Osgiliath, the Stone of Erech-- for sure.) Undoubtedly, these earliest architectural structures would have been as Númenorean in style and design as any ediface lining the streets of Andúnië or Arminelos, but they were constructed under Gondorian rule.

Furthermore, Gondor continued to rule over Calenardhon for another 2500 years, until the arrival of the Éotheod half a millennium before the War of the Ring. And as Kath's castle examples from England will show, five hundred years is plenty of time for impressive stone edifices to become forlorn ruins. Thus, any time between the arrival of the Dúnedain (and the founding of the Kingdom of Gondor) and the arrival of the Eorlings (and the ceding of Calenardhon by the Gondorians) would be a candidate for the construction of any "ruins".

Additionally, since Calenardhon was never densely populated, a time somewhere in the middle of that time period (well past when "Númenorean" would have been an applicable term), after Gondor's population had reached its zenith, but before it began to wane, would be a sensible time for some moderately-sized ruins in the Edoras region to have been first planted. Let's give it an approximate date of... 1000 T.A., a full 1100 years after the fall of Númenor.

So it is Gondorian. Not rubbish at all.

And um... yeah... I should go direct my energy to something useful. Like a post. Or maybe a PM reply. Anyway, no personal animosity is intended or felt... I just haven't let my picky side out in a while.

[littlemanpoet]

Very well, I stand corrected. Carry on. And post to the rpg thread.

[JennyHallu]

I think perhaps we should say "serving girl" rather than "wench".

"Wench", according to the Houghton Mifflin thesaurus, means a vulgar woman who flouts propriety. Seems to have definite connotations on the wanton side of things, and though it would be common practice for a medieval innkeeper, I doubt any Middle-Earth lord such as Eodwine rents out his girls.

[Folwren]

Elempi, I don't know if you're aware, but you posted your last post twice on the game thread. I thought you might like to be told.

And I hope to finally post something tonight. We'll see.

-- Foley

[littlemanpoet]

Originally Posted by JennyHallu

I think perhaps we should say "serving girl" rather than "wench".

"Wench", according to the Houghton Mifflin thesaurus, means a vulgar woman who flouts propriety. Seems to have definite connotations on the wanton side of things, and though it would be common practice for a medieval innkeeper, I doubt any Middle-Earth lord such as Eodwine rents out his girls.

From Online Etymology Dictionary comes this:

wench
c.1290 wenche "girl or young woman," shortened from wenchel "child" (12c.), from O.E. wencel, probably related to wancol "unsteady, fickle, weak," and cognate with O.N. vakr "child, weak person," O.H.G. wanchal "fickle." The word degenerated through being used in ref. to servant girls, and by 1362 was being used in a sense of "woman of loose morals, mistress." The verb meaning "to associate with common women" is from 1599.

"The wenche is nat dead, but slepith." [Wyclif, Matt. ix.24, c.1380]

In Rohan we are dealing with a culture that is pre-1362.

Thanks, Foley, I will correct the error.

[Lhunardawen]

In the words of Sam, Jenny, and a lot of other people, I'm back!

I'll be posting tomorrow...I hope.

[Celuien]

Here's the thing...

Everytime I reread the thread, "wench" is really jumping out at me. While it may have had a proper use to refer to servants pre-1362, the current connotations of the word for a post-1362 reader are a little disconcerting.

Originally Posted by littlemanpoet

wench
c.1290 wenche "girl or young woman," shortened from wenchel "child" (12c.), from O.E. wencel, probably related to wancol "unsteady, fickle, weak," and cognate with O.N. vakr "child, weak person," O.H.G. wanchal "fickle." The word degenerated through being used in ref. to servant girls, and by 1362 was being used in a sense of "woman of loose morals, mistress." The verb meaning "to associate with common women" is from 1599.

"The wenche is nat dead, but slepith." [Wyclif, Matt. ix.24, c.1380]

Also, I'm wondering about the original connotation of the word (which , of course, I can't personally attest to, not having been around in the 1300s ).
Connections to being fickle aren't quite complimentary, and I just have to wonder if the connotation of the word was ever particularly good, especially considering the meaning of loose morals that it took on between 1290 and 1362 - not a particularly long period of time.

*shrugs* I'm no linguist, but I think I would personally prefer serving girl to wench.

Sorry to stir things up and run, but I'm going to be away for the next few days. See you by Tuesday at the latest.