New Tolkien coming!

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Originally Posted by zionius

Haha, I learned this a bit late, just one day after I took pains trying to transcribe the page shown in Reader's Companion. Can't wait for the full release!

Could you tease a little bit for me? I'm wondering if the circle beside "March 8" in the scheme represents "Full Moon". And "⊘" beside "March 9" represents Tolkien changed the date of Full Moon.

Yes and yes. JRRT sometimes used drawn symbols and sometimes abbreviations to keep track of lunar phases, but track them he did. I speculate in my paper, just a bit, about that second, deleted moon. That was a very important one, as well: the one which Pippin sees from the back of Shadowfax on the night of the war-beacons, which Frodo sees setting over the Forbidden Pool, and which governs the muster of the Rohirrim.

(BTW, that page is as legible as news headlines compared to a typical page!)

[zionius]

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

Yes and yes. JRRT sometimes used drawn symbols and sometimes abbreviations to keep track of lunar phases, but track them he did. I speculate in my paper, just a bit, about that second, deleted moon. That was a very important one, as well: the one which Pippin sees from the back of Shadowfax on the night of the war-beacons, which Frodo sees setting over the Forbidden Pool, and which governs the muster of the Rohirrim.

(BTW, that page is as legible as news headlines compared to a typical page!)

Thanks, so glad to learn that!

I can only guess it might track to a note quoted in HoMe7 p. 369:my father wrote at the head of the first page of it: Moons are after 1941-2 + 6 days. He changed this to + 5 days, and added: thus Full Moon Jan. 2 is Jan. 7.

BTW, that easy page already racked my brains, you worked miracle!

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Originally Posted by zionius

Thanks, so glad to learn that!

I can only guess it might track to a note quoted in HoMe7 p. 369:my father wrote at the head of the first page of it: Moons are after 1941-2 + 6 days. He changed this to + 5 days, and added: thus Full Moon Jan. 2 is Jan. 7.

BTW, that easy page already racked my brains, you worked miracle!

Yes, that was the system he used consistently for most of the book, starting I believe at the time he wrote the episode in 'The Great River' where Sam is puzzled by the new moon and the passage of time in Lorien (which was written right at the end of 1941, probably during the Christmas holiday). He even considered but decided against bringing in the real-world lunar eclipse of March 2 1942. Once committed he stayed with it, including revising the moon in the earlier parts of the story... but he couldn't bring himself to delete the striking scene of the waning moon (impossibly) illuminating the west-facing Gates of Moria in the early evening.