Arwen's Grave Choice

[Hot, crispy nice hobbit]

Hamlet - "How long will a man lie i' the earth ere he rot?"
First Clown - "Faith, if he be not rotten before he die,- as we have many pocky corses now-a-days, that will scarce hold the laying in, - he will last you some eight year or nine year; a tanner will last you nine year."
Hamlet [Act V, Scene 1, Line 177 - 183]

Alas, poor Yorick! Little should he realise that long after his presence has faded to dust, his manner of decomposition should be discussed on an international forum... But pardon the expression.

Such talks of burial brings to mind the Death Marshes. There, if one recalls, lies the numerous unburied dead of the Last Alliance. If that is true, it seems that the spirits of both Men and Elves would haunt their place of death in the case of violent death; if a decent interring is not granted to their remains.

"'Who are they? What are they?' asked Sam shuddering, turning to Frodo, who was now behind him.
'I don't know,' said Frodo in a dreamlike voice. 'But I have seen them too. In the pools when the candles were lit. They lie in all the pools, pale faces, deep deep under the dark water. I saw them: grim faces and evil, and noble faces and sad. Many faces proud and fair, and weeds in their silver hair. But all foul, all rotting, all dead. A fell light is in them.' Frodo hid his eyes in his hands. 'I know not who they are; but I thought I saw there Men and Elves, and Orcs beside them.'

Sam then suggested that the 'devilry' was hatched by Sauron. But Sauron was defeated in the Last Alliance. One is left to wonder if the houseless spirits persisted because of the unceremonious abandonment of their bodies. If so however, then it rises the question of whether Orcs have got spirits... (NO! I am not going to open another discussion on that! This subject has deviated enough already! Let's get back on topic!)

Arwen's mortal flesh is of the stuff of the earth. If she simply lie down and died, then it has to be supposed that it decomposes in the open air. (What morbid thought that) I can't suppose any hand-maiden would follow her to Loth-lorien even though the Elves would have been gone. Just think of Boromir and his loath of Loth-Lorien. The Lore concerning Elves would probably be even more obscured by the time Arwen died. It is entirely possible, of course, that Arwen have went to Loth-lorien to try and reminisce about her Elven heritage (thats not something her children and those around her could understand), and at the same time to pass from Middle-Earth.