The Red Book Of Westmarch

[Firefoot]

In the next day or two Frodo went through his papers and his writings with Sam, and he hadned over his keys. THere was a big book with a plain red leather covers; its tall pages were now almost filled. At the beginning there were many leaves covered with Bilbo's thin wandering hand; but most of it was written in Frodo's firm flowing script. It was divided into chapters, but Chapter 80 was unfinished, and after that were some blank leaves. The title page had many titles on it, crossed out one after another, so:

My Diary. My Unexpected Journey. There and Back Again. And What Happened After.
Adventures of Finve Hobbits. The Tale of the Great Ring, compiled by Bilbo Baggins from his own obswervations and the accounts of his friends What we did in the War of the Ring.

Here Bilbo's hand ended and Frodo had wirtten:

THE DOWNFALL
OF THE
LORD OF THE RINGS
AND THE
RETURN OF THE KING

(as seen by the Little People; being the memoirs of Bilbo and Frodo of the Shire, suplemented by the accounts of their friends and the learning of the Wise.)

Together with extracts from Books of Lore translated by Bilbo in Rivendell.

"Why, you have nearly finished it, Mr. Frodo!" Sam exclaimed. "Well, you have kept at it, I must say."
"I am quite finished, Sam," said Frodo. "The last pages are for you."

Phew! (From "The Grey Havens.")

The Red Book was Bilbo's diary, Frodo's writings on his journey, and Sam's addends. The three volumes Bilbo gave Frodo were supplementary to it, but separate. Frodo (and Sam) only added to the Red Book; the other writings he left alone. Interestingly enough, if you add the number of chapters in the Hobbit and LotR together, you get 80, which is the same number of chapters in the Red Book.

(I can certainly understand your confusion, snowbird. I had the same problems shortly after reading LotR.)

Edit: The Diary is There and Back Again. That was what Bilbo wrote; Frodo added to it.

Ok, now we're getting somewhere, thank you it's really helping me.

So the red book is the diary+frodo's writings+sam's writings??

And the 3 volumes are just a different part of the red book? Because he did "Annex" it on.

And the diary does not = the 3 volumes?

[Boromir88]

Wooo, we finally figured it out. Good job snowbird and firefoot. However, now my brain is fried mush and I'm just going to lay down and pass out.

So we did!

As a recap: 1st volume = the writings from bilbo's diary, frodos writings and sam's writings.

2nd, 3rd, 4th volumes = other parts of history concerning hobbits ect.

5th volume = commentaries, genealogies and various other matters concering the hobbit members of the fellowship.

This right?

Ah, my brain is mush too!

P.S. What are "The Grey Havens."?

[Nilpaurion Felagund]

I think the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th volumes were Frodo accounts of the War of the Ring:

Frodo brought [Bilbo's diary] back to the Shire, together with many loose leaves of notes, and during S.R. 1420-I he nearly filled its pages with his account of the War.

The Fellowship, Two Towers, and Return of the King, perhaps?

Oh, and Grey Havens (or Mithlond) is the haven from where Elrond, Galadriel, Gandalf, Bilbo and Frodo set sail.

Or perhaps you refer to the last chapter of Return of the King.

Hope that helps!

[Boromir88]

If you happen to have a Middle-earth map handy it's down by the Gulf of Lhun.

Nilpaurion Felagund that doesn't really work because we know for a fact what 4 of the volumes are. 3 bilbo gave him which must be sepret accounts of the war and varioius other parts of the history of middle earth. 1 volume is filled with commentaries, genealogies and various other matters.

So were left with one vlume so it's gotta be Bilbo's diary, Frodo's account, and what sam's wrote.

Does that sound right to you?