HoME XIII: The Weird Bits

[Huinesoron]

Just stumbled across the Numenorean Pharmacopeia section, which was a bit of a surprise. I guess we knew that the Numenoreans had a lot of plants with 'interesting' properties - after all, Gondor called pipe-weed 'westmansweed', and athelas was a Numenorean herb. But I still wouldn't have expected three whole pages on Numenorean drugs and psychotropics!

I guess it shows what Tolkien was thinking about when he drew those lovely ranalinque and linque surisse sketches, and it's certainly nice to know more about them - but I could have done without quite so detailed a description of the aftereffects of pilinehtar inhalation.

(I understand an early draft of this text is going to be in the Hostetter book. Given how much longer it's supposed to be, will we finally get details on that cryptic "bark of the mellyrn" reference in Unfinished Tales? I sure hope so!)

hS