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#1 | ||
Laconic Loreman
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The Dead and The Undead
As I mentioned in other topics I've been doing another reading of the books and recently finished Lord of the Rings. Next on my Tolkien stack is The Silmarillion (which actually might prompt some more thoughts on what this thread is about).
And this thread is generally about death, as in Men's fear of their own mortality in the Tolkienverse. Also about the Dead (Men of Dunharrow, the Dead Marshes) and the Undead (The Ringwraiths). What prompted this originally is just trying to do a compare/contrast to the Dead Men of Dunharrow, the Ringwraiths, and how do the Barrow-wights fit into this whole dead and the undead. I think the Men of Dunharrow are exactly what they're called, they are indeed dead. Spirits, bound to not be at rest because of their broken oath. Which is I think interesting considering the theme of Men's fear of death. Even if their blades no longer have any "bite" (Gimli makes a comment about this), few of the living could endure them, because it's like being confronted by their own mortality, literally staring into the face of their "Death." But how do the "spirits" (for lack of a better identification) in the Dead Marshes fit in here? The Men of Dunharrow are bound by an oath. What about the "dead faces" Gollum describes: Quote:
Generally, this definition I think fits the Ringwraiths...they should be dead, but are not because they can still physically interact with the living (much different from the Oathbreakers and the spirits in the dead marshes). Indeed they are kept animated by their Rings of Powers, which gave their bearers immortality...or did it? ![]() I think Bilbo's description of the Ring's effects on him are brilliant because it gives a simple understanding of what the Ring does. Bilbo comments that he feels "stretched," and this is a great description because despite living longer, it's not prolonging Bilbo's life, not really. Gollum is actually a better example, because Bilbo despite being very old for a hobbit, is still physically possible in Tolkien's story. Gollum, on the other hand has to be close to 600 years old and that is not possible for someone akin to hobbits. For simplicity, let's just say an expected lifespan for Gollum if he never came across the ring would be 100 years. What the Ring does to him, I would say is take that same expected lifespan of 100 years and "stretches" it over a time span of 600 years, thousands of years...etc. It's a perversion of immortality. Which this all leads to I guess my major question...is Gollum "undead?" That is if the Ringwraiths are kept animate merely because of the Rings, and when the Ring is destroyed the Ringwraiths pretty much fizzled out: Quote:
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#2 |
Haunting Spirit
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Gollum maintains a physical body throughout. Not quite undead yet in my book.
Sorry for low quality post, just wanted to remember this thread. |
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Overshadowed Eagle
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I feel like the Nazgul were still somewhat corporeal - they can sit on horses, and their cloaks stay up - even if not visible. But as Soriman indicates, they were also not fully embodied. They survive being swept down a raging river, which isn't plausible for humans. Gollum, on the other hand, feels like he could still be injured; the Ring had extended his lifespan, but not turned him into something new. The OED actually quotes a Tolkien-related source on this: P. H. Kocher's 1973 Master of Middle-Earth: Quote:
And what about the Barrow-Wights? My understanding is they're spirits (of the dead? Maiar or other unembodied?) sent by the Witch-King to possess the bodies of the fallen Cardolan royalty. Since they are making use of flesh (or just bones? I've always understood the 'long arm' to have skin and so on, but the fact that the hand 'broke off' might imply something more brittle), are they undead? Or are they just dead and making use of handy corpses? hS |
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Laconic Loreman
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I think there can be connection drawn between the Ring sustaining Gollum and the Ringwraiths physical forms, but I agree with the point that Gollum could still be injured by ways that don't involve the destruction of the Ring. Therefor he has living flesh, he can "starve" as he often says to Frodo and Sam. What sparked me originally thinking wait is Gollum "undead" was more than his connection and being sustained by the Ring, but also his strange attraction to dead things. He tells Frodo and Sam he tried to reach the dead apparitions in the marshes at one time, but he could not reach them, could not touch them. And I don't know about you but if I see strange dead faces floating in marshes my first reaction is not "oh let me just dive in there and try to grab it." ![]()
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#5 |
Spirit of Mist
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To add a bit to this discussion, I am linking an old thread (which, in turn, links another even older one) that touches upon some of these issues. I certainly am not doing this to discourage discussion, but rather to add more ammunition.
http://forum.barrowdowns.com/showthr...ght=necromancy I agree that Gollum and the Nazgul were not "dead," however the Nazgul may be where Gollum would have ended up, after being "stretched too thin." Then again, this may not be true because Gollum no longer had the Ring (but of course the Nine were "held" by Sauron so maybe the Wraiths didn't "have" their Rings). Nor was Gollum "undead." But the Nazgul, notwithstanding JRRT's characterization? The Dead of Dunharrow were, obviously dead, as was Gorlim. How their shades remain, considering the Doom of Men, is an open question. When we reach the Barrow-Wights, we touch upon the Necromancy thread linked above. Maybe a correct description would be dead but inhabited? I hope that this encourages some more brainstorming.
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#6 | ||
Laconic Loreman
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Thank you for the link (and the link in the thread you linked), Mithadan. I think they will do exactly what you intend, and spark more discussion. Necromancy is certainly linked to a topic about the dead and the undead.
I was intrigued by the comment, in one of the threads, about Isildur and his heirs (Aragorn) being able to use weapons of Sauron (the Dead of Dunharrow) against him. I don't recall reading any character making that comment, but Aragorn is able to command the spirits of the oath-breakers. I don't think we could call Isildur or Aragorn necromancers, but it is an interesting point in perhaps understanding the power Aragorn had to "summon the dead to fight." Looking at the words of Isildur's curse is interesting: Quote:
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#7 |
Dead Serious
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We don't know much (really, do we know anything?) about the worship of Sauron in Middle-earth beyond that he WAS worshipped, but I think that some comparative "religious studies" to what we know of the Melkor-worship he introduced in Númenor would, in fact, suggest that Sauron-worship in Middle-earth was heavily tied to Death and the fear of death, which, ironically, seems to have involved deaths and accelerated dying.
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#8 | |
Ghost Prince of Cardolan
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Incidentally, I believe the door that Baldor was found trying to open was the entrance to a temple to Sauron, or the Shadow more generally, beneath the Haunted Mountain. Whether that was the same as the Sauron-religion propagated among the Easterlings and Haradrim may also be worth a separate discussion: "To them Sauron was both king and god; and they feared him exceedingly".
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Laconic Loreman
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#10 | |
Overshadowed Eagle
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If so, this would mean there were four players in the drama of The Broken Oath: the men of the mountains, Sauron who had corrupted them, Isildur who wanted their alliegance - and the Woses, ignored by everyone else, who carefully set their watch-stones to guard the cursed caverns which the Oathbreakers still haunted. hS |
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Blossom of Dwimordene
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But that brings up another player, our favourite king of Numenor. Ar-Pharazon and his men are also trapped in a deathless state, truly in punishment for desiring immortality. What does make them? Still living? Undead? Or does that depend on the state of their hroas and the connection between hroa and fea, if the spirit is still bound to the body?
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Overshadowed Eagle
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I've just glanced through the drafts given in HoME VIII, and... well, CT didn't even give them in full, so close were they to the text. The only difference is that Baldor is named by Aragorn directly, and a passing mention that even after the Paths were no longer haunted, nobody went through his stone door. What's weird is that I have a very clear memory of reading that section for the first time, and being sure that Baldor was outside a golden door. It's literally only in this thread that I've discovered it's just stone. I must be mixing it up with something, but have no idea what! hS |
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Laconic Loreman
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It seems like that would be an awful occupation, just sitting outside the entrance to a Sauron Temple to warn intruders the way is shut. In 2500 years it appears only Baldor and Brego stumbled upon it. When I read the part this last time, I can't shake out the image the old man is the bridge-keeper from Monty Python. ![]() ![]() (Edit: and actually the quote from The Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor does suggest it was a living old-man, as the end suggests enemies snuck up from behind Baldor and broke his legs. Grim!) Quote:
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#14 | |
Curmudgeonly Wordwraith
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In regards to the Dead Marshes, of course Tolkien was referring to his horrid experience in WWI seeing dead bloated soldiers staring lifelessly as they bobbed up from the murky water at the bottom of bomb craters and foxholes: "the Dead Marshes and the approaches to the Morannon owe something to Northern France after the Battle of the Somme."
What is interesting about Tolkien's ghastly reminiscence is that he married his personal horror to folktales of Welsh and Irish origin: Quote:
As far as the dead themselves, as noted they look grim, evil, noble, sad, proud, fair -- an approximation of their previous lives and personas mirrored below the foul water. They are not animate, they are reflections; although Tolkien never explained why "a fell light was in them." Tolkien also notes the Dead Marshes "owe more to William Morris and his Huns and Romans in The House of the Wolfings and The Root of the Mountains." Now, it's been decades since I read Morris, so I can't recall in what context Tolkien was referencing, but I do remember how Tolkienish it seemed (in a Rohirric sort of way), and I will always remember "the treasure of the world, the Dwarf-wrought Hauberk." Weird what one retains.
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Overshadowed Eagle
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There's a clear distinction between spirits which are actively doing Sauron's will (the Wights, the Nazgul) and those which are just 'sleeping' (the ghosts of the Marshes and Cardolan). Speculatively, the difference might be that the active set chose to serve Sauron after death, whereas the 'sleepers' were ensnared, by dying somewhere that was under his power. The Dead of Dunharrow would come somewhere in the middle - they're there willingly, so have an active 'fear' effect, but also have a way out provided to them by Isildur, so aren't utterly dominated slaves. Gorlim, too - he obeyed Sauron but repented, so while he may have been trapped, he wasn't (fully?) controlled. If we want a happy ending for Gorlim and Eilinel, we can assume that Sauron's 'sleeping' souls were released when Luthien broke his power. Ar-Pharazon and his soldiers, I don't think are undead at all. Iluvatar can put His children into stasis-like sleep - he did it to the Fathers of the Dwarves for centuries! The Numenoreans are probably in the same state. Quote:
I actually don't much like the 'snuck up behind and broke his legs' story: the text in LotR implies a supernatural explanation, with Baldor wasting away while hacking and scrabbling at the stone door under an overwhelming compulsion to get inside. The idea that he wandered in, got beat up, couldn't find the way out so just kept trying the door in front of him while he bled out is pretty dull by comparison. But if it did happen, given the swords of the Dead have no bite, it seems to imply either the Men of the Mountains were still a viable population thousands of years after their cursing (presumably each one who died left another ghost?), or that someone - the Woses? - was really determined that nobody be allowed to unlock their secrets. Or, zombies. But I feel like that might have come up while Gimli was going on about them just being spooky ghosts. hS |
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#16 | ||
Blossom of Dwimordene
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But by the same token, one of the ideas I've entertained for a while is that we don't even know if he was under an overwhelming compulsion to get in, or get out. Aragorn assumes he was going in, because he's standing there with a torch and a sense of direction. But it's equally possible that Baldor, driven half to madness and losing his way in the dark for however long, was desperate to get out of the caves and could not find the way back. Or, if not get out, then possibly get away, hide, run. All of these are well in the power of the dead spirits. We assume he was after what's behind the door, but we don't know what motivation drove him so intensely to hack at the stone as his strength failed. Do we know the contents of Baldor's vow? ROTK only says "a rash vow he spoke". If the vow was just to enter the passage, it was fulfilled, he had no reason to seek anything beyond for the vow's sake. If it was to discover the secrets of the place - perhaps, but how strong would it's force be against the dead? And besides, surely there are other places to discover secrets except for this locked door, there's no reason to die scratching at it fruitlessly when there are other options around that would fulfil the vow. So I don't think Baldor stayed there by his own choice, at least; it was not likely his vow that kept him at it.
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Laconic Loreman
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Which is the interpretation that made the most sense to me, because I think the descriptions of the landscape through the entire story are perhaps the most fascinating. The land has a "character" of its own, influenced by the people (or unknown things) who lived there. As Gandalf says to the Fellowship going through Hollin: Quote:
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Perhaps the Dead Marshes are actually trapped spirits of those killed in the battle from the 2nd Age. It's a topic I'm not at all familiar with besides some basic understanding. Could they be something like a "memory imprint" on the land? Similar to Hollin, where the memory of the Noldor still resides in the stones? Huey and G55, I agree that the quote from The Rivers and Beacon-hills of Gondor does remove a lot of the interest in the "legend" of Baldor's disappearance. Of course the Grey Company come across his remains, but the legend of what exactly happened to him remained. In any case, the essay still has yet to be published in full, so I think the full context could still be missing. It certainly has me even more excited about the new Tolkien book. ![]() Regarding Ar-Pharazon and the Numenoreans, again what happens to the fëar after dead is something not at all in my wheelhouse. I'm hoping when I read The Silmarillion again I will remember more, but until then I differ to other members. I wonder if understanding the Ringwraiths will shed some light on the Numenoreans who rebelled against the Valar? I don't think it would be the same extent as the Ringwraiths, but it might give some ideas. In Letter 246, there is the note the Witch-King had been "reduced to impotence" after his body was slain by Merry and Eowyn. The importance of Merry's blade is re-iterated in a few places. A blade enchanted with spells, specifically designed to be the "bane of Mordor." And the quote from the Lord of the Rings proper: Quote:
I believe though, the Ringwraiths spirits were binded to Sauron, or perhaps to their 9 Rings which Sauron held? I remember in my thread about the Ringwraiths, coming across the fascinating quote in Unfinished Tales: Hunt for the Ring, that Sauron issued "threats that even filled the Morgul lord with dismay." This would imply: 1. G55's hilarious point in the thread that Sauron has anger management problems 2. That Sauron, since he held the 9 rings, and was in control of the Nine's fëar, he could inflict some kind of spiritual pain/torment upon them. Otherwise, I don't know what physical threat could have "dismayed" the Witch-King?
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#18 | ||
Ghost Prince of Cardolan
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And yes the information in Rivers and beacon-hills of Gondor does somewhat spoil the mystery of the death of Baldor. The idea that his legs were broken by the inhabitants of the Dwimorberg suggests that the Men of Dunharrow still hadn't died out 2,500 years after the end of the Second Age, which seems odd.
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#19 | ||
Overshadowed Eagle
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That ties in with the way he doesn't seem to much care what his characters look like, assigning them physical traits only when they can sound properly Old English Epic (tall, bright eyes, hair like shadow following). I think he attributed the same kind of distinction to the Noldorin language-masters, who insisted Quenya was more like Primitive Quendian than Telerin was, even though Telerin kept the sounds more faithfully: they considered the nuances of grammar more significant than what it actually looked/sounded like. Struggling to remember the Morris books... Zigûr, I know there's a wood-sprite type figure in one of them (shades of Goldberry), but is there anything spooky enough to be a thematic source for any of the undead, such as the Marshes? hS |
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#20 | |
Ghost Prince of Cardolan
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That being said, while not 'spooky', one element that does come to mind is the three men, two old, one melancholy, who come to Cleveland, home of the House of the Ravens, in the opening of The Story of the Glittering Plain, seeking the "Land of Living Men" aka "The Acre of the Undying". Morris had concerns with "death and the desire for deathlessness" too, but he believed in the pursuit of a better way of being in this world, not any world to come.
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#21 |
Spirit of Mist
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Getting a bit far afield from the original topic, but years ago there was a thread arguing that Sauron was misguided (a polite lawyer term) in permitting a pockmarked and cratered field that allowed anyone to hide to exist before his front gate. This thread touched upon the imagery as well and included a debate regarding whether the desolation before the Gates reflected the battlefields of France during WWI.
I don't think that the Dead Marshes were specifically discussed. I would agree that the visions in the Dead Marshes were images and nothing more; not dead or undead. The images likely were placed there for shock and horror value by Sauron to make them even more difficult to traverse.
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#22 | |
Curmudgeonly Wordwraith
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I think the issue with the Dead Marshes is that it's not merely the land retaining remnants and vague recollections of previous inhabitants, like Hollin, for instance. Frodo was able to determine the fallen warriors' identities: "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." Yet he adds the further descriptor: "But all foul, all rotting, all dead. A fell light is in them." So, something evil and seductive draws Frodo to the pools; however, there are clearly faces of dead Elves among the fallen looking up at him. And Frodo refers to them directly: "Many faces proud and fair, and weeds in their silver hair." "Silver hair" would indicate Telerin, or more precisely Sindarin Elves. One would assume that the fëar of these Elves would have been called to the Halls of Mandos after they died in battle. I'm not sure how they would become dispossessed spirits enthralled by Sauron when these Elves died during the War of the Last Alliance, in which Sauron himself was defeated. The Dead Marshes came to claim the graves of the fallen warriors over time -- hundreds or thousands of years? So, when did this "fell light" consume these fallen warriors and reveal their visages after so many centuries? Tolkien never explained.
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#23 | |
Dead Serious
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Thing is though, we call them Men of Gondor and refer to the hinterlands south of the Mountains. And the same people still dwelt west of the Gap: the Dunlendings. The idea that there was still some remnant of the White Mountain "Deadlendings" seems very Tolkienesque. And, certainly, with the Dúnedain in Calenardhon being few, it's easy to imagine Gondorians living mostly near the Great Road and either Angrenost or Aglarond--plenty of possibility for remnants of the Mountain people to survive further up, who could have possibly still had some sort of contact with their more-assimilated kin across the White Mountains. Certainly, we know that the Dunlendings still harbour bitterness at the time of the War of the Ring toward the Rohirrim for usurping "their" land. While this could have specific reference to areas closer to Dunland (I'm thinking especially of the angle between the Adorn, which is a point of contention in Helm's day), it seems to be Calenardhon in general, and it seems more plausible to me that they'd resent the Rohirrim specifically, who are latecomers, if they still had some sort of presence in the White Mountains. I suppose they needn't be LITERAL descendants (i.e. father to son to son) of the Deadlendings. Perhaps the Curséd Ones literally died out, but whatever lands or homes they had, I doubt they were abandoned completely, and we know Gondor never occupied the area in great numbers, which to me implies a native population. We know that the Dunlendings were willing to live under Gondorian rule as a mixed population retaining some of their culture (c.f. the state of Isengard just before Saruman is given its care--is that part of the "Cirion and Eorl" section of UT?), and a better-integrated version of the same happened south of the White Mountains as Gondor reinforced itself with the men of the Mountains--i.e. cultural kin of the Dunlendings and the Deadlendings. So I can easily imagine that the Calenardhon-side of the White Mountains was (probably lightly) settled by a folk akin to the Dunlendings and Gondorian hinterlands, and these probably dwindled and thinned even as the Dúnedain did: probably never a great population there, and exposed to dangers like the Wainriders and Balchoth. When Cirion gave away that land to the Rohirrim, there were probably few enough left to think of it as "none," but the idea that there might have been a small sect that, instead of fleeing to Gondor or Isengard or Dunland holed up behind Dunharrow, seems possible. If so, maybe there was a long chain of hidden continuity with the Dead, but there needn't have been: the Paths of the Dead wouldn't have had any terror if the Dead couldn't influence the living, and the idea that the Dead might have corrupted or used some embittered near-Dunlendings driven to anger at the loss of THEIR land in the service of, as they'd see it, their own kin, to maim and kill Bregor as a sort of dark revenge ritual... well, I'm enjoying the idea.
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#24 | ||||
Overshadowed Eagle
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At least not by choice - but it's a great place to drive enemies into if they attack. Apparently both Amdir of Lorien and Ondoher of Gondor saw their soldiers driven into the marshes, as did the Wainriders. So could it be less a roadblock and more of a trap? Drive the enemy in there, and make them so spooked that they can't fight any more? And if you happen to be, I dunno, a Necromancer, you could put a spell on the entire marsh to capture some essence of the fallen to add to the trap. Quote:
![]() Accepting that this is a late source, it implies that the Dead Marshes were already marshes, and possibly already cursed. Perhaps each elf that fell seemed to open their eyes again as they sank into the water, cupping a dancing light in their hands. It would work very nicely with my 'trap' theory. The Two Towers says that "They fought on the plain for days and months at the Black Gates. But the Marshes have grown since then, swallowed up the graves; always creeping, creeping," but that doesn't mean the first Dead didn't appear during the battle itself. It just means that Sauron has somehow cursed the very water of the marsh - which is exactly what he's done to the Morgulduin. He probably gets a kick out of corrupting Ulmo's domain. Quote:
Which I can totally accept, and even find useful - but I think I'm always going to aesthetically prefer the 'myths'. Quote:
That said, it all fits very badly with "The way is shut... the Dead keep it". Whether the Old Man was a Dunlending, a Wose, or an animated corpse, if there's a whole colony still alive in the mountains, he's more than a bit of a liar. hS |
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#25 | |
Ghost Prince of Cardolan
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I have a very vague memory of Tom Shippey talking about Tolkien being arguably "too something" in his later years, but can't recall what it was! ![]() _____________ *Once Flat World |
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#26 |
Blossom of Dwimordene
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Pitching the Dead against the Undead
This is a bit of an alternate storyline question, but it occurred to me that both the dead and undead often scare the living through means that may not be scary for themselves. What would happen if the Dead of Dunharrow were to face the Nazgul? If, for instance, Aragorn's timeline and Sauron's military plan were different and the dead army met a Nazgul on its way. Dead people aren't afraid of death. Would the Nazgul therefore have less power over them, unable to inflict the same dread as they do to the living? Or more power, if they can interact more directly in the "Unseen" world?
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#27 | ||
Leaf-clad Lady
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For me, all of these examples - the Dead Marshes, the Men of Dunharrow, the Barrow-Wights, and so on - are essentially making the same point, if in different ways. It has to do with what Boro so beautifully described here: Quote:
Moreover, if we look at it through this kind of lens, the lack of a neat classification of the dead actually enhances their effect. I mean, imagine if the Barrow-Wights, the Men of Dunharrow, and the spirits in the Dead Marshes all appeared and functioned in the same way, and were instantly recognisable to the reader as essentially the same thing. I'd argue that they'd lose a great deal of the sense of mystery if there was an explicit logic to what they are and how they came to be there. Morthoron mentioned ghost stories, and I think that's relevant here, too. If a lot of these elements were influenced by folk tales of ghosts and spirits, then maybe they can be better understood as such, rather than phenomena to be conclusively explained?
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"But some stories, small, simple ones about setting out on adventures or people doing wonders, tales of miracles and monsters, have outlasted all the people who told them, and some of them have outlasted the lands in which they were created." |
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#28 |
Loremaster of Annúminas
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 2,301
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I myself am not convinced that there are "spirits" in the Dead Marshes, meaning some sort of sentience or even "life" albeit on a different plane. I think they are mere illusions, phantasms created by Sauron or simply as an effect of the evil miasma of the place.
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The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it. |
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#29 | |
Dead Serious
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Therefore, I think you've hit the nail squarely on the head: these are all parts of the literary theme. Their importance isn't in their relations to each other, but in how they each affect mortals and their fear of death. Mind you, that said, I think this does implicitly give us an answer: since the power of the Dead and Undead is each in relation to the fear of the Living, their "power" such as it is (and I think we can read Aragorn's death as a proof that fear of the dead is only real insofar as the Living cede it to them) is only over the Living: it's not as if the Nazgûl should fear death--if anything, being so stretched as they are (like Bilbo, only their pat of butter has been scraped over loaves and loaves of bread), they should welcome it: a release from torment and from Sauron. And what can the Nazgûl do to the Dead?
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I prefer history, true or feigned.
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#30 |
Spirit of Nen Lalaith
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: Meneltarma
Posts: 5,376
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There was a tidbit somewhere that basically says how Morgoth was capable of binding the dead souls of those who died in service to him and use them if he wished to do so.
(And the term 'service' is pretty loose in that regard...)
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Tuor: Yeah, it was me who broke [Morleg's] arm. With a wrench. Specifically, this wrench. I am suffering from Maeglinomaniacal Maeglinophilia. |
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#31 | ||
Overshadowed Eagle
Join Date: Nov 2017
Location: The north-west of the Old World, east of the Sea
Posts: 3,787
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There is an old hoard in a dark rock, forgotten behind doors none can unlock; that grim gate no man can pass. On the mound grows the green grass; there sheep feed and the larks soar, and the wind blows from the sea-shore. The old hoard the Night shall keep, while earth waits and the Elves sleep. I think this poem has to be about the Paths of the Dead. Aragorn's description of Baldor, just before 'keep your hoards', reads in part: Quote:
The poem seems to track the fate of a hoard of gold and jewels: made by elves in the First Age, taken by the dwarves, seized by dragons, claimed by a young warrior, and hoarded in the mountains by a king whose evil country was wiped out by an unknown enemy. That looks a lot like an amalgam. As a hobbit-poem that's about what we'd expect, and the Rohan connection makes me wonder if it was written by Merry, who we know was into lore. He could have merged what little he knew about the Paths of the Dead with the tale of Fram and Scatha, and then blended the whole thing with Bilbo's adventures (Elven treasure taken by dwarves and then dragons). But as an informative tale about the Dead of Dunharrow, I think it's probably lacking. hS
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Have you burned the ships that could bear you back again? ~Finrod: The Rock Opera |
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#32 |
Loremaster of Annúminas
Join Date: Oct 2006
Posts: 2,301
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The Hoard long predates The Lord of the Rings, and its internal echoes (not direct, but inspirational) are the hoard of Nargothrond and Mim
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The entire plot of The Lord of the Rings could be said to turn on what Sauron didn’t know, and when he didn’t know it. |
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