Anduril

[krunchyfrogg]

I just think Tom Bombadil was written into the story when Tolkien was writing more of a fairy tale than LotR eventually turned out to be.

He was never explained because, well, there is no explanation!

[nashriel]

i agree with krunchyfrogg on that one. noone knows enough about tom to decide his origin, tolkien never gave us that much information on him, and dabating it would never yield any answers. people has however done this for many decades, and no conclusion has been made. maybe intriguing, but in my oppinoin completly useless.

[ElfBane]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: quote: Originally posted by ElfBane: The lost blade of the house of Telcontur(Strider). With the fall of Gondor the blade was spirited to the Plane of Faerun by the last surviving wizard that didn't leave Middle Earth, Radaghast the Brown. Upon his arrival in Faerun he was befriended by the family Ilvastarr. Radaghast gave into their keeping the sword Anduril, to be an heirloom of their house, for as long as they fought Evil.

Spelling: Telcontar and Radagast.
Continuity: All five of the Istari, Radagast included, left Middle-Earth in one way or another. I doubt any of them would concern themselves with heirlooms of Men, except of course Saruman, especially after the fall of Sauron. And if the sword is in Faerun, that means that somewhere, Aragorn's heir is pissed about his stolen sword: It was prophesied that the line of Luthien would never fail.

[/QUOTE]What do you mean "left Middle-Earth"? All my references say that only Gandalf returned to Valinor. Saruman was disembodied and his spirit denied return. The fate of Radagast, Alatar and Pallando are, to the best I can find, undetermined.

[Aragorn1]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: That's one cool website. My mental jury is still out on whether an offspring of a Maia is considered a Maia. I'm inclined to say no, as Maia are pretty much immortal, and immortal beings cannot be born.

"COUGH"

What about elves?
They are all immortal and, apart from those "awoken" at the start of the first age, have been born.

[SixOfSpades]

Originally posted by ElfBane: What do you mean "left Middle-Earth"? All my references say that only Gandalf returned to Valinor. Saruman was disembodied and his spirit denied return. The fate of Radagast, Alatar and Pallando are, to the best I can find, undetermined.

True, I too have been unable to find any definite statement of the 'fate' of the remaining Wizards....so we must move forward on conjecture alone. The Istari were chosen for the specific mission of guiding and coordinating the Elves and Men of Middle-Earth against the threat of Sauron. (They were apparently restricted to being counselors rather than warriors of might, perhaps intended solely to counteract Sauron's guile, re. his corruption of Numenor and the Elven-Smiths of Eregion.) Once Sauron was finally overthrown and his dominion shattered, would the Istari not be free to return? Their desire to return can be shown by the fact that Gandalf did so, despite his well-documented appreciation for all sorts of Middle-Earthy things.

As for Saruman, whether his shapeless spirit wanders still over the realms of Middle-Earth, or whether he passed out through the Door of Night, will probably never be known. The same goes for Sauron, though he is more likely to have followed the latter path, to join his master Morgoth.

Originally posted by Aragorn1: What about elves? They are all immortal and, apart from those "awoken" at the start of the first age, have been born.

Ack! I am caught in error. The italicized portion is what I forgot:
"For the Elves do not die until the world dies, unless they are slain or waste in grief (and to both these seeming deaths they are subject), neither does age subdue their strength, unless one grow weary of ten thousand centuries; and dying they are gathered to the halls of Mandos in Valinor, whence they may in time return."
So, essentially, Elves not only live for many thousands of years, but those who die from sheer tedium (and perhaps all others, the text is unclear) are free to come back from the dead of their own accord. "True" death for the Elves is the Darkness Everlasting, which apparently can only occur as a result of breaking a vow sworn to Illuvatar, and means being excluded from the Second Song of the Ainur.

Still, the connotation of 'immortal' I was using was not "one who does not die," but "one who transcends life and death." This applies to the Vala and Maia--none are ever implied as coming into existence via any means other than the thought of Eru. Nor are any ever known to die: Sauron, Gandalf, and Saruman all manifested some outward semblance of self without any living physical body to support it. Gandalf, in particular, describes the reincarnation process (albeit in rather hazy detail), and Sauron is known to have had his body destroyed at least twice before his final overthrow.

[Riftmaker]

That isn't entirely true either. After the One Ring's destruction, the power of the elves also faded, and their magical abilities to have enormously long lives waned. There's even a quote of Galadriel saying that her power was waning, and it was becoming more and more difficult to keep the orcs out of her woods.

Also, the fact that Arwen becomes human when she chooses to remain and not return to Valinor is evidence of this as well.

Thus, elves are not 'immortal' in the sense that Maia are, but they do live for a long, long time.

[Sillara of the Tamari]

Actually, Arwen's becoming human is not due to the waning of the Elves. It is due to the fact that she is the daughter of Elrond Half-Elven, and she may choose to follow the mortal portion of her heritage if she likes.

As for the waning of the Elves, I have never read anywhere that it affects their lifespans. That is simply their nature. The waning of their power over the earth is a different matter. The earth itself is changing, and they have no place in the new earth. It was the power of the Elven rings which aided them in keeping back the encroaching change, and once that was lost, Middle-earth lost its charms for the Elves, particularly for a Calaquendi like Galadriel!

Sillara

[SixOfSpades]

True. The One Ring had nothing whatsoever to do with the lives of Elves or Men, but it was the linchpin for all the other Rings. So when it was destroyed, the power of the others faded as well--meaning that Galadriel was no longer able to use Nenya to preserve Lothlorien against change. The fact that Lorien would soon cease to be a stronghold of the old ways (when Elves were strong) merely hastened their desire to leave Middle-Earth to the Men who would inherit it.

The history of Middle-Earth is one of attrition and dwindling: First the Valar (except for Melkor) leave it, then the powerful Maiar (except for Sauron) leave it, then then Elves and (probably) the rest of the Maiar. The story begins with battles on the scale of Tulkas vs. Melkor, and ends on the scale of Sam Gamgee vs. Bill Ferny.

[Kestrel Daystar]

Originally posted by SixOfSpades: Sam did indeed defeat Shelob (a victory that even tops Turin vs. Glaurung, in my mind), but LotR implies that she survived, and even grew back the eye that he'd stabbed.

I had read somewhere that Shelob just crept away to die quietly in her cave?


--Kestrel--

[Riftmaker]

@ Six:

Well, initially all of the Valar left, but Melkor soon got kicked out of Valinor for being an evil jackass. So he took down the trees before he left.

Not ALL of the Maia left, Melian stayed, Sauron stayed...all of the Balrogs stayed (they are corrupt Maia spirits after all). I suppose that once the mortal races came to dominance, the "gods" felt their work was done, and left them to their devices.

@ Kestrel:

Yes, Shelob did crawl away to die in her cave. Hence why I said "she died".