Magic Daggers

[Alcuin]

My son & I had a discussion Friday evening about the Morgul-blade and the barrow-blade. This discussion arose from the thread about Gandalf and the Witch-King.

The Morgul-blade caused Frodo, (a hobbit, but for this purposes of this discussion,) a living man, to move into the wraith world.

We think the barrow-blade caused the Lord of the Nazgûl, a wraith, to effectively move back into the living world, where he could be killed once and for all.

My weasel-word is “effectively,” and that’s what I’m going to fall back on if you beat me up on “moving back into the living world.” Besides, I am afraid I missed that lecture on Morgul spells – too much miruvor the night before – and I’m still a little shaky on the metaphysics of the wraith world; but I hope to bone up on the subject shortly. (I’m just doing the readings, though. I’m not going to those labs!)

The basic argument is this. Éowyn cut off Angmar’s head. She can’t do that unless he is (1) accessible to her strike, and (2) vulnerable to her weapon. In other words, first she’s got to be able to hit him, and then she’s got to be able to hurt him. (Peter Jackson’s Éowyn drives her sword into the Nazgûl’s face, but I don’t believe that’s what Tolkien describes.)

I’m going to get out of the way in a moment (this is my first thread, and I’m so excited!), but I want to be sure I made that clear. According to the phrase, “breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will,” before Merry stabs him with the barrow-blade, the Witch-King either can’t be hit at all, or he can’t be hurt even if he is hit, or both. (And yes, I did just restate the previous paragraph. I hope it was clarification.)

Let me leave you two more observations that might be useful.

First, the Witch-King’s invulnerability before getting hit with the barrow-blade could be because he is a wraith, and he doesn’t have physical flesh and bone to hit. However, you should also consider that the Witch-King’s Ring of Power –whether he’s wearing it or Sauron has physical possession of it – has the property of making him invulnerable to being hit or injured.

Second, none of the Nazgûl want to face Glorfindel. The 6 not swept away were dismayed by him at the Bruinen, and the Witch-King fled from him at Fornost. Is that because he could see them and hurt them (power “against both the Seen and the Unseen”)? If you think the “can’t hit him, can’t hurt him” position isn’t correct, arguing that Glorfindel (or Gandalf) could hit him anytime, anywhere, is a good out.

Now, here’s the point. Are the barrow-blades a kind of counter weapon to Morgul blades, and might the Dúnedain have made them after bitter experience with the Morgul blades? Please don’t argue that the Witch-King’s Morgul knife is a one-off weapon, because Aragorn, Glorfindel, Gandalf, and Elrond are all familiar with Morgul knives: they’ve seen them before, they know what they are, they know what they do, and they know how they do it. Aragorn even knows a little field medicine first-aid incantation to help Frodo. Both the barrow-blade and the Morgul-blade burn away after use, leaving just the hilt.

BTW, my son suggested that the Dúnedain probably made nine barrow-blades, one against each of the Nazgûl. After all, he observed, what good would it be to just have four blades and get four Ringwraiths? You’d still have the other five roaming around, and they’d be really mad.

[Maciliel]

Congratulations on your first post Alcuin! Unfortunately I don't have my books at hand to check the passage--were the barrow blades necessarily made by the Dunedain? Couldn't they be more ancient Elvish blades that had been somehow been sequestered there? Or hoarded there by the barrow wights? For some reason I always thought they were Elvish blades from an earlier age, but I don't really know what I'm basing this on.

[Alvin Eriol]

Originally Posted by Maciliel

Congratulations on your first post Alcuin! Unfortunately I don't have my books at hand to check the passage--were the barrow blades necessarily made by the Dunedain? Couldn't they be more ancient Elvish blades that had been somehow been sequestered there? Or hoarded there by the barrow wights? For some reason I always thought they were Elvish blades from an earlier age, but I don't really know what I'm basing this on.

So passed the sword of the Barrow-Downs, work of Westernesse. But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-KIngdom when the Dunedain were young, and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorceror king.
- LOTR, "The Battle of the Pelennor Fields"

Maybe the smiths of Arnor inherited lore obtained from the Noldor in the happy early years of Numenor, and/or were instructed by Elrond's smiths (refugees from Eregion?). But the swords clearly were made by Men of Arnor.

[Attalus]

Alvin E. beat me to it. Alcuin, perhaps you could search for an earlier thread where we went after it, hammer and tongs, about who precisely killed the Witch-King, Eowyn or Merry. I was firmly on the "Eowyn gets the kill, with an assist to Merry" side, basing my argument on the very passage that you quote: "breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will." As a medical person, a close study of the phrase persuaded me that the result of Merry's strike was not breaking the W-K's invulnerability, but paralysing him. After Merry's stroke, his mace-stroke went askew and his head bowed, both indications that he was no longer in control of his limbs (and head). Eowyn drove her sword into his unseen neck, as I read it, a fatal wound whether or not it decapitated him. His Undead body was then and only then separated from his spirit, and went wailing away on the wind, back to Sauron who held his Ring, but impotent. As for the Spirit World vs. Middle-earth, I am convinced that the Ringwraiths were firmly in the Wraith-World, only being able to interact with Middle-earth through the artefacts their Master gave them, their horses("he puts horses to evil uses"), cloaks, and perhaps their swords and knives.

[Kirinki54]

The quote from Alvin continues:

So passed the sword of the Barrow-downs, work of Westernesse. But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-kingdom when the Dúnedain were young, and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorcerer king. No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter, cleaving the undead flesh, breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.

While it is unclear just how Merry obtained this information, I have always held that it means "this blade and this blade alone had the abilities to make the WK vulnerable, and it was done deliberately by an individual who desired to get to the WK and none other".

But interestingly, Tolkien wrote (in Letter 210 in which he commented on alterations in a planned film):

There is no fight. Sam does not 'sink his blade into the Ringwraith's thigh', nor does his thrust save Frodo's life. (If he had, the result would have been much the same as in III 117-20:* the Wraith would have fallen down and the sword would have been destroyed.) (* note 4. The slaying of the Lord of the Nazgûl by Éowyn. )

Does this not indicate that perhaps all four daggers from the barrow were of the same "calibre"? And if four, why not more?

[Attalus]

I have seen this quote, before, Kirinki, and agree that this contradicts the Canon in the quote that begins "No other blade..." I reconcile it in my mind to say that the other three would have had similar results, but Merry's blade was especially potent in speed, or painfulness. Given the hit or miss nature of magic, I suppose that one of the last Kings of Arthedain might have commissioned these blades as special means of ending the Witch-King of Angmar's reign of terror, and that was why they were all in the same Barrow? Or that the Barrow-Wight, one of the W-K's minions, collected them to hide them.?

[Alcuin]

When they received them in “Fog on the Barrow-Downs”, the hobbits were told the origin of the 4 blades by Tom Bombadil:

For each of the hobbits he [Bombadil] chose a dagger, long, leaf-shaped, and keen, of marvellous workmanship, damasked with serpent-forms in red and gold. They gleamed as he drew them from their black sheaths, wrought of some strange metal, light and strong, and set with many fiery stones. Whether by some virtue in these sheaths or because of the spell that lay on the mound, the blades seemed untouched by time, unrusted, sharp, glittering in the sun.

‘Old knives are log enough as swords for hobbit-people,’ he said. ‘Sharp blades are good to have, if Shire-folk go walking, east, north, south, or far away into dark and danger.’ Then he told them that these blades were forged many long years ago by Men of Westernesse: they were foes of the Dark Lord, but they were overcome by the evil king of Carn Dûm in the Land of Angmar.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The debate on exactly who killed the Witch-King is old and the subject of many threads. Maybe that’s pertinent, but my only assertion here is that Tolkien is describing a decapitation: Merry cut him in the back of the knee; the Witch-King fell, apparently to his hands and knees; and Éowyn drove her sword between his crown and mantle [outer cloak].

But suddenly he too stumbled forward with a cry of bitter pain, and his stroke went wide, driving into the ground. Merry's sword had stabbed him from behind, shearing through the black mantle, and passing up beneath the hauberk had pierced the sinew behind his mighty knee.

'Éowyn! Éowyn!' cried Merry. Then tottering, struggling up, with her last strength she drove her sword between crown and mantle, as the great shoulders bowed before her. The sword broke sparkling into many shards. The crown rolled away with a clang. Éowyn fell forward upon her fallen foe But lo! the mantle and hauberk were empty.

The W-K is not dead immediately after Merry stabbed him. He does what any mortal man or other two-legged creature would do when stabbed in the knee: he fell down; and that’s what Kirinki54 cites Tolkien as saying should happen in Letter 210. I’ve already admitted I skipped the class on Morgul-spells, and maybe there’s one for “hopping around in battle on one leg while still in agonizing pain with lightning shooting through your head and knee,” but I think the guy did what you and I would do: fall down and holler.

He's striking at Éowyn when Merry stabs him, leaving him surprised and suddenly one-legged, off-balance, and the natural thing to do is hit the ground on all fours, hands and knees. Think about a real person like one of us in this situation. He has no control over the bad knee: it goes down. He was moving forward in a strike, and he topples over, “stumbles forward.” Where do his hands go? On the ground if he wants his face out of the dirt. Maybe he still has the good knee up in a crouch – that would be really painful, because all the weight would now be on the injured knee (Get out of your chair and try it!) - but he’s still on all fours on the ground. So far the W-K is still intact: badly injured physically, but in one piece.

Éowyn gets up. She probably hears Merry calling to her. She’s really hurt, too: her left arm (her “shield-arm”) is broken. That’s what maces are used for: breaking bones through armor, and that’s why noblemen used them in battle from ancient Egypt through the Wars of the Roses. She’s got one good arm and her sword in her hand. She sees her enemy kneeling with his head out, because ole’ Angmar wore his crown today, and she can see it. What a target! She’s a shieldmaiden of Rohan, bred among men of war, and she knows what to do and how to take advantage of it.

She hits him. The sword breaks. (“…all blades perish which pierce that dreadful King.” That sure sounds like the W-K’s been hit before, and other blades have been known to perish, too.) The crown rolls away, so his head is now on its own. His clothes are empty, too, so now he’s on his own. And the last we head hear of him, he’s off screaming into the Eternal Night.

Now, it took two, Merry and Éowyn, to kill the Witch-King, but Éowyn delivered the final blow. Aragorn says as much and pays her homage in the Houses of Healing. His words also reflect a considerable knowledge of the Black Breath, from which the people of Arnor must have suffered considerable casualties in their centuries of warfare with Angmar:

'I have, maybe, the power to heal her body, and to recall her from the dark valley. But to what she will awake: hope, or forgetfulness, or despair, I do not know. And if to despair, then she will die, unless other healing comes which I cannot bring. Alas! for her deeds have set her among the queens of great renown.'

[inked]

I'm with Attalus and Alvin Eriol on this. The blades were the ones taken out of the barrow-downs, but this could mean that others of the 9 manufactured were there. Or, it could be that only 4 of the 9 had been captured and sequestered. Perhaps some of the Rangers had them as heirlooms?

Another case of the hand of ERU at work. There is not an indication in the text that any who took the the daggers had any understanding of their potency. If Tom Bombadil gave the "special" one to Merry, it cannot be due to Tom's sense of its importance, IMHO. After all, the Ring itself he treated as a bauble. Yet, Tom did take the items out of the barrow and even chose some himself.

Am I the only one who hears a heavenly voice proclaiming in deed if not word, "all things work together for good to those that are the called"...?

[SandMan]

I don't remember JRRT saying anywhere that the W-K must be killed with a specific weapon (allthough i could be wrong), so i don't think that the fact that he was stabed by a barrow-blade was of much importance. I know, the "No other weapon..." thing could sugest that, but i believe that the wound received from Merry only distracted him (painfull as it was), without being critical. The Naz'guls were sometimes "wounded" (i don't know how else to say that),remember the "all blades shatter when hiting them" (not quoting) part, but never so bad as the W-K was by Eowyn (what's worse, being stabed in the knee or being decapitated ?). What i'm trying to say is that, in my opinion, Merry' s blade counts only as a distraction; the main thing is the "No man can kill me"/ "I am no man" stuff (again, not qouting). From that perspective, Eowyn could of killed him with a butter-knife or a pan , as long she's "no man".

[Coconut Ent]

Witch-King: If you strike me down, I will become even more powerful than you can ever imagine!





All right... just one question. Why would the Dunedain of Arnor do something so silly as to BURY such potent weapons when they might have come in useful in battle? The blades were found in a tomb of a Cardolan prince, so Fornost must be still standing at the time, and Angmar was still making war. Burying the only effective weapons against the Witch King is silly.

I think there were probably a lot more of such blades, such that they could spare a few to honour a dead prince's burial. Perhaps there were dozens of such blades, arming a special "Get the Witch King!" force.

[Alvin Eriol]

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

Witch-King: If you strike me down, I will become even more powerful than you can ever imagine!





All right... just one question. Why would the Dunedain of Arnor do something so silly as to BURY such potent weapons when they might have come in useful in battle? The blades were found in a tomb of a Cardolan prince, so Fornost must be still standing at the time, and Angmar was still making war. Burying the only effective weapons against the Witch King is silly.

I think there were probably a lot more of such blades, such that they could spare a few to honour a dead prince's burial. Perhaps there were dozens of such blades, arming a special "Get the Witch King!" force.

My thoughts exactly, Coco-Ent! I was going to review the dates and reply thusly myself. The Prince of Cardolan was said to have fallen in TA1409. The Battle of Fornost took place in TA 1975. Where did this idea come from that the swords found in the mound were all there ever were? Or that there were exactly nine and no more? And if Cardolan could spare three, how many more surely must Arthedain have manufactured, unless somehow -- highly unlikely IMHO -- this was a secret only known in Cardolan? Apparently these spells were not so arduous or demanding of scarce resources that a fair number of them could not be produced, but as it happens only the ones in the barrow were preserved and available for the hobbits. While these were probably good blades, I don't get the impression they were of remotely the same class as, say, Glamdring or Durthang or Narsil -- or Sting. A number of princes and elite soldiers could presumably have been so equipped.

Given that it was stated that neither flood nor Legolas' arrows (though made in Lorien) could take out a Ringwraith, and the statement from the text cited earlier, only a weapon specially endowed with this mysterious Ringwraithicide could have "[broken] the spell that knit [the Black Captain's] unseen sinews to his will."

Another thought occurs: it would seem that in order to make a sword especially for killing Ringwraiths, one would have to be aware one was facing a Ringwraith, and I don't get the impression the forces or Arthedain necessarily knew so. The Wise, however, probably did know, or strongly suspect. So I go back to an earlier point I raised: could Elrond and the smiths of Imladris (possibly refugees from Eregion) have advised on how to manufacture them? Maybe even Saruman, Maia of Aule, student of the extant Ring-lore, and mighty craftsman, still a "good guy" at that time, might have developed the method and taught it to the human smiths of Arnor.

As for "If you strike me down, I will become even more powerful than you can ever imagine!" wouldn't that be what Gandalf would have told him at the Gate of Minas Tirith? Or better yet: that's what G could have told the Balrog at the bridge. (and it turned out to be true!)

[Alcuin]

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

Why would the Dunedain of Arnor do something so silly as to BURY such potent weapons when they might have come in useful in battle?

Good question. The Dwarves buried Thorin at Erebor with Orcrist, the back-up sword to Glamdring, which Gandalf carried and had been made either in Gondolin for Turgon or perhaps brought out of Aman by Turgon. (Turin’s Black Sword was also one of a pair.) It is curious, because the Dúnedain had been passing down weapons for some time: Aranrúth was Thingol’s sword, carried by the Kings of Númenor; Dramborleg, Tuor’s Axe (is it “Axe” or “Ax”, Maciliel?), was kept until lost in the Akallabêth; not to mention Narsil, which seems to have been an heirloom of the Lords of Andúnië. Surely the early Númenórean Exiles would have buried the Shards of Narsil with Elendil at Halifirien if they had been following this practice all along? Perhaps it somehow reflects a darkening of the old kingdom of Arnor, or perhaps it was serendipity, one of those “accidents” that later work to good?

Originally Posted by Alvin Eriol

Where did this idea come from that the swords found in the mound were all there ever were? Or that there were exactly nine and no more?

My son’s comment that it would make no sense to have only four, since there were nine Nazgûl. It was just an observation on his part, not an assertion; I thought it was sharp (!), so I added it to my post.

Originally Posted by Alvin Eriol

Another thought occurs: it would seem that in order to make a sword especially for killing Ringwraiths, one would have to be aware one was facing a Ringwraith, and I don't get the impression the forces or Arthedain necessarily knew so.

Originally Posted by Alvin Eriol

If the Dúnedain did not figure it out for themselves, their allies in Rivendell, Lindon, and Lórien would no doubt have informed them: there was too much at stake. The Dúnedain must have encountered them during the War of the Last Alliance, and knew the warning signs. But once they realized what they were dealing with, a Ringwraith on the battlefield would be hard to miss. Terror seems to have accompanied them whether they would or no. Think of the old Gaffer, of Maggot and his dogs and geese, of Fredegar Bolger who couldn’t even see or hear them, of Harry at the Westgate, and of Merry on his walk alone in Bree. In all these cases, just being near a Ringwraith was bothersome. In Unfinished Tales, “The Hunt for the Ring”, Tolkien remarks

Yet this weakness [the Ringwraiths] had … : for so great was the terror that went them (even invisible and unclad) that their coming forth might soon be perceived ...

Still, you may be right, or else lore was waning dangerously fast in Gondor, because Boromir does not seem to have recognized the Black Captain for what he was at the Council of Elrond, even though he’d been Minas Tirith’s neighbor for a millennium, and Boromir's kinsfolk in Arnor had dealt with him for long before that:

Some said that it could be seen, like a great black horseman, a dark shadow under the moon. Wherever he came a madness filled our foes, but fear fell on our boldest, so that horse and man gave way and fled.

Originally Posted by Alvin Eriol

And if Cardolan could spare three, how many more surely must Arthedain have manufactured, unless somehow -- highly unlikely IMHO -- this was a secret only known in Cardolan? Apparently these spells were not so arduous or demanding of scarce resources that a fair number of them could not be produced, but as it happens only the ones in the barrow were preserved and available for the hobbits. While these were probably good blades, I don't get the impression they were of remotely the same class as, say, Glamdring or Durthang or Narsil -- or Sting.

It sure sounds like making them was a pain:

But glad would he have been to know its fate who wrought it slowly long ago in the North-Kingdom with then Dúnedain were young, and chief among their foes was the dread realm of Angmar and its sorcerer king.

Possibly there were many of these blades. I am inclined to agree with my son: there should have been at least nine of them, but that’s my opinion, and I can’t back it up except to say that it strikes me as both logical and pleasing, neither of which is sufficient in such an exacting forum. It doesn’t rule out scores of them. From their hesitation at Weathertop, I think the Nazgûl probably knew what they were, and that might indicate more of them.

Glamdring and Narsil and Sting might all have been superior in make, but without new and improved Ringwraithicide (Darn! The manufacturer’s label clearly says, “Kills Wraith on Contact”. Aack!), such weapons might have left the King of Angmar and his 8 pals intact, although SandMan seems to disagree. I suspect you are correct in that combatants had hit them before and lost weapons. The shortcoming of “normal” weapons, even of other magical manufacture, is one of the things I am asking about in this thread.

Another part of my question is this: how are these barrow-blades like the Morgul-blades? Aren’t they both used to cross between the living world and the wraith world?

[inked]

I see I have inadverdently fallen into the heresy of only 9 blades in my reply. There were undoubtedly many such blades manufactured. We only know the history of 4.

[Attalus]

We know little about the Morgul-blade, except that Gandalf seems to know about them and their purpose, so that was almost certainly not the only one made. Like the Ring, it seems to have had some form of sentience and ablity to move, as the shard left in Frodo that Elrond removed was said to be "working inward." It was stated further that if the W-King's aim had been better, or if Frodo had not resisted, and the blade struck his heart, he would have become a wraith "like they were, but weaker and under thier control." This does not need to be some instantaneous transformation, because a blow to the heart with an edged weapon like this is generally instantly fatal, so that would liberate the victim's soul. The spell in the blade would then bind the victim's soul to make it unable to pass onto the next world, a powerful spell, indeed. This is a different kind of weapon that the Barrow-blades, IMHO, as their sole purpose, other than as a general combat weapon, was to strike this seemingly rather specific spell that knit the Nazgul's undead sinews to their wills.

[Alcuin]

Attalus, it need not be sentient to be moving. Bee stings move inward, too, because they’re barbed, although Tolkien admittedly never says the Morgul knife was barbed. (It was “notched”.) That the splinter drove toward the heart was by design; no doubt heat-seeking missiles would appear sentient to our forefathers, not to mention computers. Even so, Frodo was “fading”, whatever that means, and because he was “fading” he was slipping into the wraith world. Once he was completely in the wraith world, not even Elrond would be able to help him. (Tolkien never says what would have become of Frodo at that point, or how Elrond, Aragorn, and Gandalf would have handled the situation. I don’t imagine that the results would have been pleasant for what was left of Frodo.)

I think Tolkien reuses the Morgul knife motif when Merry wounds the Witch-King with the barrow-blade. Instead of moving the target from the living world to the wraith world, I think the barrow-blade moves the target from the wraith world back toward the living world. If that’s true, then the two knives represent two versions of the same “magic” action, one malevolent, the other essentially benevolent.

[inked]

Excellent observations and considerations, Alcuin. I had not thought of the face and obverse aspects of these blades and spells.

[Attalus]

Originally Posted by Alcuin

Attalus, it need not be sentient to be moving. Bee stings move inward, too, because they’re barbed, although Tolkien admittedly never says the Morgul knife was barbed. (It was “notched”.) That the splinter drove toward the heart was by design; no doubt heat-seeking missiles would appear sentient to our forefathers, not to mention computers. [/font]

*shrugs* Certainly both were magical weapons, and they both concerned the Wraith-world. I just don't think you can view them as opposite sides of the same coin. Though I will admit that they served opposite sides.

[Coconut Ent]

Still, you may be right, or else lore was waning dangerously fast in Gondor, because Boromir does not seem to have recognized the Black Captain for what he was at the Council of Elrond, even though he’d been Minas Tirith’s neighbor for a millennium, and Boromir's kinsfolk in Arnor had dealt with him for long before that:
Quote:
Some said that it could be seen, like a great black horseman, a dark shadow under the moon. Wherever he came a madness filled our foes, but fear fell on our boldest, so that horse and man gave way and fled.

Lore must be waning fast among the Northern Dunedain as well, for when Boromir described the new Dark Captain, Aragorn didn't jump up and say, "I KNOW WHO THAT IS!"

... and neither did Elrond. Odd.

On the other hand, when Aragorn met the Hobbits at Bree, he seemed to know that the Nine Riders were terrible foes. Which meant that he knew.

Maybe they didn't want to scare Boromir. Not that Boromir would ever admit being scared. He does like to blow his own horn.

Excellent observations and considerations, Alcuin. I had not thought of the face and obverse aspects of these blades and spells.

I hadn't thought of that either. Can it be that the Barrow-blades were "reverse-engineered" from captured Morgul-blades, but using good magic for reverse effects?


Edit:
One more thing... if a Wringwraith got stabbed with a Morgul blade, what would happen to him? Let's say, the W-K accidentally dropped the knife on his foot.

Edit:
One more thing... it was asked previously, but I never got a satisfactory answer: would Narsil and Glamdring survive whacking a Nazgul?

[Alcuin]

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

Can it be that the Barrow-blades were "reverse-engineered" from captured Morgul-blades, but using good magic for reverse effects?

Something like that, but I don’t think we can push it too hard. I do think they must be in some way related. Attalus seems to disagree, but he can speak for himself. For myself, I am more interested in how the two daggers operate in the story.

It struck me that the two items work in opposite directions. It has a very nice literary balance, too: Nazgûl strikes hobbit in Book I, hobbit strikes Nazgûl in Book V.

I am not aware of any "magic dagger" parallels in medieval or ancient literature, though. Loki fashions a dart from mistletoe to kill Baldur when all other creatures have sworn not to hurt him; there are poisoned daggers and enchanted swords galore; but this is the only occasion of a “magic dagger” that transports its victim from one world to another that I can recall.

Of course, that rather begs the question of what the barrow-blade does to the Witch-King. There is no consensus on that! I suppose I am asking this:

If the Morgul-knife makes Frodo fade and move into the wraith world, does “breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will” mean that the Ringwraith has been dragged partway back into the living world where he can be injured like any other thing in the living world? I suspect he can’t survive in the living world, only in the wraith world. It doesn’t quite fit the “spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.” But the literary balance, the repeated knife motif, along with concepts of fading and the wraith-world, the fact that they occur in roughly opposite ends of the story (end of Book I and nearly the end of Book V, roughly 1/6 of the way from either end) all lead me to think that there is something going on here inside the story.

There are another set of connections. The attack on Frodo takes place at the ruined tower of Amon Sûl, where Elendil met Gil-galad before the march to Mordor, and where Angmar killed Arveleg I in the war of 1409. Amon Sûl was one of the major strong points of Arnor. The War of 1409 is the one in which the last Prince of Cardolan died, presumably the man buried in the barrow in which the daggers were found. The death of the Witch-King takes place in the fields before Minas Anor, one of the strong points of old Gondor (and not its original capital) right after the Witch-King has broken down the gates of the city.

Without looking too silly (Hey, I’m anonymous on this forum. I could dance the watootsi with a basket of fruit on my head!), let me sketch out a simplistic Witch-King odyssey:

1. Take over Rhudaur à kill Arveleg I à destroy Amon Sûl (pass through the gate) à Fornost falls, Arnor collapses
2. Take over Minas Ithil à kill Eärnur à ride though the gate of Minas Anor/Tirith à what comes next?

Call me foolish, but that looks like a modus operandi to me. Get a base of operations, kill the ruler, take out the major fortress, knock out the capital, and the kingdom falls. (OK, so it does look like every conquest since the Hittites!) To boot, Angmar’s control of Rhudaur was probably no better than his control of Ithilien: there were almost certainly Dúnedain operating behind his lines there, too.

But Merry’s dagger (or one much like it) was probably at Amon Sûl 1610 years earlier: that’s where Frodo was stabbed with what is effectively an anti-barrow-blade (that’s my weasel-word, “effectively”; but ugh! anti-barrow-blade is such an ugly turn of phrase!); and finally Merry, witness to the assault on Weathertop and bearer of said barrow-blade, delivers the punch that somebody – maybe even the late lamented Prince of Cardolan – missed before. That makes a very pretty little loop, and I think the only thing that’s really missing is proof (something by Tolkien) that the barrow-blade was at Weathertop in 1409. Better yet, the blade was in a barrow infested with a barrow-wight originally sent there by Angmar himself and stirred up by him in time for Frodo and his friends. (According to “The Hunt for the Ring” in Unfinished Tales, Tolkien’s notes on the movement of the Nazgûl in Eriador show the Witch-King operating out of Andrath, a narrow defile and perhaps a deserted town between the Barrow Downs and the South Downs.)

One last little twist: it was during the reign of Arveleg I’s grandfather, Malvegil, that hobbits began to settle around Bree. (Later some of the Stoors of Eriador – including perhaps Gollum’s ancestors, though that is never made explicit – went back East over the mountains.) Now perhaps we can think again about how the Witch-King failed to realize that Shire was between the confluence of the Baranduin and the Lhûn. These little people just were not important. They were half his size. They weren’t strong, they couldn’t put up a fight: they were not significant. Even if any had been at Amon Sûl, they were of no import. The hobbit archers sent to Fornost to fight in 1974 were insignificant. And neither was one silly halfling crawling around in the mud in front of Minas Tirith …

At least, that makes sense to me. And I’ll readily admit I’m stretching in some places; okay, several places. Feel free to whale away at them! (But I still got my basket of fruit, and the music is hoppin’!)

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

Lore must be waning fast among the Northern Dunedain as well, for when Boromir described the new Dark Captain, Aragorn didn't jump up and say, "I KNOW WHO THAT IS!"

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

... and neither did Elrond. Odd.

Michael Martinez has a new piece posted on this forum in which he says (tongue-in-cheek) he doesn't care for Boromir. If everyone else at the Council who was "in the know" knew (Elrond, his sons, the Eldar, and Aragorn - basically what was left of the old alliance of Arnor and the elves, along with Gandalf, who also remained strangely silent on that point), perhaps they were silent because it was not the topic of debate, which concerned the disposition of the Ring. On the other hand, maybe the Rivendell crowd didn't care for Boromir, either, and left him to Aragorn. ("Elladan, what do you think of Boromir?" "Man, Elrohir, that dude's a piece of work!" "How d'ya think Aragorn will handle him? Ya’ know his ancestor was the leader of the faction that rejected Arvedui’s claim to Gondor’s throne. I'll bet that guy wants to be king himself!" "No sweat, man! Did you see him talking to Dad? He sat through the whole morning with us and never figured out what crossed the Bridge at Osgiliath!")

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

One more thing... if a Wringwraith got stabbed with a Morgul blade, what would happen to him? Let's say, the W-K accidentally dropped the knife on his foot.

This is a family post. Can you say club-hoppin' Daytona spring break? (But what's he use for fruit?)

Originally Posted by Coconut Ent

One more thing... it was asked previously, but I never got a satisfactory answer: would Narsil and Glamdring survive whacking a Nazgul?

My answer is yes but only in memory, which for the elves is evergreen. (Chlink! sparkle, sparkle!) Others may hold a different view of the outcome. (Crinch! Crunch!)

[Coconut Ent]

Alcuin, your style reminds me of Alvin Eriol and Attalus. And yes, I get those two mixed up sometimes. Now there's third.

I can just imagine you guys going for a drink.

(Unless all three are the same person posting under different names? I've done that sometimes.)