Posted: March 13, 2000 at 13:05:22: by Michael Martinez
: : Well, everyone has their own mental picture, but Frodo
: : received the One Ring when he was 33, and the other hobbits
: : were all pretty young compared to him. They hit the road for
: :Rivendell when Frodo turned 50.: Frodo was 33 but, as Hobbits were longer lived than ordinary
: humans and matured later, he appeared to be about 20-ish.
: Hobbits "came of age" at 33 and, when Tolkien was writing,
: people were considered to have "come of age" at 21. His
: possession of the ring for the next 17 years will have slowed
: down (or stopped) his ageing so, at 50 years of age, he should
: look rather like a 21 year old human. Well apart from being 3
: foot tall with hairy feet (and 'slightly pointed and elvish
: ears'?). [snip] Tolkien never said that Hobbits mature at a later age than Men. This is a purely fannish extrapolation (which I myself have fed with some analysis of genealogies). The Hobbits (at least the aristocracy) of the Shire were actually living about as long as the Dunedain at the end of the Third Age, although they didn't retain their youthly vigor for nearly as long. Sam was born in SR 1380, so he was about 38 when he set out on the trip to Rivendell. Meriadoc was 2 years younger than Sam, and Pippin was born SR 1390 (he was 29 when he met Bergil in Minas Tirith, so his birthday must have been early in the year).
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