The White Council

Re: Way off the mark.

Tolkien and Inklings Discussion

: : Actually, the Rohirrim sound more like the Roman army from : : before the 1st century BCE reforms. The Riders of Rohan : : assembled pretty quickly, and being mounted fought and were : : organized in a very different fashion from the Zulus.

: : It's doubtful Tolkien knew much about the Zulus. We do know : : he studied the classics and read them in the original Latin. : : So his knowledge of Roman history and traditions was far more : : extensive than his knowledge of Zulu culture could be.

: Tolkien was born in South Africa, he may have had more than a : passing interest in its history and peoples in later life as a : result. The Zulu War had a big impact on British popular : culture (Rorke's Drift, Isandhlwana, Ulundi etc.) in the period : when Tolkien was a boy, I would be surprised if he was not : aware of Rider Haggard's Zulu adventure stories (relatively : well researched).

Tolkien almost never expressed any interest in South Africa, except in one letter to Christopher (who was stationed there at the time as a member of the RAF during WWII). He describes it as a hot, dry, parched country and recalls that his mother hated it, though he did wistfully say he'd like to visit it again.

Nonetheless, he never speaks of the Zulus or discusses their history. They have no connection to his scholarly interests whatsoever.

: : You're still not being clear to me. Tolkien did not give a : : detailed accounting of Denethor's forces. What numbers we : : have are obviously incomplete.

: If you can find a single Gonorian force, in TWOTR, of any : description whose numbers appear to be greater than 10,000 I : would be surprised. There is no evidence for large numbers of : Gondorian troops.

I have given examples. There is a great deal of evidence for large numbers of Gondorian troops.

: : : Yes but I would imagine that only a part of these forces : : : would have been from the standing army.

: : With no real reason to do so, however. It's possible that : : there were a mixture of forces, but Tolkien never mentions : : militia. We know that some regions of Gondor sent what : : appear to be "irregulars": the fisherfolk from the Ethir, and : : the long line of men from the Langstrand. But that says : : nothing concerning who stayed behind to defend hearth and : : home.

: The forces of the Southern Fiefs are in no way described as if : they were regular troops. All the evidence points to them : being the followers of the regional lords or a regional militia : of some description. Other than Faramir who is described as a : captain (probably implying "Captain General" or some such : title) none of the leaders of Gondorian troops is described by : a military rank ; neither are the troops described as being in : military units, no regiments, cohorts, brigades or such like : are evident (excepting only the Tower Guard).

There is no evidence suggesting the troops which march to Minas Tirith are the personal followings of regional lords. And all the leaders of Denethor's council (as well as Boromir) are referred to as captains.

And Tolkien speaks of companies in many places, if military terminology is required. Beregond is a member of the Third Company of the Citadel.

: : : This is still rather small and fits fairly well with my : : : earlier estimates of army and total population size. That : : : is, by your own estimation, 7,000 would be the maximum : : : number of professional troops in or around MT at the : : : time...

: : Incorrect. I said around 10,000. : : Including the 3,000 southerners (which you state you did, see : above)that would mean 7,000 professional soldiers. I was : working from your figures.

I did not give a breakdown. I pointed out that Faramir had at least 3,000 men at the caueway forts. I also said there were probably around 10,000 men in the area of Minas Tirith when the attack began, but that excludes all previous losses and the force of unknown strength (increased by around 300 rangers sent there by Faramir) at Cair Andros.

: That implies a population of around 100,000 men in the : vicinity. Hence, Minas Tirith and its supporting lands may : have had a population as high as 500,000 people or more.

No, 10,000 soldiers implies an immense population well beyond 100,000 people in the city. More likely from 250,000 to 500,000 people.

: Nothing of the sort, the standing forces of Gondor would have : been recruited nationally.

Where they would have been recruited has nothing to do with where they were stationed. Denethor was responsible for all of Gondor (with the apparent exception of Belfalas).

: : : ...If you presume that Anorien and the city itself provided : : : some semi- or non-professional troops like the southerners : : : did, this reduces the numbers of standing troops even : : : more...

: : I have no reason to make such an assumption, however. The texts give none.

: The south provides such troops, see my reasoning above, : therefore it seems likely that the north (MT and Anorien) : would have similar duties.

Your reasoning, however, is based upon unsubstantiated assumptions. The texts do not support this viewpoint.

: : : ...Say for arguments sake that these areas provided 2,000 : : : levy-troops, this reduces the standing force to 5,000...

: : It would reduce the force to 8,000.

: Not if you included the 3,000 Southerners in the original : figure. Which is what I did.

There were fewer than 3,000 reinforcements in the city, but if we're going to look for levies from the outlands, these are them. That leaves around 7-8,000 troops already stationed in and near Minas Tirith at the time the siege began (and doesn't account for losses or other troops stationed elsewhere).

: : You're not allowing for losses in previous battles. Gondor's : : army was not being called up in a time of emergency. A state : : of war had existed at least since 2954. Sauron attacked : : Osgiliath in June, 3018. The Battle of the Pelennor Fields : : occured in March 3019.

: Each year would provide a new cadre of maturing young men to : provide new recruits. As long as the state's finances were : relatively sound attritional minor warfare would not decrease : the overall numbers of troops available. NB you don't have to : pay the wages of a dead man, therefore you can afford to : replace him.

You're assuming these guys were just called up, however, and there is nothing in the books to suggest this. Gondor's soldiers were well equipped (at least as well-equipped as the Rohirrim, who got much of their armor from Gondor) and well-trained. It takes time to raise and train an army, and Denethor's army had many concerns.

: : 300 for Aragorn? He brought men in 50 large ships and many : : smaller vessels. He probably lost far more than 300. And : : again you're not taking into account previous losses.

: Prevous losses in the south have no bearing on the losses and : overall numbers of his forces once in the area of MT.

I was not referring to losses in the south.

: : Aragorn probably brought several thousand men north -- let's : : say 5,000+ just to be HIGHLY conservative.

: You suggested 2,000 for the number of men brought north - as a : minimum - I worked on that figure. If he had a larger force : his losses might heve been proportionally larger.

No, I cited 2,000 as the number of men Aragorn contributed to the force sent against Mordor. I said nothing about the size of the force he brought from the south, although it would have to have been larger than 2,000.

: : : For the expedition this gives 1,500 for Aragorn's force, : : : 3,500 for Imrahil and 2,000 for Eomer - 7,000.

: : : Back at Minas Tirith would be 4,500 of the original : : : Gondorian force , 200 from Aragorn's, 3,000 Rohirrim and : : : Angbor's 4,000. Giving a grand total of 11,700 which would : : : be marginally more than the original force.

: : Way too small.

: We are dealing in an environment where 3,000 men was a : considerable force.

[snip comparison of Napolean's armies to the Free People's]

No, we're dealing in an environment where 30,000 men was a considerable force. 3,000 men was considered too few to accomplish anything. Gondor's numbers add up very quickly: 8,000+ in Minas Tirith, 2700+ reinforcements, Angbor's 4,000+, Aragorn's 5,000+, the implied 27-30,000 who could have been sent to Minas Tirith but were not (we must subtract Angbor and Aragorn's forces from that number).

Gondor had a lot of soldiers. Mordor simply had more.

: : : We still seem to be pitting 11,000, standing Gondorian : : : troops, 6,000 Rohirrim and perhaps 35,000 semi-professional : : : and amateur troops against Mordor's host. Though at a : : : grand total of 52,000 troops of all descriptions this fits : : : relatively well with your 3 to 1 ratio :)

: : I'm not pitting 11,000 standing troops, let alone 35,000 : : SEMI-professional and amateur troops against Mordor. The : : vast majority of the Gondorian soldiery are either described : : as professionals or not described at all. You're heaping : : unwarranted assumption atop unwarranted assumption here and : : your conclusion is unsupportable.

: It could be argued that (other than the Tower Guard) it would : be difficult to point a finger at a demonstrably professional : soldier in the whole of LOTR. The King's or Steward's shilling : is nowhere to be seen.

All of the Riders of Rohan are demonstrably professional soldiers, Aragorn's rangers of Eriador are probably professional soldiers, Prince Imrahil's knights and 700 men-at-arms are probably professional soldiers, the 500 archers from Blackroot Vale are probably professional soldiers, Faramir's 300 rangers appear to be professional soldiers, Forlong's long line of "well-armed" men from Lossarnach are probably professional soldiers....

The list goes on. There are many occurances of well-armed, well-organized, well-led soldiers in the story far beyond the companies of the citadel.

: : Gondor was a strong nation. It had a large population. It : : more than likely had a large standing army, probaly on the : : order of 30-40,000 soldiers at the time of the War of the : : Ring. Whether it relied much upon militia forces cannot be : : determined, but very few examples of such forces can be : : found: precisely 2 examples, for that matter, are all that : : CAN be found.

: Where is any evidence for such an inflated number for Gondor's : standing forces?...

What, exactly, is inflated? You proceed from the assumption that Gondor is feudal -- we've discussed this in the past and you cannot prove the feudalism. We both agree (I think) that a stronger argument for feudalism applies to Arnor (which was no longer around).

: ...The southerners cannot be examples of standing forces for : the very reason that you do not need to mobilise a standing : army from scratch, by definition it is always in a state of : readiness for war.

Where is it said these troops were suddenly called up, mobilized from scratch? Why would ordinary farmers and fisherfolk have weapons and armor lying around the homestead?

Most of what we see in Gondor is its army, not its people. We are told by Tolkien that Gondor is still a very well-populated country despite its decline.