# the nine ships arriving in middle earth



## John (Sep 14, 2021)

Hi
How is it That Elendil And His Fleet Where Blown Safely To Middle Earth If Amandil His Father Failed To Reach The Valar in The Udying Lands?


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## Alcuin (Sep 14, 2021)

No Man ever learned what became of Amandil and his companions. His plan was to depart Númenor as if for Middle-earth, then turn West and sail to Eldamar or (more likely) Tol Eressëa. All Elendil and his followers knew was that they left Númenor as planned, not what transpired afterwards. Had they reached Tol Eressëa, for instance, there is a strong likelihood the Elves would keep that information close, not revealing it to Elendil by the only means possible, Elendil’s stone (palantír) that was for communication between the Númenóreans and the Eldar after Ar-Gimilkhâd forbade visitors from the West.

In any event, Eru himself destroyed Númenor and changed the fashion of the world. That can be construed to mean that Eru provided the wind that carried the nine ships of the Faithful to Middle-earth.


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## Olorgando (Sep 15, 2021)

Alcuin said:


> In any event, Eru himself destroyed Númenor and changed the fashion of the world. That can be construed to mean that Eru provided the wind that carried the nine ships of the Faithful to Middle-earth.


Yes, assuming the Valar took a totally hand-off policy during Eru's direct intervention, which is plausible.
Otherwise, one would assume the wind to be provided by Manwë, as he is Súlimo "Lord of Winds".


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## Melkor (Sep 15, 2021)

Olorgando said:


> Yes, assuming the Valar took a totally hand-off policy during Eru's direct intervention, which is plausible.
> Otherwise, one would assume the wind to be provided by Manwë, as he is Súlimo "Lord of Winds".


Yeah, I was also thinking about Manwë. But I wouldn't be surprised if Ulmo take some part in this. It wouldn't be the first when he save someone from the sea (Voronwë, Elwing).


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## Hisoka Morrow (Sep 15, 2021)

Olorgando said:


> ...Yes, assuming the Valar took a totally hand-off policy during Eru's direct intervention,...


Oh yes, such powerful wind was "indirect" involve, XD


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## Olorgando (Sep 15, 2021)

Melkor said:


> Yeah, I was also thinking about Manwë. But I wouldn't be surprised if Ulmo take some part in this. It wouldn't be the first when he save someone from the sea (Voronwë, Elwing).


Well, as I mentioned above, the Valar taking a hands-off policy during Eru's direct intervention seems quite plausible.

From near the end of the Akallabêth in the published Sil:

"The Manwë upon the Mountain called upon Ilúvatar, and for that time the Valar laid down their government of Arda."
And one of the few things I believe we can all agree on is that Eru Ilúvatar did not need any assistance from anybody to do anything.

One speculation might go in the direction that after Eru had accomplished the really massive change, the making round of the world and the destruction of Númenor (almost a by-product of the former this seems, when one thinks about it), he might have given the government of Arda back to the Valar, so that some interventions say by Ulmo as you speculate might still have been possible.

Unfortunately for you all, that bit about Eru making the world round has exited my "how would the numbers be" fantasy. (I worked in business administration ... so this is something like a health warning about what follows; danger of banging heads against walls, perhaps ... 🥴)

The earth has a circumference of pretty exactly 40,000 kilometers or 24,900 miles.
That's how far apart the western and eastern tips of flat Middle-earth must have been - which must meet each other to make the world round.
How fast could this have happened? I'm skipping the speed of light: that would have killed all life on the planet.

But how about the speed of sound? That's "only" 1,235 km/h or 767 mph in air at sea level (and some minor other conditions).
That kind of sound would need a bit over 32 hours to cover the circumference of the earth. As we're assuming the two tips to be approaching each other, that would mean a bit over 16 hours. I'm assuming abrupt start and stop, as acceleration and deceleration complications are even more speculative than my already nutty assumptions, and probably land me in mathematics that I never mastered. But tsunamis in the open ocean have speed approaching those of jets - 1950's jets, that is. Say 700 km/h or 435 mph. 16 hour would mean that these tsunamis still traveled over 11,000 or almost 7,000 miles in that time. That seems to be a lot more than any distance ever calculated for Númenor to Middle-earth. Leaving no margin for Valar intervention.

'Course, Eru could have suspended all such empirical natural laws during his intervention ...


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## Hisoka Morrow (Sep 15, 2021)

Olorgando said:


> ...ell, as I mentioned above, the Valar taking a hands-off policy during Eru's direct intervention seems quite plausible.
> 
> From near the end of the Akallabêth in the published Sil:
> 
> "The Manwë upon the Mountain called upon Ilúvatar, and...


Far before the War of the Ring period, or at least the 3rd Age, bunches of "UFO-level" craftsmanship were a dime in ME, though via implication.


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## Alcuin (Sep 17, 2021)

Olorgando said:


> The earth has a circumference of pretty exactly 40,000 kilometers or 24,900 miles.
> That's how far apart the western and eastern tips of flat Middle-earth must have been - which must meet each other to make the world round.
> How fast could this have happened? I'm skipping the speed of light: that would have killed all life on the planet.
> 
> ...







It's Maa-gic!


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## Olorgando (Sep 17, 2021)

Alcuin said:


> It's Maa-gic!


You're insinuating, it appears to me, that while JRRT later on got tied up in knots about *cosmology* (The Two Trees ==> Moon & Sun), when it came to the *geology* of making a flat world round, JRRT either just would have shrugged, or would have given someone raising the question an annoyed / harried look and snapped "Eru just *can*!"? 😁


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