# Where Did We Go Wrong?



## grendel (Mar 24, 2021)

Elves in the First Age: Fingolfin pounds on the door of Angband, challenges the mightiest being in all of Arda to mano-a-mano combat, knowing full well that he almost certainly will not survive. But he gets a few hits in.

Elves in the Third Age: cover their ears when Gandalf recites the script on the Ring.

smh...


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## Elthir (Mar 25, 2021)

I bet Fingolfin would have covered his ears during the ring-read too. 

Why would he want to feel left out when everybody else is doing it?


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## Beard of Hoarfrost (Mar 25, 2021)

The power of individual elves seems to vary significantly. Feanor could create the Silmarils - even the Valar were astonished by these - but no other elf was ever that mighty a creator (not even the later Noldor who crafted the rings). 

Perhaps time away from Aman reduced their power as well (although, in another recent post, one commenter argues that Galadriel _grew_ in strength from First Age to Third).


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## Olorgando (Mar 26, 2021)

Beard of Hoarfrost said:


> The power of individual elves seems to vary significantly. Feanor could create the Silmarils - even the Valar were astonished by these - but no other elf was ever that mighty a creator (not even the later Noldor who crafted the rings).
> 
> Perhaps time away from Aman reduced their power as well (although, in another recent post, one commenter argues that Galadriel _grew_ in strength from First Age to Third).


"Power" and "strength" are always, I would think, very dicey terms of our own to use relating to the Elves, even more so Maiar (Sauron, Saruman, Gandalf ...) or Valar (Morgoth). Galadriel certainly rated very high in wisdom among those of the Noldor returning to Middle-earth to wage war on Morgoth. She then was tutored by Melian the Maia in Menegroth (and seems to have paid *much* more attention than Melian's ding-bat hubby Elwë), then had almost 6,500 years of experience of doings in Middle-earth in the Second and Third Ages. I would think her only serious competitor for wisest being in Middle-earth at the time would have been Cirdan, the odd millennium older even than she, though perhaps a bit on the sidelines in the Second and Third Ages. Forget Elrond.

If such wisdom helps to anticipate, and (not always possible) counter moves of an enemy, that does amount to a sort of power.

Sauron was not able to enhance his native power by the forging of the One Ring, quite the contrary, he had to pour more than half of his native power into it for it to be able to dominate the Three Great Elven Rings. These three, on the other hand, were forged by Celebrimbor, so if anything, Celebrimbor poured some of *his* native power into them (if we are to assume that his forgings and Sauron's were similar). So, if these Three Rings had been so enhanced, Gil-galad (and then Elrond), Cirdan (and then Gandalf), and Galadriel (only possessor of her Great Ring after Celebrimbor) would have been *enhanced* in power by their rings.

However the power of the Three Great Elven Rings manifested itself.


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## Alcuin (Mar 26, 2021)

(I meant to post this 24 hours ago, wrote it, then failed to post it. Ah, old age. But old age beats the alternative every day, and besides, it gives me the opportunity to write a little more…)

Fëanor was in the first generation of Elves born in Eldamar, the coastland of Valinor. He knew the Valar and Maiar personally and learned much from them directly. His father-in-law, Mahtan, was the closest of all the Noldor to the Vala Aulë and learned so much from him that he was given the sobriquet _Aulendur_, “Servant of Aulë” (though perhaps other Noldor were also called by this name because of their reverence for Aulë), and Fëanor also learned much of Mahtan. Fingolfin his brother was also of this first generation born in Valinor: his martial skills were so highly developed that he was able to engage in personal combat with Morgoth himself. Morgoth was greatly diminished in immediate power because of his expenditure of strength in ruling and controlling both the matter of Arda and its inhabitants, and though of course Fingolfin eventually lost, still he was able to wound Morgoth seven times, the last so severely that Morgoth went halt (i.e., was lame) ever after. 

I think their proximity to and direct communication with the Ainur (the Valar and Maiar) made the Eldar of Valinor (Eldamar) much wiser, stronger, and more knowledgeable than their Middle-earth kindred, even the Sindar of Beleriand. Hallowed by the presence of the Valar, the very land itself strengthened them, and time did not flow with the same deleterious effect as for Elves in Middle-earth. 

Círdan, by the way, either awakened or was born in Cuiviénen, as did Elu Thingol, Olwë his brother, Finwë and Ingwë. There seem to have been more Elves than a generation or two, though: enough for Morgoth to snatch a few (those that the Elves noticed went “missing”) to twist into the original Orcs, and for relations to have built up: Círdan was somehow akin to Thingol, for instance. He was at least one, perhaps two generations older than Galadriel.


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## Oromedur (Mar 26, 2021)

Alcuin said:


> (I meant to post this 24 hours ago, wrote it, then failed to post it. Ah, old age. But old age beats the alternative every day, and besides, it gives me the opportunity to write a little more…)
> 
> Fëanor was in the first generation of Elves born in Eldamar, the coastland of Valinor. He knew the Valar and Maiar personally and learned much from them directly. His father-in-law, Mahtan, was the closest of all the Noldor to the Vala Aulë and learned so much from him that he was given the sobriquet _Aulendur_, “Servant of Aulë” (though perhaps other Noldor were also called by this name because of their reverence for Aulë), and Fëanor also learned much of Mahtan. Fingolfin his brother was also of this first generation born in Valinor: his martial skills were so highly developed that he was able to engage in personal combat with Morgoth himself. Morgoth was greatly diminished in immediate power because of his expenditure of strength in ruling and controlling both the matter of Arda and its inhabitants, and though of course Fingolfin eventually lost, still he was able to wound Morgoth seven times, the last so severely that Morgoth went halt (i.e., was lame) ever after.
> 
> ...


I was reading Children of Hurin today and thinking a lot about Beleg Cuthalion. I think he was very likely one of the originals, awakened at Cuivienen. Made his needless death at the hands of Turin the churl even more of a sickener.


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## Elthir (Mar 27, 2021)

Crossing the Grinding Ice:

" . . . for they were a mighty people, the elder children undying of Eru Iluvatar, but new-come from the Blessed Realm, and not yet weary with the weariness of Earth . . ."

The Etyangoldi:

"The Noldor, outnumbered and taken at unawares, were yet swiftly victorious; for the light of Aman was not yet dimmed in their eyes, and they were strong and swift, and deadly in anger, and their swords were long and terrible."

Poetic as these are, I think there's an implied measure of power here -- related to being "new-come" from Aman and "younger" -- which could translate into strength/endurance in martial prowess. I like that the Sindar even called the Noldor* Lechind* "Flame-eyed".

Okay I love it rather.

And I know/think that Master *Grendel* wasn't being wholly serious with his comparison above, but I also love how attuned the Elves are to language . . .

. . . remember, *Glorfindel* was at the ring-read too


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