# Corrupted Eagles?



## childoferu (Sep 6, 2009)

Elves - Orcs
Men - Black Numenoreans, Easterlings, Southrons
Ents - Trolls

Eagles - Winged Steeds of the Nazgul?

It was an idea that kinda just popped in my head, anyone care to discuss...


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## Ithrynluin (Sep 6, 2009)

I don't know...my gut feeling is to say no. For some reason, I don't think Melkor was able to capture eagles, because they were so powerful and elusive. Sauron still less. I can theoretically imagine the agents of Melkor raiding eagles' eyries and stealing chicks, it certainly wouldn't be beyond him, but I think their nests were too high up and inaccessible, and I don't think Melkor had that many winged servants before Ancalagon & co., else he would probably have espied the location of Gondolin from above. Incidentally, the eagles roosted in the peaks of the Crissaegrim, which was basically the location of Gondor.


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## YayGollum (Sep 7, 2009)

I have seen the guess before, and I have no problems with it. They sounded like giant vultures, to myself, which is not too far from eagles. I was not a large fan of what they looked like in those movies. There are plenty of methods via which anybody could obtain some giant eagles to corrupt. It is not so unbelievable. Sure, they were supposedly superly awesome, but I mostly see them as superly obedient and, therefore, predictable. 

Anyways, a better list:

The horrible elves ---> awesome Orcs ---> Goblins ---> Hobgoblins ---> Nasssty hobbitses, who grew an immunity to evil after a bunch of evolution
Ents ---> Trolls and mayhaps Giants
Humans ---> None of the humans you mentioned were corrupted in the sense that these others were. They were merely recruited to assist evil. Olog-Hai and Uruk-Hai make sense, though.
Giant Eagles ---> Those Vulturey Nazgul Thingies
Dwarves ---> Nothing, because they're too awesome to corrupt.


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## Bucky (Sep 11, 2009)

The first problem with the theory of Morgoth corrupting Eagles is that it never appears in his writings that Tolkien intended for The Silmarillion, whereas Orcs, whether from Men or Elves, does. Also the Olog-hai & Trolls in general are both stated in TLOR as having the source of their origins.

Then, the ancient Eagles had spirits sent into them from Manwe - how is that noble spirit going to be corrupted against it's will?
Ruined perhaps outwardly like Elves captured at Angband, but not changed in the 600 or less years into Orcs either. Look at Gwindor in the Turin tale. A mere shell of himself, but an Elf none-the-less. And, 600 years is all Morgoth would've had to ruin a higher 'spiritual' being in these Eagles. Not possible.

Finally, as in most cases, the books CAN actually give us the answer:

ROTK, Battle of the Pelannor Fields:

'it was a winged creature; If bird, then greater than all birds, and it was naked, and neither quill nor feather did it bear, and it's vast pinions were as webs of hide between horned fingers; and it stank (Sounds like a few former co-workers of mine).'

Note this part: 
'A creature of an older world maybe it was, whose kind, lingering in forgotten mountains cold beneath the Moon, outstayed their day, and in hideous eyrie bred this last untimely brood, apt to evil. And the Dark Lord took it, and nursed it with fell meats, until it grew beyond the measure of all other things that fly; and he gave it to his servant to be his steed.'



The Silmarillion, 'Of The Beginning Of Days':

'nonetheless the evil of Melkor and the blight of his hatred flowed out thence (from Utumno) and the Spring of Arda was marred. Green things fell sick and rotted, and rivers choked with weeds and slime, and fens were made, rank and poisonous, the breeding place of flies; and forests grew dark and perilous, the haunts of fear; and beasts became monsters of horn and ivory and dyed the earth with blood.' - sounds an awful lot like Tolkien describing what scientists today call 'prehistoric times', no?


Then:

The Two Towers, 'The White Rider':

Gandalf: "Far, far below the deepest delvings of the Dwarves, the world is gnawed by nameless things. Even Sauron knows them not. They are older than he. Now I have walked there, but I will bring no report to darken the light of day." - Note: This IS a mountain Gandalf is referring to.


Finally:

The Letters Of JRR Tolkien #211:

Q: Did the Witch-king ride a pterodactyl at the siege of Gondor?

A: Yes and no. I did not intend the steed of the Witch-King to be what is now called a 'pterodactyl', and is often drawn (with rather less shadowy evidence than lies behind many monsters of the new and fascinating semi-scientific mythology of 'Prehistoric - me: lol). But obviously it is _pterodactylic _ and owes much to the new mythology, and it's descrription even provides a sort of way in which it could be the last survivor of older geological eras.



I had no idea what letter #211 would say, just recalled that there was something in the Letters about a 'pterodactyl'......


So, the winged steed is an 'ancient evil' (nameless thing) from the time of Melkor's evil preverting Middle-earth. Not a one on one perversion like with Glaurung, but a massive outpouring of the much mightier, just came to Arda, Melkor who could 'rear up the Towers of Mist to hinder Orome's ridings' and who's mere pressence in Utumno spread forth & perverted, water, plants and animals alike.

These winged steeds were obviously part of the perversion - from eagles, perhaps, indeed, probably. But not 'taken by Morgoth and perverted' like he did Men and/or Elves into Orcs or Glaurung into the first dragon.

It just happened as a residue of Melkor's evil dripping out of the area around Utumno; no 'hands on project'. 

Edit: And, might I add, long before Manwe sent 'spirits' to live in the eagles that lived in Crissaegrim and/or Thangorodrim.


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## Prince of Cats (Sep 13, 2009)

Bucky as becomingly helpful and thorough as ever


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## The Tall Hobbit (Sep 14, 2009)

Ithrynluin said:


> ...I don't think Melkor had that many winged servants before Ancalagon & co...


Well, He did have the Balrogs.



(Sorry, couldn't resist.)


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## YayGollum (Sep 16, 2009)

Also, there were the sickening vampires, pathetic messengers, not like the sickeningly popular vampires with the ever-accumulating warehouses of powerses. Hmph. I don't like vampires, but I'll stick with the classical sorts.


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