VV Sinclair | Updates

How is Rivendell considered a strong power?

VV Sinclair — Sat, 24 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Elrond’s house per se was no doubt perfect, whether you liked food or sleep or story-telling or singing (or reading), or just sitting and thinking…

But Rivendell itself was a significant, powerful, populated, well-organized and fortified elven refuge and stronghold, founded in SA 1697 that endured nearly 5000 years against Sauron and multiple sieges by Angmar.

In SA 3431, the Last Alliance armies of Gil-galad and Elendil gathered in Rivendell prior to crossing the Misty Mountains to besiege Mordor. Elrond muses about it at his eponymous Council:

"I remember well the splendour of their banners... It recalled to me the glory of the Elder Days and the hosts of Beleriand, so many great princes and captains were assembled. And yet not so many, nor so fair, as when Thangorodrim was broken..."

The total army size of the Alliance has been estimated at 100-150k fighters here. Some (Oropher, Celeborn, Durin VI, et al.) did join on the east side of the Misty Mountains, so conservatively assume the number assembled at Rivendell was half that, 50-75k. Add to that an unspecified number of support personnel. Assuming a “tooth to tail” ratio of 2:1, that’s at least another 25k people.

Inferable is the sufficient quartering economy of Rivendell to feed and support an army of that magnitude for years (SA 3431–3434). Another reasonable inference might be the household’s confidence it could do so in a way that would not decrease the war-waging capabilities of the Alliance while they waited.

I imagine the elf menu probably consisted exclusively of lembas…

This all sounds like at least few thousand troops to me, maintained over 5000 years, perpetually in need of decent quartering, training, repair of fortifications, with a military chain of command, lembas and miruvor production, engineering, weapons production, accurate maps, contingencies, roads, etc.

To me Rivendell seems a sophisticated, well-ordered city, capable of effectively projecting military force all over Eriador, mounting fierce defenses against superior numbers and extended sieges, and the wherewithal to quarter tens of thousands of troops for years in a pinch, (albeit in Elrond’s rather bucolic and pastoral style).

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Why didn't Sauron create more Nazgul using the Dwarven Rings that he recaptured?

VV Sinclair — Sat, 24 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Originally published on Quora.com

Sauron did! But the person of interest hadn’t turned–yet! It takes a while: 550 years to be precise!

The Mouth of Sauron was said to have entered Mordorian service when Reconstruction began in 2951 TA, as a budding member of its State Dept. If he indeed bore Thrór’s Ring from around 2846, that would make him about 150 at that time, having sported his Ring about a century, long enough for his friends and family to begin to envy and ostracize him, resenting and fearing his apparent perpetual youth and chiseled good looks (just throwing that in)…

…Too much of a good thing…

For comparison, Gollum bore the One from his bloody birthday party in 2463 TA (when he was 33, same age Frodo was when he inherited it) until 2941, when Bilbo (ahem) won it: 478 years, likely right at the edge of wraithdom, far longer than the Mouth. So long, in fact, he’d forgotten HIS own name…

Why wasn’t this one of the other two dwarven Rings instead? Answer: because he’d be a Ringwraith already, unless Sauron just happened to recover and distribute one of those Rings around the same time he got Thrór’s. Possible, but more likely Sauron wanted to use Thrór’s Ring for a very special purpose: the destruction of the House of Durin the Deathless!

The Mouth’s apparent affinity for Longbeard geopolitics is telling in this context, drawing upon Glóin’s report at the Council of Elrond.

"…about a year ago a messenger came to Dáin… from Mordor: a horseman in the night. The Lord Sauron the Great…wished for our friendship… Rings he would give for it, such as he gave of old… three rings that the Dwarf sires possessed of old shall be returned to you, and the realm of Moria shall be yours for ever… Do you refuse?

At that his breath came like the hiss of snakes, and all who stood by shuddered…"

Although not mentioned by name, this emissary must have been none other than the Mouth of Sauron, high in the secret counsels of Barad-dûr, deep in the Mordor power structure. And lying through his teeth, because he himself had the Ring of Thrór! Sauron perceived the Mouth, wearing Thrór’s Ring, had over time inculcated some fundamental natural ability for dealing with dwarven matters (including Khuzdul fluency?), and would be perfect for his overall Longbeard Solution. But not so unemployable in relations with actual mortals that his mere presence (like an actual full-blown Nazgûl) would cause irrational fear and flight response.

Whoever he was, breath hissing like snakes, he was clearly experiencing the early respiratory benefits from his new fitness regimen he was learning in Naz-schoôl…

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If Sauron was a Maia and a great craftsman, why did he ask Celebrimbor to forge the nineteen Rings of Power?

VV Sinclair — Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Originally published on Quora.com.

Sauron always played the long con. Celebrimbor was just his mark, a useful idiot.

The Lord of Gift’s goal was nothing short of the utter destruction of the Noldor, their kingdoms and heritage in Middle-Earth, and the complete alienation of the Eldar from the Edain, and both the Eldar and Edain from the Valar, even if it took millennia to accomplish.

The Year 1200…

In 1200 SA, the Númenoreans really began flexing their maritime might, permanently colonizing ME, building on their extensive plans to deforest Eriador begun under Tar-Aldarian the Imperialist… er, Mariner. Accelerated fëanorification of the Noldor diaspora would have seemed completely justified from a purely political vantage in the council chambers of Lindon and Ost.

And oh yeah! 1200 SA just coincidentally happens to be the time Annatar (aka Sauron), honey-tongued Emissary of the Valar demurely shows up at Ost’s new triumphal arch, volunteering to help solidify the Noldor political aims in ME, immediately promoted to a 33rd degree Gwaith master. Annatar makes such a galant impression upon the Eregionians that Celebrimbor and Galadriel make the necessary formal introductions to the court of cousin High King Gil-galad and is inserted into Lindon’s summer debutante season as an eligible bachelor.

Galadriel and Celeborn remain in Eregion for 150 years, side by side with Annatar Lord of Gifts, with the Gwaith, living out Celebrimbor’s neo-fëanorian fantasy before they’d finally exclave to Lórien: not because they suspected Annatar, but because they wanted to extend the geopolitical footprint of the Noldor-Longbeard alliance in response to the return of the Edain to ME.

150 tantalizing years, during which Rings of Power were discussed, ideated, planned, debugged, QA’ed, and assayed…

Think Sauron and Galadriel never collaborated?

The only explicit thing we know for sure happened as a result of that interaction is not the expulsion of Annatar, not the forging of the Elven Rings, but that the Noldor basically took action to double the size of their territory on either side of the Misty Mountains, bringing the Sindar back into the fold.

Around 1500 SA, 150 years after Galadriel emigrates, the Great Rings of Power were finally forged. Warning flags finally went off in Celebrimbor’s thick skull, and the Gwaith spawn off a skunkworks to secretly create the Three Elven Rings. Annatar gets “kicked out” of Eregion, but really that was the culmination of his thousand-year con.

Celebrimbor was just Sauron’s way to get at the Edain, to subtly engineer the complete demise of the Three Houses, who were logistically and geographically inaccessible in Númenor until their inevitable arrogance would bring them back into the ME fold, falling right into Sauron’s clutches.

If the weak and irrelevant Noldor got in the way, so much the better…

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