Tolkien related video's.

Im so sorry Forest, but when you said square dance...…………………



I cant look at that the same now.

I didn't realize the elves were so...um...buxom. 4:45

chris63 wrote:

The duel of Fingolfin and Morgoth was a legendary battle in Tolkien’s legendarium, and this video brings that battle and the fall of High King Fingolfin to life!

Fairest of all the Children of Ilúvatar, no?

Endowed with both grace and... poise.

this is an interesting article about the Stone of Erech: https://middle-earth.xenite.org/what-is-the-black-stone-of-erech/

I had forgotten that Isildur brought it from Numenor. I have to admit the idea doesn't make much sense: If you are fleeing by ship in secret, the last thing you'd do is slip a 50-100 ton stone on board. No rock is worth that trouble.

{{ I enjoy those vids, and learned something new! I had no idea Tolkien ever fully explained the corpse the Grey Company had discovered clawing at the door, let alone that his legs were broken and he was left to slowly die in darkness and fear, adn there was a Temple or Shrine on the other side of the door. I had made the obvious connection to the Rohirrim Prince, but no idea it has been so definitively confirmed and explained.

Do our own Lore Masters whom I trust from long acquaintance more care to comment on this aspect to confirm or deny it for me? }}}}

Very well structured piece. The the only thing new (to me at least) was the comparison of the ages of middle earth to Roman historian's ages of man, but I enjoyed it in large part due to the clarity that led to putting Sam's star as the final thought. Tolkien may have been a pessimist, but he expected rather than accepted defeat. He saw the stars beyond the shadow.

That was pretty good for the most part, but I'm honestly baffled that they refused to acknowledge (much less discuss) the religious nature of Tolkien's beliefs. It's a pretty glaring omission when you jump from spending the better part of 15 minutes talking about what a pessimist Tolkien was to say "but he thought something was causing good events to occur" without bothering to explain what that something was. This has to be a deliberate omission because they quote Tolkien's comment about history being a "long defeat", but exclude the first part of the sentence where he states that his reason for believing that is because "I am a Christian, and indeed a Roman Catholic" (Letters, no. 195).

I remember seeing that video and not taking the time to watch it, assuming that there'd be some spin on it I'd have to bother with working out. Thanks for doing the work for the rest of us there.

This has to be a deliberate omission- Eldo

{{It is- it comes up in the vids comments and they reply to it there- basically the guy who wrote the piece said he didn't want to address it directly but to infer the rebellious nature of it, just as Tolkien himself left it to be inferred by the reader rather than slapping the reader round the face with his religious beliefs.
Not sure in a vid on this topic if thats entirely fair. Kind of seems a big part of it to leave to suggestion, no matter how circumspect Tolkien himself might have been about making it front and centre. }}

Ah, thanks for the additional info. I'm afraid I make a point of generally not reading YouTube comments.

Like, as a non-Christian reader of Tolkien, I sometimes get annoyed at people who insist on interpreting his work exclusively through a Christian lens, but if you're gonna talk about this particular subject you kinda have to address it. They discuss eucatastrophe in the video but it's an inherently religious idea; you can't understand Tolkien's intentions if you try to separate it from his personal views on his faith because that's literally how he defined it. They quote from "On Fairy-Stories" where Tolkien discusses eucatastrophe in terms of grace ... but don't acknowledge that the passage they quote is referring to a religious concept.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_in_Christianity

I felt the religious connection was so obvious that I wasn't bothered by the omission, but I totally agree that for the general viewer it's almost criminal to ignore it.  To give them credit the topic is danced around in exactly the way Tolkien does it, with the implied mysticism intact.

The Barrow Wights one made me feel we never got enough history about the North Kingdoms.

Lots of stuff there about earlier history of Mirkwood I wasn't aware of.