The War of the Ring (47 page)

Appendix A (II) it is said that Eomund, chief Marshal of the Mark, was slain in the year 3002 in pursuit of Orcs on the borders of the Emyn Muil.

21. Old English fyrgen, firgen 'mountain', the word fyrgen-holt

'mountain-wood' occurs in Beowulf, line 1393. - Afterwards, when the Firien had become the Dwimorberg and the Firienholt the Dimholt, the Firienfeld remained (RK p. 67).

22. This name undoubtedly begins with An, and the word preceding it is almost certainly 'in'; equally certainly it is this same name that appears below, as the land of the prince Benrodir. The remaining letters of the name are uninterpretable as they stand, but their vague shapes do not exclude 'Anarion', and this name, found on the First Map (VII.309) of the region south of Minas Tirith, appears in the notes E on p. 243: 'A fleet has put out...

and sailed up the Anduin and reached Anarion' (see further p. 244).

23. This lacuna is where the page is torn across, cutting through a line of text. It might perhaps be read, but very uncertainly, as

'from the vale of Morthond and his ... sons, dark-haired, grey-eyed'.

24. Nosdiligand: the second and third letters of this name are not perfectly clear, but can hardly be other than os. Without striking through the first syllable my father wrote another form above, apparently Northiligand.

25. The illegible words might just possibly be 'fugitives' and 'representing'.

26. My father called it a 'catalogue': pp. 229, 263.

27. These messages, distinct of course from those just referred to, must have been sent from Isengard or Helm's Deep.

28. The illegible word might possibly be 'morn(ing)'.

29. It is not clear whether 'Reach battle Feb. 15' refers to the Ents or to the Rohirrim; but in any case the Ents were certainly present after the siege of Minas Tirith was relieved ('Elves and Ents drive Orcs back'; cf. also outline II $4 'Elves of Lorien and Ents come from North', and similarly outline III $4). Thus the original idea that 'tree-giants' (see VI.410), or Treebeard (see VII.211, 214), played a part in the breaking of the siege survived at least in the idea that Ents were present in the last stage of the war in the South, though this would never receive narrative form. See further pp. 343, 345-6, 361.

30. Cf. the notes given in VII.448: 'Probably Eowyn should die to avenge or save Theoden.' These notes contain also the suggestion that the mutual love of Eowyn and Aragorn should be removed.

31. This is the date given in the time-scheme D (p. 182); see the Note on Chronology following.

32. The last two letters of this name might be read as du, sc. Mordu.

33. With this cf. the outline 'The Story Foreseen from Fangorn'

(VII.438): 'Then return to Frodo. Make him look out into impenetrable night. Then use phial ... By its light he sees the forces of deliverance approach and the dark host go out to meet them'; also p. 230 in this book.

34. Cf. the outline given in VII.448: 'They pass by round Lorien'

(on the homeward journey), with the later addition (VII.451

note 18): 'No. They learn (in Rivendell?) that Nazgul razed Lorien ...'

35. Old English haliern (halig-ern or -aern) 'holy place, sanctuary'.

Cf. my father's note on Dunharrow in the Guide to the Names in The Lord of the Rings (A Tolkien Compass, ed. Lobdell, p. 183):

'Dunharrow. A modernisation of Rohan Dunhaerg "the heathen fane on the hillside", so-called because this refuge of the Rohirrim at the head of Harrowdale was on the site of a sacred place of the old inhabitants (now the Dead Men). The element haerg can be modernised in English because it remains an element in place-names, notably Harrow (on the Hill).'

36. Outline II was written on the same thin yellowish paper as was used for text H of 'The Muster of Rohan' and text C of 'Minas Tirith' (the two pages in the 'midget type'). This paper was also used for the time-schemes C, D, and S. See note 38.

37. On my father's later large-scale map of Rohan, Gondor and Mordor (on which my map published in RK was based) the distance from Edoras to Dunharrow (at the head of Harrowdale) is 16 miles and from Edoras to the Starkhorn 19 miles.

38. Outline IV was written on the same paper as that referred to in note 36.

39. Pelennor: see p. 277.

40. Galdor was preceded by Ealdor.

41. In outlines I, II and III it is said that Theoden and Eowyn (who is not mentioned here) 'slew' or 'killed' or 'destroyed' the King of the Nazgul.

42. Frodo's vision of a ship with black sails and a banner bearing the emblem of a white tree (FR p. 379) was added afterwards to the text of 'The Mirror of Galadriel'.

Note on the map accompanying outline VI.

This map, drawn fairly rapidly in pencil (with the rivers in blue crayon), covers the White Mountains and the lands to the south of them; it is laid out like the First Map in squares of 2 cm. side. In my redrawing I have numbered the uppermost horizontal line of squares 09-14 according to the First Map, although there is some discrepancy, and continued this numbering throughout, where the discrepancy becomes much greater. This is done deliberately in order to emphasize the curiously anomalous nature of this map among my father's later maps to The Lord of the Rings. Comparison with the First Map (VII.309, 319) and those published in LR will show substantial shifts in the geographical relations: thus Ethir Anduin is further to the east, directly south of Rauros, and the Havens of Umbar are shown as much less far to the south, and east of Tolfalas. On no other map is this so.

I strongly suspect that (for whatever reason) my father made this map from memory, and that it played no further part in the geographical evolution; and I think that its starting-point and primary purpose was to depict the region (pencilled more heavily than other parts of the map) between Harrowdale and the source of Morthond: with the emergence of the story that Aragorn passed through the Mountains into Gondor the map of The Lord of the Rings needed to be altered to show that there was no pass in this region (see note 14

above). It will be seen that the southern rivers have been substantially changed, though by no means reaching the final form: Morthond of the First Map is now named Ringlo, while the new Morthond flows east into the delta of Anduin. Erech is marked, south of the rising of Morthond, as is also Pelargir on Anduin (neither of which is mentioned in any of these outlines).(*) Harrowdale is shown running south-east, as on the little map reproduced on p. 258.

The map as squared out on the page extended through five vertical lines of squares east of Osgiliath (cf. VII.309), but these were apparently left blank. Subsequently my father attached a moveable portion covering O13 - 14, P13-15, and at the same time very roughly drew in the outlines of the mountains encircling Mordor, which here form more nearly a complete wall on the east than on any other map.

The Dark Tower is shown as standing on a 'peninsula' thrust out southwards from the Ash Mountains, with Mount Doom to the north-west of it, very much as on the Second Map as originally drawn, (* Pelargir was first placed at the top of the delta of Anduin. On the First Map (VII.309) a pencilled dot within a circle was placed beside Anduin at the point where rivers flow in from east and west on R13: this is obviously Pelargir, and was no doubt entered at this time. Another pencilled dot within a circle was put in to the east of the original Morthond on First Map Q12 (just to the right of the i of Enedwaith), and this is evidently Erech.) (The White Mountains and South Gondor.)

pp. 435, 438. I have not attempted to redraw this added portion, for the pass into Mordor (here called Kirith Gorgor) was apparently moved eastwards from the position in which it was first drawn, resulting in a confusion of lines that I cannot interpret; and Osgiliath was now moved a good way to the north, so that it lies north-east of Minas Tirith (as is shown on the Second Map, p. 434, and on my large-scale map of Rohan, Gondor and Mordor published in RK, but not on my general map accompanying LR). On this attached portion the Dead Marshes are named, but not the Nomenlands; the rapids in Anduin are still called Sarn Ruin. The course of Anduin below Rauros was changed on the new P14 to flow as it does on the First Map (see VII.319) in a wide easterly curve, not in a straight line south-east (and thus the mouths of Entwash had to be shifted to the east). This supports my suggestion that the present map was drawn from memory: in this one area it was corrected by reference to the First Map.

Note on the Chronology.

(i) Pippin and Frodo see the Full Moon.

It would be interesting to know just what was the 'most awkward error in the synchronization... of movements of Frodo and the others'

that arrested the progress of The Lord of the Rings in October 1944

(see p. 234). It seems to me most likely to have been their relative

'positions' at the time of the Full Moon on 6 February.

I think it is clear that the time-schemes C, D, and S belong with the work set out in this chapter, and indeed that they were closely associated with the chronological problem that my father had encountered: see pp. 141 - 2, 234 - 5. In scheme C (p. 140) Gandalf and Pippin came to Minas Tirith at sunset on Feb. 5. They had left Dol Baran on the night of Feb. 3-4, passed Feb. 4 'in hiding' (presumably at Edoras), ridden through the night of Feb. 4 - 5, and then after a short rest had

'abandoned secrecy' and ridden all through the next day (Feb. 5) to reach the city at sunset. It seems likely that the original brief narrative opening (A) of 'Minas Tirith', in which as they rode 'still the world of grey and green rushed by and the sun rose and sank', was associated with this scheme, and that it was abandoned because my father decided that Gandalf did not in fact ride by day (see pp. 231 - 2). In the pencilled continuation of that opening (p. 231) the new story had entered: it is night, two days since Pippin 'saw the sun glinting on the roof of the king's great house', and the 'third riding', thus the night of Feb. 5 - 6. They see the beacons and the westbound messengers, but the moon is not mentioned; and it is obvious that in this story they will arrive at the wall of the Pelennor in the morning (Feb. 6). This is the story in scheme D (p. 141), except that there the beacons and the messengers are seen on the second night of the ride (Feb. 4 - 5). In that scheme the Full Moon 'rises about 9.20 p.m. and sets about 6.30 a.m.

on Feb. 7. Gandalf rides all night of 5 - 6 and sights Minas Tirith at dawn on 6th.'

It was a datum of Frodo's journey that he came before the Black Gate at dawn of Feb. 5, leaving at nightfall; and he was in Ithilien (the episode of the stewed rabbit) and was taken by Faramir to Henneth Annun on Feb. 6 (the night of Full Moon, which Frodo saw in the small hours of Feb. 7 setting over Mindolluin). In my father's letter of 16 October 1944 he said that among the alterations made to resolve

'the dislocated chronology' he had increased the journey from the Morannon by a day; this alteration was made to scheme D, and was present in scheme S as first written (see pp. 141-2). But the alteration was made by pushing Frodo's journey back by a day, so that he came before the Morannon on Feb. 4; he still comes to Henneth Annun on the 6th. Therefore, when he looked out from the Window of the West and saw the moon setting, Gandalf and Pippin were already in Minas Tirith; the time-schemes are explicit (and it was presumably on this basis that in outline III, p. 259, Pippin in Minas Tirith on the evening of the 6th 'sees the full moon rising and wonders where Frodo is'; similarly in outline V, p. 262, and also in the outline given in the next chapter, p. 276).

In the second draft (B) of the opening of 'Minas Tirith' (p. 232) Pippin on the night of Feb. 5( - 6) saw the full moon rising out of the eastern shadows as he rode with Gandalf; and in the third draft (C, in

'midget type', p. 233) Pippin wonders where Frodo might be, 'little thinking that Frodo on that same night saw from afar the white snows under the moon.' Surely my father's intention here was to relate Pippin's thought to Frodo's at Henneth Annun (as in RK); but there was a day out. Was this the chronological problem?

On the face of it, apparently not; for the modifications made to the chronology did not correct it. On the other hand, that my father was concerned with precisely this question is seen from an isolated page of notes on diverse subjects, one of which casts some very cloudy light on the matter:

Whole of Frodo's and Sam's adventures must be set back one day, so that Frodo sees moon-set on morning (early hours) of Feb. 6, and Faramir reaches Minas Tirith on night of the 7th, and Great Darkness begins on 7th. (This can be done by making Frodo and Sam only wander 4 days in the Emyn Muil.) The next night Frodo would see from far away the full moon set beyond Gondor and wonder where he was in the mists of the West, and the war-beacons would be hid from him in the darkness of the world.