Chapter 1.9: At the Sign of the Prancing Pony

Count Menelvagor wrote:

> On Dec 9, 9:51 am, "Noel Q. von Schneiffel"
> <noel.von.schneif....TakeThisOut@fats.teunc.org> wrote:
>
> you do have a point, since there are flying castles, after all. as it
> happens, i was alive during the third age, and i'm trying to remember
> anything about bree, but all that comes to mind is that the
> inhabitants went well with cheese.
>
>> farther away from Earth than 124.3cm. Now I am starting to wonder if
>> that was why hobbits evolved? Because anyone taller than four feet
>> would have been constantly killed by the moon crashing into his
>> forehead, a clear evolutionary disadvantage.
>
> what about the 7-foot-tall dunedain, then?

I think Noel is (only slightly) wrong on a couple of points. He said "We
can therefore safely deduce: Tolkien knew the moon was much closer to Earth
in the Third Age. In fact, when Bilbo composed the song..." Do we know for
a fact that Bilbo actually composed it? I very much doubt it was entirely
original. Bilbo probably wrote these specific lyrics, but from earlier
sources. I theorize, therefore, that the moon began to drift away from the
Earth at a date prior to the arrival of any 7-foot Dunedain, but after the
hobbits had reached their <124.3cm stature.
--
derek
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On 10 Dez., 14:03, Derek Broughton <n....TakeThisOut@pointerstop.ca> wrote:
> Count Menelvagor wrote:
> > what about the 7-foot-tall dunedain, then?
>
> I think Noel is (only slightly) wrong on a couple of points. He said "We
> can therefore safely deduce: Tolkien knew the moon was much closer to Earth
> in the Third Age. In fact, when Bilbo composed the song..." Do we know for
> a fact that Bilbo actually composed it? I very much doubt it was entirely
> original. Bilbo probably wrote these specific lyrics, but from earlier
> sources. I theorize, therefore, that the moon began to drift away from the
> Earth at a date prior to the arrival of any 7-foot Dunedain, but after the
> hobbits had reached their <124.3cm stature.

You are, of course, right about the possibility that Bilbo wrote the
song from earlier sources. One might add the caveat that the invention
of the five-string fiddle (as played by the cat) would mark the
earliest possible date, but I cannot recall any specific date for this
invention. More research is evidently needed here.

But be that as it may, I see no problem with the 7-foot Dunedain. I
quote Butterbur on Strider: "Goes about at a great pace on his long
shanks; though he don't tell nobody what cause he has to hurry." Maybe
the Dunedain developed their long legs, keen sight and alertness so
they could outrun the moon when it approached. Running away from
predators is a validate survival strategy as well. Their slower or
more lazy relatives had to shrink to make it.

One more interesting thing: According to Gimli's song in Moria, in
Durin's time - who was a very short fellow as well - "no stain yet on
the Moon was seen". This may indicate that either a) the moon stains
are slight damage on the moon surface from these accidents or b) they
are dried human blood. I know a couple of balrogs who would find
option b) rather romantic.

Noel
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"Noel Q. von Schneiffel" <noel.von.schneiffel.RemoveThis@fats.teunc.org> skrev i
meddelandet
news:5bb47fc9-8010-4d62-9d26-5eaf22fc72fd@i12g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
Ave, amici mei!

[snip]

>One thing worth pondering, I think, is the architecture of Bree. Not
far into the chapter, I stumbled over this peculiar remark: "The
village of Bree had some hundred stone houses of the Big Folk". When I
built my temple back in my world-conquering days, I learned the hard
way how heavy bricks can be. How did the Bree-folk manage to build 100-
stone houses? (1 stone = 6.35kg, 100 stone = 635kg; a car can easily
weigh more than 1000kg!) Aerated concrete? Bamboo? Reed? Helium bags
under the roof? We are also told that the Prancing pony had "two
wings". That and the abnormnally low weight, and you start to wonder -
could these houses fly? Was Bree a mobile village? The "Prancing"
Pony, indeed! That would also explain why travel between the Shire and
Bree had decreased. Maybe Bree had just drifted further away?

>Another thing: One can only bow in awe before Tolkien's wisdom. Only
since the Apollo missions - and the installation of laser reflectors
on the moon surface - we know for sure that the moon slowly drifts
away from Earth, at a speed of about 3.8cm per annum. However, Tolkien
already knew that in the 1940s! How else can we explain Frodo's song
and the fact that "the cow jumped over the moon"? I have tried to
empirically test how high a cow can jump. I went to a field and
pricked 100 random cows' behinds with knitting needles. I measured the
highest of the ensuing jumps as 124.3cm. (It was a young, strong cow,
and I had used my longest and sharpest needle.) We can therefore
safely deduce: Tolkien knew the moon was much closer to Earth in the
Third Age. In fact, when Bilbo composed the song, the moon was not
farther away from Earth than 124.3cm. Now I am starting to wonder if
that was why hobbits evolved? Because anyone taller than four feet
would have been constantly killed by the moon crashing into his
>forehead, a clear evolutionary disadvantage.

[snip]

Another fact about Middle-earth which has been mysteriously ignored is that
Denethor and Gandalf were both in the acting business. Perhaps that is
because, being the primadonnas they were, they used Frech words instead of
speaking English. Here is an exchange between them in "The Siege of Gondor".

Gandalf: "A sortie must be made ready."
Denethor:"[Yada yada I know everything long before you do.] As for the
sortie, I had already given thought to it. Let us go down."

Notice how they are jockeying for position. Gandalf says that a "sortie"
(exit) must be made, and Denethor says: "I already thought of that! Let's go
down to the greenroom."
Now, if those two thespians had used a good old Anglo-Saxon... ulp! I mean
Latin... word like "exit" instead of "sortie", then everybody would have
realized that the rivalry between Denethor and Gandalf was really that of
two actors vying for the top billing.

Öjevind
 >> Stay informed about: Chapter 1.9: At the Sign of the Prancing Pony 

Noel Q. von Schneiffel wrote:

? But be that as it may, I see no problem with the 7-foot Dunedain. I
> quote Butterbur on Strider: "Goes about at a great pace on his long
> shanks; though he don't tell nobody what cause he has to hurry." Maybe
> the Dunedain developed their long legs, keen sight and alertness so
> they could outrun the moon when it approached. Running away from
> predators is a validate survival strategy as well. Their slower or
> more lazy relatives had to shrink to make it.
>
> One more interesting thing: According to Gimli's song in Moria, in
> Durin's time - who was a very short fellow as well - "no stain yet on
> the Moon was seen". This may indicate that either a) the moon stains
> are slight damage on the moon surface from these accidents or b) they
> are dried human blood. I know a couple of balrogs who would find
> option b) rather romantic.

Very good points! I think you have the makings of a PhD thesis here.
--
derek
 >> Stay informed about: Chapter 1.9: At the Sign of the Prancing Pony 

On Dec 11, 4:06 am, "Noel Q. von Schneiffel"
<noel.von.schneif....TakeThisOut@fats.teunc.org> wrote:
> But be that as it may, I see no problem with the 7-foot Dunedain. I
> quote Butterbur on Strider: "Goes about at a great pace on his long
> shanks; though he don't tell nobody what cause he has to hurry." Maybe
> the Dunedain developed their long legs, keen sight and alertness so
> they could outrun the moon when it approached. Running away from
> predators is a validate survival strategy as well. Their slower or
> more lazy relatives had to shrink to make it.

So, what REALLY shrank the hobbits must have been their welfare state,
which encouraged idleness, while the neoliberal Numenoreans prized
individual initiative and therefore grew tall by their own exertions,
possibly literally pulling themselves up by their bootstraps.

> One more interesting thing: According to Gimli's song in Moria, in
> Durin's time - who was a very short fellow as well - "no stain yet on
> the Moon was seen". This may indicate that either a) the moon stains
> are slight damage on the moon surface from these accidents or b) they
> are dried human blood. I know a couple of balrogs who would find
> option b) rather romantic.

Disgusting.
 >> Stay informed about: Chapter 1.9: At the Sign of the Prancing Pony