Just Joined.

[FIUT]

Hello everybody. I have just started reading the History of Middle Earth books. Got through the Silmarillion, Unfinished Tales, and Lost Tales. Reading now The Return of the Shadow. Hope to get into some discussions about how these books differ from and are similar to the final Trilogy.

My favorite Tolkien culture is the people of Rohan and I'd like to know more about their early history in ME and what real life models Prof. Tolkien based them on.

I just found the archives site for this one and I'm reading through the messages there right now to catch up with you folks before I try my own hand here.

[Stormrider]

Heril Bloodfist:

I'm glad that you joined our group and have even begun reading the Archives!

I too have always been fondest of the people and land of Rohan! Éowyn has been my inspiration since I read about her and Meriodoc's great achievement on the Pelennor Fields! Théoden King and Éomer have also struck feelings of kinship with me.

My horse, Storm, is not a meara but she has been a wonderful companion and friend and we have learned from each other through the years.

I have the books that you have mentioned above and have read The Sil and UT but have only glanced through the others mostly for research purposes. I would love to get into them one of these days soon!

Welcome to Tolkien's Ring. I know you will enjoy it here.

[MajahTR]

Heril;
you have made our lady Stormrider very happy to have another Rohan admirer...

welcome to Tolkien's Ring!
i look forward to reading your posts. i am constantly awed by our members insights and have learned so much about Tolkien since i first joined myself.

take care,
Majah

[Desi Baggins]

Welcome and enjoy! Please feel free to start some discussions!

Forth Eorlingas!

[Greenleaf]

Hello Heril,

I'm glad to meet you. I've read the Silmarillion and Unifinished Tales but not the HoMe series. I've been considering to buy it within this year, or at least some of the books if they are too expensive to buy all of them at once. Since you started reading the series, I'm looking forward to your insights.

Although I'm more fascinated by the Elves, the Rohirrim are my favorite people among Men. One of the reasons, I think, is because they love horses so much, and the way they feel connected to their horses conveys to me a sense of freedom. After all, I may have an Elvish pen-name but I chose a Rohan avatar!

See you around on the boards

[Alaere Dûnhilien]

Mae govannen, well met, Heril Bloodfist!

Honoured to make your acquaintance. I'm looking forward to reading your insights and to bumping into you around here...
Welcome to our cosy group...

Alaere

[Aeleorn]

Hi Heril!

So, you are one of the Rohirrim... Nice to make your acquaintance. I myself am a ranger woman of the north, but never the less, I feel very comfortable in the wonderful plains of Rohan.
So, tell me, horse master, are you going to participate on the new Hobbit study? It would be nice to have someone there who has read so much about ME and Tolkien. You could provide us with so many background information. Actually, I'm sort of jealous that you've already read sp much...

See you around!
Love, Aeleorn

[FIUT]

Thank you all for the warm welcome! I've been here a short while and already I am having great fun, and incidentally learning all sorts things about Tolkien's ME that I'd never have come up with on my own. Very stimulating.

Stormrider: "My horse, Storm, is not a meara but she has been a wonderful companion and friend and we have learned from each other through the years."

Ah! You have a horse! That would explain by itself, even if you had no other reasons, your fondness for Rohan. I used to ride in eastern Wyoming, a leased animal only, but the experience of moving from a trot to the silky smoothness of a run across the short grass prairiee is absolute heaven! Tolkien seems to spend a lot of time working up the Rohirrim as a full culture, and his descriptions of horse riders moving through the landscape is riveting - but in his biographies, I find no mention of his having ever ridden anything other than a street car, subway, or motor car. Where did he get his accurate horse knowledge?

I can understand that the costumes, armours, social structure, value system of the Rohirrim should seem so correctly consistent in detail, after all he was an Saxon scholar, but the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisians etc did not have much to do with horses. It was the Celtic-Roman Britons, I think, who used cavalry formations in the 5th and 6th centuries, not the Saxons. This may be a good topic for investigation later, just what caused Tolkien to wed horses to the his Saxon based Rohirrim?

MajahTR: Oh you really said it! Lots of excellent interactions here that have led me into new ways of thinking already. And I'm reading through the archives and find even more information stock-piled there! Now I just need the time to digest it!

Desi Baggins: Thanks for the welcome! I will probably start a series on Tolkien and War soon. Trying to look at it from a philosophical point of view, and see if there are any laws of "proper warfare" in ME, a chivalric code of behaviour, and a "just war" concept. Tolkien gives us several hints that the Numenoreans started out as teachers when they came back to Middle-earth in the Second Age, but then they became conquerors, imperialists I think. I'd like to see if this indicates Tolkien was actually against some aspects of the British Empire he lived in; and then I guess that might also have some application to the present situation of the US after the collapse of the Soviet Union? So far I have more questions than answers here, but just ordered a book by John Garth that goes into Tolkien's war experiences in 1914 - 1918 and tries to see how these experiences show up in way JRRT treats warfare in ME.

Greenleaf: Very happy to meet you! I'm learning a great deal from your posts, and you might try the second hand book sales through Amazon Dot Com. I got most of my HOME volumes for 1/2 to 1/3 price that way!

A lot of people seem really taken with the Rohirrim, even though, I suppose, they are not really prime movers in the central themes of the LotR, that might be a good topic for discussion itself! Just why do so many people react strongly and favorably to the Rohirrim when Numenor and the Elves are more central figures in the long battle against Morgoth/ Sauron? Is it just the added dimension of the horses that gets us hooked on the culture of the Rohirrim? It sure helps, but I think there may be more, LOL, I'll have to think and read some more on this topic! But your statement RE "sense of freedom" seems to really hit an answering chord.

Alaere Dûnhilien: Thank you for the greetings, Alaere, I can almost guarantee we'll be bumping into one another on the boards - I am a rather "mouthy" type! LOL! And you are right, it is a good cosy group that projects a fine warm feeling, even when we disagree with one another!

Aeleorn: So, a Ranger Woman of the north, eh? Well, then maybe you can tell me, how come your Ranger horses are so "scruffy" looking? I remember thinking that as the "Kings and Queens" of humanity, the descendants of Numenor should have very imposing steeds - the white stallion complex I guess. But the horses brought down from the north by Elladan, Elrohir, and Halbarad seem not quite to fit the stereotypic bill! LOL! When I started thinking on this more, I realized that the Rangers needed serviceable horses, with longer coats to stand the cold and rains of the Eriador conditions of the north, and "showy" white stallions might be too conspicuous for patrolling Rangers who need to keep a low profile.

Yep, Andorinha enticed me here on the basis of the up-coming Hobbit Study, a topic I do not have much deep reading in, so I'll rely on all of you for the deeper insights there!

Don't be jealous yet! My readings are still kind of patchwork right now, and every time I think I've got something nailed down from one HOME volume, I find the next book contradicts my schemes and I have to start from scratch! Oh, well, the alternative to reading more Tolkien would be getting my lazy bones out to clean leaves from the gutters and fix the garage door.


Thanks again to all the members of TR for putting up with me!

[Lanhail]

Heril said:

but in his biographies, I find no mention of his having ever ridden anything other than a street car, subway, or motor car. Where did he get his accurate horse knowledge?

To be off the topic of this board, but a subject I also wondered about: The only thing I have ever found about Tolkien and horses is this from Tolkien and the Great War by John Garth (a book that blew my socks off) (pg 24) In 1912, Tolkien enrolled in King Edward's Horse for military training. "Tolkien had a strong affinity with horses, which he loved, and became ade facto breaker-in. No sooner had he broken one horse in but it was taken away. Another would be given to him and he had to start the process over again." There is a bibliographical note for this subject: Priscilla and Michael Tolkien, quoted in Amon Hen 13,9. Perhaps there is more information there.
Lanhail

[FIUT]

Hullo, Lanhail! Thank you for that information regarding Tolkien and horses! Now it makes sense! I wonder why H. Carpenter never mentioned this aspect of JRRT's life in the biography or the Letters?

Well, I just ordered John Garth's book yesterday, and if it has this kind of information in it, it should indeed be worth the "used-book" half price I paid!

[Androga Erindalant]

Greetings and welcome to TR, Heril Bloodfist. I hope you enjoy our group very well. Have a nice read in the archives too. If you find something you'd like to discuss, just post a new topic on the appropriate forum in here.

Until we meet again
Orgulas

[FIUT]

Thank you for the kind welcome, Orgulas! I am already enjoying myself immensely here, and finding TR an "engrossing" entertainment! Great idea, and if I do find something in the archives that might be renewed here, I'll take your advice and just start up a topic or a line wherever it seems most appropriate.