# What are the powers of the One Ring?



## Morrus (Dec 23, 2014)

We know that Bilbo and Frodo used it to turn invisible, thats it use can be sensed by Sauron and his minions, and that it corrupts its owner. But clearly the ring is far more powerful than that - Gandalf says he would start to use it with the best intentions, implying that it can do something other than turn him invisible.  Boromir knew it could be used in some way in the war effort.

Is that explained anywhere in any of the ancillary writings?  What can the ring do?


----------



## Alzrius (Dec 23, 2014)

I think that this is an excellent article on the subject, containing quotes, analysis, and even d20 statistics!


----------



## Rune (Dec 23, 2014)

It's main purpose is to control the other rings of power (and, presumably, their wielders). Two hobbits from the shire wouldn't even have an inkling about how to do this, but Gandalf or Galadrial could probably have figured it out. Denethor too, maybe.

And Sarumon. Sarumon, having extensively studied the subject, might actually already know how.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 23, 2014)

Rune said:


> It's main purpose is to control the other rings of power (and, presumably, their wielders). Two hobbits from the shire wouldn't even have an inkling about how to do this, but Gandalf or Galadrial could probably have figured it out. Denethor too, maybe.




So mainly to control the nine Nazgul, Galadriel, Agent Smith, and Saruman?  Plus seven dwarves somewhere?  Didn't Sauron already have the nine and seven rings, though?


----------



## Rune (Dec 23, 2014)

Yes, mostly--Gandalf has the third elven ring, not Sarumon. And it seems to exert some manner of control over everyone who knows about it, anyway. But controlling the rings is what it was made for. 

By the time The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are happening, that pretty much means controlling the elves (and Gandalf, though Sauron doesn't know that).

It's also worth mentioning that Sauron, like Melkor before him, has always had a special hatred for the elves.


----------



## Whizbang Dustyboots (Dec 23, 2014)

I've always thought it was Sauron's phylactery as well, and would allow him to regain physical form. I'm not sure where I got that, though, unless it's just all the liches with magic rings that also happen to be their phylacteries, leading to the hilarious complications when a party member insists on keeping it.


----------



## MarkB (Dec 23, 2014)

I always figured that, throughout the time we see the Ring in use, it was basically just continuing to obey the last command given to it by someone who knew what they were doing - Isildur's "make me invisible!" command. None of its subsequent wielders had sufficient lore to understand how to command it to do something else.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 23, 2014)

That whole "enhancing the wearer's existing nature" thing. Maybe that's why hobbits turn invisible with it - they hide from bigger folk a lot. It's their existing nature. 

In which case it wouldn't turn Gandalf invisible. It would do something completely different.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 23, 2014)

Morrus said:


> So mainly to control the nine Nazgul, Galadriel, Agent Smith, and Saruman?




Mainly, but there are a lot of minor abilities.

It could, for example, change a person's appearance.  For example, not even wearing the Ring, merely carrying it, Samwise appeared to an orc as a powerful warrior wreathed in shadow, carrying some item of power and menace.  Similarly Frodo draws upon this power on Mount Doom to intimidate Gollum, appearing as a figure robed in white, bearing a wheel of fire (presumably, the ring has a mighty ego, and so always includes itself in the imagery.

This may be an extension of a more general ability - an enhancement to the bearer's ability to dominate others, ring or no, and the images described may be more mental illusion.  Sam and Frodo have little such ability natively, so the enhancement doesn't mean much.  

It is repeatedly said that a goodly chunk of Sauron's power is in that ring.  As angelic beings go, Sauron was of higher order then Gandalf and Saruman, so we could be talking about a *lot* of power in there.  Surely, that can't all be required to dominate other wearers of rings.  The way Gandalf and Galadriel speak, the ring also would represent a significant boost to their personal power - presumably, they know enough about magic to access the power Sauron had locked away in there, in ways that mere mortal hobbits couldn't.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 23, 2014)

Does "plot control" count as a power?


----------



## Umbran (Dec 23, 2014)

Morrus said:


> That whole "enhancing the wearer's existing nature" thing. Maybe that's why hobbits turn invisible with it - they hide from bigger folk a lot. It's their existing nature.
> 
> In which case it wouldn't turn Gandalf invisible. It would do something completely different.




I believe that it is noted elsewhere by Tolkien that the Nine and the One both have invisibility powers when worn by mortals.  It is suggested by some that the Nine *aren't wearing* their rings during the trilogy, so they aren't invisible.  Sauron doesn't have the One to control the Nine, so he's taken those rings personally as a way to control the Ringwraiths. 

Note that Gandalf and Saruman are not mortals.  And Galadriel isn't really either.  They may already exist in the spirit realm, so that the One may not work the same way on them.

Also, the only people we ever see use the rings are stated to be resistant to its effects, and know squat-all about magic.  They get to use only what the Ring allows them, and can exert little or no control over the ring, where others might be able to.  Maybe more knowledgeable wearers can choose to be invisible, while the hobbits can't turn the things off.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 23, 2014)

Olgar Shiverstone said:


> Does "plot control" count as a power?




I don't think the bearer gets to control the plot.  If anything, the bearer is controlled by the plot.


----------



## Rune (Dec 23, 2014)

Umbran said:


> It is repeatedly said that a goodly chunk of Sauron's power is in that ring.  As angelic beings go, Sauron was of higher order then Gandalf and Saruman, so we could be talking about a *lot* of power in there.  Surely, that can't all be required to dominate other wearers of rings.  The way Gandalf and Galadriel speak, the ring also would represent a significant boost to their personal power - presumably, they know enough about magic to access the power Sauron had locked away in there, in ways that mere mortal hobbits couldn't.




Galadriel also laments that many wondrous things were wrought with the elven rings (including, if memory serves, Lothlorien) and the destruction of the one ring would mean their passing. 

Presumably Sauron (or someone knowledgeable) could use the one ring to destroy, corrupt, or otherwise control these works, as well.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 23, 2014)

Rune said:


> Galadriel also laments that many wondrous things were wrought with the elven rings (including, if memory serves, Lothlorien) and the destruction of the one ring would mean their passing.
> 
> Presumably Sauron (or someone knowledgeable) could use the one ring to destroy, corrupt, or otherwise control these works, as well.




Er, maybe, and maybe not.  We don't quite know how they work.

As I recall it, the issue is that Lothlorien is currently maintained by her ring - the rings tend to impose stasis, like having hobbits live for centuries - such that if the ring dies, so does Lothlorien.  But the place was built before her Ring came into it.

The Three were created using methods that Sauron taught the elves.  However, Sauron himself was not personally involved in their crafting, as he was involved with the Seven and the Nine.  So, Sauron could not directly influence the powers of the Three.  He can't even find the Three, normally.

Now, Tolkien was not a scientist, and I don't think he ever felt a need to fully describe this.  But, to No-Prize it, the destruction of the One would cause a major ripple and destruction in the powers that the Rings all use - much like a nuclear bomb sets off an EMP.  The rings all fry, and Lothlorien dies.  That does not mean that the One really can manipulate the powers of the Three - in fact, we are told explicitly that he cannot.  There's some suggestion that if Sauron actually had possession of the Three, he could corrupt them so he could dominate their powers and owners.  But, short of falling into his custody, the Three are largely safe.


----------



## Rune (Dec 23, 2014)

Umbran said:


> Er, maybe, and maybe not.  We don't quite know how they work.
> 
> The Three were created using methods that Sauron taught the elves.  However, Sauron himself was not personally involved in their crafting, as he was involved with the Seven and the Nine.  So, Sauron could not directly influence the powers of the Three.  He can't even find the Three, normally.
> 
> Now, Tolkien was not a scientist, and I don't think he ever felt a need to fully describe this.  But, to No-Prize it, the destruction of the One would cause a major ripple and destruction in the powers that the Rings all use - much like a nuclear bomb sets off an EMP.  The rings all fry, and Lothlorien dies.  That does not mean that the One really can manipulate the powers of the Three - in fact, we are told explicitly that he cannot.




Sauron _without_ the one ring can't find the elven rings, true (he can't find the one ring, either). We are told, explicitly, that the one ring was made to control those elven rings (among the others, of course). And, remember, Frodo could see that Galadriel was wearing a ring just by carrying the one ring. 

Since the elven rings maintain such a connection to the the things they make that the destruction of the rings would also mean their destruction, I don't think it's much of a stretch to think that someone could use the one ring to control the elven rings to exert some change over those things, whatever form that change might take.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 23, 2014)

Wait, so the One Ring only gives power over... the rings he already has? What does he need it for then? He already has the rings it might give him power over.


----------



## tomBitonti (Dec 23, 2014)

This has a nice discussion.  The inclusion of quotes helps a lot!

http://www.quora.com/What-powers-does-Gandalf-possess

Thx!

TomB


----------



## Rune (Dec 23, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Wait, so the One Ring only gives power over... the rings he already has? What does he need it for then? He already has the rings it might give him power over.




No. Sauron wants the one ring back so he can rule the elven rings (which he does not possess) and to reclaim the power that he poured into the making of the one ring.


----------



## MarkB (Dec 23, 2014)

Umbran said:


> I believe that it is noted elsewhere by Tolkien that the Nine and the One both have invisibility powers when worn by mortals.  It is suggested by some that the Nine *aren't wearing* their rings during the trilogy, so they aren't invisible.  Sauron doesn't have the One to control the Nine, so he's taken those rings personally as a way to control the Ringwraiths.




If I recall correctly, the Ringwraiths themselves _are_ invisible, it's just their gear and clothing that isn't - in fact, the whole purpose of their outfits is to give them form and shape so that they can interact with others. I seem to recall Frodo being able to see the Ringwraiths' faces within their hoods after putting on the Ring on Weathertop, and Eowyn stabbing at the empty-seeming space beneath the Witch King's crown to slay him.


----------



## Kaodi (Dec 23, 2014)

Sauron is not really a higher order being than Gandalf and Saruman. I was reading somewhere the other day that the Istari were actually diminished by taking on their mortal forms as their true power would have made elves and men fearful of them as well. Sauron was undoubtedly more powerful as his height than they were at their height, but that is not an order level difference.


----------



## Dioltach (Dec 23, 2014)

Kaodi said:


> Sauron is not really a higher order being than Gandalf and Saruman. I was reading somewhere the other day that the Istari were actually diminished by taking on their mortal forms as their true power would have made elves and men fearful of them as well. Sauron was undoubtedly more powerful as his height than they were at their height, but that is not an order level difference.




Off the top of my head, I recall that Sauron took on a large chunk of Melkor/Morgoth's power, which put him on a different level from the Istari and other Maiar.

Also, wasn't Galadriel born in Valinor, before the creation of the Silmarils? From what I understand, she was pretty much the wisest and (with possible exception of Sauron) most powerful being in Middle Earth.

(And so much for Tolkien being a mysogynist: apart from Galadriel, the next most important female character defies society's rules, rides to war in disguise and then faces off against the most powerful of the Nazgul. I think Tolkien portrayed female characters not as inferior, but in a way he thought was realistic for a semi-medieval society.)


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Umbran said:


> However, Sauron himself was not personally involved in their crafting, as he was involved with the Seven and the Nine.  So, Sauron could not directly influence the powers of the Three.  He can't even find the Three, normally.






Rune said:


> No. Sauron wants the one ring back so he can rule the elven rings (which he does not possess) and to reclaim the power that he poured into the making of the one ring.




So we have two opposing opinions here which directly address my question but give different answers. Which of you is correct?


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> So we have two opposing opinions here which directly address my question but give different answers. Which of you is correct?




Umbran's interpretation is in line with my reading.


----------



## Ryujin (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> We know that Bilbo and Frodo used it to turn invisible, thats it use can be sensed by Sauron and his minions, and that it corrupts its owner. But clearly the ring is far more powerful than that - Gandalf says he would start to use it with the best intentions, implying that it can do something other than turn him invisible.  Boromir knew it could be used in some way in the war effort.
> 
> Is that explained anywhere in any of the ancillary writings?  What can the ring do?




The ring is literally a part of Sauron, as he poured his power into it when it was created. That's where the corrupting influence comes from and why the ring strives to find its way back to him. Any power that it manifests is the power of Sauron himself.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Ryujin said:


> The ring is literally a part of Sauron, as he poured his power into it when it was created. That's where the corrupting influence comes from and why the ring strives to find its way back to him. Any power that it manifests is the power of Sauron himself.




Yes, I understand where the power _comes from_. My question is what the power _does_.


----------



## Ryujin (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Yes, I understand where the power _comes from_. My question is what the power _does_.




Presumably anything that the millennia old creator, who was perhaps the most powerful arcanist of his time (as per The Silmarillion; after the First Age) was capable of himself. He was the servant of the equivalent of a god, who was sort of that universe's equivalent of Vulcan. The only limitation would be the wearer. As Sauron was one of the Maiar (servants of the gods and, perhaps, lesser gods in and of themselves) and since Gandalf is also a Maiar in human form, Gandalf would likely just have ended up being another Sauron if he'd taken up the ring.


----------



## Rune (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> So we have two opposing opinions here which directly address my question but give different answers. Which of you is correct?




_One ring to rule them ALL, one ring to FIND them. _

Umbran's statements are true of Sauron WITHOUT the one ring, but that ring has a purpose, and that purpose is made quite explicit.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Ryujin said:


> As Sauron was one of the Maiar (servants of the gods and, perhaps, lesser gods in and of themselves) and since Gandalf is also a Maiar in human form, Gandalf would likely just have ended up being another Sauron if he'd taken up the ring.




Yeah, I've heard that. I knew that already. My question was that that is all very... vague. What does the ring actually do?


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Rune said:


> _One ring to rule them ALL, one ring to FIND them. _
> 
> Umbran's statements are true of Sauron WITHOUT the one ring, but that ring has a purpose, and that purpose is made quite explicit.




That it allows Sauron to find Elrond, Galadriel, and Gandalf?

Are they hard to find? I know Galadriel and Elrond's addresses. That whole trilogy can't all be just because Sauron couldn't find Gandalf, surely? Ironic, if so, since he was accompanying the one ring that could find him.


----------



## Zander (Dec 24, 2014)

Dioltach said:


> (And so much for Tolkien being a mysogynist: apart from Galadriel, the next most important female character defies society's rules, rides to war in disguise and then faces off against the most powerful of the Nazgul. I think Tolkien portrayed female characters not as inferior, but in a way he thought was realistic for a semi-medieval society.)




Apologies for the digression away from the topic of the powers of the one ring, but there's no reason to believe that Tolkien was making a feminist statement when he had Eowyn (and Merry) defeat the Witch-king of Angmar. The Eowyn + Merry vs Nazgul fight tells us nothing about Tolkien's attitudes to women.

Tolkien was a philologist who loved word-play and his Middle Earth stories are full of plays on words. The defeat of the Witch-king was an in-story play on the word "man" and its various meanings. It was prophecised that the Witch-king would not be defeated by  "man". The Witch-king took that to mean mankind. But the prophesy actually meant "man" in the narrowest sense, that is, a human male. That is why Merry as a non-human male and Eowyn as a human female were able to defeat him.

Nothing to do with politics. Everything to do with philology.


----------



## Ryujin (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Yeah, I've heard that. I knew that already. My question was that that is all very... vague. What does the ring actually do?




That would be because it isn't spelt out in any of the works that I've read, beyond the obvious and explicit statement that it controls all of the other rings. Presumably that means all of the ring bearers, which would mean essentially controlling the world by controlling its rulers.

The One Ring comes from a time when the gods literally strode the earth.


----------



## Rune (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> That it allows Sauron to find Elrond, Galadriel, and Gandalf?
> 
> Are they hard to find? I know Galadriel and Elrond's addresses. That whole trilogy can't all be just because Sauron couldn't find Gandalf, surely? Ironic, if so, since he was accompanying the one ring that could find him.




Not the ring-bearers. The rings themselves. The elven rings hide themselves from sight (which is why Galadriel was intrigued that Frodo saw she was wearing one). 

But the one ring's specific purpose is written right on the ring, itself--that being to rule all of the rings of power, find them, bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Dioltach said:


> I think Tolkien portrayed female characters not as inferior, but in a way he thought was realistic for a semi-medieval society.)




There is nothing realistic about Middle Earth. 

And you're misunderstanding the criticism. Nobody said he portrayed female characters as inferior. They're saying he barely portrays them at all. 

Seriously. Reread The Hobbit. Count the female characters. The total is... zero.  The entire gender does not exist in that book. 

And they barely feature in LotR. Jackson had to beef up the role for Arwen (giving her the male Glorfindel's role). Eowyn does kill the Witch King of Angmar, though, so women aren't completely absent - just 99% absent!


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Rune said:


> Not the ring-bearers. The rings themselves. The elven rings hide themselves from sight (which is why Galadriel was intrigued that Frodo saw she was wearing one).




So you're saying Sauron didn't know Galadriel and Elrond had them? I'll grant Gandalf, but Galadriel and Elrond? Really?



> But the one ring's specific purpose is written right on the ring, itself--that being to rule all of the rings of power, find them, bring them all, and in the darkness bind them.




Well he found and bringed the nine and seven already. It's just the three he doesn't have. And it appears he can't control those anyway. And is too stupid to find them even without the One Ring.

Seems he's not all that bright, is our Sauron!


----------



## Rune (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> So you're saying Sauron didn't know Galadriel and Elrond had them? I'll grant Gandalf, but Galadriel and Elrond? Really?




Well, he may easily have guessed.  But, even if he knew, he wasn't powerful enough to assail their strongholds (or, presumably, another Maiar), without first recovering the one ring and/or dominating the world with armies of orcs and evil men. 




> Well he found and bringed the nine and seven already. It's just the three he doesn't have. And it appears he can't control those anyway. And is too stupid to find them even without the One Ring.
> 
> Seems he's not all that bright, is our Sauron!




He can't control them without the one ring. With it, he explicitly could.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> So we have two opposing opinions here which directly address my question but give different answers. Which of you is correct?




I went and reread some passages - I stand corrected.  Rune is correct - teh Elves knew when Sauron had first put on his ring, and took theirs off to protect themselves.  They then only have used the Three when Sauron did not have the One.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Kaodi said:


> Sauron is not really a higher order being than Gandalf and Saruman.




Yes, he is.  Not hugely higher - he is still a Maiar, not one of the Valar, but even back before they all came to the East, he was notably more powerful - Saruman and Gandalf are pretty minor Maiar, while Sauron was near top of the class.

Remember that Sauruman, Gandalf, and Radagast and teh Blue Wizards (collectively the "Istari") are there because the Powers that Be tried once to meddle directly in mortal affairs, and it ended really badly.  The Valar swore off doing that.  So, the Istari are *minor* powers sent to nudge and influence, and to generally keep an eye on things.

Meanwhile, before his fall, Sauron was the right-hand-angel to Aulë the Smith, the great craftsman of the Valar, who personally made the dwarven race.  It is from this that Sauron knows how to make things like magic rings.

Gandalf was claimed to be the wiseset of the Maiar, back in the West.  But, when called upon to go be a wizard in the mortal lands, he begged not to be sent, as he knew he didn't have the power to oppose Sauron.  So, yes, Sauron was more powerful.  Gandalf, however, is *smarter*.


----------



## Olgar Shiverstone (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Yeah, I've heard that. I knew that already. My question was that that is all very... vague. What does the ring actually do?




Makes you grumpy and invisible, then it jumps in a volcano.

It's the MacGuffin. It doesn't actually have to *do* anything. What did the Maltese Falcon do? The Mordor Run in less than 12 leagues?


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> That it allows Sauron to find Elrond, Galadriel, and Gandalf?
> 
> Are they hard to find? I know Galadriel and Elrond's addresses. That whole trilogy can't all be just because Sauron couldn't find Gandalf, surely? Ironic, if so, since he was accompanying the one ring that could find him.




No - but then Gandalf wasn't even around in the East when the One Ring was forged, if I recall correctly. 

Sauron wanted to dominate everyone in Middle-Earth, really.  He wanted to do that through the leaders of people.  So, he put on a pretty elven face, called himself "Annatar", the "Lord of Gifts", and brought them this whole story about how rings would be awesome.  He taught Celebrimbor (an elf, who we don't see in the trilogy at all, as he's dead by then), a whole bunch of stuff about magic rings.  

Celebrimbor made 16 rings (the Nine for Men, the Seven for Dwarves) with Sauron's assistance.  Celebrimbor made the Three without Sauron.  Thus, the leaders of Elves, Men, and Dwarves *all* had rings.  Sauron then went and made the One, to try to dominate *everyone*, through those leaders.

Since the Three weren't made by Sauron, the elves at least had a chance to avoid that fate - they could sense the attempted influence and take their rings off.  At this time the Elves with Rings were Gil-Galad, Cirdan, and Galadriel.  Gil-Galad handed his off to Elrond, which is good.  There's a bunch of warring that goes on (Sauron captures Celebrimbor and tortures him to death trying to find where the Three are, Gil-galad is eventually killed by Sauron on the slopes of Mount Doom, and so on).   Cirdan, Galadriel, and Elrond just basically sit on their rings until Sauron is apparently defeated by Isildur, Elrond, _et al._

Eventually (if I have my dates right, about a thousand years after Sauron got the One Ring cut off his hand), Gandalf shows up, Cirdan recognizes him for what he is, and gives him his ring.  It is another milennium before Smeagol/Gollum finds the One, and another few hundred years before Bilbo meets Gollum - so Sauron's without his ring for something like 2500 years.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Well he found and bringed the nine and seven already.




Not quite true.  He was there when the Seven were forged.  He handed those Seven off to the Dwarves.  Now, these were probably not Celebrimbor's best work - elves and dwarves have never really gotten along.  The Seven aren't really powerful.  Sauron can't really make anyone wearing one of the Seven do anything, ecept be very greedy and a little paranoid.

The Seven are out there a while - Sauron eventually gets three of the Seven back, and tries to bribe news of Bilbo out of the dwarves with these three, to no avail. 



> And is too stupid to find them even without the One Ring.
> 
> Seems he's not all that bright, is our Sauron!




Sauron's bright, but in a book-learning kind of way.  It is pretty clear that he's not terribly wise.  Not a people-person.  But, it isn't that he isn't smart enough to find the Three.  It is that he is never told where they are in the first place, and those Three are not being used while he's alive.  This is not a world in which he can just cast Locate Object.  Powers in Middle Earth are not so easy. He can't even find his *own* ring unless someone uses it!

Consider, Morrus, that there are three objects on the planet, that you have personally never seen or touched.  Their owners turn them off and put them away in their sock drawers and under rocks, leave them inert, and never bring them out.  How, pray tell, do you find them?  Needle in a haystack!


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Yeah, I've heard that. I knew that already. My question was that that is all very... vague. What does the ring actually do?




Consider it this way - the One Ring is so powerful that, if it got used in the story such that we knew... the story would be over.


----------



## Morrus (Dec 24, 2014)

Umbran said:


> Not quite true.  He was there when the Seven were forged.  He handed those Seven off to the Dwarves.  Now, these were probably not Celebrimbor's best work - elves and dwarves have never really gotten along.  The Seven aren't really powerful.  Sauron can't really make anyone wearing one of the Seven do anything, ecept be very greedy and a little paranoid.




Wait, so it can't control the three *or* the seven? Just the nine then? 

This ring deal keeps getting worse! Not only does the ring not do much, it doesn't even do the few things I thought it *did* do! 


> Consider, Morrus, that there are three objects on the planet, that you have personally never seen or touched.  Their owners turn them off and put them away in their sock drawers and under rocks, leave them inert, and never bring them out.  How, pray tell, do you find them?  Needle in a haystack!




Yeah, but I'd probably start with the three most powerful magical elves on the planet.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Zander said:


> Tolkien was a philologist who loved word-play and his Middle Earth stories are full of plays on words. The defeat of the Witch-king was an in-story play on the word "man" and its various meanings. It was prophecised that the Witch-king would not be defeated by  "man".




The actual quote is, "Do not pursue him! He will not return to these lands. Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man shall he fall." 



> The Witch-king took that to mean mankind. But the prophesy actually meant "man" in the narrowest sense, that is, a human male.




Actually, the Witch-king was fleeing the battlefield when this was said, so it is not clear that he heard the original statement. 

Later, at the battle in which he dies, he says, "Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!"  Note that he's broadened it out from how he shall not fall by the hand of man, to how no man can so much as slow him down.  Sounds like a telephone game, to me 



> That is why Merry as a non-human male and Eowyn as a human female were able to defeat him.




Calling Merry non-human is a tad dicey.  Hobbits consider themselves a different people, but in various places Tolien is fairly clear that hobbits are "relatives" of Men, a "variety" or "separate branch" of mankind.  This is borne out in how, in the SIlmarillion, we know the origins of elves, dwarves, men, ents, orcs, and all.  But Hobbits don't come up.  



> Nothing to do with politics. Everything to do with philology.




I think it is also clear homage to Macbeth - 

"Be bloody, bold, and resolute. Laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth."

And Macbeth is then killed by someone who was, in effect, born by Caserian Section.  This predated Tolkien by several hundred years - the trope solidly established.


----------



## Umbran (Dec 24, 2014)

Morrus said:


> Wait, so it can't control the three *or* the seven? Just the nine then?




The other way to look at it is that the Seven are kind of crappy.  Sure, he can control them, but that's like controlling one of the very first toy radio controlled cars - the ones that go forward, and back-and-turn, and that's it.



> Yeah, but I'd probably start with the three most powerful magical elves on the planet.




Yes.  Ge tried that - killed Gil-Galad, who didn't have a ring having handed it off to Elrond.  Tortured Celebrimbor, who didn't break.  After that, the rings are all sitting with those elves, in well-protected enclaves.  Those elves let few non-elves in, and *all* the elves are on to your tricks.  The only way you have to get at the rings is by frontal assault, and when you try to do that to one, they all gang up on you, and fight you off.

So how, exactly, are you getting your hands on the rings?  Even if you know it is somewhere in Lothlorien... that's still a space the size of a city.  Lots of nooks and crannies.  How are you going to get it other than burning the place to the ground and sifting the ashes?


----------



## Zander (Dec 24, 2014)

Umbran said:


> The actual quote is, "Do not pursue him! He will not return to these lands. Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man shall he fall."
> 
> Actually, the Witch-king was fleeing the battlefield when this was said, so it is not clear that he heard the original statement.
> 
> Later, at the battle in which he dies, he says, "Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!"  Note that he's broadened it out from how he shall not fall by the hand of man, to how no man can so much as slow him down.  Sounds like a telephone game, to me




Yes, it's true that the Witch-king may not have heard the prophecy directly and that it may not have been passed to him verbatim. But the fact that he understood it to mean that he could not be impeded by "man" is the salient point. It's his misinterpretation of the word  - whether heard directly or not - that's key to the play on words. It's because of his understanding of "man" in the narrow sense, that he wasn't wary of Frodo like the other Nazguls were during the encounter at Weathertop. From the Witch-king's point of view, Frodo was a "man" and therefore not a threat.  



Umbran said:


> Calling Merry non-human is a tad dicey.  Hobbits consider themselves a different people, but in various places Tolien is fairly clear that hobbits are "relatives" of Men, a "variety" or "separate branch" of mankind.  This is borne out in how, in the SIlmarillion, we know the origins of elves, dwarves, men, ents, orcs, and all.  But Hobbits don't come up.




The hobbits considered themselves distinct from but taxonomically equal to Men. When Merry and Pippin meet Treebeard, they suggest that his list of creatures that already mentions Men needs updating to include hobbits as well. Of course, the hobbits may have been wrong about themselves, but if the elf who foretold the fall of the Witch-king made the same mistake (of considering them distinct from Men), the word play still works.    



Umbran said:


> I think it is also clear homage to Macbeth -
> 
> "Be bloody, bold, and resolute. Laugh to scorn
> The power of man, for none of woman born
> ...




Whether or not it's also an allusion to Macbeth, Tolkien patently isn't making a political statement about female empowerment. He explicitly stated that no part of the Lord of the Rings was an allegorical reference to real-world happenings.


----------



## Hand of Evil (Dec 25, 2014)

In a way you can see that both Bilbo & Frodo were gaining some other benefits from the ring than invisibility, others listened to them and in a way, deferred to them.  Was this just because of charisma or was the ring helping?


----------



## Temmy (Jan 1, 2015)

The main power of the One ring is to control the other rings. Saurons plan was to create rings of power for the mightiest members of the other races, then use his ring to dominate them. It worked on men..thus we got the ring wraiths. Due to the unique nature of Dwarfs in the Tolkien universe, they could not be dominated. So Sauron worked hard to reclaim as many dwarf rings as possible. The Elves created their own rings of power, very powerful rings that could do things like hold entropy at bay, but since those rings were created using the knowledge given to the elves by Sauron they were subject to the ruling ring. The moment Sauron put his ring off, the elves realised what was going on and took their rings off. They could only wear thier rings while Sauron did not possess the one ring. Since they were subject to the one ring, when the one ring failed, so did the elven rings. And since these rings maintained the elven realms in middle earth, the destruction of the one ring meant the end of elvish power.

The second thing the ring did was to enhance the inherent power of the person using them. Consider it a kind of spiritual focuser, taking the diffuse spiritual essence of the wearer, and focusing it into a more potent form..a bit like boiling water to get salt. Someone who has a great deal of spiritual power like Sauron or Galadriel would get far more use out of it than a simple hobbit. In DnD terms one could say that the rings added a crapload of extra levels, the more Wisdom and levels you have, the more levels it would add.

In Tolkiens universe objects of power are made by passing a bit of your essence into them. This can diminish the maker. In DnD terms, you are spending levels to create an artifact. (this was why morgoth got weaker and weaker over time..he mixed his essence into the earth and his minions to control them, and as they multiplied, his own personal essence declined)  To make something as powerful as the great ring, Sauron had to pass the majority of his own essence into it. Now this wasn't a problem, as long as Sauron was wearing his ring because that essence is still usable by him. But with the ring gone, he lost the essence he used to make it, and his power was diminished, like a level 20 mage who places 10 of his levels in a ring, and loses the ring. To gain his full power, he needed his ring back.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Jan 2, 2015)

In HERO terms, the One Ring is either an Inobvious or Obvious Accessible Focus.


----------



## Kaodi (Jan 2, 2015)

That takes some major lurkage fortitude to register in 2005 and make your first post nearly 10 years later.


----------



## reelo (Jan 2, 2015)

Umbran said:


> Not quite true.  He was there when the Seven were forged.  He handed those Seven off to the Dwarves.  Now, these were probably not Celebrimbor's best work - elves and dwarves have never really gotten along.  The Seven aren't really powerful.  Sauron can't really make anyone wearing one of the Seven do anything, ecept be very greedy and a little paranoid.




This is wrong. The 7 were no less powerful than the 9. But it is said (Silmarillion iirc) that Aulë, when creating the dwarves, made them especially strong-willed and difficult to dominate, because of Melkor.
Therefore the rings did not have as strong an effect on the dwarves. They could not be subjugated, so Sauron corrupted them by amplifying their innate lust for gems and precious metals, which was as much as he could do *to the dwarves*.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Jan 3, 2015)

Kaodi said:


> That takes some major lurkage fortitude to register in 2005 and make your first post nearly 10 years later.




Guess who has been wearing the _you know what..._


----------



## WayneLigon (Jan 3, 2015)

Morrus said:


> Yeah, I've heard that. I knew that already. My question was that that is all very... vague. What does the ring actually do?




I keep coming back to the idea that Sauron poured so much of himself into the One Ring that he basically ceased to exist save as a wraith without it, and it took him 3,000 years to get to the point of even appearing visible. Me, I'd assume that the Ring, in the hands of someone knowledgeable like Gandalf or Galadriel, would allow you to do anything Sauron could do back in the day. He was an earthshakingly powerful sorcerer, so one would assume you'd be able to bend the elements to your will, do mass mind control on his creations like he does with the orcs, trolls, etc, speak and see across vast distances. You could probably do some of the things you see in Lair powers for major monsters in D&D now; the land itself eventually comes to mirror you. Galadriel is wild and fey, so Lothlorian is as well. When Sauron was at his full power, Mordor responded to him, becoming a dark and evil place, just as The Necromancer he slowly poisoned the entirety of Greedwood just by his continued presence. Someone with the Ring fully empowered would probably have similar effects in their region. 

Most magic in Middle Earth is powerful but subtle. Tolkien is very much obeying the basic rules of faerie tale magic here, with the huge magical effects also having a massive cost, usually in time and lasting effects on the wielder.


----------

