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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 18 2024, 7:02pm
Post #1 of 49
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Isildur and the Oathbreakers
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Isildur and the Oathbreakers? Yeah, man, I saw them support Led Zeppelin at the Rex Ballroom in Bognor Regis - think it was maybe 1968....
No, no: what I want to ask is how we imagine this cursing the Oathbreakers bit actually working:
“For at Erech there stands yet a black stone that was brought, it was said, from Númenor by Isildur; and it was set upon a hill, and upon it the King of the Mountains swore allegiance to him in the beginning of the realm of Gondor. But when Sauron returned and grew in might again, Isildur summoned the Men of the Mountains to fulfil their oath, and they would not: for they had worshipped Sauron in the Dark Years.
‘Then Isildur said to their king: “Thou shalt be the last king. And if the West prove mightier than thy Black Master, this curse I lay upon thee and thy folk: to rest never until your oath is fulfilled. For this war will last through years uncounted, and you shall be summoned once again ere the end.” And they fled before the wrath of Isildur, and did not dare to go forth to war on Sauron’s part; and they hid themselves in secret places in the mountains and had no dealings with other men, but slowly dwindled in the barren hills.”
LOTR - The Passing of the Grey Company
We don't happen to have anything on the wording of the Mountain Men's oath, by any chance? Especially anything it included about on the 'penalty clauses' (by analogy to a contract) - that is, the agreed consequences of breaking the oath?
I'm musing about this in the context of Tolkien trying to maintain that Men can't do magic (which has turned up again here). This sort of epic cursing sounds a bit like doing magic though.
Thoughts:- <Sigh>, just more evidence that magic in Middle-earth is a loose canon
- Men can't do magic but Isildur, like his descendant Aragorn "is not a pure ‘Man’, but at long remove one of the ‘children of Lúthien’.” - Letter#155. Tolkien escapes through a loophole, again!
- (My preferred candidate) Isildur is not using any magical power of his own. Maybe the oath's penalty clauses gives him the power to decide what would become of the Men, or he is merely explaining the implications of their default? I'd find it particularly amusing if the Mountain Men had sworn an oath witnessed by and putting them at the mercy of Eru (who, as followers of Sauron, they presumably think is a fiction got up by the Valar.)
These aren't mutually exclusive of course, and maybe someone has an option Number 4. that is much better? Or options 5 to n?
Number 3 is probably a bit consistent with the trouble cause by the Oath of Feanor. We don't read that oath in the Sil., but I remember CuriousG finding it (from Arda Reconstructed by Douglas Kane of this parish)
Be he foe or friend, be he foul or clean,
brood of Morgoth or bright Vala,
Elda or Maia or Aftercomer,
Man yet unborn upon Middle-earth,
neither law, nor love, nor league of swords,
dread nor danger, not Doom itself,
shall defend him from Feanor, and Feanor's kin,
whoso hideth or hoardeth, or in hand taketh,
finding keepeth or afar casteth
a Silmaril. This we swear all:
death we will deal him ere Day's ending,
woe unto world's end! Our word hear thou,
Eru Allfather! To the everlasting
Darkness doom us if our deed faileth.
On the holy mountain hear in witness
and our vow remember, Manwe and Varda!
From a Tolkien text collected in Arda Reconstructed by Douglas Kane, and quoted by CuriousG here
How do you imagine it working?
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
(This post was edited by noWizardme on Jan 18 2024, 7:07pm)
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Silvered-glass
Rohan
Jan 19 2024, 10:29pm
Post #2 of 49
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I find the story of Isildur's curse very strange.
For one thing, there is the origin of the Stone of Erech. It is said to have been brought from Númenor by Isildur, or perhaps it fell from the sky - people aren't sure in the present day of the story, though the book at a first glance appears to side with the Isildur origin. However a Rhyme of Lore says that "seven stones" were brought from Númenor and those match the seven palantírs. There is no room in the lore for an eighth stone, especially a huge one that looks like it would have been unreasonably difficult to move by ship. The Stone of Erech could only be numbered among the seven stones if it was one of the seven palantírs, but this option results in unreasonable difficulties on multiple fronts, starting from the initial placements of all the palantírs being known and none of them being Erech.
At least Erech's name goes far back, which suggests that there was something in the place before Isildur:
Yet the names of nearly all places and persons in the realm of Gondor were of Elvish form and meaning. A few were of forgotten origin, and descended doubtless from the days before the ships of the Númenoreans sailed the Sea; among these were Umbar, Arnach and Erech
The Stone of Erech reminds me of the Black Stone of Kaaba and could in fact have been meant by Tolkien as its equivalent or possibly even the same stone early in its history, before it was broken (at least two separate times, the last of which historical) and became as it is now. The story about Isildur bringing the stone could have been concocted by the locals because they had worshiped the stone in the Dark Years and didn't want for the new rulers of the country to destroy the people's important cult object simply because it was associated with the worship of Sauron.
I find it also more than a little questionable that Isildur would have been able to curse an entire people with such a strong effect. If Men, even high-born Númenoreans, were able to do such things, it should have had a bigger impact on the plot (though maybe Boromir's curse on all the halflings is in-world responsible for the modern absence of hobbits) and also sounds like a particularly nasty thing to do... I think it's more likely that Sauron the Necromancer was the author of the curse attributed to Isildur. After all, the Men of the Mountain betrayed Sauron too when they refused to come to fight on either side.
And as for whether the Dead would have been able to liberate themselves from Sauron's curse by fighting against Sauron, it all depends on the exact wording of the curse. It is worth mentioning that the Corsairs of Umbar are descendants of Númenor, which may be very relevant here. If Aragorn had taken the Dead to the Pelennor Fields or the Black Gate, the results could have been very different.
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 20 2024, 6:12pm
Post #3 of 49
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A couple of times here we've had fun working out the practicalities (or absurdities) of Isildur bringing such a thing with him by ship.
Bracegirdle doing some approximations, with the result that a 12-foot diameter stone of, say, granite would weigh maybe 74 tons. YMMV if you prefer a different construction material, natch.
Then, But if of ships I now should sing, what ship would come to me,
What ship would bear such a collosal ball, in difficult sailing conditions caused by a divine-wrath tsunami?
Then, you have the problem of manourvering it into position once you wash up somewhere Gondorish:
Adding to the puzzle is the suggestion in the text that Isildur set the Stone on the hilltop "at his landing". That evokes the idea of Noah's Ark coming to ground on Mt. Ararat as the Flood's waters receded. In this equally semi-mythical case, we are asked to imagine, I think, that the vast waves of Numenor's doom and Elendil's escape washed his small fleet up onto the coastal highlands of Gondor. No 'specially designed dock' would have been available as the prince clambered down from his beached ship, left high and dry and many miles from the nearest shoreline once the sea had settled back to its usual level! It may well be that they simply dismantled the ship piece by piece from around the Stone, liberating it in place to roll gently into the shallow pit where it has been ever since.
And of course the question of 'why' is even further from an answer than 'how'. Why was the ship carrying the Stone? What did it signify back in Numenor, that they felt compelled to load it and carry it at such tremendous cost in labor and in stowage space in the cargo hold? Whatever its meaning or use back in the homeland, could Isildur have anticipated repurposing it as a dark, forboding, and even cursed marker of a shipwreck landing high on a barren hill in the land of exile?
Fun stuff to speculate on, as always.
squire, in "A Carrack was generally smaller than a Galleon, but not always", 2019
Fun stuff to speculate on indeed, because let's face it -
"If there is anything pleasant in criticism, it is finding out what we aren’t meant to find out."- Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes, by Monsignor Ronald A. Knox, 1911
Fun and pleasant whether motivated by a sincere enjoyment of trying to solve such puzzles, or whether the entertainment is to come up with the most far-fetched idea that can be presented straight-faced, with of course as much textural backing as possible.
Fun, but I sincerely believe that Tolkien never thought about any of this whatsoever, and if asked to fill in the details would react with a shrug as he did to Mr Hastings:
You have at any rate paid me the compliment of taking me seriously; though I cannot avoid wondering whether it is not ‘too seriously’, or in the wrong directions. The tale is after all in the ultimate analysis a tale, a piece of literature, intended to have literary effect, and not real history. That the device adopted, that of giving its setting an historical air or feeling, and (an illusion of ?) three dimensions, is successful, seems shown by the fact that several correspondents have treated it in the same way–according to their different points of interest or knowledge: i.e. as if it were a report of ‘real’ times and places, which my ignorance or carelessness had misrepresented in places or failed to describe properly in others. Its economics, science, artefacts, religion, and philosophy are defective, or at least sketchy.
Letter 153 (a letter in draft form To Peter Hastings, 1954). from a 1e edition of 'Letters'
My own guess is that Tolkien was after (and got) the effect in the stories of some amazing mysterious ancient structure redolent of the past power and grandeur of Gondor at its forming, and never mind the practicalities that might occur to the Interested Reader after a bout of fridge logic. Spoilsport.
Oddly though, I remember a mention in HoME of Tolkien playing with the idea of the Stone of Erech as a giant palantir. So the 'seven stones' bit of the rhyme's accounting does work. Now I'm imagining Isildur appearing in the Stone of Erech like it's a great big dystopian TV, and cursing the Mountain Men that way....
I did like your point, Silvered-glass that the Mountain Men were doubly traitors: having sworn seperately to fight for both sides (or being otherwise solmely committed to Sauron,we think), they actually fought for neither. I wondered whether your last sentence "If Aragorn had taken the Dead to the Pelennor Fields or the Black Gate, the results could have been very different." was a suggestion that divided loyalties might then resurface. So wiser to release the Mountain Men after the relief of Minas Tirith, as well as kinder, and less likely to lead to any tyranical temptations. As I say, not sure whether that was what you meant, but I do like that idea.
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 20 2024, 7:06pm
Post #4 of 49
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That 2014 thread on the Stone of Erech is awesome and I completely missed it at the time! Ta for posting!
I journeyed HoMe-wards (Volume IX), to refresh my memory and very much enjoyed CJRT's astonishment ("the extraordinary thing about this...") at his father's ability to casually move the Stone of Erech around, let alone how on Arda Isildur got the thing there, in-universe. Tolkien begins with placing the Stone more or less where it ended up in the final text, before deciding to move it to between the mouths of the Rivers Lameduin (Gilrain) and Anduin (Ethir Anduin); and then to move it again to the mouth of the River Morthond, on the shores of Cobas Haven. CJRT's exasperation to one side, if the Isildur was going to be written up as having lugged the Stone from Númenor, both of the discarded locations were at least more practical than what Tolkien eventually went with, in that they were by the sea.
I couldn't remember the association with the Palantíri in the slightest, so many thanks for that tasty titbit! At least as far as Volume IX is concerned, I see that it wasn't the Stone of Erech itself but rather that Tolkien's draft initially located one of the Palantíri in the vault of a ruined tower built next to the Stone of Erech.
Still pondering your excellent framing and questions that you kicked off the thread with...!
Welcome to the Mordorfone network, where we put the 'hai' back into Uruk
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Eldy
Tol Eressea
Jan 20 2024, 9:51pm
Post #5 of 49
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This is a hobbyhorse for me, so I apologize if this post is a bit orthogonal to your OP, but I don't think Tolkien's comment about Men being unable to do magic is worth putting stock in. He immediately undercut that statement in an endnote (which you quoted in one of the linked threads) when he remembered that the Barrow-blades were said to be the "work of Westernesse, wound about with spells for the bane of Mordor" (TTT, III 1). One could argue that Númenóreans in general fall under the descent from Lúthien exception since after thousands of years all of them would be descended from her, but it's not clear that Tolkien realized this.* And that can't account for Gandalf's statement that he "once knew every spell in all the tongues of Elves or Men or Orcs, that was ever used for [opening/unlocking doors]" (FOTR, II 4).** Some Tolkien commentators try to draw up typologies of supernatural abilities that let them claim Mannish and Orkish "spells" are not "magic", but I see no value in such intellectual gymnastics for the sake of retaining a statement from the Letters that Tolkien himself promptly cast doubt on.
This is not to say that I think Humans had the same baseline level of (potential for) supernatural abilities that Elves had, nor that "magic" worked the same for all the peoples of Middle-earth. And in some cases, like Hobbits and their preternatural "art of disappearing swiftly and silently", a seemingly magical ability is rather "a professional skill [maintained through] heredity and practice, and a close friendship with the earth" (FOTR, Prologue). Despite my Letter 155 skepticism, I'm fond of the idea that descent from Lúthien increased the ceiling of magical ability for Humans, especially with regard to healing, and it's possible that played a role in the case of Isildur and the Oathbreakers. But I don't think there's any great mystery here.
---
* His discussion of Númenórean beardlessness/beardedness in NoMe (ch. 2.v) strongly suggests he did not realize that all Númenóreans, rather than only the elite, eventually shared in the Elvish descent originally limited to the House of Elros. On the other hand, it's suggested in ROTK that Imrahil of Dol Amroth's appearance indicates the thousand-year-old infusion of Elvish blood into his family (by Mithrellas, according to legend). But even the foot-soldiers of Dol Amroth are "tall as lords, grey-eyed, dark-haired" (ROTK, V 1), suggesting Tolkien grasped the mathematics of human reproduction in this instance. Or maybe he just imagined they preserved ancient Númenórean phenotypes more consistently than others in Gondor.
** See also: the demonstrated abilities of the Drúedain (per their eponymous chapter in UT); the Orkish equivalent of miruvor (TTT, III 3), for which we have no non-supernatural explanation; and Sauron teaching "sorcery" to servants like the Nazgûl (initially human; TS, OTROP), the Mouth of Sauron (always human; ROTK V 10), and unspecified "magicians", "those who have become like [Sauron]" (presumably humans and/or Orcs; Letter 155 itself!). It should be noted that the last example comes up in the context of Tolkien distinguishing between magia and goeteia, but this sort of fine distinction is beside the basic point that humans and Orcs doing what most readers would casually call magic was nothing exceptional in Middle-earth.
(This post was edited by Eldy on Jan 20 2024, 10:06pm)
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 21 2024, 11:13am
Post #6 of 49
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"When a forum member likes to go on tangents (go on tangents)"
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I think I should be the last person to mind anyone posting 'orthogonally', given the number of tangental things I've been posting.
In fact what started me thinking about Isildur and the Oathbreakers was precisely getting into a sort of Consistency Police mood (as I do simetimes) and trying to think of other things that didn't seem consistent with Tolkien's 'Men can't do magic' thought. Isildur's curse does seem like an example. But I missed Gandalf's words at the Gates of Moria though, which is a good one.
Weirdly, I do both enoy these quibbles and at the same time think they're absurd. I'm such a mess.
But no real harm in it, until and unless sommeone holds their own interpretation of things so dear that they get angry about the existence of any other ideas (as we both remember that has happened sometimes, with 'genetics' being a hot button topic for some folks in the fandom)
So I'm not sure I enjoyed my time in the Tolkien Consistency Police. The thoughtful ones are a mournful lot. Here's their song:
When it's 'Men can't do no magic' but they do some (but they do some)
When the Prof. changes his mind about Grey Elves ('bout Grey Elves)
Then the fandom arguments can get quite gruesome (get quite gruesome)
And folks can quite forget - enjoy yourselves!
If Men and elves have children with each other (with each other)
And genetics is kicked tote-lee into touch (into touch)
Ah take one consideration with another (with another)
Then consistency's not worth so very much!
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
When Consistency Policing's to be done (to be done)
A Policeman's lot is not a happy one.
(After The Pirates of Pen-arduin by Galdriel and Saruman)I did have time learn the song but didn't really manage the dance (I'm the one falling over in the video).
Certainly if one decides to just ignore (or qualify away) Tolkien's 'Men can't do magic' thought, then we have apparently solved the immediate problem - Isildur curses the Mountain Men magically.
But does that really explain things? - er, no, well not really because the next obvious question is to ask about what sort of magic and how might it have worked, and who else could do what....and so it goes.
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
(This post was edited by noWizardme on Jan 21 2024, 11:27am)
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 21 2024, 11:15am
Post #7 of 49
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Ah, so I misremembered or misunderstood?
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The (abandoned) idea was a tower with a palantir in it next to the Stone of Erech, not that the stone itself was a big palantir?
Thanks. Good to have that cleared up.
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 21 2024, 11:48am
Post #8 of 49
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Timelines, history and folklore
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Reading the story I really like the effect of the Stone of Erech, and the (?magical) arhitecture of Orthanc or Helm's Deep. And the swwitchback climb past the waethered Pukel Men up to Dunharrow. And I also like the Barrows on teh Barrow Downs, and the various other ruined bits and bobs - they give the story mystery and colour (as well as some plot points).
When Aragorn summons the Mountain men (8th March TA 3019) it's over three thousand years since they were cursed. There's stuff at leas that oold to see in Britain, but it is prehistoric (I mean, no written records). So it tends to be mysterious and the source of much folklore, until antiquarianism and then archaeology were invented. That's the effect I get from the story, and it is a good one.
Some bits and bobs in the Third Age (TA) Gondor region are like that within the story, I suppose - nobody knows in detail who built them, when or how and why.
But Tolkien has made the Stone of Erech different - it is a matter of history.
Appendix B gives us a timeline - it can't have been placed there earlier than the arrival of Elendil and Isildur and the foundation of Gondor (SA 3320). Maybe Isildur was swearing in allies in the period between that an Sauron's attack of SA 3429, which overran Gondor and caused Isildur to escape to Arnor. Or maybe the oath was sworn as the Armies of the Last Alliance returned to Gondor (before Sauron's defeat, SA 3441). Can't think of why Isildur would want that oath sworn after that, and anyway he only had a couple of more years to live.
If Middle-earth became somehow available for historians to visit, then maybe there are some interesting papers about the Srone of Erech in the Minas Tirith archives, along with Isildur's memoir about the Ring.
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 21 2024, 11:50am
Post #9 of 49
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I suppose we could believe Erech von Däniken, and decide the Stone was made by aliens?
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 21 2024, 1:17pm
Post #10 of 49
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Loving the observations around the historical and prehistorical, and its transposition in a Middle-earth context! I was an archaeologist at one point in my career, on the 'historical' side of the trade, so to speak but one of the many awesome things about the job was that excavation and survey work inevitably exposed you to prehistoric material - whether I was working in Australia or the Mediterranean. The feigned history of Middle-earth, as you say, pushes some of what we might normally categorise as 'prehistoric' in our own context into the 'historic'. The Stone of Erech isn't just an inscrutable megalith, with no written record of who / why / when. Tolkien nudges it into an era of written records.
On the timeline, I agree with where you get to. Taking a look at three helpful passages in this regard, one from Appendix B and the other two from HoMe IX, we have respectively (emphases mine):
For at Erech there stands yet a black stone that was brought, it was said, from Númenor by Isildur; and it was set upon a hill, and upon it the King of the Mountains swore allegiance to him in the beginning of the realm of Gondor. But when Sauron returned and grew in might again, Isildur summoned the Men of the Mountains to fulfil their oath, and they would not: for they had worshipped Sauron in the Dark Years.
This is a stone [of Erech] set up between the mouths of Lamedui and the Ethir Anduin delta to commemorate the landing of Isildur and Anárion.
Stone of Erech was black stone fabled to have been brought from Númenor, and set to mark the landing of Isildur and Anárion and their reception as kings by the dark men of the land.
The first passage heavily implies a very early date in the history of Gondor - the foundation period, as you say, in or shortly after II.3320. The second and third, which are are drafts, are less unequivocal. Commemorative monuments can be installed long after a defining event occurred, of course. Elendil's followers erected a monument at he Have of Umbar to Ar-Pharazôn's humbling of Sauron many years after the event, for example. While the first passage gives the strongest indication that Tolkien's feigned history tied the Stone of Erech to Gondor's foundation era, an interesting difference between the published text and the drafts is that the latter do explicitly blend in the function of foundation commemoration with the oath of allegiance sworn by the Men of the Mountain, and make this as much about Anárion as it does Isildur. They were, after all, coeval and equal kings of Gondor under the High Kingship of Elendil, and the draft text better respects the author's characterisation elsewhere of the pre-Last Alliance constitutional settlement. I also note the shift in feigned historical tone, from the more figurative "[the] stone fabled to have been brought from Númenor" to the more utilitarian "a black stone was brought, it was said, from Númenor".
An aside (it's the Reading Room, after all!), my thoughts run speculatively back to the aforementioned Exilic Númenórean monument in Umbar (Appendix A, 'Gondor and the Heirs of Anarion'):
... and on the highest hill of the headland above the Haven [of Umbar] they set a great white pillar as a monument. It was crowned with a globe of crystal that took the rays of the Sun and of the Moon and shone like a bright star that could be seen in clear weather even on the coasts of Gondor or far out upon the western sea.
There's absolutely nothing to substantiate my speculation but I'll put it anyway that this 'feels' like another mysterious artefact of Númenor, installed in Middle-earth after being rescued from the wrack and ruin of the Akallabêth. These Exiles after all have form for carrying their pet rocks across the sea :)
Welcome to the Mordorfone network, where we put the 'hai' back into Uruk
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 21 2024, 6:34pm
Post #11 of 49
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Interesting that draft saying "set to mark the landing of Isildur and Anárion and their reception as kings by the dark men of the land." (HoME)
I'm combining it with "and upon it the King of the Mountains swore" (Aragorn's account of things in LOTR, but my italics)
We end up with the situation where (for imponderable reasons) the Stone of Erech seems not only an ideal marker to place to commemmorate the landing, but has a significance such that the new vassals of Kings Isildur and Anárion swear upon it.
So it must have been available at the time these oaths were sworn, as otherwise oaths could not have been sworn upon it. It can't be a commemorative marker placed long after these events (my amusing real-world example of such a much-later marker being the Rufus Stone in the New Forest, Hampshire, England).
I suppose, strictly speaking, it doesn't have to have been in the location Aragorn finds it until later. Though that would leave us with the additional task of wondering who moved it and why. But the important thing here - for it is the thing that gets the Mountain men into trouble - is that the swearing was done, and it was upon the stone.
I'm imagining the "receiving Isildur and Anárion as kings" was the same event as the swearing of alliegence - obtaining a commitment to loyalty and military service from ones' new vassals sounds like a likely priority. That would again suggest it is all happening as soon as possible after Isildur and Anárion land.
But goodness knows what the pre-existing significance of the stone was that made it the ideal object upon which to swear: to hold these promises, and to represent the kingship of Isildur and Anárion and their heirs, and the mutual bonds betweenkings and subjects.
~~~~~~
"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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uncle Iorlas
Rohan
Jan 21 2024, 9:02pm
Post #12 of 49
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Weirdly, I do both enjoy these quibbles and at the same time think they're absurd. I'm such a mess.
Spoken as if from my own heart. And, kind of critically, I think it matches the author’s mindset as well.
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Silvered-glass
Rohan
Jan 21 2024, 10:16pm
Post #13 of 49
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Fun stuff to speculate on indeed, because let's face it - " If there is anything pleasant in criticism, it is finding out what we aren’t meant to find out."- Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes, by Monsignor Ronald A. Knox, 1911
Fun and pleasant whether motivated by a sincere enjoyment of trying to solve such puzzles, or whether the entertainment is to come up with the most far-fetched idea that can be presented straight-faced, with of course as much textural backing as possible.
In these matters the approach to take is to eliminate the impossible options, so that what is left should be the truth. I saying this as the person who has been posting these weird Tolkien theories that go against people's preconceptions and get dismissed as obviously wrong. (I also have developed some theories that I haven't gotten into posting about yet, including "the big theory that changes everything", a theory so extreme that reactions along the lines of "Did you even read the book?" would be the expected result if I just posted the short version, so I've tried to address all the likely counter arguments in advance and explain everything very clearly and thoroughly, though at the cost of the text file having grown uncomfortably long...)
But anyway, I am plain unable to come up with a sufficiently workable scenario for Isildur bringing the Stone of Erech to Middle-earth. There are simply too many logical problems with this premise.
Some major issues to be taken into account:
- Given the difficulties with ship transport and the limited space available, how special and powerful would the Stone have needed to be to have been worth the trouble of moving?
- If the Stone was such a big deal, why isn't it mentioned in any of the stories about Númenor and earlier?
- If the Stone was such a big deal, how did the Lords of Andúnië come to have it instead of the royal dynasty?
- If the Stone was a gift from Valinor, why is the Stone associated with curses rather than blessings?
- If the Stone was an important memorial set by Isildur, why doesn't Erech have a Sindarin name?
- If the Stone was more portable than it would appear, why was it left in Erech?
- If the Stone was really special and magical, why was it left unguarded in the open?
- If the guard on the Stone lapsed with time, why didn't anyone take advantage of that?
- If everyone just kind of forgot about the Stone, how did it get forgotten so thoroughly that even Denethor didn't think to use it?
- If Denethor thought this Stone was too dangerous to use, why did he leave it vulnerable to Sauron and the Corsairs of Umbar?
- If Denethor couldn't spare the men to keep the dangerous Stone guarded, why didn't he at least cover it with a big pile of dirt?
- If the Stone didn't really have all that much use in peace or war, why bring it from Númenor?
- If Isildur just liked having a big unwieldy curse stone in his ship's hold, what does this say about Isildur's character and common sense?
- If Isildur thought a big unwieldy curse stone was the perfect memorial for his arrival, what does this say about Isildur's character and common sense?
- If the Stone wasn't really about enforcing feudalism with the power of curses, what was the Stone about then?
- If the Stone was just a pure and holy witness to an oath, how does venerating a rock square with the Faithful religion?
- If the Stone was just a pure and holy witness to an oath, why didn't the Gondorians treasure the Stone more?
- If Isildur was a bad egg, aren't we back at the unreliable history that people wish to avoid?
- If Minas Tirith was saved because of Isildur's genocidal lack of mercy, is this really the interpretation intended by Tolkien?
My conclusion is that the Isildur version for origin for the Stone of Erech does not hold together. When the impossible is removed, we are left with the conclusion that the Stone most likely fell from the sky after all, as a meteorite, like the alternative story has it, or else has some other forgotten origin in the distant past.
Fun, but I sincerely believe that Tolkien never thought about any of this whatsoever, and if asked to fill in the details would react with a shrug as he did to Mr Hastings: You have at any rate paid me the compliment of taking me seriously; though I cannot avoid wondering whether it is not ‘too seriously’, or in the wrong directions. The tale is after all in the ultimate analysis a tale, a piece of literature, intended to have literary effect, and not real history. That the device adopted, that of giving its setting an historical air or feeling, and (an illusion of ?) three dimensions, is successful, seems shown by the fact that several correspondents have treated it in the same way–according to their different points of interest or knowledge: i.e. as if it were a report of ‘real’ times and places, which my ignorance or carelessness had misrepresented in places or failed to describe properly in others. Its economics, science, artefacts, religion, and philosophy are defective, or at least sketchy.
Letter 153 (a letter in draft form To Peter Hastings, 1954). from a 1e edition of 'Letters'
My own guess is that Tolkien was after (and got) the effect in the stories of some amazing mysterious ancient structure redolent of the past power and grandeur of Gondor at its forming, and never mind the practicalities that might occur to the Interested Reader after a bout of fridge logic. Spoilsport.
I think people are selling Tolkien short by being so quick to assume that anything that feels slightly off is just an error. Tolkien paid a lot of attention to cause and effect. The Stone of Erech is a major plot device, and Tolkien wouldn't have treated it like an insignificant background issue left unexplored like, say, the styles and evolution of Gondorian pottery.
Tolkien also would have been entirely familiar with the concept of higher criticism given that ancient texts were in his academic field. Tolkien's Elves and Dwarves can even be seen as an exercise of higher criticism against myth and philology with the intention of discovering the original nature of the beings behind the words and the Christianized folk stories.
Here is also a quote showing that Tolkien thought about and explicitly included unreliable distorted versions of history in his worldbuilding:
From The Palantíri in UT:
Communications depended on messenger and errand-riders, or in times of urgency upon beacons, and if the Stones of Anor and Orthanc were still guarded as treasures out of the past, known to exist only by a few, the Seven Stones of old were by the people generally forgotten, and the rhymes of lore that spoke of them were if remembered no longer understood; their operations were transformed in legend into the Elvish powers of ancient kings with their piercing eyes, and the swift birdlike spirits that attended them, bringing them news or bearing their messages.
This makes it sound like Tolkien invented the palantírs as a way of trying to imagine the lost real history behind the myth of Odin's ravens Hugin and Munin, along with similar examples such as Zeus and his eagles.
As an aside, an unsolved question: If Tolkien had written a story in the realistic style of LotR in which the characters actually got to become acquainted with Manwë rather than believing in him as a mythic figure far away, how close to science fiction would the story have been? Even the palantírs in LotR could be interpreted as sufficiently advanced technology in a world in which psychic powers are considered the domain of science fiction, as in a lot of old SF.
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 21 2024, 10:44pm
Post #14 of 49
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a meandering walkthrough of oaths, curses, Dead Men, doom and prophecy (destination tbc!)
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This is a great thread you’ve started here noWiz! I’ve got a bit of previous form on putting the Dead Men of Dunharrow into an ‘Unseen world’ typology, which more or less attempted to explain these unfortunates as having had their fëar restrained to Middle-earth after the perishing of their hröar, as a consequence of their broken oath. In their case, breaking the bond of allegiance meant breaking the bond between fëa and hröa. What I didn’t get anywhere near is what you’re perusing – the intriguing question of ‘how’ this ghastly and ghostly state came about. I suspect I didn’t broach this at the time of my own earlier posting because I had no idea what the answer was!
I like your three categories, as I reckon they cover pretty much every plausible lens through which to regard the phenomenon and because they’re not mutually exclusive. I reckon where I come out on this is somewhere within scenario 3 or perhaps a phantom (pun intended) scenario 3.5. That’s without prejudice to me also agreeing with the observation that there are too many exceptions to Tolkien’s own ‘Men don’t do magic’ pseudo-rule to exclude the possibility of Isildur exercising supernatural power. Particularly given he is a scion of a family that possesses the ‘Lúthien gene’ (I also take Eldy’s point about diffusion and descent, once you get into the realm of millennia).
My thinking on this is a bit meandering but it’s partly informed by the ‘what’: as in what has happened to the Men of the Mountains. If I stick with my earlier conclusion that these humans have experienced and are enduring a severance of the fëa from the hröa, then what we have is akin to the state of undeath that Sauron, through the Nine Rings of Power, imposed on those men who later became the Nazgûl. The physical substance of the Dead Men and the Nazgûl alike has shrivelled away over time but the spirit, which should otherwise have departed for the Halls of Mandos and thence beyond, is trapped, pinned to Middle-earth like a desiccated insect to a board. As you remarked, we lack the words of the original oath (or indeed oaths, as Silvered-glass shrewdly observed), so we don’t know if Isildur is enacting a specific clause, so the speak, or if he’s free-styling, enraged at the betrayal he’s witnessed and simply coming up with the worst thing he can think of on the spot. Either way, it’s testament to how utterly and grimly binary even the Faithful’s view of the world has become, post-Akallabêth. This punishment for choosing the ‘wrong side’ (ie. Sauron) is dreadful, flying in the face of the natural order of mortality.
For some context: taking a non-exhaustive look at other instances of oath-breaking, we certainly see vengeance either built into or otherwise exacted in the event of faithlessness. For example, for his betrayal of allegiance sworn to Caranthir, the First Age Easterling leader Uldor was named ‘the accursed’ and in revenge he and his brothers were slain to a man (‘Of the Fifth Battle’, The Silmarillion). The oath of service that Pippin swore before Denethor prompted what comes across as a formulaic reply from the Ruling Steward (emphasis mine): “… and I [Denethor] will not forget it, nor fail to reward that which is given: fealty with love, valour with honour, oath-breaking with vengeance.” (‘Minas Tirith’, LotR). The price of betraying an allegiance is clearly dear but still, I’d argue, in a different league to what Isildur exacts.
You helpfully pulled up the text of the Oath of Fëanor from the ‘Annals of Aman’, and it’s a handy bit of juxtaposition. I’ve given a couple of examples of what I’ll term ‘normal’ oaths and consequences of oath-breaking. In contrast, the Oath of Fëanor, to put it mildly, is so disproportionate as to be in the realm of insanity. Its terms and conditions, the scope of who it seeks to punish and the stated and horrifying consequences even for the oath-takers themselves – all of it is terrifying madness, even before we read what happens next in the ‘Quenta Silmarillion’. The juxtaposition I have in mind is that whatever the words of the actual oath sworn by the Men of the Mountains to Isildur, the consequence of forswearing is, arguably, also disproportionate. Isildur isn’t vowing to punish the Men of the Mountains with, say, the execution of their king and his leadership team. Isildur condemns an entire people to restless undeath. I suppose it’s possible to comprehend the visceral nature of what Isildur calls down upon the Men of the Mountains, given Sauron the Deceiver’s recent, devastating impact on the Númenóreans and their island homeland, and the subsequent existential nature of the War of the Last Alliance. Even so, the outcome still feels to me like something Sauron himself would relish engineering, as indeed he had already with the Nazgûl. Or reminiscent in its extremism of an oath of vengeance sworn by a monomaniacally deranged King of the Noldor.
A closer analogue to what the Men of the Mountains may have specifically sworn before Isildur might be the Oath of Eorl. In this example, the leader of the Éothéod, Eorl swears everlasting friendship between his people and Gondor and binds his successors to the oath in the process: “…and let them keep it in faith unbroken, lest the Shadow fall upon them and they become accursed” (‘Cirion & Eorl’, Unfinished Tales). There is nothing explicit in here about ‘accursed’ meaning ‘condemned to restless undeath’, although I note the reference to ‘the Shadow’ and that one of the names for the Dead Men was ‘Shadow-men’. An interesting line of inquiry then: would the Rohirrim die out and be reduced to wraiths if any of their rulers, at some point in the future, betrayed Gondor? Indeed, given that Cirion utters “a like bond of friendship” (there’s no text given before he skips to his ‘by Eru’ rider), would faithlessness on the part of Gondor result in a similar punishment from beyond the grave? I’m not sure I’d answer my own questions here in the affirmative but the reference to the Shadow does add a level of intensity, recalling the seemingly fundamentalist and unforgiving world view of Isildur that Evil is not to be brooked (until you insist on taking a pretty weregild from a 'dead' Dark Lord's hand, of course).
Back to attempting to unpack ‘how’ Isildur managed to graduate from ‘normal’ vengeance to pronouncing a curse that effects ‘paranormal’ vengeance, a form of damnation, on the forsworn in question. This is where I lean towards your option 3 more overtly. Isildur utters a curse and what he asserts as the consequence does in fact come true. The Men of the Mountains don’t die immediately but they experience an extinction trajectory, insofar as their mortal bodies or hröar are concerned, and they are forced to unnaturally persist “through years uncounted”. But is this the same thing as Isildur literally being the supernatural wielder of this level of power? I mentioned before that I don’t need convincing that mortals can perform magic or magical feats in Middle-earth. Yet what Isildur does feels out of proportion to what one mortal could possibly achieve or impose within the Circles of the World, even given the looseness of Tolkien’s ‘rules’ on magic. What I’m trying to get at here is what you elegantly describe as Isildur “explaining the implications of their default” and what I more clumsily put as: the Men of the Mountains exposed themselves to punishment through the violation of an oath; Isildur wants something drastic in the vengeance department and gives voice to that; but the horrific consequences aren’t necessarily or solely derived from his personal potency.
And thus to my ‘option 3.5’ take on all of this. Perhaps Isildur’s curse functions along similar lines to prophecy in Middle-earth. Consider the following from ‘Of the Ruin of Doriath’, The Silmarillion:
It is told that a seer and harp-player of Brethil named Glirhuin made a song, saying that the Stone of the Hapless should not be defiled by Morgoth nor ever thrown down, not though the sea drown all the land; as after indeed befell, and still Tol Morwen stands alone in the water beyond the new coasts that were made in the days of the wrath of the Valar.
I don’t reckon anyone would argue that Glirhuin, through his song, literally caused the preservation of the Stone of the Hapless and the creation of Tol Morwen. Any more than Glorfindel caused the Witch-king to become specifically vulnerable when he foretold that this foe would fall “not by the hand of man”; or that Mandos personally brought about the extended suffering of the Noldor through the Prophecy of the North. There’s a difference between a curse and prophecy, of course, and I’m majorly at risk of stretching this argument to breaking point! Both, however, serve to foretell an outcome or ‘doom’, desirable or otherwise to those involved; and both can be associated with oath-making and oath-breaking. So, rather than being the direct agent in the damnation of the Men of the Mountains, perhaps Isildur was more the herald or executor of that people’s ‘doom’, once the sin of oath-breaking had been committed?
I’ll finish (finally!) with some remarks about the function of ‘doom’ in Middle-earth and how it may be applied to the sad circumstances of these wayward sworn allies of Isildur; as well as some on the function of the Dead Men in Tolkien’s narrative of the War of the Ring. To turn the tide at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields, Aragorn needs to turn up with decent-sized reinforcements. And in the story, the only way to recruit such forces quickly enough to make a difference is to completely and implausibly liberate Gondor’s coastal fiefs from the scourge of the Corsairs of Umbar. The way he pulls that off, of course, is cashing in his hereditary claim to the allegiance of a supernatural army, temporarily and ironically becoming something of a necromancer. In effect, he uses the unnatural punishment meted out to the Men of the Mountains thousands of years previously to play an unnatural trump card in the war. This is not to say the Men of the Mountains were destined or fated to break their oath to Isildur – there is, more or less, always choice in Middle-earth, I reckon – but the ensuing ‘doom’ paves the way for Aragorn to be able to make his play to turn the tide at the Pelennor Fields. With that in mind, just imagine if the Men of the Mountains had honoured their oaths during the War of the Last Alliance rather than the War of the Ring! In the former, they would have been just another contingent marching under the banners of Elendil and Gil-galad, arguably a drop in an ocean of soldiery; whilst in the latter, they were an unstoppable army of the damned, setting up a decisive intervention.
The ‘doom’ that flowed from this oath-breaking shares a loose parallel with what befell the host of Ar-Pharazôn that landed with him on the shores of Aman. From the ‘Akallabêth’, we have this:
But Ar-Pharazôn the King and the mortal warriors that had set foot upon the land of Aman were buried under the falling hills: there it is said that they lie imprisoned in the Caves of the Forgotten, until the Last Battle and the Day of Doom.
Human soldiers trapped in stasis, in opposition to the natural order of death, awaiting a call-up to fight in a cataclysmic battle for the fate of the world – sound familiar…? Similar to the above, this is not to say that Ar-Pharazôn had no choice but to launch his insanely hubristic invasion of the Undying Lands because Eru planned all along for the Valar to have access to Númenórean reinforcements at the end of days. However, I’d argue that Ar-Pharazôn’s transgression, like that of the king of the Men of the Mountains, exposes and then sentences him and his army to this particular ‘doom’.
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(This post was edited by dernwyn on Jan 22 2024, 12:38am)
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 3:37pm
Post #15 of 49
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So in sum, our current idea is that the Men of the Mountains swore an oath of loyalty to Isildur and Anárion. Our best guess is that happened shortly after I & A landed, and before Sauron attacked (II. 3429)
For reasons that are probably unguessable, the Stone of Erech was deemed the appropriate thng to swear on. That suggests to me that either;
- it is already something to do with kingship, which would make it an appropriate object to 'hold the promise' - just as we see Pippin and Merry swear loyalty as warriors in ceremonies using their own swords, or Smeagol swears a (tricksy) promise to Frodo 'by the Precious' since Frodo won't let him swear on the Precious. Or;
- It is a holy/diabolical/magical relic or powerful l object whose power would be invoked if the oath were broken (Which seems to be what Forodo is warning Smeagol about: "It [the Ring] will hold you. But it is more treacherous than you are. It may twist your words. Beware!)
(there's no other substantiation for either idea as far as I can see.)
(BTW: I'm inclined to agree with Silvered-glass that it becomes much more believable if the Stone had been made in Gondor, rather than brought over by I & A. But Tolkien does seem determined that they brought it).
Looking at Aragorn's account of this lore again...
“For at Erech there stands yet a black stone that was brought, it was said, from Númenor by Isildur; and it was set upon a hill, and upon it the King of the Mountains swore allegiance to him in the beginning of the realm of Gondor. But when Sauron returned and grew in might again, Isildur summoned the Men of the Mountains to fulfil their oath, and they would not: for they had worshipped Sauron in the Dark Years.
‘Then Isildur said to their king: “Thou shalt be the last king. And if the West prove mightier than thy Black Master, this curse I lay upon thee and thy folk: to rest never until your oath is fulfilled. For this war will last through years uncounted, and you shall be summoned once again ere the end.” And they fled before the wrath of Isildur, and did not dare to go forth to war on Sauron’s part; and they hid themselves in secret places in the mountains and had no dealings with other men, but slowly dwindled in the barren hills.”
LOTR - The Passing of the Grey Company
this is consistent with the Men of the Mountains refusing to help defend Gondor from Sauron's attack of II. 3429. Of course it is possible to make up a tale in which they serve then, but refuse to join the Last Alliance. But I would have to make up a motive for them to change sides at that point, and that seems unnecessary.
II. 3429 also seems a likely time for Isidur to be feeling vengeful (Sauron's attack seems to over-run Gondor, and Isildur 'escapes down the Anduin' and has the task of returning with the Last Alliance later). And this also seems a good point at which Isildur might think "this war will last through years uncounted", which would be an odd thing to say just after the Battle of the Last Alliance (Though one can also imagine him speaking prophetically and so saying something he couldn't work out for himself; or one could hypothesise that Ringbearer Isildur knows that Sauron will be back; or, or, or...).
I suppose we are left wth the question of why the Men of the Mountains didn't fulfil their oath by joining the Last Alliance. It's not obvious to me why they "they hid themselves in secret places in the mountains and had no dealings with other men, but slowly dwindled in the barren hills" At least I don't know why they did that when Isildur might have calmed down an Sauron might be gone.
But maybe they thought Sauron would win and so were wrong-footed when first Sauron and Isildur disappeared in quick succession, and there was no-one to help them out of their bind.
And we're left with perhaps some insights into the character and views of Isildur. He does come across as someone who insists on his rights as he sees them - including having the One Rng as 'weregeld' (a compensation payment for relatives lost in battle).
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"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 4:18pm
Post #16 of 49
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I agree that there are a whole bundle of problems with the how and why of Isildur bringing the Stone across as one of the treasures evacuated with the Faithful, despite Tolkien seeming to insist on that. Then I think we disagree with what to do with that problem. Which is fine. Logic does not work very well in Middle-earth. That's a direct result of Middle-earth being a fantasy place (containing thinngs and situations that can't be extrapolated from the real world).
So, as a silly exmple, I just have to postulate that the Stone of Erech contains some magic such that Isildur carried it in his pocket until he told it to get big. All the problems vanish in a puff of sub-sub-creativity. But it's not very satisfying somehow.
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"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
(This post was edited by noWizardme on Jan 22 2024, 4:24pm)
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 4:26pm
Post #17 of 49
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Ah!! I know why they had to swear upon the Stone!!
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I think the Men of the Mountains were (understandably) timid about all this, and they wouldn't swear allieganece at all until they felt a little boulder
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"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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Silvered-glass
Rohan
Jan 22 2024, 4:38pm
Post #18 of 49
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The Deliberate Location of Erech
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I journeyed HoMe-wards (Volume IX), to refresh my memory and very much enjoyed CJRT's astonishment ("the extraordinary thing about this...") at his father's ability to casually move the Stone of Erech around, let alone how on Arda Isildur got the thing there, in-universe. Tolkien begins with placing the Stone more or less where it ended up in the final text, before deciding to move it to between the mouths of the Rivers Lameduin (Gilrain) and Anduin (Ethir Anduin); and then to move it again to the mouth of the River Morthond, on the shores of Cobas Haven. CJRT's exasperation to one side, if the Isildur was going to be written up as having lugged the Stone from Númenor, both of the discarded locations were at least more practical than what Tolkien eventually went with, in that they were by the sea.
Here we see proof that Tolkien gave real thought to the Stone of Erech instead of just plopping it down on a field and moving to other matters.
I think Tolkien in the end choosing to go with a location that would have been notably inconvenient for Isildur is evidence that Tolkien didn't mean for the Isildur story to be the real historical truth. Isildur would have put his marker on land near water, but meteorites do not respect the boundaries of land and sea and can fall down anywhere. By sheer mathematical probability, a random meteorite would have been vastly more likely to fall to an Isildur-unfriendly location on land (a large target) than to one convenient for Isildur (a much smaller target). Hitting the sea would have been even more likely, but in that case the meteorite would have been lost under the waves and not come to the story.
Tolkien's choice of placement fits the meteorite theory of origin far better than it does the Isildur theory.
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 22 2024, 5:36pm
Post #19 of 49
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They really did find themselves between a rock and a hard place...!
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Ethel Duath
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 5:49pm
Post #21 of 49
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it works much, much better from Numenor. And I think it's clear from what Tolkien has said in his letters plus just the nature of his story, that the "ambience"--for lack of a better word--of Myth and his skill at creating an atmosphere of wonder and mystery and a sense of things going on mystically, all at least partly out of reach would probably be better served by a Numenorian origin. (Or that idea or the "fallen from the sky" and therefore to ancient peoples would also likely have a mystical nature.)
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 22 2024, 6:45pm
Post #22 of 49
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I really like your observation about Tolkien and ambience through myth-making. And it sits very nicely with the one reference that Tolkien did make to Erech in his correspondence (Letter #297). This was in reply to a query about whether ‘Erech’ in LotR was at all connected with the eponymous Biblical name for the ancient Mesopotamian city of Uruk (itself an uncanny but fitting coincidence of a different sort, come to think of it!). In denying the suggested Erech connection, Tolkien went on to explain:
Nonetheless at the time of writing L.R. Book V chs. II and IX… and devising a legend to provide for the separation of Aragorn and Gandalf, and his disappearance and unexpected return, I was probably more influenced by the important element ER (in Elvish) = ‘one, single, alone.’
I love it how Tolkien is literally setting out his creative process here, whereby the need to ‘devise a legend’ is married with his passion for linguistics! It tells us next to nothing about that pesky Stone of Erech but I reckon this fragment is priceless :)
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noWizardme
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 7:40pm
Post #23 of 49
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I have a third candidate, I'm afraid
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A third candidate for what Tolkien might be doing imagining such a strange stone in an inconvenient location.
Our existing candidates are:- A per Silvered-glass: It's sufficiently unlikely that readers are intended to wonder whether the Numenorean origin story is true, or realise ti can't be (one could also point to the language used for this -- "a black stone that was brought, it was said, from Númenor by Isildur".
- Such an unlikely and incomprehensible achievement is intended to show the mystery and ambience of Numenor (and maybe Tolkien had not given much thought to the practicalities
- (Well it's more like 2.5, really) its like one of those real-world projects that are deliberately hard/ a bit pointless and are really built for political gain - to show off 'how we can do hard things':
We choose to put this great big stone on a hill in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win, and the others, too.
Isildur, speech to some blokes on a windy hill in the middle of nowhere. From Unstarted Tales
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"I am not made for querulous pests." Frodo 'Spooner' Baggins.
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Ethel Duath
Half-elven
Jan 22 2024, 8:45pm
Post #24 of 49
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I have an interest and have done some reading about these ancients sites and their languages (have you ever read "Empires of the Word" A Language History of the World by Nicholas Ostler?), but I'm having a brain-dead sort of day, and I'm not catching the parallels somehow, other than a small city-state based sort of empire and a linguistic isolate? Although I'm not quite sure if that entirely tracks . . .
Or the Gilgamesh epic?
(This post was edited by Ethel Duath on Jan 22 2024, 8:46pm)
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Felagund
Gondor
Jan 22 2024, 9:47pm
Post #25 of 49
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'if you build it; they will come'
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You've quoted my fourth favourite text in all of Tolkiendom! Rounding out my 'top 4' are, of course, Unreliable Tales, Unremembered Mutterings and Utterly Unbelievable Inklings .
Turning to my fifth favourite, The Silmarillion, there's a nice line in there that certainly portrays the Gondorians as 'you imagine it; we build it' types:
... but other works marvellous and strong they built in the land in the days of their power, at the Argonath, and at Aglarond, and at Erech; and in the circle of Angrenost, which Men called Isengard, they made the Pinnacle of Orthanc of unbreakable stone.
Erech gets a mention in the list of wonders, although given that it's described as a singular, globular stone it doesn't quite fit with the act of 'building'. It does go with the grain though of it being a construct, in a broader sense, of the Númenóreans, as opposed to it having "fallen from the sky, as some believed" ('The Passing of the Grey Company').
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I suppose we could believe
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