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DwellerInDale
Rohan
Jul 2 2013, 3:01pm
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The Nazgul as products of necromancy: canon after all?
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A number of people have decried the inference in The Hobbit: AUJ, that the Nazgul are entities raised from the dead by necromancy. While flipping through the Appendices and ROTK text a short while ago, however, I came across these lines:
"Begone, foul dwimmerlaik, lord of carrion!" ---Eowyn to the Witch King at the Battle of Pelennor Fields
dwimmerlaik: (in Rohan, work of necromancy, spectre) ---Appendix, Index II, Persons, Beasts, and Monsters
Did Eowyn consider the Nazgul as beings raised from the dead? And does that justify the inference as canon? What do folks think?
Don't mess with my favorite female elf.
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Morthoron
Gondor
Jul 2 2013, 4:44pm
Post #2 of 11
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is predicated on Anglo-Saxon; ergo, the use of "dwimmerlaik" to define what Eowyn considers supernatural conjured through sorcery. This is in line with Eomer's reference to Galadriel:
The Rider looked at them with renewed wonder, but his eyes hardened. 'Then there is a Lady in the Golden Wood, as old tales tell!' he said. 'Few escape her nets, they say. These are strange days! But if you have her favour, then you also are net-weavers and sorcerers, maybe.'
Tolkien paints the Rohirrim as a superstitious lot, unaware of the history of Middle-earth that even a Hobbit like Samwise is aware of. Eomer and the Rohirrim evince the same fear of the netherworldly when Aragorn decides to take the Paths of the Dead, a place none of the Rohirrim have gone since the days of Baldor, son of King Brego. The Rohirrim even named features of the haunted area in words an Anglo-Saxon might use to describe the supernatural or evil: Starkhorn (OE stearc "stiff, strong") Harrowdale (OE hergian "make war, lay waste, ravage, plunder), Dimholt (dim + OE holt "woods") and of course, Dwimorberg, which contains the same OE root as "dwimmerlaik" and berg, from the OE beorg (West Saxon) and berg (Anglian) "barrow, mountain, hill, mound,".
Please visit my blog...The Dark Elf File...a slighty skewed journal of music and literary comment, fan-fiction and interminable essays.
(This post was edited by Morthoron on Jul 2 2013, 4:46pm)
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Rostron2
Gondor
Jul 2 2013, 4:49pm
Post #3 of 11
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Well, it's not undead in the sens that people are thinking
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The Nazgul are somewhat in an undead class by themselves. Now, Barrow-wights are a different matter. If we must make comparisons, those seem closer to the zombified beings that are the over-used trope these days.
The further that PJ can run from those cliches the better.
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Salmacis81
Tol Eressea
Jul 2 2013, 5:14pm
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Well, problem is that the Nazgul never actually died, they exist in a sort of in-between state. I guess the Dead Men of Dunharrow are sort of similar, although how they ended up in their predicament was much different from how the Nazgul ended up in theirs.
The barrow-wights, like rostron said, would be the closest thing to "zombies" in Tolkien's lore. Their origins however seem very different from anything else in Middle-earth lore, and they seem to be confined to the Barrow-downs. Apparently they are the result of spirits sent by the Witch-king to stir the bones of the men buried in the Barrow-downs. Who or what these spirits were, is never mentioned (AFAIK), and why reanimation of the dead is never mentioned anywhere else in Tolkien's lore, I do not know. I can't recall ever reading anywhere that Sauron was capable of bringing the dead back to life, and the fact that the Witch-king was given that power seems sort of odd to me.
(This post was edited by Salmacis81 on Jul 2 2013, 5:19pm)
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dormouse
Half-elven
Jul 2 2013, 6:25pm
Post #5 of 11
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Apologies for posting something similar in another thread....
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..but the question keeps coming up in different forms.
Necromancy is defined as communing with the spirits of the dead. There's an important distinction between the spirit, which still has its own will and personality, and the magically re-animated dead body, which doesn't (and so isn't capable of communication).
I'd say Eowyn was right in considering the Witch King an unnatural thing, created by magic, because as a man he should have been long dead. His spirit had outlived his physical body, because the power of his ring didn't allow him to die naturally. That's different from being raised from the dead
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The Mitch King
Rohan
Jul 3 2013, 6:35am
Post #6 of 11
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what if you reanimated a body by summoning an existing spirit to it or perhaps putting your own will inside it??
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dormouse
Half-elven
Jul 3 2013, 8:35am
Post #7 of 11
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If it's your own will it's a zombie...
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Otherwise pass, I don't know. All I'm saying is that there's a difference between the undead spirit - ghost, wraith, whatever - which retains something of its own personality - and the dead body, which is just an empty shell.
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Fredeghar Wayfarer
Lorien
Jul 3 2013, 9:11am
Post #8 of 11
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Not sure why this is in question
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I would consider the Nazgul an example of necromancy. Granted, they're in an in-between state but their spirits have outlived their corporeal bodies. That implies a manipulation and control of said spirits, which is what necromancy is. They didn't have a conventional death but their bodies wasted away until there was nothing left and only the power of their rings (controlled by Sauron's will) kept them mobile in the world.
I think what people are objecting to is the tombs of the High Fells plotline. Because if the Nazgul could be buried in tombs, that makes them seem more conventionally dead and immobile, at least temporarily. And that part is non-canon.
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DwellerInDale
Rohan
Jul 3 2013, 9:14am
Post #9 of 11
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The body appears to be the sticking point
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It seems that much of the resistance to the Nazgul being products of necromancy is in the association with zombies, the animated physical bodies of the dead, which clearly the Nazgul are not. In the OP, however, I wanted to contrast the ideas that the Nazgul did die and then were"resurrected" in their current spirit or wraithlike forms, versus just "fading into" their state without ever dying, which seemed to be the prevailing interpretation of Tolkien's canon. Tolkien using a term that he defined as "work of necromancy" seemed to lend some support to the former interpretation.
Don't mess with my favorite female elf.
(This post was edited by DwellerInDale on Jul 3 2013, 9:15am)
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dormouse
Half-elven
Jul 3 2013, 9:32am
Post #10 of 11
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... and you have a good point. Magic/necromancy was clearly involved in what they became. The question is at what point the body became - er - no longer present, and how.
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Salmacis81
Tol Eressea
Jul 4 2013, 7:45pm
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I can only speak for myself here...
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It seems that much of the resistance to the Nazgul being products of necromancy is in the association with zombies
I'm not opposed the idea of the Nazgul being tied into Sauron's "Necromancer" guise, although I wish they woudn't have gone the tombs/High Fells route with it. The Nazgul were plenty active after the realm of Angmar was destroyed, and at the time of The Hobbit they should have been preparing Mordor for Sauron's impending return. It is entirely possible, however, that we won't see all 9 of them in Dol Guldur, so that could leave room for some of them to be in Mordor. Anyway, like I said, linking the Nazgul to "necromancy" is not a huge concern of mine.
I'm more opposed to the idea of Azog, Bolg, and/or Thrain being resurrected versions of themselves.
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