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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 18 2018, 2:46pm
Post #1 of 7
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LOTR Lunar Readalong, week of 1419 Solmath 26: The Breaking of the Fellowship, Book III Chapters 1 - 6, Book IV Chapters 1 - 2
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Usual Caveat: This is really not recommended for first-time readers, and as with most read-alongs, these posts will contain spoilers.
This post is a continuation of last week's post.
This week's Readalong starts with "The Breaking of the Fellowship", followed by interleaved readings where there are at least 2 (but up to 4) parallel readings each day!
The week ends with "The King of the Golden Hall", the day before "Helm's Deep".
You may have also noticed, as I found out while making this chart, the many descriptions of the moon for this week. I believe the moon is described at least once each day this week, the most so far! Once again I'll point out that this year's moon phases are not an exact repeat of 1942's moon phases, so the 1st quarter moon will be coming about a day later by this year's reckoning; but this was done so that next week's full moon will fall on the correct night of Rethe 7/8!
(This post was edited by Ataahua on Feb 25 2018, 11:03pm)
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 18 2018, 10:58pm
Post #2 of 7
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Since Boromir's funeral was around mid-afternoon, then the waxing crescent moon would have been around its highest peak in the southern sky, trailing a couple of hours behind the sun. It's not described in this scene in the story, but I can imagine it was practically directly above the Tindrock as they watched his boat go over the falls and as they sang their Lament for Boromir.
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 19 2018, 2:55pm
Post #3 of 7
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We can tell about what time Pippin dropped his brooch based on the moon
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The Reader's Companion doesn't quote Tolkien's time-scheme for the hour Pippin dropped his brooch on Solmath 26. Since the waxing crescent moon had not yet set, it must have been early evening, probably sometime before 9 p.m.
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 20 2018, 6:12am
Post #4 of 7
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As Aragorn put it in Chapter 2 (the next day)
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...he sets early and is yet young and pale.
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 24 2018, 6:05pm
Post #5 of 7
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1419 Rethe 2: Second Battle of the Fords of Isen
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1419 Rethe 2 is also the date of the "Second Battle of the Fords of Isen", so those with a copy of Unfinished Tales may want to read the remainder of that chapter as well!
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 25 2018, 4:47pm
Post #6 of 7
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Updating some midnight cut-offs as I go
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As I've mentioned before, I'm still kind of figuring this schedule out as I go, although the Reader's Companion has helped me prepare the week's schedule ahead of time (and I confess that I had already taken some notes of my own for some of these Shire dates after my first read through, before I owned a copy of the Reader's Companion).
I have noticed that the Reader's Companion tends to list dates at passages that mention the dawn or morning (kind of reckoning dates from sunrise to sunrise as they do in Gondor), so as I read these sections last week, I edited some of the cut-off points in last week's Readalong chart to try and get them closer to midnight.
For example, Appendix B lists Solmath 29 for the date that "Merry and Pippin escape" from the orcs outside Fangorn, and from the story we know they were still on the hill with the orcs when the moon had set the night of Solmath 28. Since that was a night or so before the 1st quarter moon (which was on Solmath 30 at 4:39am according to the actual 1942 moon phase), that means the moon had set about an hour or 2 before midnight on Solmath 28, so I'm guessing it was sometime around midnight when Grishnįkh carried Merry and Pippin away from the camp, and I updated the cut-off for Solmath 28 to the break in the chapter right after that scene.
I also pushed back the cut-off for Book IV Chapter 1 on Solmath 29, since the moon should have set nearly at midnight that night (or just a bit before). So we can tell that Gollum doesn't start leading Frodo and Samwise to the Marshes until right around midnight.
I also originally had the reading for Book III Chapter 2 on Solmath 30 going all the way to the end of the chapter, but the 3 Hunters don't see Saruman until after the moon had set that night, which would have set just after midnight. So I added an entry for this scene on Rethe 1 before dawn.
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Murlo
Rivendell
Feb 25 2018, 5:35pm
Post #7 of 7
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Midnight cut-off for Ents arrival at Isengard on Rethe 2?
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I also noticed that Merry seems to imply that they saw the host of Isengard march out just past midnight, since just before that scene he says "not long after midnight there was a tall wood all round the north side of Isengard." But Unfinished Tales says that host was spotted from the Fords just before midnight, and Tolkien's scheme quoted in the Reader's Companion says they marched out around 10:30pm. So the midnight cut-off for that scene on Rethe 2 should probably be after the host sets out, maybe at the line 'My business is with Isengard tonight, with rock and stone.'
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