The Siege of Gondor XII -- Final Thoughts and Open Discussion.

N.E. Brigand

N.E. Brigand

Half-elven
I have few questions that didn’t fit in earlier in this week’s discussion.

1. Why is the word “siege” used in this chapter only in compound words (e.g. “siege-engine”) and in the title?

2. Why is this chapter called “The Siege of Gondor” not “The Siege of Minas Tirith”?

3. Does this chapter have a theme, a central idea that is conveyed? I don’t know, but I think the subject of courage needs further exploration, with attention to the character of Faramir, including Gandalf’s intense interest in him, and his success as a “stout captain” and a “captain who still has the courage” at holding the enemy assault back for two days, while the city falls in just 36 hours once he is struck down -- and ask what relevance is there in whether or not people succumb to a magical despair. Also consider that description that I suggested was too explicit: “It was the face of one who has been assailed by a great fear or anguish, but has mastered it and now is quiet.” Maybe it's explicit for a good reason.

4. It also may be worthwhile to examine the two debates in this chapter: are they really about the same thing? I have argued that Denethor is wise in sending Faramir to Osgiliath, since it delays the assault long enough for the Rohirrim to arrive. But if Faramir could hold off the enemy for two days while afield, why could he not inspire two more days of defense on the city walls? Without sacrificing himself, and ultimately saving his father? Maybe Denethor needed to make the “foolish” decision after all. Your thoughts?

And now it’s your turn to bring up anything else about “The Siege of Gondor”. Thanks for your participation this week!
 
Things have been too hectic for me to do more than lurk, but thanks for an interesting week and for the great questions (and answers).

And a mathom for you.... courtesy of my favorite brothers!

siege-1.jpg
 
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This was the first discussion I participated in and I found your questions very thought-provoking!

I think the chapter is called "The Siege of Gondor" because if Minas Tirith had fallen, Gondor would have been destroyed. Minas Tirith as the last keep of the kingdom, a symbol for the Gondorians, that's how I see it.
 
Like simplyaven this was my first forray into the reading room. I thought I could answer some questions relying on my memory of the book. Almost immediately I found rereading the parts under discussion (as well as before and ahead) was essential: for one I was quite young the last time I read the book and didn't understand the subtlties; the films had made quite an impression and obscured my knowledge of the books; and finally out of respect for others participating in the discussions. Still, as has been noted, Tolkein leaves a lot of room for speculation (a past time I greatly enjoy).

A nagging question for this chapter is why it was called the "Seige of Gondor." Given time lines, it seemed rather a straight forward attack compared to an actual seige which would last weeks, months, or even years. For a city such as Minas Tirith, one would think a siege of a day or two would not be enough to create hunger. That is, of course, assuming the city was properly governed.

Maybe this speaks to your second question... Gondor it would seem has been under siege (yet not in the totally cut off from the outside sense) since before Boromir set off for Rivendell. This chapter then is the climax of what has been in place ere the "long expected party."
 
Since Denethor's character has generated the most discussion, followed by the nature and effect(s) on the user of a palantir, here seems a good place to finalize the arguments of both or either.

5. Has your opinion of Denethor changed or been reinforced by our discussions and readings?

6. It seems that there is almost universal agreement that use of palantiri is dangerous because they are inherently evil. I pointed out the issue of Divination and Tolkien's Christian sensibilities... mention of the watchers on the walls in a few places seems to confirm Tolkien was aware of the preferred way for Christians to obtain advanced information. Further, Denethor abandons Tolkien's own faith by desiring to "burn like heathen kings of old."
Do you agree that corruption is part and parcel of using a palantir? That is if one is not aware that what is seen can be inaccurate or missing vital information that would not lead the user to draw certain conclusions?
 
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In the notes to Tolkien's song cycle (I believe it was), he writes that the helpful elves that Frodo meets in the Shire are returning from a visit to the Tower Hills, where they used the palantír to gaze on Elvenhome (Tol Eressëa), where the master palantír is found. The kings of Gondor and Arnor used the palantíri for communication and observation for two millenia, to their advantage and with no harm to themselves. Aragorn will continue to use his Stone in the Fourth Age. However, as Gandalf notes at the end of Book III, "there is nothing that Sauron cannot turn to evil uses". Sauron servants captured the palantír of Minas Ithil 1,000 years before the War of the Ring. Once he had a Stone, it became very dangerous for others to use them, particularly those without the highest authority, because they allow mind-to-mind communication where Sauron could dominate.
 
1. Why is the word “siege” used in this chapter only in compound words (e.g. “siege-engine”) and in the title?

I suppose the attack on Minas Tirith really isn't a traditional siege (from the French for 'seat' or 'sitting', meaning that the enemy sits and waits until you starve to death). It might turn into such a siege, as the citizens know: "[The Enemy] has a weapon that has brought low many strong places since the world began. Hunger...." But in the end it doesn't come to that - the city falls to assault.

2. Why is this chapter called “The Siege of Gondor” not “The Siege of Minas Tirith”?

Perhaps because the attack on MT isn't a siege (as I argue above). Instead it's the whole of Gondor that's besieged, as Sauron's forces surround and press in on the entire region.

3. Does this chapter have a theme, a central idea that is conveyed? I don’t know, but I think the subject of courage needs further exploration, with attention to the character of Faramir, including Gandalf’s intense interest in him, and his success as a “stout captain” and a “captain who still has the courage” at holding the enemy assault back for two days, while the city falls in just 36 hours once he is struck down -- and ask what relevance is there in whether or not people succumb to a magical despair.

That's a very interesting point you make. Is Tolkien deliberately drawing a very pointed comparison between the courage of the father and the son? I think it's said somewhere in the story that Denethor and Faramir are very much alike, which is something that's always puzzled me. But perhaps that's an important starting point for the way the story plays out. They are both serious-minded scholars, not interested in glory for its own sake. If they had not been challenged in this overwhelming way, perhaps they would indeed seem very much alike. But when push comes to shove, Faramir proves to have the charisma and courage of an active leader, while his father chooses to withdraw further into his solitude. The father's courage is still-born - he imagines himself a warrior, even dresses like one in secret, but can't bring that out into the real world. Is that because he's become too deeply drawn into the "fantasy" world of the (Sauron-influenced) palantir? I don't like the idea of simply "magical" despair, though - it has to resonate with "realistic" despair, otherwise it has no roots and no real applicability. I think the depiction of Denethor's fate is heightened by the use of magical elements, but underneath is the underpinning of real, psychological truth that Tolkien always seems to provide.

But if Faramir could hold off the enemy for two days while afield, why could he not inspire two more days of defense on the city walls? Without sacrificing himself, and ultimately saving his father?

That was my argument this week - if Faramir himself thought he would be of more use manning the walls of Minas Tirith, might he not have been right? The attack on Minas Tirith might have turned into a regular, long-term siege if there had been more and better-led manpower to make a frontal attack difficult.

Whether that would have saved his father is the big question. Was it really Faramir's "death" that turned his mind? After all, Faramir wasn't dead, and others knew it - Denethor simply refused to believe that Faramir could be saved. Would Denethor ever have been able to face what to him would seem the humiliation of bowing to a new King? If he could have changed his thinking completely and, like Theoden, seen that salvation lay in giving freely of himself, rather than in a futile attempt to hold on to what he had, things could have been very different.

And now it’s your turn to bring up anything else about “The Siege of Gondor”. Thanks for your participation this week!

Thank you for a very challenging and inspiring week of discussion! Your generosity in the way you stimulate the debate is much appreciated.
 
was to occupy enough of the field to get Grond and the Witch King safely up to the gates of the city, to breach them. Meanwhile, they "softened up" the city by the firebombing, launching heads, etc. Once Grond and Wiki were in place, I don't think Faramir could have done anything from inside the walls to delay their arrival or prevent the walls from being breached allowing the enemy to swarm in. The movie portrayed the assault on the city quite faithfully, IMO.

No, Faramir was in the place where he could be most effective, and those two days were priceless.

I believe what drove Denethor into madness was a combination of massive guilt in regard to Faramir, combined with his perception that the war was lost (due to his belief that Sauron had obtained the Ring, or whatever drove that final conclusion).
 
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We'll never know for sure. Lots of "foolish" decisions turn out to be right in LotR, and lots of "sensible" ones turn out to be wrong. In this case, we can't even agree whether it's foolish or sensible to begin with!

(My thinking is that Faramir wouldn't simply remain inside the walls while the Enemy came right up with Grond, but would wait for the best chances to lead sorties. The Grond strategy works because there's no-one left in the city to prevent it. That's where the defence might have held things up the longest. The heads wouldn't even have been available, of course, if not for the earlier slaughter, and Faramir's presence would have been an added factor in preventing the kind of demoralisation that the heads achieve.)
 
As shocked as we are by Denethor's mental collapse and his intent to burn himself and his son, there are precedents that we mostly admire.

If it is indeed true that "all is lost" and the city is about to fall to the hordes of orcs and other undesirables thronging the walls, with Sauron poised to assume control of Middle Earth, is dying sooner rather than later so irrational? The orcs have been catapulting heads into the city; how many imaginative ways do you suppose they have of despoiling the bodies of the Steward and his heir? Might an honorable funeral pyre indeed be a better option?

In the first century AD, members of a Jewish sect who were being persecuted by the Romans fled to the isolated mesa of Masada, in southern Israel. The Romans laid siege to them, and ultimately built a sort of ramp up the mesa and breached the walls. When they entered the fortress, however, the Romans discovered that its 936 inhabitants had set all the buildings but the food storerooms ablaze and committed mass suicide rather than face certain capture, defeat, slavery or execution by their enemies. The mesa is now a national shrine.

How is this different from what Denethor has in mind, except that he is personally attending only to himself and Faramir, leaving everyone else to "die in whatever way pleases you"?

The major difference, of course, is that even first-time readers can see that help will come, somehow, and all is not truly lost. And we are certainly appalled that Denethor is planning to burn them alive. Moreover, we know that as a Catholic Tolkien regards suicide as the ultimate sin, the "door that must not be opened" as in a.s.'s eloquent post, and the major theme of the entire book is to "carry on regardless".

We know all these things. But Denethor does not. Is he so irrational?

Thanks, NEB, for an excellent discussion.
 
Because it was supposed to happen too early to be excused with the falling of the city. He didn't wait long to see how the battle is going and even more - he didn't fight to know how it is going. He sat in his palace seeing only his own confused visions and foreseeing what he was influenced to foresee. The burning itself is nothing new, yes. It's been common in my culture as well like in many ancient cultures dated few thousand years before the Christ. But it has always been the final resort. And for a leader to do it in the middle of a battle, it has never been acceptable. To do it would mean everything else has been done and tried, and most people have been killed, and things are obviously hopeless. I don't see this in Denethor's case. Having said that, I don't see Tolkien's Catholic background interfering. I find him objective and observing, not judging.
 
This has been quite an action-packed chapter!

As to why it's titled "The Siege of Gondor"? Well, "Minas Tirith" was used in a previous chapter title, and the repetition looked awkward on paper.

No, really, according to HoME Tolkien had a difficult time in writing this chapter, and the drafts were untitled. It may be that the title was never arrived at until the final writing, in which case, my above jest might not be too far from actuality!
 
We have several appearances of magic in this chapter used as a weapon or in a form like a weapon: Gandalf and the Witch King spar with magic here and there, and the siege engines hurl projectiles that apparently have sorcerous arts, as well as the devilry-filled trenches of fire. Also, the wall of Minas Tirith is also too hard for even these enchanted siege weapons to harm; they must go for the gate, and even the gate cannot be broken without the spells of ruin and the lightning stroke.

How much other use of magic can you envision in the siege of Minas Tirith?
 
I'll get around to your's later.
But:
The major difference, of course, is that even first-time readers can see that help will come, somehow, and all is not truly lost.
Click to expand...
Reinforces the second part of my statement, when I was alone in asserting that Denethor would not have succumbed to the temptation to use the Ring until the uttermost end.
But, I suspected then (and still do), he would have felt the uttermost End came long before it really did.
 
We do hear about the Enemy's operations against Rohan and against the Southron fiefs. It does seem to be a siege against the whole realm.
But compare to the sieges of Angband and Barad-dur, which were called after the fortress, although probably the forces weren't next to them all the time.
 
A "siege" is a military blockade of a city or fortress with the intent of conquering by attrition and/or assault (cf. Wikipedia). One might consider the attack on Lorien to be a siege, though we don't know enough about it to say. The movements against Rohan and the southern regions were just attacks.
 
Forgive my imprecise language here but the thought is still mushy:

Maybe it is called the Siege of Gondor because when Sauron began deceiving Denethor by showing him easily misinterpreted truths, it was as if he laid siege on Gondor's fate through the mind of Denethor. It is a metaphorical or maybe even psychological siege since Gondor was not cut off from the outside until Mordor's actual attack.

Further confirmation that the palantir was a primary weapon is its end... yes it is obvious how two hands were left imprinted on it at the burning of Denethor, but symbolically, it shows that two forces of will exploited the palantir, and it is forever tainted by this.
 
N E Brigand just reminded me of this classic from 2004. There was an excellent, perceptive series of posts from a devoted movie-firster as she read the books for the first time. Her observations of book-Denethor produced a record-setting long thread, with a lot of good thoughts that are relevant now, and which you may enjoy.
 
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