The Eagles of Manwë

“Cirith Ungol!” He Muttered. “Why That Way, I Wonder?” Did Gandalf Have a Better Way in Mind For Frodo and Sam?

/ stephencwinter / 8 Comments

The Return of the King by J.R.R Tolkien (Harper Collins 1991) pp. 796-797

As Gandalf and Pippin take a few moments for reflection after their meeting with Denethor and Faramir Gandalf ponders what he has learnt from what Faramir had brought from his mission in Ithilien and most especially what he has learnt of Frodo and Sam.

“Cirith Ungol!” he muttered. “Why that way, I wonder?” He turned. “Just now, Pippin, my heart almost failed me, hearing that name.”

Faramir too felt nothing but horror when he first learnt that this was the way that Gollum was going to lead Frodo and Sam into Mordor and even now Pippin can see that Faramir “did not like the place [Gollum] was taking them any more than [Gandalf]” did. Gandalf knows far more than Faramir knows of Cirith Ungol, the pass of the spider, but we must ask the question, if Gandalf’s heart failed him on hearing that name did he have an alternative in mind that would have been better for Frodo and Sam to follow? Did he have a plan for entering Mordor that he had not had the chance to speak of to Frodo before his fall in Moria?

Of course, the answer to this question is that we do not know. Gandalf did not speak of plans to the members of the Fellowship. His initial plan to cross the Misty Mountains by the Redhorn Gate below Caradhras was no more than one step on the journey towards Mordor, a way that he hoped would be passable because the journey that Boromir had taken north through the Gap of Rohan was not available to them because of Saruman’s treachery. Gandalf did not even speak of his intention to go by way of Lothlórien let alone the way the Fellowship should go after staying there.

So we can say with certainty that if Gandalf did have a plan to enter Mordor by a particular way then he never spoke of it, not even to Frodo. This leaves us only with speculation and this we will attempt to do here.

We know that Frodo first tried to enter Mordor by way of the Morannon, the Black Gate, and we know that this was clearly impassable. It was the way that Sauron expected an invasion from his foes and so it was more fortified than any other way into his land. And so if it was not to be that way or by way of the Morgul Vale and Cirith Ungol what other way could Frodo take?

The northern and western and southern marches of Mordor were impassable mountain ranges apart from the two passes of which we have spoken so this leaves us with the east of his land. The way into Mordor from that direction was more open than any other although all the lands east of that border were Sauron’s allies, but it might have been possible to go that way. Why then did Frodo not consider it? The reason is simple. It was because of time. Frodo knew that he did not have the luxury of time to complete his mission, that if he took too long, even if he were to succeed, all would be too late. The forces of evil would have destroyed much that was good, true and beautiful in the world, perhaps even rendering the world unhabitable except for that which was nasty and vicious.

Even at the beginning of the journey that Frodo made with Sam after the breaking of the Fellowship and his journey through the Emyn Muil, Frodo resented any delay.

“What hope we had was in speed,” he said to Sam. “Delay plays into the Enemy’s hands- and here I am: delayed.”

So we are left with the strongest sense that Gandalf had no better alternative than the one that caused his heart to fail, unless we go back to that ridiculous meme that is popular with some fans of the story that Gandalf meant Frodo to be flown to the Cracks of Doom by the Eagles of Manwë and if that was the case we might just expect him to mention this just once in the story or that he would have taken the route west to the eyries of the Eagles out of Rivendell, the way that Thorin’s party took in The Hobbit, instead of going south to the Redhorn Gate.

No, I think we must at last come to the conclusion that Gandalf had no plan, even that whatever news he received of any way into Mordor would have caused his heart to fail. Of course, he is right to fear that Gollum’s intentions are treacherous, “But so it must be. Let us remember that a traitor may betray himself and do good that he does not intend. It can be so, sometimes.”

The Eagles of Manwë Praise the Faithfulness of the People of Minas Tirith.

/ stephencwinter / 12 Comments

Last week I promised to continue the love story of Faramir and Éowyn but I ask you to permit me to make you wait one week more before we return to it. Last week we thought about the great wave that seemed to threaten the end of all things and yet brought a joy that was both entirely unlooked for and which brought tears to those who were pierced by it. Now all the people in the city learn what has brought such joy for,

“Before the Sun had fallen far from the noon out of the East there came a great Eagle flying, and he brought tidings beyond hope from the Lords of the West, crying:

Sing now, ye people of the Tower of Anor, for the Realm of Sauron is ended for ever, and the Dark Tower is thrown down.”

I hope that discerning readers will have noticed that Tolkien is careful about the use of capital letters for nouns in his work. In an earlier post on this blog we saw it in his use of the word, Pity, and so here Tolkien uses it to draw our attention to the importance of the noun that is capitalised. In the sentence that I quoted above there are four nouns that receive a capital letter, a sign that this is a sentence of particular importance, but the one that I want to focus on is the word, Eagle.

This is no ordinary Eagle. For one thing the Eagle sings in human speech and comes to Minas Tirith as the herald of the free peoples of Middle-earth. For another this Eagle was one of those who came to the climactic battle before the Black Gate. This Eagle is a descendant of those that Manwë, the lord of the Valar, sent to Middle-earth in the First Age to be his messengers. Their task was to keep watch on Morgoth, who was Sauron’s lord, and to do this they built their eyries on the peak of Thangorodrim itself, the very mountain beneath which Morgoth built his fortress of Angband.

They have kept their watch faithfully through long ages and from time to time, at crucial moments, they have intervened directly in the affairs of the free peoples. They carried Beren and Lúthien from Angband, the party of Thorin’s dwarves from the trees in which they were trapped by orcs and wargs, Gandalf from the Tower of Orthanc when he was held captive by Saruman and later carried him from the mountain top after the great battle with the Balrog and finally they attacked the Nazgûl at the Battle of the Black Gate.

It is thus no coincidence that it is an Eagle of Manwë that is the herald of the fall of Sauron. The faithfulness of the Eagles speaks to the faithfulness of Minas Tirith.

“Sing and rejoice, ye people of the Tower of Guard, for your watch hath not been in vain.”

Just as the armies of the West were drawn into the story of Frodo and Sam at the Field of Cormallen so that it became their story too so all who have remained in the city as the host went to battle are brought into the story of the faithful vigil of the ages. The boys who play with Bergil, son of Beregond of the Guard of the Tower, the women who Ioreth of the Houses of Healing tells of the first coming of the king to his city, all become part of the story of the faithful watch.

The 16th century English theologian, Richard Hooker, once wrote, “How are the people to know they are faithful unless their captains tell them?” Faithfulness will lie at the very heart of the civilisation that is born with the downfall of Sauron and the return of the King and the story of faithfulness with which the new age begins will dignify every man, woman and child to whom the captains tell it. It is this act of giving dignity to the people that is one of the central tasks of the captain whether a parent, teacher, chief executive, president or king. Any who fail in this task are not true captains.