/tg/ was having a Silmarillion thread. Today I learned that Ancalagon the Black was really big. Like eats large mountains for breakfast big. And he wasn't full-grown yet. Well done, Tolkien - you've made Epic levels in D&D look lamely underpowered by comparison, in a setting that, centuries later, makes 10th level characters look outrageously overpowered by comparison.
The entire first age was pretty nutters. Everything in LotR was basically just the dying shadows of the first age. Sauron was just a minion, there were entire armies comprised of Balrogs, demigods running around all over the place, a giant spider-thing eating the world's source of light, gems so shiny even the big-bad couldn't resist them. And the fall of Gondolin, which even included tanks (or something which in description resemble tanks; not a surprise given that it was written while Tolkien was recovering from fighting in WW1's Battle of the Somme).
Wow. That's... I... want to read it now.
Do it! Seriously, Silmarillion is fun once you get past the beginning.
The first age was written to be like a mythology, so everything is impossibly epic. It begins with the creation of the world, and describes what things were like when those beings that created it are still living on it and involved with things.
LotR being the dying shadows of the first age is a pretty good description. It's the last conflict in Middle Earth involving immortals and great powers (until what is basically Tolkien's version of Ragnarok). It ends with Middle-Earth being mostly dominated by ordinary men. There's still dwarves around, but it seems to me like they're sort of a reclusive minority, certain to fade into obscurity over time. The elves all go to the Undying Lands. The Valar (the gods who created the world) admit that they can't ever get involved with the business of lesser beings without fucking everything up, so they take their island (the Undying Lands) and fly away. Numenorean blood (of which Aragorn is an example) thins out and disappears. It's all set up so Arda can progress to becoming analogous to modern-day earth, with all memory of the first and second ages having faded to obscurity.
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Topic: [MILK] There were 12 eggs here what did you do with them? (Happy thread?!) (Read 16280330 times)