Who were the Nazgul?

Who were the Nazgul?:-

- Which race of men did each come from?

- How did each Nazgul rank to each other?

- What were their names?

- Did they have any descendants?

- Why did they fear fire?

[Raynor]

- Which race of men did each come from?
- How did each Nazgul rank to each other?
- What were their names?

As far as I know, the race of only three of them is known:

Originally Posted by Akallabeth, Silmarillion

Yet Sauron was ever guileful, and it is said that among those whom he ensnared with the Nine Rings three were great lords of Numenorean race.

Khamul, the second to the witch-king, is called the "black easterling" in the Hunt for the Ring, Unfinished Tales, and the Shadow of the east. For the rest, I know no other information.

[The Might]

Only wanted to add that, as far as their ranks are concerned, they are based on their link to the Ring, and not on their previous status in a certain society. For example it is said about the Witch-king that he was always most ready to sense the presence of the Ring. Second to him in this was Khamul, who was also the one to be most disturbed by sunlight. So clearly their qualities differed, perhaps creating a certain hierarchy.
About your descendants question...I don't know any answer either. Could be, but considering this shroud of mystery around them, I doubt that such things would have been known.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Yes, I think TM quite got it. There is not much information about them apart from what was said here. Only to that fire thing,

Sauron can put fire to his evil uses, as he can all things, but these Riders do not love it, and fear those who wield it.

I think fire might represent here the cleansing power, something which gives light in the darkness, and also the heat: as an opposite to cold and death the Riders represent. It is just a speculation, however, can't think of much more.

Originally Posted by Legate of Amon Lanc

Yes, I think TM quite got it. There is not much information about them apart from what was said here. Only to that fire thing,

I think fire might represent here the cleansing power, something which gives light in the darkness, and also the heat: as an opposite to cold and death the Riders represent. It is just a speculation, however, can't think of much more.

The Witch King didn't seem to be afraid of the fire than ran down his blade when he confronted Gandalf. Also, if the Nazgul fear fire, doesn't than mean they would be in great fear of the Balrog in battle?

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Mansun

The Witch King didn't seem to be afraid of the fire than ran down his blade when he confronted Gandalf. Also, if the Nazgul fear fire, doesn't than mean they would be in great fear of the Balrog in battle?

I think not (about the Balrog). You see, that was the "evil" fire (cf. the quote above). You can imagine it, fire, that does not give heat to warm up your bones, but unbearable heat to kill you, or a consuming, destroying fire. However the quote implies that the Nazgul were especially afraid of fire in all its aspects, this just signifies their connection with night and darkness. But if it came to this, they could have used the fire for evil - something like the Orcs could, though with reluctance, roam the surface in sunlight.
But in general - I think that the idea of "if the Nazgul ever encountered the balrog" would be most probably unimaginable in Middle-Earth. After all, Nazgul never encountered the Balrog and I think Tolkien didn't even want them to. He avoided things like this. We do not know enough about the Nazgul nor about the Balrog (do they have wings?) to decide such a thing, and the Professor didn't provide any such informations. As far as I now, that is.

[Hookbill the Goomba]

Originally Posted by The Encyclopedia of Arda FAQ

What were the names of the nine Nazgûl?


One of them, the second in rank after the Lord of the Nazgûl himself, was named Khamûl, and also known as the Black Easterling. This is the only one of the nine Nazgûl explicitly named by Tolkien.
This may come as a surprise if you've come across one of the many sources that list a set of names of the other eight: Murazor (the Witch-king himself), Dwar, Ji Indur, Akhorahil, Hoarmurath, Adunaphel, Ren and Uvatha. These names are common across the Web, and often have detailed biographies to go with them. They're also consistent with what Tolkien had to say about the origins of the Nazgûl: in the Akallabêth it is stated '...among those whom he ensnared with the Nine Rings three were great lords of Númenórean race', and indeed three of these names are Númenórean in form: Murazor, Akhorahil and Adunaphel.

None of these eight names, though, have their origins in Tolkien's own work. Instead, they come from a series of role-playing and trading card games produced by Iron Crown Enterprises. The names of Murazor, Dwar and the rest emerged from the unavoidable need for these games to develop and expand Tolkien's universe to meet the needs of the gaming fraternity. The games' popularity accounts for the regular appearance of the names, to the extent that they're now frequently presented as the 'true' names of the remaining eight Nazgûl.

Some readers have even suggested that these names are so widely accepted that they should be considered the de facto names for the eight otherwise unnamed Ringwraiths. On a personal level, or in the context of the games that spawned the names, this isn't an unreasonable approach: if Tolkien never told us the name of, say, the Witch-king, there seems little obvious harm in imagining that his name was originally Murazor (or anything else, for that matter). Things become a little more problematic where the names are published without explanation: we receive plenty of e-mail from puzzled readers trying to work out which of Tolkien's books the names come from (hence this entry in the FAQ).

As for The Encyclopedia of Arda, this site is very specifically aimed at exploring Tolkien's own works, so it really isn't appropriate to include names or biographical details that we know did not come from Tolkien himself. Indeed, the same principle applies to characters who appear only in the recent movies, so it's not our intention to provide entries for (say) Hoarmurath, Uvatha or - for that matter - Lurtz from Peter Jackson's movie of The Fellowship of the Ring.

In short... we don't know.