The Dead Marshes

[Jessica Jade]

I just finished reading the section in Two Towers when they go through the Dead Marshes. I have a few questions about them that maybe some of you can help me with?

Why do the faces of the dead glow with light in those deep slimy pools? Are they trying to draw passer-byers into the pools too? Are the faces (or spirits) trying to ensnare anyone who happens to see them, and lead them to their own death? {Remember how Frodo seemed entranced by them...why was this so???}

I know that the faces are of those who died in that battle at Mordor long ago, but why do their faces (spirits?) remain there, and why are they visible? Gollum said not to look when the lights come on.. but What exactly are the lights, and why do they glow? Are the spirits causing them at will?

Gollum also mentioned that you cannot reach them, hinting that he tried to. (the book says that Sam guessed why, but it didn't say what sam thought). Why would Gollum try to reach them??

The whole Dead Marshes seem quite ambiguous to me...does Tolkien ever say anything else about the marshes? I really want to know more about them, so if anyone knows anything, please eniighten me! [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[Kuruharan]

Okay, I'm sorry, but I have to ask...
What's the . ·'´) ¸.·´¸.·´¨) ¸.·*¨) (¸.·´ (¸.·´ ¸.·´ ¸.·´ stuff at the end of your sig? Just curious...

Gollum was trying to get down there to eat the dead bodies.

[Jessica Jade]

ah, i suspected he was trying to eat them, just wasn't sure. That stuff at the bottom of my sig? It's supposed to be a design, and it looks cool when done right...but here on this board, it makes it all on one line, which is not how it's supposed to look. It's really supposed to look something like this:

}-~ . ·'´)
¸.·´¸.·´¨) ¸.·*¨)
(¸.·´ (¸.·´ ¸.·´
¸.·´¸.·*`·-» Jessica~ (¸.·


anyway, if anyone knows anything else about the Dead Marshes...tell all [img]smilies/smile.gif[/img]

[Lush]

They are an ancient horror.

[Lush]

Gee, can I be any more cryptic? [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] I guess one can always substitute lack of knowledge with intense tone.
...The editor in me is rearing her ugly head.

[Kuruharan]

I guess one can always substitute lack of knowledge with intense tone.

And vagueness, don't forget vagueness. Be vague and make it sound good and you can bluster your way through just about anything. [img]smilies/tongue.gif[/img]

(How do you think I've gotten so far in college? [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] )

[Joy]

Jessica, I know that I am probably ten miles away from the bulls-eye, but here's my thought.

The glowing green lights, I thought was the Aurora Borealis. During this time, even today in some cultures, they were a sign of woe, danger and a terrible omen.

I hope that this link will be allowed here. Here are some pictures of the Aurora. Take a look especially at the greenish ones. They remind me of this scene.

As for the rest of your questions, I have no clue, as I wondered them myself.

[Joy]

I'm sorry, the link has been changed. Here is the new Aurora Link

[Birdland]

I always thought of the lights as being a kind of swamp gas, what they used to call "Will O' the Wisp", a freakish but natural phenomena.

As for the faces; as I recall, they are the faces of the slain in the War of the Last Alliance, right? When Isildur cut the ring from Sauron's hand? All in all, one of the saddest, creepiest descriptions in the book.

I like to think that the faces are just illusion, and that the spirits of Elves and Men are not trapped forever in the Dead Marshes.

[Airetauriel]

The faces in the dead marshes are the faces of all killed in the Last Alliance, who were buried there when it was solid ground, I think. And then the marshes crept and crept up, swallowing the graves and trapping the souls of all slain in the mud and water. I don't know what the lights are, but I always thought of them of something like the lights of the dead trying to find their way home, but always trapped into their eternal torment. (Gee, I'm cheery!) Frodo was transfixed by their suffering faces, because, well, wouldn't you be? The floating faces of the dead, trapped almost like bodies trapped under ice, but in the surface of the glimmering pools. I think that if you look at them for too long, then you become bewitched by their suffering faces. Also, the tricksy lights that roam across the marsh can lead you from the safe paths through, that Gollum was leading them on. Hence his advice not to look at them , and not to follow them. And I also think Gollum was trying to eat the bodies.

Oh, and I DON'T like the question on some quiz or other that asks 'What scared Gollum in the dead marshes?' And it turns out to be the Nazgul - and a very tricksy question, if you ask me!!!!!

Airetauriel [img]smilies/eek.gif[/img]

[Eowyn of Ithilien]

I think that Gollum could never touch them because they are enchanted...a warning to those who would threaten Mordor
*chilling*

[Lush]

Yep, I willingly humiliated myself on this forum by starting a thread on which I confessed to having an actual nightmare after reading about the Dead Marshes right before I went to bed.

[Kalimac]

Definitely one of the best scenes in the trilogy. And Lush, don't be embarrassed, I had a nasty dream or two about the Dead Marshes as well when I first read about them (granted I was 10 years old and reading with a flashlight at two in the morning, so I was in a mood to be creeped out, but still).

The lights were probably the will o'the wisp, as Birdland said, at least that's what it sounded like while reading it. Gollum calls the lights "candles of corpses" but that could just be an expression showing how much fear the place is held in. And maybe I'm wrong, but doesn't Tolkien mention somewhere that the faces in the water aren't actually there for real? Something about the corpses simply being shadows, that the real bodies disappeared long ago.

And Gollum was probably trying to find some food down there, though to be fair all the book says is that "Sam thought he guessed" why Gollum was looking, which implies that Sam might be wrong about it. On the other hand, it's hard to picture Gollum spending all that time trying to get down there out of reverent curiosity; his two main obsessions seem to be the Precious and food (fisssh), and everything he does is aimed at securing one or the other.

[avarerniliel]

Here's my info on the dead marshes Jessica:

Those little glowing lights were creatures (not gas bubbles) called Will O' Wisps. They're a naturaly evil being that live in marshes, they like to gather around each other, they're rarely found seperated. They try to lure others into the marshes so that they die to. I'm not sure why, maybe they get a kick out of leading someone to their doom.

As for the dead people in the swamp, they're the corpses of dead men after they had a war (but you probably knew that already).

And Gollum had tried to eat the dead faces. You know how he is with rotting flesh [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] .

[lathspell]

As for the first question, I think those faces are 'corps candles'.
Gollum to says that in his own unique way: 'The tricksy lights. Candles of corpses, yes, yes. Don't you heed them. Don't look. Don't follow them.'
These things are undead, luring you into the pools with these lights (in this case the lighted faces)... how exactly I do not know. If you look at them they kind of absorb your energie in some curious way. That's all I heard of these weird undead.

As for the second question: I think Gollum too was under lured by them and tried to reach them. How he became free of them I do not know. I kinda wondered about this question myself some time ago.

[Jessica Jade]

i was always wondering WHY they want to lure you to the deep pools? Remember what Gollum said, something about being careful not to follow them, "Or hobbits go down and light little candles!" implying that if they are ensnared by the faces, they will share the same fate. Why do they want to lure people? Maybe i'll never know....

[VanimaEdhel]

Hmmm: Aurora Borealis in Middle Earth?

Anyway: I thought that the lights were from the swamp gas or something myself. Since the hobbits and Gollum obviously would not have scientific knowledge of such things, they probably saw them as just lights.

Maybe they drew people in to share the same torment? You know, kind of like "misery loves company" type of a thing? Or it could just be totally innocent and, being curious, one would lean over, loose one's balance, fall into the muck, and get stuck in the mud and die there or something. It could just be a natural phenomenon like that, I thought.

And Gollum being drawn in? Maybe he was curious about the corpses, or maybe they enticed him...I know not. Maybe you should hunt down Gollum/Smeagol and ask him [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] Good luck finding him!

[ March 29, 2002: Message edited by: VanimaEdhel ]

[Birdland]

I don't think it's so much the Dead wanting to lure people in as Sauron. The Dead Marshes has "Sauron" written all over it; probably created as another Guardian for his Realm, as well as a slap in the face to the races that defeated him on that same field so long ago.

[Kuruharan]

I don't think it's so much the Dead wanting to lure people in as Sauron.

Could it possibly all just be in the head of the beholder?

[Birdland]

Could it possibly all just be in the head of the beholder?

Hmmmmm...Nooo, I always figured I'm right and everyone else around here is off-the-wall. [img]smilies/evil.gif[/img]

[Kuruharan]

Hey, I can hardly fault you for that. That philosophy has always worked pretty well for me too. [img]smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]

[lathspell]

VanimaEdhel - as for the why-question i have no idea. Tolkien (or Gollum) only says that you'll light a candle yourself. Gollum says this when he tells them he tried to reach them once.
'Very carefully! Or hobbits go down to join the Dead ones and light little candles. Follow Sméagol! Don't look at the lights!'

And next the capturing of Gollum: I think I'll leave that sort of things for Aragorn the Elfstone. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

[Nuranar]

Hey, y'all,

I don't have my books with me, but isn't there something about the Barrow-Wights and the spirits of the Dead Marshes being akin? I think I got the impression that they were similar, that there were wight-like spirits creating the illusion of the dead warriors, trying to lure the living in just as the barrow-wights did.

Can anyone find anything about that? Thanks!

[Altariel]

I don't think the lights are a natural thing... Mordor sometimes seems like a pretty unnatural place. I think that they are the spirits of the people who died in the battle before the Black Gates, but JUST the spirits. The bodies themselves are probably gone. So, I think that one of two thing happened.

1. Their souls might not have been able to depart (perhaps because of the location, perhaps for some other reason) and now they lure travellers into touching the water and use some kind of magic-dead-face-wighty thing to trap the travellers' souls too, or maybe they just are mesmerised, and fall in and drown. So maybe they are like Barrow-wights, trying to lure in the spirits of the living, as Nuranar said.

Or...

2. They are an illusion, a warning to any who would assail Sauron, put there by Sauron himself to either frighten or ensnare those who try to enter Mordor secretly. They might just be there to scare people or they might actually be dangerous.

I believe the book said that their were different kinds of faces in the water: the faces of Men, Elves, Orcs, etc. So, if there are Orc faces, something makes me think that Sauron didn't do it, that it is a natural thing (natural meaning "unintentional", . Not necessarily "something put there by nature," like a Will o' the Wisp. More like a Wight.).

Why would Sauron want to advertise the fact that he lost the battle by putting Orc-faces in the Marshes? If he had created this illusion, couldn't he just create the illusion that there were only the faces of Men and Elves in the Marshes?

[ April 06, 2002: Message edited by: Altariel ]