Determining the ages, Tolkien's great use of Mathematics and Historic Events.

[THE Ka]

I found this today while i was reading over some material in the Encyclopedia of Arda... It caught my eye and made me wonder about how Tolkien deturmined the end of each age by the fall of a tyrant or great battle, and that if we were to recon and imagine the time from today and the forth age how would we deturnime the amount of years for each age.

Although we have no records of the later Fourth, or any following Age, Tolkien makes a brief allusion to the future of Middle-earth in a letter written in 1958: "I imagine the gap [between the Fall of Barad-dûr and modern times] to be about 6000 years; that is we are now at the end of the Fifth Age, if the Ages were of about the same length as S[econd] A[ge] and T[hird] A[ge]. But they have, I think, quickened; and I imagine we are actually at the end of the Sixth Age, or in the Seventh."

( "Forth Age". The Encyclopedia of Arda.2004)

Hope you enjoy, i found it very interesting. Digging up a good mystery now and then and pondering it until you see its possiblities threw are many highlights of many peoples lives, including mine.

Do you have any comments on this? I would be glad to hear any member's wisdom or opinion. Blessed Be, THE Ka.

[Joy]

This is not anything from Tolkien, but here is my speculation based on how the previous ages ended.

4th Age - Birth of Christ - even in our modern world, this was important enough to change the Calendars from BC to AD (Began the 5th)

5th Age - 14th Century. Around the Rennesaince Period (Began the 6th)

6th Age - World War I (Began the 7th)

[Voralphion]

To have the birth of Christ as the end of the fourth age,would have for a very long age (~4000 years)while the other ages are less than two.
Her's a suggestion
End of fourth (beginning of fifth)- Noah's flood
End of fifth (beginning of sixth)- Birth of Christ
End of Sixth (beginning of seventh)- World War II, atom bombs dropped on Japan (beginning of nuclear age)

[Joy]

I was thinking about the Flood, but my thoughts on that was the Flooding of Beleriand at the end of the 2nd Age. The Earth was transformed then. Shortly after Noah's Flood it is writen that in the days of Peleg, the Earth was Divided (Gondwanaland was broken into contients). Could this be something similar to what happened at the end of the 2nd Age?

[Son of Númenor]

The Fourth Age seems like it wasn't long enough ago. I would have imagined that its end would have been marked roughly by the Ice Age, wherein some believe that ancient civilizations came to their ends (many speculate that the Sphinx was actually created circa 15,000 B.C., based partially on the fact that it shows significant signs of water erosion & it has not rained in that part of Egypt for several thousand years). If Tolkien wanted his mythology to hold any kind of 'weight', it seems that he would have said the Fourth Age came to an end in or around 15-10,000 B.C. In this case, the end of the the Fifth Age may have been the birth of Christ, & I like Voralphion's idea that the Sixth Age reached its end in World War II because of the atomic bomb (or in World War I, even, since it had a profound impact on the world as we know it & on Tolkien himself).

But then, who am I to question Tolkien on when an Age should or should not have started?

[Voralphion]

Shortly after Noah's Flood it is writen that in the days of Peleg, the Earth was Divided (Gondwanaland was broken into contients). Could this be something similar to what happened at the end of the 2nd Age?

I don't think the flooding of Beleriand could be Noah's flood. Middle Eath wasn't drastically changed after that, (Beleriand was destroyed but that was it). More change happened in the drowning of Numenor, when the world was made round and new lands created.

In regards to Son of Numenor's reply regarding the supposed age of the sphinx, I too have thought of that, (there are also apparently other things that are believed to be of about 10000BC as well), but I don't think those ideas were around when Tolkien was alive so he can't have used them in his estimation of the time between the fourth age and our time.