Maybe it's just nonsense but...

[littlemanpoet]

Maybe it's just nonsense but Durelin's recent thread on capital punishment in Middle Earth and how the First Age Elves readily practiced capital punishment, Eol being but one example, and it got me thinking whether there are generally loose comparisons that could be made between the Four Ages recorded of Middle Earth and certain eras in the breadth of real world history.

(My apologies to any who understand that Middle Earth really and truly happened.)

The First Age, thusly, with its readiness to punish with death, its ready correlation of word to deed, its oaths, its remoteness, and other aspects, have much in common with pre-historic real world. By pre-historic I refer to those periods of our past for which most of our trustworthy information comes from archaeology and our less trustworthy comes from mythologies or mythic tomes such as The Iliad, The Odyssey, Gilgamesh, etc.

The Second Age then, perhaps, corresponds to written recorded history that we deem religious and perhaps more trustworthy but not completely so. Such as the Old Testament of the Christian Bible, the Pelopponesian Wars, even into the readily accepted historical periods of Greek and Roman Empires.

The Third Age would then correspond to the so-called Dark Ages and Medieval period, an era of degradation and decay with the seeds of culture readily available to be mined in old libraries and extant cultures, and young cultures such as the Eorling, galloping into known history and aspiring to acculturation and literacy as did the Germanics and other "barbaric" peoples.

The Fourth Age would then correspond to post-Renaissance (?) or post-Viking (?) era.

Now, I am not in the least trying to draw one-to-one correlations. No allegory here. (seems I said that somewhere else recently but it deserves being said) I'm sure there are many things that argue against what I'm presenting here, and that's fine, please do mention them. But I hope that some of you might be willing to bring to this thread other correspondences that come to mind, or perhaps you might help refine the above mentioned general correspondences.

[Macalaure]

Excellent thread, Elempí!

Being somewhat interested in ancient history, I've been pondering stuff like that, too, for a long time but thought it too silly to make a thread of it.

I agree with your general classification. The first age is of a very archaic nature and perfectly fits the early antiquity. On the one hand, you have the 'high' cultures of Egypt, Mesopotamia and Anatolia, which could resemble the different elvish cultures and kingdoms. On the other you have the more peasant-like cultures of men, who could resemble the celtic and germanic, maybe also the mycenaic greek, cultures of that era. The strong commingling of history and religion (interference of Gods etc.) is typical for both the Quenta Silmarillion and Iliad, Odyssey, Old Testament (which I would put in here, but discussing that is beside the topic) and all those old epics.

The classical and later antiquity would be the second age then. I would start the era with the emergence of the Persians and the rise of monotheism they brought with them. Sure, this is just a coincidence with the monotheistic development of Númenor, but it's a nice one. The mid-númenorian era of Aldarion and Minastir would fit the classical Greece and earliest Rome, where both might and nobility are at peak. The Roman Empire has a clear resemblance of the late Númenor, both being in a process of decay and being swept away by a wave, so to speak, in the end. I can easily picture a similarity of the army that Pharazôn led to Middle-earth and the roman cohorts.

In Middle-earth, we don't find a 'dark' era like we do in real history. Arnor and Gondor follow Númenor very quickly, whereas it takes some centuries til the elendilian Charles the Great becomes Emperor and takes this old tradition up again. The third age has a very medieval feel to it, doubtless. I see the parallels just like you do.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Wow, an interesting thread, really!

I think this might be a very interesting topic if we dig deeper into it, but we have to start somewhere. The classification you did seems just fine: very good, both of you, I agree with all you said about the late Númenor resembling Roman Empire in its latter days, as well as the ancient cultures. And I like very much the "Charles the Great" comparison, Macalaure

To the Dark Ages thing - here your opinions seem to differ a little bit; perhaps I might add my own little bit. I'm leaving out what do we imagine under the term "Dark Ages" and I'm totally leaving out what Tolkien thought about the Dark Ages, since this would be sufficent for a whole thread But generally, I think we might find a "dark age" in the Middle-Earth: you are right that Gondor and Arnor followed Númenor very closely, but you are forgetting about Angmar and the fall of Arnor. I think at least Rhudaur and the lands south of Baranduin had their "dark ages" in very similar way as we know them. Well, more or less.

What I think I have more to add to is the taking of First and Second age. I agree with assigning the, how elempi says, "pre-historic" cultures to the First Age. Nevertheless, I am not quite sure of the Old Testament times, as elempi assigns it to Second Age and Macalaure to the First Age. From my point of view, you are both right. If you consider the first civilizations in the Fertile Crescent, you'd assign most of them to the First Age. We always had two very significant civilisations in here from the beginning: the Egypt and the Mesopotamia in general (represented by various bigger state formations) which were important in the "global" sense (them being the centers of the world of that time), and between them the little and insignificant nations, also the nation of Israel from some time. Each of these nations had a "cultic nature" at that time - and they relied on it very much. As Tolkien wanted (he himself says it), we don't have any signs of "cultic age" between the Middle-Earth's nations. But we have the similarities to these cultures (btw - I just noticed, how do the words "cult" and "culture" fit together? ), as elempi said, "with its readiness to punish with death, its ready correlation of word to deed, its oaths, its remoteness, and other aspects". The Old Testament, I think, is the connection between this and the following age. Genesis? Definitely First Age. Typical. Exodus? Still the First Age. But starting with the history of Israel's cognition of their God, the remoteness ends. These are not just myths like Gilgamesh and the other ones. Israel recognizes the world not just as a place where unknown higher forces play their games with mortals, but they find their own place in the world. Yes, many things remain or change but slowly, but the nation has something more now. It knows that their God cares for them for sure - and none of the surrounding nations had this, their gods came and gone. This is much like the Númenorean age: the people of Edain also had became closer to the Powers, they were not remote from them as they used to be. Thus, this is not just First, but also the Second Age. Númenor is definitely Old Testament for me - the era of Kings, the priesthood (! we have no other mentionings of something like priesthood or rites except on Númenor), you could track the history of Númenor with its ups and downs not just in its resemblance of the Roman Empire but also with the ups and downs of Israel with dark times when they strayed away from the paths of their God (when there always just a part of the nation remained untouched - you could track this as far as the foundation of Arnor and Gondor).
Speaking of the rites in both Old Testament and Númenor, one example for all (Unfinished Tales, A Description of the Island of Númenor):

Near to the centre of the Mittalmar stood the tall mountain called the Meneltarma, Pillar of the Heavens, sacred to the worship of Eru Ilúvatar. (...) Thrice only in each year the King spoke, offering prayer for the coming year at the Erukyermë in the first days of spring, praise of Eru Ilúvatar at the Erulaitalë in midsummeer, and thanksgiving to him at the Eruhantalë at the end of autumn.

Compare with Exodus 23,14-18, orders given to Moses:

Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.
Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty)
And the feast of harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours, which thou hast sown in the field: and the feast of ingathering, which is in the end of the year, when thou hast gathered in thy labours out of the field.
Three times in the year all thy males shall appear before the Lord GOD.

I can imagine more rites like this existing at Númenor, thus, I'd assign the old Israel (who had the Torah - the patriarchs of course would not) to the Second Age. But Genesis with all the tales of creation and all the "first-time-model" tales, as well as the history of the exodus from Egypt which to me resembles the final episodes of the First Age like Eärendil&co., would be mirrored in Tolkien's world in the First Age.

[littlemanpoet]

Thanks for your enthusiastic replies, Mac and Legate!

I agree that the Old Testament is best seen as paralleling both First and Second Ages. Genesis and Exodus seem best to fit the First Age with their mythic wonders. Not that the mythic wonders end, but as soon as the priesthood and chosen nation themes are established in the latter part of Exodus, from thence until the end of the Old Testament, you are dealing with a more Second Age type of parallel.

The New Testament is a whole different kettle of fish and I don't know if or how it belongs in this discussion, so I'm going to dismiss it for now.

Worth adding to the Greek and Roman ship/sea cultures are the Phoenicians and their descendants, the Carthaginians.

I think that starting with the emergence of the Persians is a bit late, and would start things with the beginnings of Greek and Greek-like (Philistine for example) dominance; this would be roughly 1200 B.C., which does seem to be just a couple centuries after the Hebrew Exodus; and incidentally correponds with the onset of the Iron Age.

And I agree with the assignation of the end of the Kingdom of Arnor in the north as being reminiscent of the Dark Ages in Europe. In fact, come to think of it, all we have in Arnor at the end of the Third Age in Arnor, is the Shire and Bree and its surroundings. Dunland is a barbaric land. Rohan is on a par with early Germanic kingdoms in Europe. It would seem that the Shire and Bree are small outposts in an England that is not an island, seemingly like the time between the Germanic migrations and the Viking raids. So I'm rethinking that bit.

Check out Etymology On Line to satisfy your curiosity about words from time to time.

culture
1440, "the tilling of land," from L. cultura, from pp. stem of colere "tend, guard, cultivate, till" (see cult). The figurative sense of "cultivation through education" is first attested 1510. Meaning "the intellectual side of civilization" is from 1805; that of "collective customs and achievements of a people" is from 1867.

"For without culture or holiness, which are always the gift of a very few, a man may renounce wealth or any other external thing, but he cannot renounce hatred, envy, jealousy, revenge. Culture is the sanctity of the intellect." [William Butler Yeats]

cult
1617, "worship," also "a particular form of worship," from Fr. culte, from L. cultus "care, cultivation, worship," originally "tended, cultivated," pp. of colere "to till" (see colony). Rare after 17c.; revived mid-19c. with reference to ancient or primitive rituals. Meaning "devotion to a person or thing" is from 1829.

[Formendacil]

As a bit of an addendum, Tolkien himself makes the connection (I believe its in the Letters... somewhere...) about Gondor's Byzantine-like quality. The Middle Ages parallel is very appropriate: while Arnor and the Wilderland enter their dark ages, Gondor (Byzantium) reaches heights of great power, reminiscent of Númenor (Rome) of old.

[Macalaure]

Originally Posted by littlemanpoet

I think that starting with the emergence of the Persians is a bit late, and would start things with the beginnings of Greek and Greek-like (Philistine for example) dominance; this would be roughly 1200 B.C., which does seem to be just a couple centuries after the Hebrew Exodus; and incidentally correponds with the onset of the Iron Age.

I'm not sure I agree. Keep in mind that Iliad and Odyssey were written roundabout, I think, 800 B.C., and even though the Odyssey is already far less archaic, we agree to let them be part of the First Age. The early Greeks remind me a bit of the Easterlings, destroying the minoian Crete and being a constant thorn in the side of the Hittite empire. The parallel would be even more striking if historians would agree on whether the Sea Peoples were Greeks or not.
Even though the Greeks slowly emerged from 1200 B.C. on, this time was dominated by the Assyrians and Babylonians, whom I would keep in the first age.

I don't want to offend, but I think you might overemphasize the importance of ancient Israel. After all, most of the time it was conquered by somebody and its cultural and religious influence only came A.D.
That's why I saw the coming to power of the Persians so significant. Here, for the first time (if we ignore the short period of Echnaton in Egypt), a monotheistic culture is in a dominant position, even largely influencing the jewish religion.

Maybe we shouldn't try to match Middle-earth-ian history one-to-one to real history and just match eras to other eras, allowing gaps. We then could cut at 1200 B.C. or so and resume with the slow rise of Greek (after the Dorian migration/invasion) and Persian culture from around 800 B.C. on, letting them grow in time like the Númenorians, gradually founding colonies and then assume real power from around 500 B.C. on.