The Moon! What Moon?!

[Elmo]

Ah, its good to be back to post yet another inane topic on this forum I've grown to love...

Em where was I? Ah yes the moon. From my rough understanding of Tolkien chronology of writing the legendarium, from its earliest beginning of it Tolkien had the creation of the moon at the same time as the sun after the two trees were destroyed by that Melkor and his spider chum. Then why does Gimli sing in the mines of Moria:

no stain yet on the moon was seen

when he is singing about Durin waking up in the Ages of the Stars when Menel was sans moon. I'd have always thought that Tolkien only conceived of the moon being there at that time of his writing of 'Myths Transformed' which were written long after LOTR was finished. Perhaps this the genesis of Tolkien's strange reworking of his legendarium was seen in this song but then again it is physically impossible to have 'no stain' on the moon at the time Durin awoke.

Maybe, perhaps, that the Dwarves were unaware of the chronology of Arda but I'd always thought that they seemed to be a relatively advanced folk who might have studied such things especially being surrounded by ancient rocks. Perhaps the ancient dwarves in Nogrod and Belegost knew the truth with their dealings with Elves and as the dwarves became more isolated they lost the knowledge. Maybe the dwarven poet who wrote it was just using artistic license but then again it must have been a common license to take in Middle Earth because a similar claim is made in a poem in the Adventures of Tom Bombadil. (Don't ask me the name I've returned the book to the library ) But then that poem also mentions Gods so I'm confused

[alatar]

Think that this 'moon stain' was a result of the belching smoke from that mysterious Shire locomotive driven by the talking fox...

Guess that it's just a literary device (if I'm using that right).

You look at the moon and see 'stains,' as, looking down at your shirt after a sumptuous dwarven meal, the food and beverage that wasn't caught in your beard now decorates your shirt. Stains don't appear when something is new, like when you took your shirt out of the drawer and put it on that morning, hence the moon must be old as it looks more like your post-meal shirt. If your shirt could have once been clean (even if you never remember it being otherwise ), then so could the moon. Just another way of indicating time's passage; time's arrow where we go from pristine clean to cluttery dirt. Entropy.

Whatever; what did cause those stains in Tolkien's cosmology? Asteroids? Melkor? Or does Tilion need a bib?

[Elmo]

Good point, I hadn't really thought of a non-asteroidal reason for the stains. Myths Transformed really messed with my mind.

[alatar]

Originally Posted by hewhoarisesinmight

Good point, I hadn't really thought of a non-asteroidal reason for the stains. Myths Transformed really messed with my mind.

Your thread struck a cord as I just finished rereading a book on greek mythology. Many of the stories provide 'explanations' of why we observe the world as we do. Reading your thread, I now am stuck wondering just how Tolkien explains the current condition of the moon.

In another thread, I wondered how elves, returning across the Straight Road to our current time/space, would think about the moon as, well, we've been there, done that and left a flag - and we're going back.


P.S. Congrats on your ascension; it's the climbing, not the peak, that counts.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by alatar

Whatever; what did cause those stains in Tolkien's cosmology? Asteroids? Melkor? Or does Tilion need a bib?

As far as I know...

First:

Originally Posted by Silmarillion; Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor

But Tilion was wayward and uncertain in speed, and held not to his appointed path; and he sought to come near to Arien, being drawn by her splendour, though the flame of Anar scorched him, and the island of the Moon was darkened.

Second, not necessary but here might lay the reason as well:

Originally Posted by Silmarillion; Of the Sun and Moon and the Hiding of Valinor

But Morgoth hated the new lights, and was for a while confounded by this unlooked-for stroke of the Valar. Then he assailed Tilion, sending spirits of shadow against him, and there was strife in Ilmen beneath the paths of the stars; but Tilion was victorious.

Damage assessment: 80%?

[Galin]

Christopher Tolkien notes that Ainulindale C* Round World Version was:

'...thus an experiment, conceived and composed, as it appears, before the writing of The Return of the King, and certainly before The Lord of the Rings was finished. It was set aside; but as it will appear later in this book, it was by no means entirely forgotten.' Morgoth's Ring

In Ainulindale C* (in which the Sun was not a Tree-flower) Melkor took a portion of the earth and this became Ithil, and its origin is placed in the context of the tumults of the making of Arda.

So we can see Tolkien thinking about variant ideas before he finished The Lord of the Rings anyway, more generally speaking. As to the whole tale, this is an interesting question, and there's a very interesting later revision to The Hobbit that might be noted. In the First Edition (1937)...

'... before they came back into the Wide World. In the Wide World the Wood-elves lingered in the twilight before the raising of the Sun and Moon; and afterwards they wandered in the forests that grew beneath the sunrise. They loved best the edges of the woods,...'

This was changed by JRRT in 1966 to read:

'... before some came back into the Wide World. In the Wide World the Wood-elves lingered in the twilight of our Sun and Moon, but loved best the stars; and they wandered in the great forests that grew tall in lands that are now lost. They dwelt most often by the edges of the woods,...'

[alatar]

Thanks, Legate of Amon Lanc, for the quotes.

But Tilion was wayward and uncertain in speed, and held not to his appointed path; and he sought to come near to Arien, being drawn by her splendour, though the flame of Anar scorched him, and the island of the Moon was darkened.

and

But Morgoth hated the new lights, and was for a while confounded by this unlooked-for stroke of the Valar. Then he assailed Tilion, sending spirits of shadow against him, and there was strife in Ilmen beneath the paths of the stars; but Tilion was victorious.

I'd considered this, but 'scorching' to me would (yes, this is nuts and picayune) produces a different pattern. The moon, as we currently see it (no pictures available from the Third Age), looks blotchy - stained, or blood-splattered - and not scorched, which could result in a more uniform darkening. If blood, who's? If not blood, what? And doesn't anyone have a towel and bucket of soapy water? And weren't these chariots of the gods hallowed?