Sauron's Temple

[Marroc Underhill]

Does anyone know anything about "Sauron's Temple"? I know it's a structure that once excisted in Numenor. It seems kind of strange that there would be a "Temple" at the very heart of Numenor.
Does it have anything to do with when Sauron was known as the Gift Lord or whatever? Please answer. Anything would help. Even your speculations.

[Lord of Angmar]

Sauron being known as Annatar, the 'Lord of Gifts', was after Numenor. Sauron's temple in Numenor was a result of his heavy influence on Ar-Pharazon and the corrupted Numenoreans. The temple was built to worship 'Melkor, Lord of All, Giver of Freedom', the one who Sauron presented as the almighty God over Ea. Ar-Pharazon, being blinded by his (and his people's) lust for immortality and his ignorant despise of the Valar, was tricked by Sauron into worshipping Melkor and assailing the Undying Lands with a naval force.

[Iarwain]

Too true, too true. [img]smilies/frown.gif[/img]

More details: the structure was enourmous, with a massive silver dome and extraordinarily thick walls. Sauron conducted constant sacrifices to Melkor, burning the victims. The sickening amount of human ashes and smoke eventually turned the dome black, which it remained until it sunk.

Also, there as a temple to Eru on Meneltarma (sp?), the "pillar of heaven" from which one could see to Valinor. Not so much is written about this temple though, save that Tar-Miriel ran to the temple for safety as Numenor sank. She perished before she could reach the top.

For more info, read "Akallabeth" in the Silmarillion, or read the extensive information on the history of Numenor found in the Unfinished Tales.

Iarwain

[Voralphion]

Sauron being known as Annatar, the 'Lord of Gifts', was after Numenor

What do you mean by after Numenor. Sauron was known as Annatar after Numenor was established, but before its fall. When he was captured by Ar-Pharazon the war of the elves and Sauron had already occured and he had taken the rings of power.
The temple was established in Numenor by Sauron after had become the kings councillor as a way of destroying all favour the Numenoreans had left with the Valar. He told them that Melkor Lord of All would free them from death and make them immortal.

[Iarwain]

I believe my leige meant that Sauron wanted to conquer Numenor, as in: Sauron was dying to get his hands on Numenor, and kill it.

Iarwain

[Man of the Old Hope]

I think that we should not assume that there was a temple to Eru Ilúvatar on the heights of Meneltarma. The relevant texts in Akallabêth say simply that there was a "Hallow" upon the heights:

"But in the midst of the land was a mountain tall and steep, and it was named the Meneltarma, the Pillar of Heaven, and upon it was a high place that was hallowed to Eru Ilûvatar, and it was open and unroofed, and no other temple or fane was there in the land of the Númenóreans."

After the Numenoreans develop a fear of death, and labor to discover some means of raising the dead or prolonging life, and fill "all the land with silent tombs", they turn more and more to pleasure and revelry:

"and after the days of Tar-Ancalimon the offering of the first fruits to Eru was neglected, and men went seldom any more to the Hallow upon the heights of Meneltarma in the midst of the land."

When Tar-Míriel the Queen attempts to flee "the mounting wave, green and cold and plumed with foam," the text simply states that "she strove to ascend the steep ways of the Meneltarma to the holy place".

So until Sauron's "surrender" to Ar-Pharazôn and his seduction of the Numenoreans (save the "Elf-friends", the Faithful) into worshipping Melkor as "the Giver of Freedom" in a horrific, human-sacrificing cult through which the supplicants wished to be released from death, Numenor did not have a temple.

In the notes to Athrabeth Finrod ah Andreth ("The Debate of Finrod and Andreth" - from which comes my signature line) in Morgoth's Ring, C. Tolkien introduces the "Tale of Adanel", a story of how Melkor came to Men in the East before their early First Age migration into Beleriand, promising them marvellous riches, abundant food, and dwellings of ease, if they would but worship him as the Giver of Gifts and would build him a "house upon a high place, and call it the House of the Lord." Eventually sickness and weakness came upon the people, fire and water rebelled against them, and the birds and the beasts shunned them. Those fearful of Melkor's anger and power attempted to placate the Giver by offering as human sacrifices those who openly dissented from his cult.

I'm not sure which of these tales precedes the other in time, but I think we can conclude from them that Melkor and his chief servant Sauron demonstrate a twisted, vile, and evil pattern of fear, subjugation, and destruction in their temple-building and their cultus-devising.

[Gwaihir the Windlord]

Establishing mastery over Men under them, with fear, is indeed a tactic that both Lords of Darkness used. Straight alliances with Men as well, though.
The worshipping of Melkor in Numenor pretty effectively rplaced Illuvatar/the Valar, and largely turned the hearts of Numenor to evil in their latter days.