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From: warren@pluto.UUCP (Warren Burstein)
Newsgroups: net.books
Subject: Re: Middle Earth (Tolkien) Questions
Message-ID: <176@pluto.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Nov-85 01:11:13 EST
Article-I.D.: pluto.176
Posted: Thu Nov  7 01:11:13 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 8-Nov-85 08:10:47 EST
References: <1182@rayssd.UUCP> <852@utai.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Industrial Automation Systems Inc., New York, N.Y.
Lines: 31
Summary: Why the wraiths needed the rings

In article <852@utai.UUCP>, gkloker@utai.UUCP (Geoff Loker) writes:
> "Now the Elves made many rings;  but secretly Sauron made One Ring to rule
> all the others, and their power was bound up with it, to be subject wholly
> to it and to last only so long as it too should last."
> 		     - 'Of the Rings of Power & the Third Age'
> 
> So the rings were destroyed when the Ring was.  The Elven rings weren't
> because Sauron never had any sort of contact with them or control over
> them.  The others were too closely bound to the One Ring, though, to
> survive its destruction.

I don't think the Nazgul-Lord's ring was destroyed, by the destruction of
the One.  The quoted passage refers only to the power of the other rings.
One the other hand, his body vanished when he was killed, and perhaps so
did his ring.

> First, the Seven were for the Dwarves who had proven relatively immune to
> the rings and, so, probably wouldn't work on Men.  Secondly, all evidence
> I could find pointed to the fact that the Nazgul wore the Nine -- if they
> didn't, would they still have been wratihs?  Finally, Sauron was trying
> to gather his power together so it could grow, rather than expend it in
> creating more Nazgul.

They would have remained wraiths without their rings as they had "faded."
I think Sauron let them keep the rings or they would have been lacking in
power without them, and might have been driven insane if he had taken
them away.

Anyone read _Lays_of_Beleriand_?  I think I'll wait till it gets cheaper.
Does it contain any new information, or is it a recasting of what we
already know about the First Age.