Confusion about Wights

TrewynEvenstar · 01-04-2002, 09:46 AM

What the heck are wights? Are they dead kings (which was sort of my impression from Fellowship) or something else? How did they get to be wights? I was checking the appendixes for something about wights, and never found it. Does the Simarillion talk about Wights, or another of the books? I am about six chapters into the Simarillion at the moment.

ChildofEru · 01-04-2002, 04:42 PM

ive always thought them to be people (beit elven, men, etc) who had a magical object of great power, im sure that gandalf spoke of other rings not just the 20 rings given among the races, who abused them and wasted away where only their souls remain.
thats my theory.

Pailan · 01-04-2002, 05:22 PM

"Evil spirits sent to dwell in the Barrow-downs by the Witch-king of Angmar during his wars with the remnant of Arnor, and who remained there long after the realm of Angmar itself had vanished from the world."

I found this apt description over the Encyclopedia of Arda. Hope this helps.

TrewynEvenstar · 01-06-2002, 12:48 PM

Oh....thanks!

Darkside Spirit · 01-06-2002, 03:24 PM

Forgive my ignorance, but who the heck was the "Witch-king of Angmar" and why was he at war with "Arnor"?

Wayfarer · 01-06-2002, 03:35 PM

A 'wight' is technically any spirit that is controlling body it has no right to.

The 'barrow' wights were animate corpses, which would have been in preternaturally good shape (i.e. not zombies with parts falkling off). They're 'barrow' wights because they inhabit barrows. As in 'the barrow downs'.

When the rohirrim dismiss aragorn and company as 'elvish wights', it is most likely that they are referring to the posession of mortal mean by unhoused elven spirits.

You could say that the werewolves, being wolves inhabited by fell spirits, are sort of 'wolf wights'. And in the older mythology, trolls (as animate stone creatures) would have been 'stone wights'.

I.E. When we say 'wight' we usually think of the first kind, but there could be many more flavours.

An interesting tidbit: Inolondil once stubbornly insisted on spelling it 'white'.

Darkside, the Witch King was the lord of the Nazgul. He's the wraith that gets all the speaking parts.

Angmar was the kingdom he ruled during the second or third age. It was west of the northernmost misty mountains.

Arnor was the sister country of Gondor. It fell into a state of decay, until only the rangers remembered it's existance. The witch king helped just a tad in this department.

emplynx · 01-06-2002, 03:43 PM

From http://www.m-w.com

Quote:

Main Entry: 1wight
Pronunciation: 'wIt
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, creature, thing, from Old English wiht; akin to Old High German wiht creature, thing, Old Church Slavonic vesti thing
Date: before 12th century
: a living being : CREATURE; especially : a human being

bropous · 01-07-2002, 01:43 AM

Pailan has it right on the money.

And the Witch-King, the Lord of the Nazgul, ruled the "Witch Kingdom of Angmar". On the map in Lord of the Rings, look directly to the North of the ettenmoors, at the far northern end of the Misty Mountains, and you find this text: "Here was of old the Witch-Realm of Angmar". However, since 1988, the maps in LOTR are of such hideously CRAPPY quality it may be hidden in the fold of the book. Why they had to supplant the original map with the current one, which looks like it was drawn with crayon, I'll never know. Shelly Shapiro drew a terrible map.

Read Appendix A, section iii, "The North Kingdom and the Dunedain", starting on page 358 of Return of the King, Darkside Spirit. The northern realms of Arthedain, Cardolan and Rhudaur, as well as the Witch-Kingdom of Angmar and Carn Dum. The entire subject is covered in great detail.

Wayfarer · 01-07-2002, 08:32 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by bropous
Why they had to supplant the original map with the current one, which looks like it was drawn with crayon, I'll never know. Shelly Shapiro drew a terrible map.

Huh. The large single volume LOTR I got recently has quite a nice map. It's split into four portions, and has a margin, so nothing is lost in the fold in the book.

With my old trilogy, I finally resorted to pulling the two pages with the map out of the book and taping them together. that looked quite nice.

bropous · 01-07-2002, 09:16 PM

Ah, Wayfarer. I've not seen the single-volume LotR map. The one I have is about 16x24, taken from a hardback volume of "Unfinished Tales" back in about 1987, and it looks a lot like the original map I had in my well-thumbed and spine-broken paperbacks from the early- to mid-seventies. I got it laminated a long time ago, and I am not sure whether J.R.R. himself did it, but it looks totally different from the Shelly Shapiro knock-off copyrighted from 1988.

I gotta admit that I do love the map shown at the beginning of the Peter Jackson film. Beautiful job on that one. Even shows parts of the lands past the Sea of Rhun.

Wayfarer · 01-07-2002, 09:24 PM

heh...

I traced out the map from my copy, and put all four secions together, and it's like 24 by 36 inches. Very nice.

bropous · 01-07-2002, 09:39 PM

Okay, dammit, Wayfarer, ya bested me....by 8x10 inches...but size ain't everything, it's how you USE that map...LOL!

emplynx · 01-07-2002, 10:59 PM

http://www.taylorcustom.com/localink...mearthmap.html has some impressive maps. They have one that prints out on 6 pages, I have it hanging on my walll. It is hard to tape together though!

bropous · 01-08-2002, 12:31 AM

Hey, thanks for the link, emplynx! Very handy.

01-04-2002, 09:46 AM	#1
TrewynEvenstar Sapling Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: USA Posts: 9	Confusion about Wights What the heck are wights? Are they dead kings (which was sort of my impression from Fellowship) or something else? How did they get to be wights? I was checking the appendixes for something about wights, and never found it. Does the Simarillion talk about Wights, or another of the books? I am about six chapters into the Simarillion at the moment.

01-04-2002, 04:42 PM	#2
ChildofEru Hobbit Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 24	ive always thought them to be people (beit elven, men, etc) who had a magical object of great power, im sure that gandalf spoke of other rings not just the 20 rings given among the races, who abused them and wasted away where only their souls remain. thats my theory. __________________ Theres a lesson here... its better to watch stuff then to do stuff - Homer Simpson

01-04-2002, 05:22 PM	#3
Pailan Elven Warrior Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: aisle 12, seat#2 Posts: 449	"Evil spirits sent to dwell in the Barrow-downs by the Witch-king of Angmar during his wars with the remnant of Arnor, and who remained there long after the realm of Angmar itself had vanished from the world." I found this apt description over the Encyclopedia of Arda. Hope this helps. __________________ "Holy Entmoot, Batman!" "Who knows, Robin? This strange mixing of minds may be the greatest single sevice ever performed for humanity! Let's go, but, inconspicuosly, through the window. We'll use our Batropes. Our job is finished." Oh, btw, Frodo lives.

01-06-2002, 12:48 PM	#4
TrewynEvenstar Sapling Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: USA Posts: 9	! Oh....thanks!

01-06-2002, 03:35 PM	#6
Wayfarer The Insufferable Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 3,333	A 'wight' is technically any spirit that is controlling body it has no right to. The 'barrow' wights were animate corpses, which would have been in preternaturally good shape (i.e. not zombies with parts falkling off). They're 'barrow' wights because they inhabit barrows. As in 'the barrow downs'. When the rohirrim dismiss aragorn and company as 'elvish wights', it is most likely that they are referring to the posession of mortal mean by unhoused elven spirits. You could say that the werewolves, being wolves inhabited by fell spirits, are sort of 'wolf wights'. And in the older mythology, trolls (as animate stone creatures) would have been 'stone wights'. I.E. When we say 'wight' we usually think of the first kind, but there could be many more flavours. An interesting tidbit: Inolondil once stubbornly insisted on spelling it 'white'. Darkside, the Witch King was the lord of the Nazgul. He's the wraith that gets all the speaking parts. Angmar was the kingdom he ruled during the second or third age. It was west of the northernmost misty mountains. Arnor was the sister country of Gondor. It fell into a state of decay, until only the rangers remembered it's existance. The witch king helped just a tad in this department. __________________ Disgraced he may be, yet is not dethroned, and keeps the rags of lordship once he owned

01-06-2002, 03:24 PM	#5
Darkside Spirit Hobbit Join Date: Nov 2001 Posts: 47	Forgive my ignorance, but who the heck was the "Witch-king of Angmar" and why was he at war with "Arnor"?

01-07-2002, 01:43 AM	#8
bropous EIDRIORCQWSDAKLMED DCWWTIWOATTOPWFIO Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Littleton, CO Posts: 1,176	Pailan has it right on the money. And the Witch-King, the Lord of the Nazgul, ruled the "Witch Kingdom of Angmar". On the map in Lord of the Rings, look directly to the North of the ettenmoors, at the far northern end of the Misty Mountains, and you find this text: "Here was of old the Witch-Realm of Angmar". However, since 1988, the maps in LOTR are of such hideously CRAPPY quality it may be hidden in the fold of the book. Why they had to supplant the original map with the current one, which looks like it was drawn with crayon, I'll never know. Shelly Shapiro drew a terrible map. Read Appendix A, section iii, "The North Kingdom and the Dunedain", starting on page 358 of Return of the King, Darkside Spirit. The northern realms of Arthedain, Cardolan and Rhudaur, as well as the Witch-Kingdom of Angmar and Carn Dum. The entire subject is covered in great detail. __________________ "...[The Lord of the Rings] is to exemplify most clearly a recurrent theme: the place in 'world politics' of the unforeseen and unforeseeable acts of will, and deeds of virtue of the apparently small, ungreat, fogotten in the places of the Wise and Great (good as well as evil). A moral of the whole (after the primary symbolism of the Ring, as the will to mere power, seeking to make itself objective by physical force and mechanism, and so also inevitably by lies) is the obvious one that without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless." Letters of JRR Tolkien, page 160.

01-07-2002, 09:16 PM	#10
bropous EIDRIORCQWSDAKLMED DCWWTIWOATTOPWFIO Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Littleton, CO Posts: 1,176	Ah, Wayfarer. I've not seen the single-volume LotR map. The one I have is about 16x24, taken from a hardback volume of "Unfinished Tales" back in about 1987, and it looks a lot like the original map I had in my well-thumbed and spine-broken paperbacks from the early- to mid-seventies. I got it laminated a long time ago, and I am not sure whether J.R.R. himself did it, but it looks totally different from the Shelly Shapiro knock-off copyrighted from 1988. I gotta admit that I do love the map shown at the beginning of the Peter Jackson film. Beautiful job on that one. Even shows parts of the lands past the Sea of Rhun. __________________ "...[The Lord of the Rings] is to exemplify most clearly a recurrent theme: the place in 'world politics' of the unforeseen and unforeseeable acts of will, and deeds of virtue of the apparently small, ungreat, fogotten in the places of the Wise and Great (good as well as evil). A moral of the whole (after the primary symbolism of the Ring, as the will to mere power, seeking to make itself objective by physical force and mechanism, and so also inevitably by lies) is the obvious one that without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless." Letters of JRR Tolkien, page 160.

01-07-2002, 09:24 PM	#11
Wayfarer The Insufferable Join Date: Aug 2001 Posts: 3,333	heh... I traced out the map from my copy, and put all four secions together, and it's like 24 by 36 inches. Very nice. __________________ Disgraced he may be, yet is not dethroned, and keeps the rags of lordship once he owned

01-07-2002, 09:39 PM	#12
bropous EIDRIORCQWSDAKLMED DCWWTIWOATTOPWFIO Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Littleton, CO Posts: 1,176	Okay, dammit, Wayfarer, ya bested me....by 8x10 inches...but size ain't everything, it's how you USE that map...LOL! __________________ "...[The Lord of the Rings] is to exemplify most clearly a recurrent theme: the place in 'world politics' of the unforeseen and unforeseeable acts of will, and deeds of virtue of the apparently small, ungreat, fogotten in the places of the Wise and Great (good as well as evil). A moral of the whole (after the primary symbolism of the Ring, as the will to mere power, seeking to make itself objective by physical force and mechanism, and so also inevitably by lies) is the obvious one that without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless." Letters of JRR Tolkien, page 160.

01-07-2002, 10:59 PM	#13
emplynx Self-Appointed Lord of the Free Peoples of the General Messages Join Date: Nov 2001 Posts: 1,214	http://www.taylorcustom.com/localink...mearthmap.html has some impressive maps. They have one that prints out on 6 pages, I have it hanging on my walll. It is hard to tape together though!

01-08-2002, 12:31 AM	#14
bropous EIDRIORCQWSDAKLMED DCWWTIWOATTOPWFIO Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Littleton, CO Posts: 1,176	Hey, thanks for the link, emplynx! Very handy. __________________ "...[The Lord of the Rings] is to exemplify most clearly a recurrent theme: the place in 'world politics' of the unforeseen and unforeseeable acts of will, and deeds of virtue of the apparently small, ungreat, fogotten in the places of the Wise and Great (good as well as evil). A moral of the whole (after the primary symbolism of the Ring, as the will to mere power, seeking to make itself objective by physical force and mechanism, and so also inevitably by lies) is the obvious one that without the high and noble the simple and vulgar is utterly mean; and without the simple and ordinary the noble and heroic is meaningless." Letters of JRR Tolkien, page 160.

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