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Old 02-06-2002, 10:36 PM   #1
Finmandos12
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Sauron and Gothmog

Who was higher up on the chain of command? I know they were referred to as the leaders of Morgoth's Maia.
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Old 02-06-2002, 10:40 PM   #2
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I think Sauron was higher up. He was more powerful, and he was considered Melkor's leutenant. Gothmog was more of the bodyguard/warrior type.
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Old 02-07-2002, 03:02 AM   #3
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Sauron is named the greatest of Morgoth's Maiar (in different words) in (I believe) the Valaquenta, so I think that settles it.

Gothmog I think was the captain of Angband's military, while Sauron was Morgoth's chief Lieutenant.
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Old 02-28-2002, 12:17 AM   #4
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yes, Sauron was Melkor's chief lieutenant and in charge of Angband, while Gothmog was more the 'destroy the intruder' bodyguard evil balrog type creature
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Old 02-10-2020, 06:08 PM   #5
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From The Silmarillion, section “Valaquenta”, chapter “Of the Enemies”, comes the very last paragraph:
Among those of [Morgoth’s] servants that have names the greatest was that spirit whom the Eldar called Sauron, or Gorthaur the Cruel. In his beginning he was of the Maiar of Aulë, and he remained mighty in the lore of that people. In all the deeds of Melkor the Morgoth upon Arda, in his vast works and in the deceits of his cunning, Sauron had a part, and was only less evil than his master in that for long he served another and not himself. But in after years he rose like a shadow of Morgoth and a ghost of his malice, and walked behind him on the same ruinous path down into the Void.
In Morgoth’s Ring, in the section “Myths Transformed”, part VII, “Notes on motives in the Silmarillion”, Christopher Tolkien publishes a text of his father’s that he labels “B”. This is from the first section of B, numbered (i):
Sauron was “greater”, effectively, in the Second Age than Morgoth at the end of the First. ... Eventually he also squandered his power … in the endeavour to gain control of others. But he was not obliged to expend so much of himself. To gain domination over Arda, Morgoth had let most of his being pass into the physical constituents of the Earth – hence all things … on Earth … were liable to be “stained”. Morgoth at the time of the War of the Jewels had become permanently “incarnate”: for this reason he was afraid…

Sauron … inherited the “corruption” of Arda, and only spent his (much more limited) power on the Rings; for it was the creatures of earth, in their minds and wills, that he desired to dominate.
Finally, in Letter 183, Tolkien wrote that,
Sauron desired to be a God-King, and was held to be this by his servants
and in a footnote to this passage,
When [Sauron] found how greatly his knowledge was admired by all other rational creatures and how easy it was to influence them, his pride became boundless. By the end of the Second Age he assumed the position of Morgoth's representative. By the end of the Third Age (though actually much weaker than before) he claimed to be Morgoth returned.
Gothmog Lord of the Balrogs was killed in battle by Ecthelion in the Court of the Fountain during the Fall of Gondolin, who also died.

It is certainly worth noting, however, that after the destruction of his first body in the Downfall of Númenor, Sauron’s subsequent physical forms strongly resembled those of the Balrogs.
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Old 03-12-2020, 03:27 PM   #6
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Gothmog's main problem in this comparison, IMO, is mostly that he got killed long before the end of the First Aera. Sauron's own rise to power only begins after Morgoth's taken completely off-stage by the Valar.

Could Gothmog have achieved a similar path, given the chance?

Perhaps not, because nothing is ever said (IIRC) about the creative or mental powers of balrog, whereas Sauron most definitely had serious skills in that field, even before Morgoth's final incarceration.

Perhaps sheer balrog-power simply wouldn't have sufficed to be a the next Dark Lord.
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