[dog-man]

yeah, i know i should put this on a different section of the forum.

but all my friends (and enemies) are here.

ok, we can also mention and discuss the different times that dogs are part of the books or movies.

anyway, i have a problem with the concept of elves.

it seems they can live forever...but they can be killed pretty easily.

Laurelin, you seem to take some biology courses...is there some way to explain that?

also, Lady Arwen was a young woman after thousands of years.
does that mean she spent hundreds of years in diapers?

also, i don't remember elvish little kids...did they ever explain that...i don't remember.

also, one of the least developed characters was Lady Galadriel's husband, Celeborn.
He was supposed to be among the wisest, but he seemed pretty slow to me.
it didn't seem like he could keep a woman like Galadriel satisfied.

maybe, that's why Arwen decided to expand her horizons to "men"...she spent a lot of time there, and maybe saw her aunt's dissatisfaction.

[bluedawg]

Did you pick the correct area to post this thread?

[Dakota Spirit]

Originally Posted by dog-man

yeah, i know i should put this on a different section of the forum.

but all my friends (and enemies) are here.

ok, we can also mention and discuss the different times that dogs are part of the books or movies.

anyway, i have a problem with the concept of elves.

it seems they can live forever...but they can be killed pretty easily.

Laurelin, you seem to take some biology courses...is there some way to explain that?

also, Lady Arwen was a young woman after thousands of years.
does that mean she spent hundreds of years in diapers?

also, i don't remember elvish little kids...did they ever explain that...i don't remember.

I'm not sure if some of your comments are meant to be jokes...but I'll try and address them the best I can.

How does long life have any connection to how hard one is to kill? Living for one year or 100 isn't going to make a difference - a sword through the heart will do the same amount of damage. Elves aren't 'superhuman' creatures...they simply enjoy long life. Similar to how we live longer then dogs, yet can both be killed fairly easily.

Similarly, Elves do not grow on the same time scale as us. 1000 years is a drop in the bucket to them.

What's your question about kids? I'm not sure where you are having a problem with that...

ETA: Regardless of where you post this (ie. the Off Topic Forum) it will still be seen by most people here as many of us search the forum via the "New Posts" link at the top of the boards.

[sillylilykitty]

Originally Posted by dog-man

ok, we can also mention and discuss the different times that dogs are part of the books or movies.

anyway, i have a problem with the concept of elves.

it seems they can live forever...but they can be killed pretty easily.

They are immortal. Which means unless they are killed by someone or something they will live forever. Pretty simple.

Originally Posted by dog-man

also, i don't remember elvish little kids...did they ever explain that...i don't remember.

My sister read the books (I havent). I think I remember her telling me something about it. She said that there are no kid elves. They all are old, very very old and they dont make babies. Im sure there is someone else who can help you more on that one.

[zimandtakandgrrandmimi]

Originally Posted by dog-man

yeah, i know i should put this on a different section of the forum.

but all my friends (and enemies) are here.

ok, we can also mention and discuss the different times that dogs are part of the books or movies.

anyway, i have a problem with the concept of elves.

it seems they can live forever...but they can be killed pretty easily.

Laurelin, you seem to take some biology courses...is there some way to explain that?

also, Lady Arwen was a young woman after thousands of years.
does that mean she spent hundreds of years in diapers?

also, i don't remember elvish little kids...did they ever explain that...i don't remember.

also, one of the least developed characters was Lady Galadriel's husband, Celeborn.
He was supposed to be among the wisest, but he seemed pretty slow to me.
it didn't seem like he could keep a woman like Galadriel satisfied.

maybe, that's why Arwen decided to expand her horizons to "men"...she spent a lot of time there, and maybe saw her aunt's dissatisfaction.

in the lord of the rings universe, everything was created by illuvatar(god). he made the valar which are kind of like illuvatar's angels. he told the valar he was going to create two races, the eldar or elves and men. and to men he would give the gift of passing beyond the borders of the universe while elves could not. there is a lot of stuff that happened but basically some of the elves went to live in middle earth instead of with the valar and when they grow tired of middle earth they take the ships and sail back to the land of the valar and shed all that was with them in middle earth. they aren't people, they are more like solid spirit beings in a sense. they shed their bodies but don't die because that gift wasn't given to them.

arwen is a bit special. her father is elrond who is half elf and half human. the valar gave elrond's family a choice to die or to take the ships. aragorn is descended in direct line from elrond's brother..in tolkien's stories there are a lot of themes including elf girl goes gaga for mortal that repeat themselves in the stories. and it's hinted that the valar want it to be that way..

celeborn has some great tragedy to him, the movies don't go into a lot of things...

ask the lotr nerd anything....this is one of my fav nerd subjects!

[emily445455]

I love LOTR. I don't really think about things like that though...lol!

[dog-man]

Originally Posted by Dakota Spirit

How does long life have any connection to how hard one is to kill? Living for one year or 100 isn't going to make a difference - a sword through the heart will do the same amount of damage. Elves aren't 'superhuman' creatures...they simply enjoy long life. Similar to how we live longer then dogs, yet can both be killed fairly easily.

Similarly, Elves do not grow on the same time scale as us. 1000 years is a drop in the bucket to them.
.

the next person who posted said that they have an immortal aspect to them.
i also got the impression that when they go over on the ships, it's forever.

if they're just long-lived, i get your point.

but then, if they are just long-lived, are they babies for hundreds of years?

Originally Posted by zimandtakandgrrandmimi

when they grow tired of middle earth they take the ships and sail back to the land of the valar and shed all that was with them in middle earth. they aren't people, they are more like solid spirit beings in a sense. they shed their bodies but don't die because that gift wasn't given to them.

!

so, when they get killed, do their spirits just go back to the land of the Valar?

i got the impression that their death in battle was similar to our own.

also, LOTR nerd, what about the lack of kids?

[Shaina]

Originally Posted by dog-man

the next person who posted said that they have an immortal aspect to them.
i also got the impression that when they go over on the ships, it's forever.

if they're just long-lived, i get your point.

but then, if they are just long-lived, are they babies for hundreds of years?



so, when they get killed, do their spirits just go back to the land of the Valar?

i got the impression that their death in battle was similar to our own.

also, LOTR nerd, what about the lack of kids?

Going over on the ships is forever...they are given a limited window by the Valar to return to the land in the west and live there. By choosing to go there, they give up their lives in Middle Earth.

I imagine the lack of children is (1) because to them, having a child once in a a few thousand years is perfectly reasonable and (2) many of the long-lived races have very low fertility rates to keep their races from overrunning the population. No idea on the growth rate for children. Also, children aren't relevant to the story, so they would be less likely to appear. I mean, if you read the stories you'd think men outnumbered women in Middle Earth 20:1, but I rather doubt that was the case either, especially with all the wars.

I think their death is supposed to be quite similar to the humans. They are not Valar...they are made in the image of the Valar I believe, but they are not Gods or demi-Gods like the Valar are (I would need to refresh myself on the specifics...I only read the Silmarillions once, quite a while ago--a phenomenally dull read).

[dog-man]

ok, here's a trivia question.

the elves had 3 rings.

i believe Lady Galadriel and Elrond had two of them...that is what gave their neighborhood beauty and power.

who had the third elvish ring?

[Dakota Spirit]

Originally Posted by dog-man

ok, here's a trivia question.

the elves had 3 rings.

i believe Lady Galadriel and Elrond had two of them...that is what gave their neighborhood beauty and power.

who had the third elvish ring?

Gandalf

[Shaina]

Originally Posted by Dakota Spirit

Gandalf

*seconds this*

[dog-man]

Originally Posted by Dakota Spirit

Gandalf

excellent.

so, here is my question.

if he had the elven ring, and knew how to use it, how could Saruman beat him up?

Saruman might have been a somewhat superior Wizard, but Gandalf was no slouch either...and he had an elven ring...those rings were the source of the power of Lothlorien and Rivendell, which could hold off the forces of Sauron for a significant while.

[sillylilykitty]

Dog-man, have you read the books? If you havent you should (I need to read them too!), wouldnt your questions be answered in the books?

[zimandtakandgrrandmimi]

Originally Posted by dog-man

the next person who posted said that they have an immortal aspect to them.
i also got the impression that when they go over on the ships, it's forever.

if they're just long-lived, i get your point.

but then, if they are just long-lived, are they babies for hundreds of years?



so, when they get killed, do their spirits just go back to the land of the Valar?

i got the impression that their death in battle was similar to our own.

also, LOTR nerd, what about the lack of kids?

ok the movies leave out a lot. there are elf children in the lord of the rings universe, featured mostly in the book 'the silmarillion'. it seems they mature physically at the same rate mortals do (at least the mortals of the race of numenor who's average lifespan was about three hundred years) but they are born knowing a lot more than the average mortal baby in some respects...they don't really mature at all mentally and spiritually because they are permanent fixtures so to speak..elvish death in battle is superficially similar to a mortal. consider this, both an elf and a numenorian(the numenorians came descended from elrond's brother, aragorn is one of them. at the time of the war of the ring and frodo's journey, aragorn is about 85 years old) can decide if they want to to just close their eyes and die. with a thought. so death for one of elven blood is different because they are more spirit than substance in a manner of speaking. if they are terribly wounded and mangled they choose to shed their bodies and pass on. if they haven't put themselves in danger they can choose to go, with body or without....

tolkien's lotr stories are incredibly complex, there are complete written alphabets and spoken languages for each race. the silmarillion' is millions of years of middle earth history that is the backstory to the trilogy. three movies can't possibly hope for that much depth...whole chunks of the book trilogy's storylines didn't make it into the movies...

Originally Posted by dog-man

ok, here's a trivia question.

the elves had 3 rings.

i believe Lady Galadriel and Elrond had two of them...that is what gave their neighborhood beauty and power.

who had the third elvish ring?

cirdan the shipwright of the grey havens had it first but gave it to gandalf either before or right at the start of the war of the ring.


okidoki

here's one....what were the three unions of elves and men?

aragorn and arwen is the obvious one....who was involved in the other two?

ps arwen was the daughter of celebrian, who was wife of elrond and galadriel's daughter, making galadriel arwen's grandmother not aunt....

Originally Posted by dog-man

excellent.

so, here is my question.

if he had the elven ring, and knew how to use it, how could Saruman beat him up?

Saruman might have been a somewhat superior Wizard, but Gandalf was no slouch either...and he had an elven ring...those rings were the source of the power of Lothlorien and Rivendell, which could hold off the forces of Sauron for a significant while.

so sauron was chief lieutenant to morgoth the outcast vala...he took over when morgoth was thrown out by the vala. he's a maia. a race somewhere between vala and elf. he was tricky back in the old days and wormed his his way into helping out making all the rings except the three. but since he was connected to the one and the seven and the nine, if gandalf or elrond or galadriel openly used the rings they would in some part be controlled by sauron...gandalf does use the ring of fire in the books but not openly for fear of sauron...

nother trivia...

what race is gandalf and what is his real name?

[dog-man]

Originally Posted by sillylilykitty

Dog-man, have you read the books? If you havent you should (I need to read them too!), wouldnt your questions be answered in the books?

i read the books more times than i care to admit.

i started when i was 10.

not everything is answered by reading...Tolkien was a genius, and a madman for details...but he still was human.

[FriendsOfZoe]

I actually wrote my big research paper in 11th grade honors English on LOTR...my theme was about the "transcendental nature of things" and hence I was mostly focusing on the end of the third book--wherein the great battle of our time is won, but it also signifies the passing of the old guard. Tolkien actually talks a lot about children in the books (couldn't possibly remember where, but I know I found the details for my paper back in the day!).

The hobbits and men have children.

The elves have not reproduced in centuries, which is why they are endangered---they may be immortal unless harmed, but as they are killed one by one, they cannot replace the population. This was part of the reason it was such a big decision for the elves to join the fight for middle-earth...they knew that they would be a) losing large numbers and b) relinquishing leadership of middle-earth to the men. It was part of the deal, and they decided it was important enough.

The dwarves, likewise, don't have many women. Hence the dwarves are also a dying race.

Finally, the ents are the most dying. Their women disappeared years ago, and in the books, they barely had enough life left to wake up and fight for their forest.

So that's my take on the reproduction thing.

[Mycathinks hesadog]

Dog man, I believe The Simarilion answers alot of the questions you've been asking, except for the physiological and anotomical details on elven reproduction.

[Love's_Sophie]

Originally Posted by Mycathinks hesadog

Dog man, I believe The Simarilion answers alot of the questions you've been asking, except for the physiological and anotomical details on elven reproduction.

I was just going to recommend that one...and the The Hobbit...

[sillylilykitty]

Originally Posted by Love's_Sophie

I was just going to recommend that one...and the The Hobbit...

I am glad my sister has all these LOTR books, I cant wait to read them

[dog-man]

Originally Posted by FriendsOfZoe

I actually wrote my big research paper in 11th grade honors English on LOTR...

The elves have not reproduced in centuries, which is why they are endangered---they may be immortal unless harmed, but as they are killed one by one, they cannot replace the population. This was part of the reason it was such a big decision for the elves to join the fight for middle-earth...they knew that they would be a) losing large numbers and b) relinquishing leadership of middle-earth to the men. It was part of the deal, and they decided it was important enough.

.

interesting...do you remember where this is discussed...in one of the appendixes?

do the elves use some sort of birth control?
was there some sort of spay program, or are they just a bit cold-blooded?