October 2, 2002

It's a Mistake
Brett C.

Well, deep breath and here we go.

The whole timeline in the appendices for LOTR is not very well thought out. Sorry Professor.

Annatar rightly raises the point of how the Nazgul manage to maintain a 2 year siege of Minas Ithil right on Gondor's doorstep. Seriously, it is a flawed premise from the start. Are we to believe that while the Nine invade Gondor that the Wise would do nothing to come to the kingdom's aid. For that matter, the Wise and the Elves tend to dither around while Sauron and his minions pretty much have their way for 2 millenia. Personally I think even the idea of 3000 years passing until the War of the Ring is a little hard to swallow - 1500 tops would be a more credible amount of time, even with the longevity of the Dunedain and the immortality of the Elves. But to get back to the topic of Minas Ithil, it would have been a much better concept to have the city taken suddenly by surpise out of Mordor, and falling before the full might of Gondor could come to it's aid. The palantir, of course, was captured in this second attack, having been rescued from the city's fall in the 2nd age by Isildur when he fled with the White tree sapling, which was then planted in Minas Anor [Tirith].