December 20, 2002

Re: Aragorn's Age and Piro Hobbit
Fluidshaggy

I submitted an article to similair to this a while ago but it never got posted. So, I'll give it another go.... Everybody in the debate of why Aragorn did not live 300 years seems to be overlooking the simple fact that Aragorn decided to die. I don't have the text with me at the moment but as near as I can recall he tells Arwen he does not wish to become an old diminished king and he feels Eldarion is ready for the responsibilities of kingship. He seems pretty naive in this text when he tells her she must now decide wether to die as a human or to go west and join her people. A decision, as she points out, she made a long time ago. Then he simply walks down to the tomb, lies himself on the slab and dies. Who can say how long he might have lived had he done things differently. It seemed awfully cruel to me to leave Arwen, who gave up all she new and loved for him, alone to grow old and die without him.

Also, to Piro Hobbit, the reason it took them longer to get from Rivendell to Moria than it did to get from Hobbiton to Rivendell is they took a very indirect route to Moria(it being their second choice). You have a tendency to cover less distance when you spend your days trodging through the snow than you would on a sunny afternoon.