Answer these u LOTR addicts

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fini
CAN anyone tell me if they know the ages of :
1. Gandalf
2.Elrond
3.Legolas

and where on earth( or middle earth) can i find who got all the rings and the rings' names........i know the names of the Elf rings only

chica16
well im not sure on ages

well at the time the movie is taking place , elrond, galadriel and gandalf have the 3 elf rings, i need to re read some of this stuff i haven't read in a while.... legolas i think is around 2900, elrond.. hmmm is pretty old lol... i'll have to check

undomiel
I think legolas is 2,931 or something

imhotep
Oh, he's my age, cool. I wonder wich Horoscope sign? I figure him for a Taurus.

P-NuT
elves are immortal

fini
hmmmm well with my research Elrond is over 4700 yrs old.......And not all elves are immortal, and i'm lookinf just for when they die ( but since most of them go to the great havens, then death is not important)....i wanna know when they were born


And chica, during the MOVIE Gandalf did not get his elf ring yet Cirdan still had his, gandalf got his ring when they were leaving for the shire

Ushgarak
????

Gandalf had it ages before he left the Shire in the books, why do you assume different in film?

Now, Peter Jackson has fixed Legolas' age at 2931 years old. But this has always struck me as odd- I always got the idea that Legolas was far younger in the books.

Tolkien never officially sets his age. We know he is at least 500 years old but little clues point to him not being much older than that. This page will show you the evidence we have:

http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/tolkien/36517

turin
well the rest of the rings of power arent ever really disgused as to who had them (as far as i have read). I believe it was thorins grandfather thror who had one of the dwarven rings, but had it taken away from him when he was slain outside moria (i think). as for the rest of the dwarven rings who knows. now the rings of men are obviously possesed by the ringwraiths but who were they? If i remember right some where numenorean lords who had established realms in middle earth, but the witch king i beleive was a man who became a great sorceror under the teaching of sauron and then took a ring of power, but then i again now that i think about it the sorceror dude might be the mouth of sauron. Ush, what you say, sound right?

Ushgarak
No-one really knows the Nazgul's origins but it is rumoured the Witch-King was a Dunadan- a Numenorean, at that- and his second is meant to be an Easterling.

GABRIEL05
I wonder what would happen if you managed to steal a ring from a ringwraith...hmmmm.

Ushgarak
They aren't physical so it would be hard. But I THINK Sauron has them.

GABRIEL05
yeah thats what I thought, but Sauron doesn't have physical form, so they've got to be somewhere.

Ushgarak
At Barad Dur.

turin
so you are saying that once the rings had power over the wraiths Sauron took the rings back from them? interesting i never thought of it that way i just always assumed that they still wore them. hummm. also wasnt the second in comand of the wraiths name gothmog? i dont now where i read that and i dont know if the guy was named after the lord of the balrogs or what.

Ushgarak
Yeah, I have never heard a Nazgul called Gothmog- I doubt Tolkien would have done that.

billyboyd4ever
yea...and arent some of teh dwarven rigns lost forever, and some possesed by sauron?

silvabullet
Gandalf is 7,000 years old

billyboyd4ever
no hes not

undomiel
how old is Gandalf?

billyboyd4ever
not 7,000 years, thats for sure

undomiel
oh

Mormegil
Gandalf is about 1,900 years old. Him, Saruman, Rhadagast, and the two unnamed Blue Wizards arived in Middle-Earth around 1,100 years after the start of the Third Age, and the LotR takes place around 3,018 years after the start of the Third Age. I happen to know that the Istari (Wizards) are all Maiar, lesser beings than the Valar but still great. Sauron and the Balrogs are also Maiar, only they were drawn into evil by the power and splendor of Morgoth. The Valar, The Lords of the West, held a council together about the growing threat of evil from Dol Guldur. They agreed to send 5 Maiar in the form of Men, and they were forbade to take dominion over the lives of others, and were ordered to unite together those that would resist the Evil. These Maiar were Olorin (Gandalf), Curumo (Saruman), Aiwendil (Rhadagast), Alatar and Pallando (The Blue Wizards). All Valar and Maiar were created by Eru Iluvatar before the creation of the World. Therefore, Gandalf's actual age would be 50,000 at the least. For though some Valar were created before other Valar and some Maiar were created before other Maiar, all were, as I said, created before the beginning of the World, and the time from when the first Valar were created and when they all descended upon the World was not long (maybe some thousands at most). But after the beginning of the World, tens of thousands of years past before Elves first awoke in Middle-Earth, and then it was at least another 10,000 years before the waking of Men and the first rising of the Sun. On that day (I believe) was the First Day of the First Age, and from that time to the time of LotR, another 10,000 years passed at absolute least.

All in all, Gandalf is around 1900 years old (after Olorin took that form, thus becoming Gandalf), though if you consider Gandalf'a age to be Olorin's age, he could be anywhere from 50,000 years old to 100,000 years old, possibly even older.

NOTE: Although both Olorin and Sauron are Maiar, Sauron is more powerful. For some Valar are weaker to other Valar, and some Maiar are weaker than other Maiar. The strengths of the Maiar can very greatly, as a Maia can be as weak as a Ring-Wraith or as strong as a Vala.

turin
Anyone get a chance check out this great site http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/ I looked up gothmog and there was 2 definitions one for lord of the balrogs and one for lieutenant of morgul who took over the forces of minus morgul after the loss of his lord. It doesnt say wether he is a wraith, but i believe in the actual book that it specifies a wraith took over after the loss of the witch king.

Mormegil
Yes, a Wraith did take over after the loss of the Witch-King, but the second in command of the Wraiths was Khamul the Easterling. Thus, it is likely that Khamul, not this other wraith you speak of, took over command of Minis Morgul.

As for this 'Gothmog,' I do not believe that any Wraith had such a name.

turin
did you look up the web site i linked? it says khamul is second in comand but that gothmog took over on the pelenor fields. hum? kind of seems odd. it must be one of those many things that tolkien had changed and changed again till who knows what his actual intent was.

Mormegil
Well, for one thing, I am not sure whether you (and that site) are right or wrong. I have insufficient evidence to prove either, though I say this:

It has come to my knowledge that a card-game exists of the LotR, and that there are cards for each of the Ring-Wraiths. However, the names given to the Nazgul on those cards are made up, save ONLY for the Witch-King and Khamul. It is my belief that Tolkien never got around to making names to any of the other Wraiths, and that the names of the Nazgul on the cards are made to be imitations of actual names (and they did a terrible job of it). Many people take things they see on websites to be fact without considering the credibility of the source. There never was any Nazgul named Gothmog. Gothmog is the name of the Lord of Balrogs, and his name only. The names made for the other 7 Nazgul are unbelievably corny, and I would think it obvious to anyone that they are stupid faxsimilies, and not true names.

As for one of those things Tolkien changed over and over again, I do not believe it is. The confusion is due to other people making up false information to try and look smart, while there aren't any facts supporting their claims.

turin
dude you are acting like i am calling you out or something. i was just saying that this web site, which i have found to be very acurate, has a bit of confusion with it on the subject of a second gothmog and khamul. perhaps the second gothmog was just a man who was a liuetent of minus morgul who took over after the fall of the witch king on the pelanor fields, i find that hard to believe, but it just doesnt specify. Now the confusion involved with LOTR is not made up by people trying to look smart. If you have ever read any of the history of middle earth books you would know that tolkien wrote and rewrote everything many times and even once they were published he was still hashing over it all. It has actually caused a lot of debate in this forum, because you can find things written by tolkien that werent published till after his death that alter, conterdict, or go into more detail on the original work. so do we take only his published works as true or all of his writtings. Now you raise a good point not everything on websites are to be trusted, but everything i have ever looked at on this site has been correct so I beleive this to be a very credible website. before dismissing things to people making stuff up, check it out and determine for yourself. Now just flat out saying there never was a wraith named gothmog, did you try and look up any info on it or are you winging it, or maybe you are relying on those trading cards you got.

Mormegil
I have no trading cards of my own, I just found that there were trading cards while trying to research the names and histories of the Nazgul. I have read 5 books about the History of Middle-Earth, and I more than know about how things kept changing. I have just not seen any evidence in those works that any Wraith was ever named Gothmog, and I therefore am not sure whether or not it is true. I have looked all over the net for things about the Nazgul, but the only sites I found were sites that had stuff about that card game. Also, I think that the name Gothmog has a meaning in the Black speech or some other tongue that specifies that it is a Lord of something, and it wasn't the Lord of anything before the Witch-King died. I have yet to look at the site you posted but I will momentarily and I will get back to you on what I think.

Mormegil
Okay, I've checked it out, and I have this to add:

The site specified that the names are, in fact, not made by Tolkien, but made up as imitation names of the various languages they had come from. The names were made up by Iron Crown Enterprises for the card game, and it has mistakenly been spread across the net as fact. As that very website stated, however, they were not made by Tolkien and are not facts.

turin
I assume you mean the names for the Nazgul are on the encyclopedia of arda web site and that they state the names are made up. I havent seen the cards so i apologize i dont know what any of those names are. Did you look up the name gothmog? what was your impression of the site? I think it is a great refrence, but a person should always have more than one source to back them up so i will see if i can find where i read that about 2 gothmogs. kind of puzzling thing here. was the second gothmog man or nazgul or i guess in your case did he exist.

Mormegil
Well, I don't know what the source of there information is. It didn't say its name in the names made up list, though it only said that Khamul was made by Tolkien... I don't quite understand that... I'm looking into it, but I haven't found anything yet. Other than that, however, that sitee does seem like a reliable source of information with its sources all foundin the books. But the Gothmog thing wasn't in any of the books I've read...

turin
i had problems finding anything on the gothmog issue except if you have "The Complete Guide to Middle Earth" by i think robert margroff or something like that he makes references to it, which leads me to beleive that it is somewhere in one of the books. i am betting it is in "the peoples of middle earth", but havent checked that out yet.

Lorien
Elrond has been living on Middle Earth over 6500 years. So may be he is over 7000 years old. So Gandalf is more than 7000 years old.

Lorien
Elrond has been living on Middle Earth over 6500 years. So may be he is over 7000 years old.OOps i'm sorry i don't know why my reply is shown 2 times. embarrasment

Lorien
I have tried to find something about the other rings but i could not.

Daddy Two-Foot
The three elven rings were made by Celebrimbor of Hollin and are the only rings of power never to be sullied by Sauron's hand. They are called Narya, Nenya and Vilya. Narya is the ring of fire and was originally wielded by Cirdan the Shipwright, but he gave it to Gandalf when he came to Middle-Earth. This is why Gandalf makes the claim to the Balrog 'I am a servant of the Secret Fire, weilder of the Flame of Anor.'
Nenya is the ring of Adamant had has always been kept by Galadriel. Vilya is the ring of Air. It was originally kept by Gil-galad, the High King of the Noldor, but at some point before the War of the Last Alliance he gave it to Elrond who has it during the War of the Rings.

glorfindel
gandalf is older than the middle earth as he was one of the miaia smokin'

Aragorn#1
I think that the rings of men are on the wraiths and thats what gives them there powers but....souron has control over those ring so he orders them what to do.

whiterider
gothmog is a balrog and i think gandalf is very old because he was a maiar, Olorion was his name and the maiar are very old. gandalf as a wizard is not old as olorion as a maiar, but i think of it as the same thing kind of

Ushgarak
We seem to be going around in circles here, and Fini already bknew about the Elven Rings.

whiterider
like i was saying gandalf as a maia is very old because the maiar were created before middle-earth. but as an istari gandalf is not as old. but in the books i dont believe it realy tells how old he realy is.

whiterider
i just read in one of my books that olorion was gandalf's name in his youth, but he arrived in middle-earth as gandalf around TA 1000

Ambarturion
I suppose it really depends on whether you count Olorin`s time before coming to middle earth as Gandalf ( in which case he is as old as creation ) or just from his coming with the other Istari to middle earth in the third age.

whiterider
yeah. i rest my case. think you very much ambarturion

chica16
gandalf's cool..

lotrlover7000
if any of you people would read laughing out loud than you would know it says that the istari are older than middle earth itself

whiterider
yeah that is what im saying, duh. but gandalf is even older because he is a maia

Celebrian
In two towers there is that line from gandalf as he is leaving Edoras that says some thing like "500 lives of men have I spent going as I may, now I am needed everywhere." that's not exactly it. But if the average life of a man in middle earth is around 100 than we know that he has lived about 500 years in middle earth but he had lived before as he he is an istari. and istaris are a special division of the maia

chica16
how old is aragorn? i forget

waznboyd
aragorn is no more than 100 wink or i think he could get more than 100 iono.....but not by average lifespan

thranduil is one of the earliest ppl that sails across from valinor (ithink) or is that gil galad...iono, so thats prolly from the First age, and thranduil is STILL alive i think.....legolas shouldnt be that old cus they didnt say anything about him during "the hobbit" and oh well....hey i didnt know gandalf was sayin that when he was facing the balrog...you guys make me look bad! lol confused Happy Dance

nemo
i think's about 80. wink
just know he's one year younger than denethor.

fini
at the time of the LOTr saga aragorn was 89..........he lived to be 210 though

turin
thranduil never sailed to or from valinor and it is reasonable to beleive that gilgalad was born in middle earth during the first age. legolas had to be around during the battle of 5 armies though he might not have participated in the battle itself, otherwise he would be a very young elf.

Verity
Gandalf is the oldest...he is 7,000 ys old
Elrond not sure, dunno if it's specified anywhere...
Legolas, I believe he's somewhere close to 3,000 ys old?smile

Hegemon875
That is incorrect. Gandalf already had it but when he was leaving from Middle Earth he wore it openly.

Hegemon875
Sarumans name is actually Curunir

aniron
what would happen if you pulled down the hood of a ringwraith lol

turin
besides dieing, you would find nothing under it. lol

must_kill_Santa
i no legolas is 2 931
Gandalf is 2 018 (remember Gandalf is still Human but a Wizard so he is younger then Legolas and Elrond as they are immortal)
Elrond is 6 517
You must also remamber that it is fiction and not real so it doesnt matter how old they are

Shadowfax
Has anyone read the appendixes at the end of the third book? cos if u did the answers wud probs all be there, but ive only scanned them. also some of the story is continued there, like what happens to everyone afta the end of the book(s)

Shadowfax
no, gandalf is immortal, as well as the elves. Wizards and elves are the two immortal races, and in this case, immortal does not mean cannot die, it means that they can not catch any type of illness, things like that, but they can be slain in battle

turin
ents are also immortal (dont get sick or grow old)

Fire
and you always learn something new

ugthebarbarian
ok guys, it looks like no one actually knows what they're talking about except mormegil and turin.

From what mormegil said, Gandalf must be at least 50,000 years old. He is one of the Maiar, so he is older than middle-earth itself. He was there as the Valar shaped Arda. The other wizards, the istari, are also Maiar. Therefore they are also 50k+ years old.

Gandalf received the ring from Cirdan when he arrived in Middle-earth. Cirdan longed to leave, and he saw that Gandalf was a being with a righteous soul, so he gave his ring to him. Therefore, Gandalf had the ring for his entire time throughout wandering Middle-earth.

The elven rings and human rings are pretty obvious. The dwarven rings are not. I have read the appendices and a few of the history books. Tolkien states AS PART OF THE STORY that the fate of all save one of the dwarven rings were unknown. It is LIKELY they were acquired by Sauron, because the dwarves had become smittened with the precious metals of the earth. Their greed was enhanced by the rings and by Sauron's evil power. The one dwarven ring thats fate was known was carried by Thrain, Thorin's father. Unfortunatley he was attacked by creatures of Sauron near Dol Guldur some years before the Hobbit took place. Gandalf tried to save him, but it was too late. The ring was with Sauron.

In reference to entire Gothmog incident, read the books ppl. don't look at websites. The books are ur best bet are finding authentic information. By books, I mean the silmarillion, unfinished tales, and the history.

turin
ugthebarbarian, for the gothmog thing are you refering to their being two of them? ya i went home and read ROTK and it specifically states that the individual who took over for the witchking was named gothmog. i was wondering was he a ringwraith or just a dude, did you find anything on that?

ps thanks man and it appears you know your stuff aswell

ugthebarbarian
Well then I guess we solved the Gothmog thing then Turin. I don't have my books here with me (at college) so I can't check. I do have the silmarillion somewhere in the back of my closet.. but that's about it. I highly recommend "The Atlas of Middle Earth" 2nd edition by Karen Wynn Fonstad. For all of us addicts out there, it has maps of all the battles that took place in middle earth. It has rough maps of locations that were not even in the Silmarillion, such as a map of Valinor, Thangorodrim/Angband and detailed maps of Lothlorien, Rivendell, etc.
The battle maps are particularly interesting if you're into that.

Just thought i'd tell you ppl =)

turin
ya i have that book, i am only about half way through reading it but it is a pretty interesting book.

Fire
cool I need to get so many more books

XxtinuvielxX
all i kno is that legolas is 2,394 or somthin like that, the other two, i have no idea. heh heh.....


i would cut off your head, dwarf, if it stood a bit higher from the ground!

fini
uh people, some of u have to go do some reading ( me included) , but i'm sure that there are no immortal races in LOTR........... they all age and die.......some more slowly than others

hmm i think i'll get more answers AND questions when i finish the history of middle earth..............but is, of course, gonna be after my degree......have to much damn work to do to read out everything

FreeMason
Gandalf can't even be slain in battle, this happens in fact and he comes back as "Gandalf the White"...he is immortal as he's not a middle-earther, or from valinor or whatever...the elves are immortal in that when they die they go to wherever...while humans must wait it out in middle earth as being "dead".

What happend 10,000 years ago? That date sticks in my mind.

lotrlover7000
Gandalf is older than middle earth itself
Happy Dance Happy Dance

lotrlover7000
laughing out loud smokin' rolling on floor laughing beer doctor rock yes bunny

lotrlover7000
just tryin out some smilys

turin
gandalf can be slain, much like the balrog was (their both maiar) and the way i read it, he was slain after the defeat of the balrog. the only truely immortal i guess would have to be the valar. even when morgoth was truelly defeated he was only banished to the outer void. perhaps though when a maiar is slain such as the balrog they also are only bannished or "removed" from arda, making them also immortal. who knows !?!?!?! eek!

Shield_Eowyn
hey, silvabullet, where did u get that pic???

shaber
Gandalf has been in Middle earth 2000 years. He is a Maiar (angel) though, who has taken physical form 2000 years ago. The Maiar are very old indeed. The world began about 23,000 years ago, so he is at least that old in entirety.

Elrond is about 7,000 years old.

Legolas, no idea, probably quite old.

Only the Elven rings had names. Sauron helped in the construction of the Seven and the Nine.

P.S. There were five Wizards who came to Middle Earth 2,000 years ago. Saruman was the leader, in white with raven hair, (now gone white) Gandalf in grey was the second. The other two had much less significance, one was in brown who never did anything important, the other two in blue, who went to the east with Saruman. Only Saruman returned.

Exa
23,000? I thought it was something about 55,000 years confused
-about 33,537 years in the Valarean Age before the counting of days, about 14,370 in the Years of The Trees, 590 the First Age, 3441 the Second Age and 3021 the Third Age. Well without the time before the couting of time it's quite exactly 23,000 years

Tolkien never gives a birth date for Legolas but PJ fixes the beginning of the Third Age... dunno the exact number, 87, I think...

Fire
okie

shaber
I discounted the Valenorean age. If gandalf was created before then, then he is a lot older! I would be more interested to know when Sauron went wrong. Evil Valar and Maiar suffer a kind of senility (Melkor lost his fanastic supreme powers; Saruman was soon reduced to a contemptible beggar). If Sauron hadn't forged the Ring about 5,000 years ago, then he would have deteriorated by now. I know that he was in Angband when Melkor was in Utumno. Perhapshe was turned AFTER the coming of the trees?

Exa
Maybe he was... before he was a servant of Aule (as also Saruman was... and the Noldor that arose against the Valar...) so I think he became "evil" after the creation of the trees and the awaking of the elves

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