The Real Ring?

[Paul S. Person]

I found this online today:

http://www.seattlepi.com/news/world/article/Ring-that-may-have-inspired-Tolkien-goes-on-show-4403044.php

It doesn't /look/ like a plain band of gold. Still, I suppose the
inspiration could have been detail-free.

The curse tablet, after all, never made it into the books.

What struck me was how Hobbit-like the person holding the ring looks,
at least to me.

But perhaps I am confusing "Hobbit" with something else.
--
"Nature must be explained in
her own terms through
the experience of our senses."

[Curlytop]

Paul S. Person set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
continuum:

> What struck me was how Hobbit-like the person holding the ring looks,
> at least to me.

A very young child I would say. Pity she's out of focus - or is that the
effect of merely holding the Ring? Would she disappear completely if she
put it on?
--
ξ: ) Proud to be curly

Interchange the alphabetic letter groups to reply

[Paul S. Person]

On Sun, 07 Apr 2013 20:35:11 +0100, Curlytop
<pvstownse...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

>Paul S. Person set the following eddies spiralling through the space-time
>continuum:
>
>> What struck me was how Hobbit-like the person holding the ring looks,
>> at least to me.
>
>A very young child I would say. Pity she's out of focus - or is that the
>effect of merely holding the Ring? Would she disappear completely if she
>put it on?

But what does Aragorn tell Eomer about Merry and Pippin? I paraphrase:
"to your eyes they would appear but children". So of course a Hobbit
would appear to our eyes to be a child!

As to disappearing if she put it on, so far as I know, the experiment
was not attempted.

[Troels Forchhammer]

In message <news:3cmol8p1gd1foq57m...@4ax.com>
Paul S. Person <pspe...@ix.netscom.com.invalid> spoke these staves:

>
> I found this online today:
>
> http://www.seattlepi.com/news/world/article/Ring-that-may-have-
inspired-Tolkien-goes-on-show-4403044.php

One of many ...

> It doesn't /look/ like a plain band of gold. Still, I suppose the
> inspiration could have been detail-free.

I think it is appropriate to state the conclusions on this question
in the Tolkien Society and the Mythopoeic Society:
Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler (not yet knighted at the time) and his
wife and partner, Tessa Verney Wheeler, conducted excavations at the
site of a Roman temple at Lydney towards the end of the 1920s. Wheeler
wrote a report on the excavations in which he noted, among other
things, the people who had been at the dig -- Tolkien was not among
those, but among others that were thanked for their expert assistance.

Tolkien wrote, for the report, a essay on 'The Name Nodens'
(republished in an issue of /Tolkien Studies/) as that name appears on
several items found at the Lydney dig site. The essay appears as an
appendix to Wheeler's report, and the letters between Tolkien and
Wheeler suggests a business-like relationship (last names, no
references to having met or things like that).

There is no evidence that Tolkien actually visited the Lydney / Nodens
dig site, nor that he and Wheeler ever met in person.

The ring that is now being displayed at The Vyne was found in the 18th
century roughly a hundred miles from the Lydney site at a place called
Sichester (close to The Vyne). Nothing about this ring is included in
Wheeler's report, and there is nothing to suggest that Tolkien actually
knew about it.

--
Troels Forchhammer
Valid e-mail is <troelsfo(a)gmail.com>
Please put [AFT], [RABT] or 'Tolkien' in subject.

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided
into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from,
and (d) rocks.
- /Equal Rites/ (Terry Pratchett)

[Paul S. Person]

Here is a link that will now work (the one above can no longer be
found, such is the nature of the daily newspaper):

http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/04/02/ring-that-may-have-inspired-tolkien-goes-on-show/

This appears to be the same article, with the same apparent Hobbit
holding the ring. (Yes, I know it is Fox News, but it is still the
same article I saw before.)

The article states:

>]An archaeologist who looked into the connection between the ring and
>]the curse tablet asked Tolkien, who was an Anglo-Saxon professor at
>]Oxford University, to work on the etymology of the name Nodens in
>]1929.
>]
>]The writer also visited the temple several times, and some believe he
>]would have been aware of the existence of the Roman ring before he
>]started writing "The Hobbit."

So, JRRT's visits to the temple are presented as a fact, as is the
statement that "some believe" he may have been aware of the ring. I
have, of course, no idea what the truth may be.

And I still think the person holding the ring looks a lot like a
Hobbit.

[None]

"Paul S. Person" <pspe...@ix.netscom.com.invalid> wrote in message

> So, JRRT's visits to the temple are presented as a fact, as is the
> statement that "some believe" he may have been aware of the ring. I
> have, of course, no idea what the truth may be.

The weasely "some believe" is a strong indication that it's a pile of
orcshit.

[Paul S. Person]

Possibly so, but at least they (and, no, I don't mean you) didn't wait
until the original link ceased working before citing evidence that
JRRT never visited the site, never mind saw the ring.

This appears to be based on the archaelogical report, which would
include everyone who worked on the site but might not include casual
visitors. Nobody is claiming that JRRT actually worked at the site.

Note that JRRT's visits are asserted by the article without
weasle-words. It is only his seeing the ring that is weasled.

[Wayne Brown]

In alt.fan.tolkien Paul S. Person <pspe...@ix.netscom.com.invalid> wrote:
> I found this online today:
>
> http://www.seattlepi.com/news/world/article/Ring-that-may-have-inspired-Tolkien-goes-on-show-4403044.php
>
> It doesn't /look/ like a plain band of gold. Still, I suppose the
> inspiration could have been detail-free.
>
> The curse tablet, after all, never made it into the books.
>
> What struck me was how Hobbit-like the person holding the ring looks,
> at least to me.
>
> But perhaps I am confusing "Hobbit" with something else.

Considering Tolkien's expertise and position as a noted scholar of
Anglo-Saxon, I think it far more likely that the various Anglo-Saxon
amulet rings were the inspiration for his magic rings. In particular,
there are three well-known rings with runic inscriptions running all
the way around the band with which Tolkien no doubt would have been
familiar: The Bramham Moor Ring, The Greymoor Hill Ring (sometimes
called the Kingmoor Ring), and the Linstock Castle Ring. Both the
Bramham Moor and Greymoor Hill rings have the same inscriptions, and
the Linstock Castle ring has a related inscription. The inscription
itself is gibberish, possibly intended to be some generic magical
expression like "Abracadabra," but a small portion of it also was found
in "Bald's Leechbook" as part of a spell for staunching blood. So the
rings may have been intended either to provide protection from harm,
or for healing injuries.

The Greymoor Hill ring is in the British Museum. Here's a link to
pictures and descriptions of it:

http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/search_object_details.aspx?objectId=88694&partId=1

And here is a link to general information on all three of these rings,
plus four others:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Saxon_runic_rings

(Hmmm--a total of seven Anglo-Saxon rings with with runic inscriptions,
and three especially notable ones. "The Seven and the Three."
Coincidence or intentional?)

--
F. Wayne Brown <fwb...@bellsouth.net>

ￜￜs ofereode, ￜisses swa mￜg. ("That passed away, this also can.")
from "Deor," in the Exeter Book (folios 100r-100v)