Well, perhaps the build such great structures simply because they can and want
to show all others what skills they have. In the First Age they were
actually commissioned by elves to work on Menegroth and Nargothrond, so their
skills impressed even those "uppity" first-borns! "-) The dwarves'
ability to hew rock is an important defining aspect of their culture, so they
build on a grand scale to showcase their talents. The same could be asked
of the returning Numenoreans. Why did they have to build structures like
Orthanc or the Argonath or all those other monumental structures across Arnor
and Gondor? It's almost as though the mortal races feel they have to
build on a grand scale to assert their cultural superiority given the fact that
they perhaps feel somewhat cultually inferior to the elves with their
impressive, but more understated architecture (well, let's leave Gondolin out
of the "understated" category). I always think of Shelley's poem
"Ozymandias" when in this context, how the mortals vainly try to use stone to
achieve some measure of
immortality!
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
"The world is changing: I feel it in the water, I feel it in the earth, I smell it in the air"
--Treebeard
