The third evil was the invasion of the Wainriders, which sapped the waning
strength of Gondor in wars that lasted for almost a hundred years. The
Wainriders were a people, or a confederacy of many peoples, that came from the
East; but they were stronger and better armed than any that had appeared
before. They journeyed in great wains, and their chieftains fought in
chariots. Stirred up, as was afterwards seen, by the emissaries of
Sauron, they made a sudden assault upon Gondor, and King Narmacil II was slain
in battle with them beyond the Anduin in 1856. The people of eastern and
southern Rhovanion were enslaved; and the frontiers of Gondor were for that
time withdrawn to the Anduin and the frontiers of the Emyn Muil. [At this
time it is thought that the Ringwraiths re-entered Mordor].
1. Theories on the origins of the Wainriders and who they might be,
and why they are so well armed? Were they a confederacy engineered by
Sauron for the purposes of diverting Gondor’s attention away from Mordor?
2. Why does the return of the Ringwraiths appear in a brief, bracketed
aside (here we should maintain the illusion that this Appendix is part of the
Red Book, perhaps written in Gondor or by Pippin or Merry)? Is it, like
the other oblique references to Sauron, an indication of how much “offical”
Gondorian history misses the “real story” of what is causing the decline in
their civilization?
The war did not go well and in T.A.1944 Gondor almost succumbed to an invasion
of South Ithilien when King Ondoher and his sons were killed. They were
saved, however, by Eärnil, one of the great Gondorian commanders:
But Eärnil, Captain of the Southern Army, won a great victory in South
Ithilien and destroyed the army of Harad that had crossed the River
Poros. Hastening north, he gathered to the main camp of the Wainriders,
while they were feasting and reveling, believing that Gondor was overthrown and
that nothing remained but to make the spoil. Eärnil stormed the camp and
set fire to the wains, and drove the enemy in a great rout out of
Ithilien. A great part of those who fled before him perished in the Dead
Marshes.
3. Comments on Eärnil’s battle strategy? Note how he uses the
element of surprise like our friend Aragon Elessar will many centuries
later. Is the surprise attack the key to the Númenoreans’ battlefield
success?
4. What do you think happens to those who die in the Dead Marshes?
Are they perhaps trapped there to become some of the “spirits” haunting that
place along with the earlier victims (whatever the nature of the apparitions at
the Marshes is)?
NOTE: As I mentioned earlier, I will be offline tomorrow, so the next set
of questions will be posted on Wednesday when board traffic permits. Hope
everyone enjoys their first ROTK viewing! See y'all on the other
side.
Nasmith -- The Argonath
