How did Gildor's messages get to Aragorn and Rivendell so fast?
 

Aragorn told the hobbits in Bree that he'd received messages from "Gildor's folk" concerning their plight. Glorfindel stated that he'd received messages too. How did they do this so fast?

Eagles :D

The Elven Rings of power allowed telepathy between their Keepers. This is revealed in an excerpt I read (I think UT, don't hold me to that, I need to look it up), and I recall being rather wide eyed when I realised it. This was a residual power left of the Rings, in a story about the journey of Elrond, Galadriel and Gandalf, who stood together, communicating without word. I very much suspect it was Gandalf who made sure he kept Elrond up to speed with the situation.

This theme is not unique to the Rings. Palantiri, case in point, and the notion of a Master Ring/Stone is also what is central to the basis of the Sauron's means of undoing all the Three had made. He would have forced his Will upon them, one by one, invaded their minds, and possibly obstructed the expression of a Ring's power by that force of will.

Osanwë kenta. Elvish telepathy from. An essay published in a journal alas not HoME. But even with bush telrgraph beteeen elves and rangers might have worked what with both beong able to travel much swifter than hobbits who are taking a circuitous route and are then grievously wounded ..remember it took several days after meeting Gildor to get to Bree even and Glorfindel set out nine days before meetimg them, so about when the hobbits were at weathertop.

That was a :cool: post -- nice to meet u. thanx for those materials

Ranger's, n birds and stuff, maybe. Sorta like the Ranger variant of Radagast.....

hahaha!

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No problems. I have enjoyed reading your posts so far. I have had a chance to look this up and there is a fortnight between the night the hobbits spent at Woodhall and Glorfindel leaving Rivendell which given that Gandalf, albeit on Shadowfax rode between Bree and Weathertop in 3 days seems quite enough to transmit the message by normal methods as long as horses were involved. Aragorn says it would take 12 days for him to get to Rivendell from Weathertop and maybe even elves would be pushed to manage the Woodyend to Rivendell on foot in 14. We know that the Rangers were aware of a developing situation and they clearly had some sort of structure with "caches" at Weathertop and probably Fornost Erain. The rangers did have horses even if they went on foot when stealth was required.

The silent conversation between the Wise in Dunland, late in RK, is certainly Osanwe (and has nothing to do with the Three Rings, which by then were merely historically-significant jewelry). But the essay on Osanwe-kenta makes it, not clear, but at least fuzzily implies, that conversational long-distance radio comms (as in the movies) was theoretical, not practical, for Incarnates, even the greatest among the Eldar.

It is, as T says of the Eagles, a dangerous 'machine'- otherwise, Gandalf would have been, like, "Elrond! Galadriel! Help! Saruman's a rat-fink and trapped me on top of his tower!" And Gildor would have been all "Elrond, send Glorfindel here ASAP to take over as escort for this Halfling, because Gandalf is missing" etc etc ad nauseam.

At long distances, the best it could manage was to 'transmit' intense emotional states to those to whom the 'sender' was very close- so accordingly there might have been an element of this in Arwen's 'sensing' Aragorn's desire for the Dunedain to join him. But Middle-earth conference calls? I don't think so.

(Also- if the Noldor could use Osanwe for long-distance conversation, why bother making the Palantiri?)

I'm going to hold you to that--respectfully. I have not read my materials about the Three and messaging for a long while, but I'm going to find them. The question for me is whether or not there was a residual capacity of the Three. Galadriel's commentary in Lothlorien about the Rings, or other comments I read, implied that the Rings would not become entirely worthless, but merely overly impotent to do anything great. I formed the inference for a reason, I recall, but just cannot, for the life of me, remember where I read it. (Though the Dunland meeting of the Wise rings a bell. Can you quote from it, please?)

But--we also know that Sauron could put thoughts into the heads of the Nine before they were wraiths, during the transformation phase, with increasing tendency. It's implied from the comments about the Mortal Men when Tolkien says that their minds were filled with phantoms or thoughts and they could not discern that those were not their own.

Sauron's presence through The Three, when their wielders took the Rings off (TA) during the War of Elves and Sauron emphasises the point. I believe they couldn't use the Rings during the War of Elves and Sauron for that reason.

[edit]".....the Rings off (TA) during...." should read ".....the Rings of (SA) during..." [/edit]

Are you referencing this quote?

She says our "power is diminished", making no mention of the Three. With the destruction of the One, the Elves are shorn of that power given by the their Rings. Notably, after refusing Frodo's offer of the One, Galadriel says:

I see no reason why the Three would not instantly lose their virtue when the One is gone. The Nazgûl instantly fall at that time, intimately tied to their Nine Rings. and though we don't see the start of it, Bilbo's age catches up with him incredibly quickly after the One is destroyed.

I would add that the Bad Guys made use of bird-messengers, and there's little reason to think the Elves couldn't. I note that Gandalf tells Radagast "Send out messages to all the beasts and birds that are your friends. Tell them to bring news of anything that bears on this matter to Saruman and Gandalf. Let messages be sent to Orthanc."

And in real life Tolkien was directly familiar with carrier pigeons, a major mode of communication for a battalion signals officer in WWI.

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EDIT:We also know that some Rangers were at this time not far away, on the south-border of the Shire especially around Sarn Ford; just two day before they had held off the Riders there for some hours.