Connection.
 

Isildur cut the Ring from Sauron's hand, and died soon after.

Gollum cut the Ring from Frodo's hand, and died soon after.

Any comments?

Maybe something to do with the way the Ring protected its current wearer, at least until it got sick of him? Admittedly Frodo didn't have the friendliest relationship with the Ring, but at the moment when Gollum bites it off he is actually claiming its power for himself etc., so could be seen to be (albeit briefly) on the Ring's side.

And after all, the Ring was not the nicest of objects: even when it liked you, its way of protecting you wasn't terribly healthy (the "thin and stretched" thing). Or you could just argue that there was a rather nasty fate attached to it. or something like that. i'm half-asleep tonight.

another one to add, not quite the same but still: Boromir attempts to grab the ring and meets a sticky end pretty sharpish, also involving some sort of physical mutilation. I could probably brood over the symbolism of the cutting off the finger thing, but too tired right now. it does remind me of that grisly bit in "The Changeling" (can't remember who wrote it, Jacobean chap, don't think it was Ford or Webster) when what's-his-face needs the ring of the man he has just killed, can't get it off his dead finger, promptly cuts (bites?) it off, and then hops straight into bed with the dead man's fiancee to boot.

The circle closes
 

There's clearly a connection here, in that the Ring abandons and betrays both Gollum and Isildur; but the in the former case the abandonment and the betrayal to death are separated by a matter of decades. Gollum's death is more a fulfillment of the prophecy at RotK p.922 (HarperCollins single-volume edition): "If you touch me ever again, you shall be cast yourself into the Fire of Doom."

I think the real connection here is between Sauron and Frodo: the Ring's maker and its would-be destroyer. Sauron creates the Ring to enslave the world, which provokes the War of the Last Alliance and his eventual downfall. The Ring is forcibly taken from him. Frodo, although he begins with the intention of destroying the Ring, eventually claims it. In fact, his final attempt to claim the Ring seems intended to echo Many Meetings, where the following exchange takes place:

Therefore when Frodo claims the Ring at the Sammath Naur, he assumes an ownership and title that is not his. In effect he tries to become a petty Sauron himself:

Therefore we can see the cutting of Frodo's finger as a deliberate parallel of Sauron's own injury. In effect Gollum's assault and the loss of Frodo's finger are a deliverance, but their nature reminds us that Frodo has, however briefly, desired to become as Sauron. In a small way his attempt has succeeded: like Sauron, he has lost a finger.

Then again, the parallel may be much simpler: the easiest way to remove a ring from a finger it is disinclined to leave is to cut off the finger. In the cases of both Isildur in the Last Alliance and Gollum at the Sammath Naur, the Ring had good reason to wish to stay on its current bearer's hand, so perhaps the only way to remove it was physically to remove the member on which it was worn. An interesting parallel is that the cases of Isildur and Gollum are alike and yet opposed: both revolve around possession of the Ring, but Isildur dies in losing it, Gollum in reclaiming it. It seems that the scene at the Sammath Naur is the closing of a circle: what began with the making of the Ring ends where that was achieved; what began when Isildur cut the Ring from Sauron's hand ends with Gollum biting it from Frodo's. This structure seems too premeditated to be simply coincidence, so I see it as an example of Tolkien's use of symmetry and dramatic opposition in The Lord of the Rings.

p.s. *bump*

Gollum-Isildur: I also see a discrepancy of about 500 years, where Gollum owned the Ring himself. I forget how long Isildur had it, but it was an insignificant amount of time compared to Gollum, who only died after losing it, then gaining it back. (Details, details..)
And btw, Eve... I wonder if PJ's decision to have Isildur killed by arrows linked in any way to Boromir's death by Uruk arrows? ;)

It wasn't just PJ's decision