[Angry Hill Troll]

If Gandalf didn't recognize Thrain at the time, though, how did he get the map and key passed on to him

Thráin simply gave Gandalf the map and key, without Gandalf having any idea of what they were or who Thráin was.

But he gave the map and the key to me. 'For my son,' he said; and then he died, and soon after I escaped myself. I stowed the things away, and by some warning of my heart I kept them always with me, safe, but soon almost forgotten.

Then it dawns on Gandalf 90 years later when he is talking to Thorin:

I had the plan and the key of the secret entrance to Erebor...And I had kept them, though without any design of my own, until the moment when they would prove most useful.

Hmmm, Gandalf sure has that serendipity thing down! [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

In a different (but similar) version of the story, Gandalf adds regarding the map and key, that

[Thráin] had been in pits of Dol Guldur for five years at least. I do not know how he endured so long, nor how he had kept these things hidden through all his torments. I think that the Dark Power had desired nothing from him except the Ring only...A small oversight; but it proved fatal. Small oversights often do.

Question: Who thinks Gandalf had Narya with him during his visit to Dol Guldur? Or did he drop it off with Galadriel (probably the prudent thing to do?). I think it would have annoyed Sauron to no end if he later discovered that one of the Three Rings was (briefly) right under his nose! [img]smilies/tongue.gif[/img]