I agree with you here,
Esty, that the information contained in ‘The Line of Elros’ constitutes ‘essential facts’. I would suggest, however, that it be read along with the
Akallabêth, published in
The Silmarillion, a piece that fleshes out the facts in this one, and which we learn here was composed by Elendil himself.
You made some interesting points, including saying here:
The one fact I find most interesting foreshadows Aragorn's death at the end of LotR - the ability of Númenórean kings to die at their own will. They also laid down their sceptres voluntarily while they were still hale. Later on, when they ruled until death, their life span was reduced. Why do you think this is significant?
The Númenóreans lived far longer than ordinary Men, and the descendants of Elros even more so. In the notes at the end of this piece, it says that
the increase in the Númenórean span was brought about by the assimilation of their mode of life to that of the Eldar: though they were expressly warned that they had not become Eldar, but remained mortal Men, and had been granted only an extension of the period of their vigour of mind and body. ('The Line of Elros',
Unfinished Tales, (London: Unwin Paperbacks, 1982), p. 225)
Elros lived to 500 years of age, his reign being 410 years long. When he died, his eldest son, Vardamir Nólimon, being already 381 years old, did not ascend the throne, but gave the sceptre to his son, Tar-Amandil, though he was still counted as the second monarch of Númenor.
This appears to have set a precedent, and become a fundamental part of the Númenorean monarchy, that the monarch would surrender the sceptre, i.e. abdicate, in favour of his or her heir, when the latter was fully mature in mind and body to rule. For that reason, the monarchs would marry at a later age than their people, being longer lived. Almost all the monarchs from Vardamir to Tar-Ancalimon (the fourteenth) lived to be around 400 years old, their people living on average 200 years.
When Tar-Aldarion laid down that the King’s Heir should only marry one also descended from Elros, he was not laying down some ideal of equality of birth between spouses, of keeping the line ‘pure’. It was because he felt that the breakdown of his marriage to Erendis was due to her life-span being shorter than his, she not being descended from Elros.
The
Akallabêth makes this clear:
For the Lords of Númenor had been wont to wed late in their long lives and to depart and leave the mastery to their sons when these were come to full stature of body and mind. ('Akallabêth',
The Silmarillion, (London: Unwin Paperbacks, 1979), p. 319)
Also they, like the Númenóreans in general, would lay down their lives voluntarily, when it was indicated to them that their ‘
period of vigour’ was nearing its end. Aragorn II’s death in ‘The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen’ was a much later example of how this took place. Such a death reminds me of the poet Dylan Thomas’s famous phrase of ‘
go gentle into that good night'.
Later, however, in the Second Age, the Númenóreans, including their monarchs, would cling on to life. One of the latter (Tar-Ciryatan) compelled his father to abdicate in his favour before he wanted to. His son, Tar-Atanamir, was called the Unwilling, refusing to abdicate or voluntarily lay down his life, and dying in ‘
dotage’. It is not a coincidence that during his reign he and others spoke against the Ban of the Valar. His grandson, Tar-Telemmaitë, set the precedent that the Kings ruled in name from the death of their father to their own. We see the influence of the Shadow here, this being accompanied by a decrease in lifespan, the change from using the Elvish languages in favour of Adûnaic, and an increasing hostility to the Valar and the Elves, and those who were close to them.
The Ruling Queens seem to have reigned with little authority and less luck. Either their husbands wielded the power, or they rejected men. What is the impression you get from these royal Númenorean women?
I'm afraid that I don’t agree with you here,
Esty. There is no evidence of this. If we take the first two of the three Ruling Queens, Tar-Ancalimë and Tar-Telperien, nothing at all is said that they were ineffective rulers. It is true that their personal lives were (or appeared to be) messed up; but this isn’t necessarily an indication of lack of capacity for government.
Tar-Ancalimë’s personal life was messed up due to her being used by both parents, and being set bad examples by both. She was not attracted to marriage, only doing so because of a persistent suitor and public pressure, love having nothing to do with it. The after effects appeared to go down a few generations.
While Tar-Telperien, her great-granddaughter, was not born in her lifetime, she may have seen these after effects in older generations of her family who were. Perhaps that led her not to marry. There may be a real life comparison with the famous Queen Elizabeth I of England (r. 1558-1603), who remained unmarried, suggestions being made that her father Henry VIII’s personal life (including her mother’s execution) put her off marriage, as something that would make her both personally and politically too vulnerable.
The third Ruling Queen, Tar-Vanimeldë, was certainly not an effective ruler, ‘
loving rather music and dance’, the power being wielded by her husband. Still, I would say that two out of the three Ruling Queens appear to have been effective rulers.
As in the previous chapter, we find that royal Númenorean marriages are often unhappy and ill-matched. That of Ar-Gimilzôr and Inzilbêth is one example - her influence on her son and his subsequent reign is positive though.
Again, I don’t believe you have enough evidence for this. In the early days, because the Númenoreans lived more like the Elves than other Men, they and their monarchs would follow Elvish marriage customs, which would mean that they either married for love, or at least freely consented.
Aldarion and Erendis certainly married for love. While that marriage ended badly, as did that of their daughter, of the other numerous royal marriages that would have taken place, there are few indications that they were specifically unhappy.
There are, certainly, a few known later exceptions, which can be seen as an example of royal marriages being more like the ‘dynastic’ ones in royal families in our time period until fairly recently, where the last thing thought of was the wishes of both spouses. This can be seen in Ar-Gimilzôr, who married Inzilbêth, a woman politically opposed to what he stood for, but who was good-looking. In the
Akallabêth, it is made clear that she didn’t want to marry him; but her wishes didn’t count, which could certainly be seen as a growing of the Shadow’s influence.
The worst royal marriage is that of Míriel with her cousin Ar-Pharazôn. She was due to be the fourth Ruling Queen after her father died; but Pharazôn not only, with popular support, usurped the Sceptre. He also married her by force, marriage between those more closely related than second cousins being legally forbidden, according to the
Akallabêth. This most certainly reads like a lot of royal marriages in our time period. It’s a sad personal indication of how things will end in the not too distant future...
Do you have a favourite King or Queen of Númenor? Is there trivia in this chapter that fascinates you?
The problem about choosing favourites is that we know so little about some monarchs, and a lot about only a few, having a very varied amount of information to work with. I certainly like Tar-Meneldur, and his decision to abdicate before his time, due to a genuine moral dilemma, which if he had not abdicated would have paralysed the government of the Isle. He also made a good attempt to reconcile the sometimes conflicting challenges of being both a good parent and a good monarch in a hereditary monarchy, where the monarchs ruled as well as reigned.
Tar-Palantir is my second favourite, trying to do the right thing, but being opposed by most of his people, and many in his own family, dreading what the future might bring for his daughter after he died.
