Quote:
Originally Posted by Huinesoron
Eventually, yes. Perhaps events simply got in the way before he got that far. Gollum lasted 500 years without becoming even slightly transparent, after all.
hS
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Well, true, but Gollum was a hobbit (more or less), and "remarkably tough in the fibre". Based on Appendix B, if some at least of the Nine were "high Numenorean lords," then they would have taken something less than 400 years to become "wraithed."
It is true that the Mouth had not been in the service of the Dark Tower for that long; only since its rebuilding a few decades prior.
Of course, the Nine Rings were being used at the time,* and so Sauron only had three Dwarf-rings at his disposal, the ones his messenger offered to Dain. But I can't help but suspect a plot-hole here; Tolkien getting carried away with the idea that these were specifically "Dwarf-rings" when actually they were all intended for Elves and not for mortals at all.
*By which I mean not that the RW had them, but that Sauron only controlled the Nine so long as he held their rings.