[ArcusCalion]

Airships"Your objections make a lot of assumptions. It is true that these flying ships could not feasibly have been built till after LotR, but as Fin says, between even the Fourth Age and our current time is an enormous gap. Tolkien posits that we are currently at the end of the sixth Age (in 1960s) so it is conceivable that we are in the very beginnings of the seventh age at this time. The Second and Third ages are around 3400 and 3200 years long each, and even if the next 3 were shorter, that still means a time period of around 9000 years between the end of LotR and the current year. This is plenty of time for the Numenoreans to have developed airships of their own and flown to the new lands, and for people to have taken them to be gods. I do not think the assumption that it must refer to our own historical discovery of flight holds water. In addition, the text does not say this is the reason they knew the earth was round, only that it was the final confirmation of this fact.

1) As Fin says, we did not make this any sort of general change. Tolkien uses the term at times. There are times where we may have changed 'Valar' to 'Powers' in the Akallabeth text, but only if CT has said that this change would reflect the original state of Tolkien's text as opposed to his own edited version in the published Sil.

2) Agreed, good catch. I am fine with 'was'.

3) I agree with Fin, the reference is to his cousin who is mentioned just before, and any confusion is included in Tolkien's own wording, so we can't change it.

4) I like Fin's recommendation best, since it keeps more and flows just as nice.

AK-SL-08: Agreed, nice catch!

5) Awesome find!

6) This was, as Fin says, a delicate balance, and it may need some revision.

7) The idea is as Fin says that it is shocking to hear the Quenya from his son, who was almost expressing support for Sauron earlier, and it signals that he might not be as brainwashed as we think. However, if you are adamant that does not work, we can remove it.

8) Good find!

9) Great find! I would just add a 'he' after 'mountain' to make the grammar work with the new construction.

I just want to say, that gandalf, your combing through our drafts has been really helpful and I can already see great improvement in flow and structure and substance, so thank you for your tireless efforts!