Tolkien Events 2009

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Mithalwen

I think Tolkien said that Venice had a look of Old Gondor in the letters so your imagination is in good company!

Earthquakes aren't quite the same as Mount Doom, but I certainly had a momentous leave-taking of Italy.

While there, I did see several paintings, engravings, images and references to eagles carrying men, particularly the eagle of a particular god. And I did see lots of wargs in the art, although the most important one was suckling--not an image conducive to Tolkien's wargs!

But all in all I saw so many nudes, of both the butt (and other parts) nekkid variety and the oak and fig leaf entailed variety, that it was a stretch to think of Middle earth. (I should say, though, that Botticelli's clothed females could well be imagined as elven, particularly in the Primavera--which is not a bad idea, as Botticelli was playing with ancient mythology.) And it is probably worth noting that historical record of the English in Florence and Rome is not one that particularly speaks well of olde colde Englonde. Tolkien might even have been a bit miffed by it all, unless he saw it as a rejection of the mindless mechanism he so deplored.

So I think that the search will have to be narrowed down to Venice in the next trip to Europe. After all, once one makes it over the pond, any other distance in Europe is a piece of cake, so it shouldn't be too difficult to make a Venice/London/Oxford run.