LotR -- Book 1 - Chapter 08 - Fog on the Barrow-Downs

[Thinlómien]

Originally Posted by davem

And the transition seems to take place within the earth itself. Frodo goes through a death & rebirth initiation within the barrow. There is evidence that barrows & tumuli were used in this way - New Grange in Ireland was used as a place of religious gathering at dawn in mid summer, when the sun would shine through the entrance & illuminate the inside of the mound.

Frodo faces the ‘Guardian’ of the mound, in the darkness, faces his own fear & desire to escape, overcomes it, & then calls on the other, higher, Guardian for aid. The Guardian comes & liberates him. He is taken from within the earth, born again into a new world. He is one of the ‘twice born’, an initiate.

Good observation. I also paid attention how Tolkien very deliberatedly constructed the scene so that Frodo gets his moment of lone heroism before Tom Bombadil intervenes (by Frodo's request). I quite like the whole thing as a demonstration of Tolkien's ideas of heroism - Frodo is no Conan the Barbarian who chops the Barrow-Wight in half, but instead, he rather sensibly calls for the more powerful Tom Bombadil to rescue him and his friends.

Originally Posted by Inziladun

I wonder why, before their deaths, the hobbits had to be clothed in white. And how did Frodo escape that?

For the first question, was it a deliberate mockery on the part of the Wight; a sacrifice made to the lord Sauron, whose "negative resurrection" he refers in his incantation?

For the second, I can only posit that Frodo both was not reclothed, and was not made to stay unconscious, because of the Ring.

I always assumed Frodo escaped the white clothes simply because he came later. Nonetheless, the new garments are an interesting (and creepy) detail, which made me chuckle a little on this reread too - I was imagining the Barrow-Wight fussing over the unconscious hobbits undressing them and then dressing them up in fancier clothes and jewellry. Seriously though, I suppose it was an enchantment of some kind that transformed the hobbits' clothes into white robes and jewellry; after all, Tom tells them they will not find their old clothes (even though he brings a lot of other things from the barrow). I don't think the Barrow-Wight just ate the clothes or something

The image of the hobbits in the white clothes and the unnaturally long hand coming to cut their throats with the sword is very powerful and very creepy, but one that has not been included in any adaptation as far as I know, and also seldom depicted in any fan art or official art. Only this one by Ted Nasmith comes to mind, and it very well illustrates how strange the whole scene is (including the green light):