The downfall of the hobbit-folk

[Farael]

Originally Posted by narfforc

Maybe they just re-intergrated back into the species Man, This could have been caused by introducing into the gene pool the Ent-draughts that Merry and Pippin drank, causing their offspring to grow ever taller, have you noticed how big the kids are today................................

Well, the Professor DOES give us a little insight on what happened to the hobbits... namely that they don't like big people. How could they re-integrate with the big people (the species of Man) if they disliked them?

I think Davem is on to something, the other times a "disaster" happened in The Shire the hobbits responded as an united front to repell the enemy. Also, they did it by themselves. Now, I am sure we all agree that Merry, Pippin, Sam and Frodo were not "normal" hobbits, yet their coming was needed to spark the revolution in The Shire.

The other times the hobbits responded by themselves, but this time they needed forces from the outside. Maybe it is, as Davem said, because the seed of mistrust had ben sown among them.

Originally Posted by bombi

When Aragorn became king he passed a law forbidding anyone, himself included, from passing into the Shire. Could this account for the hobbits rarity? Perhaps they did not dwindle literally, they just dwindled from the memory and lore of the humans. I at least have always favored this idea, I would find myself terribly distraught in a world without thier kind.

I must say I was not aware of such law. Could you perhaps expand on it? Why did he say so? Did it actually mean that no-one should go to the Shire or that no-one should bother them?