Healing in the House of Elrond

Frodo was healed from his Morgul wound thanks to the healing from Elrond. The poison was removed through removal of the splinter & through using healing techniques such as Athelas. However, even still Frodo in theory should have died from the severe infection caused by the wound, given that it stayed in him for about 2 days before Elrond removed it. So how was Frodo saved? Was it through Elrond using healing powers inherited from Eru?

[Lalwendë]

I won't pretend to have extensive medical knowledge but I do know that sometimes 'foreign bodies' can be better left within the injured body than removed straight away, or even at all. Knife wounds are particularly bad news as the body receives a double blow of damage as the blade passes through the flesh twice - going in and then coming out again, unlike a bullet which tends to go in and stay in. So for Aragorn or anyone else to have attempted to remove a splinter of blade out in the field would have been very risky, medically speaking, and it was probably best to leave it alone.

On the topic of Elves having healing powers, I was thinking about this the other day. Why would they have them at all? Elves, having seemingly endless life, must not get ill or catch diseases as Men might (no fatal tuberculosis, cancers or heart disease presumably), so why would they need healing powers? These skills must surely have been limited to healing battle wounds or maybe even just to healing Men?

[Estelyn Telcontar]

I don't know if there is possibly other information somewhere in the Legendarium concerning Elrond's healing powers, but there are two brief comments in the first chapter of the second book of FotR, "Many Meetings". First concerning Elrond:

Elrond is a master of healing...
...there was some fragment of the blade still in the closed wound. But it could not be found until last night. Then Elrond removed a splinter. It was deeply buried, and it was working inwards.

That suggest to me that it was a kind of spiritual battle that Elrond fought; the fragment had to be located before it could be removed. How that was done remains a mystery - it must have some kind of surgery, but we do not read of a subsequent wound, so it must have been a special ability indeed.

The other comment refers to a special resistant quality in the Hobbits:

And it seems that Hobbits fade very reluctantly. I have known strong warriors of the Big People who would quickly have been overcome by that splinter...
Your heart was not touched, and only your shoulder was pierced; and that was because you resisted to the last.

Add to that what the Warden of the Houses of Healing said about Merry in Minas Tirith:

They are a very remarkable race. Very tough in the fibre, I deem.

As so often in real life as well, it seems that Frodo's healing was a combination of a very skilled physician and a patient with a strong will to survive.

[Findegil]

The healing powers were, I think, not a special elven ability. They were a special ability of the house of the children of Luthien. Aragorn says in the LotR in the chapter "The Houses of Healing" that he would wish for Elrond to be their because he is the eldest of that house and has the most healing abilities. In addition we see Aragorn and Elronds sons go to the houses and help healing the black breath, but not Legolas who is an elf as well.

The ability was possibly an inheritance from Melian how is attested in some old versions of the story of Túrin with great healing abilities used on Beleg. Also Lúthien shows the same abilty when dealing with Berens wounds after his fight with Curufin and later with Carcharoth.

Respectfuly
Findegil

[Bêthberry]

Originally Posted by Estelyn Telcontar

I don't know if there is possibly other information somewhere in the Legendarium concerning Elrond's healing powers, but there are two brief comments in the first chapter of the second book of FotR, "Many Meetings". First concerning Elrond:

That suggest to me that it was a kind of spiritual battle that Elrond fought; the fragment had to be located before it could be removed. How that was done remains a mystery - it must have some kind of surgery, but we do not read of a subsequent wound, so it must have been a special ability indeed.

Perhaps Elrond was a Psychic Surgeon.

I would have though this thread would have stimulated more interest, with healing methods such as Athelas, Miruvor, & more besides the magical healing ability of Elrond. Frodo was effectively a wraith by the time Elrond could have worked on him, so his healing powers can cure even the deadly dark poisons & powers of Sauron.