MEO RP/Tales of Lore

[arathorn]

Ahh... found an online map from the Hobbit.. So I was correct in thinking where we were (I see the forest gate on this one). Although, as ArPharazon said, I only see one gate ... guessing the other is way up north, at the Forest River entrance?

[Eonwë]

It's a bit hard to see, but the map marked "Wilderland" in The Hobbit does show the Forest Gate and the Forest Path North of the Old Forest Road. It even warns us of prominent spider hunting grounds :} Ironically, there is a large one North of the Forest Path :}
I don't recall if the Forest Gate actually has/had a gate
at its mouth or if that simply meant it was the opening to the Forest, but one could no doubt have been put up in the time since The Hobbit, if there wasn't one (I haven't read The Hobbit in quite some time).

Technically, I'm pretty sure there is no gate at the Old Forest Road, as I recall it being part of the Great East-West Road, unless however, scout posts in the neighboring trees, which probably would exist, count as a gate.


It is nice to know I'm not walking into a trap :} Now that I know where we all are, my next part will come soon :}

Take care :}
Eonwë

[Varda]

I don't think there was a physical gate as such, merely the opening. I considered having the "gate" turn out to be illusion, then dropped it and went along. Still, it says "gate" so it got a gate.

[Varda]

Checked in The Hobbit: Ch 7 "Queer Lodgings" mentions a clear spring outside, close to the forest-gate, where they Thorin's party fills waterskins.

Ch 8 "Flies and Spiders" tells of the entrance, and the time is autumn:
"The entrance to the path was like a sort of arch leading into a gloomy tunnel made by two great trees that leant together, too old and strangled with ivy and hung with lichen to bear more than a few blackened leaves."

"The path itself was narrow and wound in and out among the trunks."

Cobwebs on either side of the path, but not strung across. Very dark, quiet, windless. Lots of different colored eyes watch at night. Watch-fires at night attracted things, including thousands of dark-grey and black moths, some big as a hobbit's hand. They also brought in black bats. The black squirrels tasted horrible.

No spring or river is near the path until the black Enchanted River. The river is twelve feet across, with a black boat tied to the bank for crossings, with no oars. A deer can jump it. The versions of red deer included a dark male (hart) and snowy-white female (hind), and equally white fawns.

Nearer the elf home, the elves hunted north of the path, horns, baying dogs, after the white deer.

Fungi, pale green herbs that smell bad.

Four days walk east of the Enchanted River the trees become almost all beeches with straight grey trunks. Greenish light about them. Breezes. No undergrowth now.
They heard laughter of fair voices; singing that sounded beautiful, strange, eerie.

Two more days, path goes downward into a valley full of oaks. At their tops, Bilbo saw ordinary spiders hunting a kind of "purple emperor" butterfly, but of a velvety black, of which there were hundreds, so he called them "black emperors". The valley is near the eastern border.

In The Hobbit, the giant spiders can talk, can be insulted by being called Attercop and Tomnoddy. Do we want our spiders to be intelligent or merely huge arthropods?

[arathorn]

I introduced the spiders as having whispery chirping voices to show a kind of language that they use among themselves (just as other races do, so no one else can know what they are planning). We can build on that though.

As for the gate, as Eonwe said, one could easily have been put up since the time of the Hobbit to make the entrance more secure, so we're not way off. The path itself could have been widened or made more passable too. Stands to reason.

[Varda]

Sounds good.

[Eonwë]

"With bird on bow and beast in den/ in their own secret tongues he spoke."

Aside from this there is also as I recall a thrush who tells Bard of Smaug's weakness. This implies a level of intelligence among even "normal" creatures.

This aside, these spiders are descended from Shelob, who is descended from Ungoliant, so I'd say they have some level of intelligence, or at least the greater ones of them may, pushing the lesser great spiders on like generals sending out their troops.

Not that anyone would speak Spiderish :} but the malevolent intent could probably be discerned by certain races or individuals, making a rudimentary understanding possible, for those who concerned themselves with the lore and knowledge of their enemies.

[Elatan]

I agree with Eonwe there, don`t we all know how we, at least like to tell ourselves, understand our cats and dogs and horses ? because we live around them and study them on daily basis.
We don`t live around spiders but those who have studied them ( and other beasts + creatures ) may have the same, or better, level of understanding these. Watching movements of limbs, eyes and listening to the sounds they make.

[Elatan]

I copied and pasted what I once found scattered around in books concerned the different roads into Mirkwood.

Most northern was what was called the Forest Path starting at the Forest Gate 75 Miles South of the Northern end of Mirkwood and further South was the Old Forest Road some few Miles from Rhosgobel.

The Forest Path was not a well known path through Mirkwood. The Forest Gate was lying around 70 Miles North of Beorns house and some 100 Miles from the Old Forest Road but Beorn knew the path and counselled Bilbo and the Dwarves to take that road instead of the Old Forest Road. The path ran in a great curwe from the Forest Gate East South-East and then North North-East crossing the Enchanted River to the East-eaves of Mirkwood near Thranduils Caverns. To the river there was some 180 Miles and from the river to the eastern eaves of Mirkwood yet some 65 Miles.

The Old Forest road was coming from the Old Ford. It ran through Mirkwood south of Emyn Duir in a direct eastern line from 10-15 Miles South of Rhosgobel at the west eaves of Mirkwood to the marshes at the east eaves.

Between the Old Forest Road and the Forest River in the east of the Forest was Emyn Duir, the Mountains of Mirkwood.

This kind of means if we talk of the Forest Gate we are NOT supposed to meet at the Old Forest Road intrance to Mirkwood coming straight from the Old Ford but up North-West in Mirkwood.

Posted a link for a cut out part of my private map.

homed.inet.tele.dk/tolkien/MeOmeeting.JPG

[arathorn]

I found that path on this map (it's marked 'Elf-path') and the Forest Gate is clearly marked here too (red dot):

valarguild.org/arathorn/mirkwood.jpg

[Varda]

Beautiful beautiful job on the maps, guys!

So now we're all on the same page, headed for the Forest Gate on the not-so-well-known path. Auros and I earlier chose The Path as the more likely route for the Fellowship to take if they had to go through Mirkwood. Therefore, Auros has been sent to check it out. If our folk join coming in from different directions as they are, they will have more recon info for Elrond, so all is well!

[Eonwë]

Actually, it seems everyone so far is coming from the West :}

Thanks Elatan ;} That's about what I had estimated for my journey from Carrock to the Forest Gate. Assuming a horse can go about 30 mph at a hard gallop, I should've been there in about 2-2 1/2 hours rather than after dusk I suppose :} But, er, well, the land wasn't even, and, um, I didn't go as the crow flies :}

[ArPharazon]

Yes, everybody seems to be coming from the West, except Calion and Fainan.

Reading back about our origins, I have noticed that I myself have caused the confusion, with my story of the Enchanted river, and the Elf-clearings. The tale before that, starting with Varda's mention of the Old Forest Road, began at the.... Old Forest Road.

Everybody seems to have fitted themselves to my version, so the problem hasn't escalated as much as it could have, but I still want to apologize for this mistake, and will do my best to avoid similar happenings in the future.

[arathorn]

Hmm.. I just noticed that my name 'Haran', fits right into 'Arathorn' ... remove 'Haran' and you get 'tor' or 'rot' or 'ort'... sounds like a D2X rune <chuckle> ;D.

I wonder if Tolkien consciously knew that Arathorn had the elvish word 'haran' in it meaning 'chieftain'. I imagine he did.

BTW, I see that we have no men in the story yet. Only elves and one lonely dwarf. Curious.

[Eonwë]

I believe Elatan's character Dusksinger is a Mortal woman.