Leo left a comment on yesterday's post "What ship will bear you back across so wide a sea?" that had my mind turning a bit on some possibilities.
In the comment, he left a link to a post he wrote about a year ago. Here is the link again here:
Galadriel: Foil to Feanor, and Source of Silmarils 4,5, and 6
It is a really interesting post, which ties Gimli's request of Galadriel's hair to not only events of the past (specifically Feanor and the 3 Silmarils), but also to potential future uses of her hair, including that hair being used in conjunction with the creation of 3 new stones of light, or silmarils. Here is the quote from Gimli that Leo pulls in to illustrate Gimli's desire and the potential reference to stones (the quote is Gimli responding to Galadriel's question about what Gimli will do with her hair):
“Treasure it, Lady,” he answered, “in memory of your words to me at our first meeting. And if ever I return to the smithies of my home, it shall be set in imperishable crystal to be an heirloom to my house, and a pledge of good will between the Mountain and the Wood until the end of days.”
Given what I have been writing here on this blog about Stones, this obviously caught my attention. In the post, Leo surmises that crystals would be made out of mithril with the hair incorporated as the source of light. This would be a similar situation to that of the Brother of Jared, which was mentioned in the post "Jaredites in Moria: Making sense out of the Brother of Jared and his shining stones", where we have him going into Moria, making some stones out of mithril, and asking Jesus to touch them in giving them light.
This makes complete sense, and I think the story where new stones are made in Moria from mithril works great.
However, as I mentioned in the comments section, because I have been looking for a solution to a few problems related to the Anor and Ithil Stone collection, I latched on to his very good insights to see how they might be applied to this other story we have been working on herem(which he also mentioned as a possibility in his comment).
There are two primary unresolved issues with the Anor and Ithil Stone 'linking' story, one of which I have touched on, and one I don't believe I have (outside of just introducing it in the comment section yesterday). There are likely more issues, but these are the two big ones I can think of right now.
The first, is the fact that both the Anor and Ithil Stones have been marred in some fashion, or under some corrupted use. It is said that the Anor Stone was permanently 'damaged' based on the circumstances of Denethor's death. This is what Tolkien wrote in LOTR immediately following Denethor's death on the pyre:
Casting the pieces into the blaze he bowed and laid himself on the table, clasping the palantir with both hands upon his breast. And it was said that ever after, if any man looked in that Stone, unless had a great strength of will to turn it to other purpose, he saw only two aged hands withering in flame
Aragorn further confirms this to Pippin later in "Many Partings". Pippin (remember this is Joseph Smith, in my story, and we once again see his inborn interest in Stones, one that would carry forward into his life as Joseph):
"I wish we could have a Stone that we could see all our friends in," said Pippin, "and that we could speak to them from far away!"
"Only one now remains that you could use," answered Aragorn; "for you would not wish to see what the Stone of Minas Tirith [Anor Stone] would show you..."
For this story we are exploring here, the Anor Stone would go on to become the Liahona of Lehi and Nephi's story, where all present in that company were able to look at and into that Stone. Further, it will be used in the future by Faramir to establish a link with the Ithil Stone in Valinor. For either of these to be possible, I think this 'damage' or the lingering image of Denethor's burning hands would need to be removed and the Stone 'healed'.
That is the first problem, and again I have touched on it a bit before. I've written in past posts that something would have happened to make this possible, likely in Ithilien, but was unsure as to what.
The second problem has to do with the range of communication that the Palantiri were capable of, at least according to known lore of them or what Tolkien wrote. The Anor, Ithil, and Orthanc Stones were known as 'minor' stones, being relatively small (able to be carried by one person) vs. some of the larger Palantiri. I don't have the book on my right now, but in Unfinished Tales, in the section on Palantir, Tolkien indicates that the range of these minor Stones would have been something around 500 miles.
We are obviously talking about much longer distances than 500 miles! I've kept this issue in the back of my mind, thinking that there are so many other practical issues to sort through that a matter of range was the least of my problems.
The Hair of Galadriel, however, might pose a solution to both of these problems, and actually give some additional meaning to the gift itself.
First off, however, we are assuming some magical properties to this hair. The quotes that Leo cited definitely allude to this possibility, but they could also be taken by way of analogy. Meaning, her hair was so beautiful that it was as if it had captured the Light of the Two Trees, not that it actually had. This would obviously be a bummer for our story if this was just by analogy. So, for narrative convenience, I am going to assume that there is indeed some magical property to her hair, and that in fact one of her purposes in carrying that light with her into Middle-earth was for the restoration (and enhancement) or the minor Palantir Stones.
With her gift of foresight, and likely for reasons she was not fully conscious of in Lorien, her gift to Gimli becomes part of the answer to her own unanswered question and to Saruman's mockery. In this story, the Light contained in her gift would have been used in some fashion to both heal the Stones of their past abuse, as well as to enhance their capabilities of communication and probably of travel, since this isn't something necessarily associated with Palantiri, but definitely is with Silmarils or lighted Stones. On that last point - of enhancement - in combining the light of the Trees with the Palantiri, we essentially have a new 'thing' - a Palantir-Silmaril, having the capacities and capabilities of both types of Stones.
How that would have actually worked in practice, both in their refashioning with the Light, as well as just general operation, is beyond me, but I can imagine it from an internal story consistency standpoint, so it works for now. Leo had suggested that perhaps Mirthil that holds the light is encased around the Stone, which could definitely work. Or, perhaps just a touch of the Light on the Stones themselves was sufficient to enact a change.
A number of possibilities, but the point of this particular line of thinking is that the Light of the Trees may have both healed and enhanced the three minor Palantir, making the other story elements we have explored here on this blog possible, and that would have been enabled by Galadriel's gift.
I don't know - I like it, but we will have to see how it goes. Interestingly, this notion of golden, magical hair brought to mind another story: Disney's take on the Rapunzel story, "Tangled"
Tangled and allusions to Galadriel's Hair and El-Anor?
I am attaching the opening sequence to "Tangled" below. It is about a 4 minutes clip.
There are some interesting artistic choices that Disney made in their story. I am not familiar with another version of Rapunzel's hair in which it is not only long, but also infused with magic and light (there may be others, but my quick search didn't yield any... maybe because searching online yielded almost all results going back to Disney's version anyway).
But, we have obviously some symbols here that related to the story. As Flynn, the narrator says, it all starts with 'the Sun'. Light is first captured in a flower, which is then literally infused or captured in Rapunzel's hair, which then gives her magical properties, including healing.
This fits very well with or shares remarkable similarities to the story of Galadriel's hair, and is what we are counting on for this story we are working on here.
Surprisingly, the Rapunzel story, as well as other versions of the fairy tale, involves 'transportation' in a very important way. In the story, Rapunzel resides in a very high tower which can only be climbed up or down via her hair. She lets down her hair, and someone is able to climb up, or be let down, with her hair having to be quite long indeed in order to span the distance. "Travel" between the ground and the tower would not be possible without the use of her hair (although I think in the Disney version Flynn is able to scale in or find a way in without it).
I think this matches up well to the use of Galadriel's hair (or the light from it) in the Anor and Ithil Stones, particularly. A 'very high' place will need to be reached, and Galadriel's hair, if in fact it was used to heal and enhance these Stones, will become, in many ways, the way or path that is followed to reach it. The light from it that now infuses those Stones enables the link to happen over such vast distances, perhaps, while also allowing for some kind of 'travel', I suppose, a figurative strand or rope being established between them.
Lastly, this concept of "Light", and specifically the light of the Trees as potentially given from Galadriel, seems to fit well with my words of the Anor Stone having an 'ancient sunlight'. These were the words I originally conveyed in my post "Rolling the Stone: Who were the couriers and where did they go?"
Feb 10 and 11, 2020
Those of us who delivered that ball-instrument to Lehi's family;
a compass, yet not wholly so, sufficient to lead one across seas to lands promised.
A palantir it was - a globe of crystal, metallic-seeming royal ancient sunlight beaming
<asguiliant>
Singing songs of heroes bold, yet some songs remain untold
Resonant it was, echoing thought commissary needful for instruction, eggs bearing
[Hodnil]
to learn from who irradescent, a welding link, hands made sickly stewards reward
[Gildor]
The mention of a 'metallic-seeming' (referring to Nephi's mention of fine brass) crystal that 'beams' ancient sunlight might be in reference to the fact that it now contains the Light of the Trees thanks to Galadriel and Gimli, and not just a figurative reference to the Anor Stone's name, which is what I think I previously largely assumed that description to point to.
In any case, some interesting thoughts sparked by Leo's connection of Galadriel's Light with crystals. I think this can work, or at least could help explain some things, even if the details and mechanics remain a mystery.
No comments:
Post a Comment