A small point but its likely that Maglor cast himself into the Great Sea. He did not live forever live on the shores of Middle-earth as is a said in the Silmarillion. There are no mentions of him in the later Ages.

That's a valid point, LoA, but we still can't really contradict what Tolkien said--if he wrote it in The Silmarillion, then it is absolutely unrefutable, and all of our opinions are merely opinions with no proof.

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On the contrary I have proof:

"The remaining two Silmarils are regained from the Iron Crown — only to be lost. The last two sons of Fëanor, compelled by their oath, steal them, and are destroyed by them, casting themselves into the sea, and the pits of the earth." (Letter 131)

"No other player has there been,
no other lips or fingers seen
so skilled, 'tis said in elven-lore,
save Maelor* son of Fëanor,
forgotten harper, singer doomed,
who young when Laurelin yet bloomed
to endless lamentation passed
and in the tombless sea was cast."
Unfinished Tales

And The Silmarillion is certainly not definate. All the Silmarillion is is a load of notes gathered together by Christopher Tolkien (most can be found in HOME - thats why alot of HOME seems to repeat The Sil) and put in a readable layout. It is certainly not canon. Tolkien never had part in putting it in publishable form.

As you can see Tolkien himself says Maglor cast himself into the Sea in one of his letters. This certainly shows that the Silmarillion is not nearly as steadfast as Lord of the Rings for example. This information should have been included but may have been overlooked by Chris.

Aerandir - you should know I am not one to speculate unless I state so...

Right. Thanks, LoA. I hadn't remembered that from The Unfinished Tales, and I've never read The Letters of JRR Tolkien. That was useful info.

The way you wrote your post on the last page made it sound as though you were speculating.

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It was a test. I was seeing how far you would trust my statement without any proof.

Ah. Well, as you can see, I didn't trust it so far. But that was because I was thinking of the contradictory statement in The Silmarillion.

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Yes indeed I ponder why that statement was included in the Sil as its an earlier concept than the one in Unfinished Tales.

Well, I'm sure that Christopher Tolkien had his reasons.

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^Yes, although we may disagree with some of his editorial choices, I think a lot of them were intended to clarify and improve the story. So in some cases, when there is conflicting information and we can't be sure which piece is more credible, I think we should choose to believe whichever we prefer.

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"If I had a button that would cause all guns everywhere to disappear, I might push it.
Wars would be more fun if we used swords again."
– one of my guyfriends

Well, we know a lot more about Maedhros, which means we can have a blast speculating about Maglor, but even though I respect Maedhros for his refusal to participate in the Burning of the Ships at Losgar, I like Maglor more because he was the first of the Sons to get seriously uncomfortable with their oaths.

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^ Ditto. I cannot really choose either, they're both my favorite.

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And as he looked into her eyes
Within the auburn of her hair
The trembling starlight of the skies
He saw there mirrored bright and fair

♥In a poly relationship with Kili and Tauriel♥

Eonwë didn't say that the oath was void. Only that Maedhros and Maglor no longer had right to the Silmarils. It's not the same thing. Maglor argued that the oath would be made void if Manwë and Varda denied it since they named them in witness, but Maedhros said that only Eru Ilúvatar himself could release them from their oath because it was by Him that "we swore in our madness".

I suppose the thing to do would have been to ask Manwë to ask Ilúvatar if He would be okay with them ditching the oath, since Manwë was able to talk directly with Eru like he does with the Beren and Luthien situation. But I guess Maedhros didn't think of this. He also didn't want to go back to Valinor, only to find out there that Manwë and Varda weren't gonna let them have the Silmarils and then have to bring war into Valinor again.

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<BR><center><img src="http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j49/emergencyCALL_911/wistfulvoicesmurmeringonthebridgein.png"><BR><img src="http://i77.photobucket.com/albums/j49/emergencyCALL_911/wistfulvoicesmurmeringonthebridgeth.png"></BR>~From the Book of Lost Tales Part II</center><BR>

Fair point; they arent the same thing. Its been a while since I read that specific passage, but IIRC, Manwe is King of Arda, vice regent of Illuvatar on Arda. With this title comes the authority to act in Illuvatars name; which includes nullifying oaths taken in the name of Illuvatar. Besides, he of all the Ainur knew the heart and intent of Eru best, and so could speak for Eru with good authority.When Eonwe states their claim to be void; it removes any right for them to own the silmarils; granted this doesnt stop them taking them, but it removes the right they and their father had to them due to the atrocities commited.

As for Beren and Luthien, that is far more unique than the oath made in Eru's name by the seven sons of feanor. For Luthien to travel to mandos,to move him to tears who had never wept before was a single incident that will and has not been repeated,at least not in canon. As I understand it, it was one of those things that was meant to happen; that is to say, it was not in the freedom of Illuvatar.

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"This is the hour of the Shire-folk, when they arise from their quiet fields to shake the towers and counsels of the Great. Who of all the Wise could have foreseen it? Or, if they are wise, why should they expect to know it, until the hour has struck? "

Correct about the diphthong, which agrees with the first post in this thread which tries to illustrate the sounds with "My thros"... but even this may not give enough information to English speakers, as Tolkien's -dh- has the sound found in English "this" rather than in English "thin". Tolkien sometimes wrote the name with the Old English letter "edh", thus Maeðros.

When writing the name with Elvish letters, this distinction is made... note the character used for the word galadhremmin, versus the one used in the word ennorath, in A Elbereth Gilthoniel, the version in tengwar in The Road Goes Ever On.

I can't say anything about pronouncing names because I don't know anything about how English speaking people write stuff like "this is how you pronounce this or that". I just say Maedhros just as it's written, M-a-e-dh-r-o-s.Mainly because in Finnish you just say everything just as it's written.

Anyhow that's just trivia. I think I like Maedhros or Maglor the most. I think Maglor is my favourite, because at first he seems like the voice of sense amongst the other sons but then again he's taken part in all of the kinslayings. He's definitely not so innocent as he might seem. Anyways I think he feels sorry and guilty about his actions and therefore is more likeable. And the ending, him wandering around the shores and singing songs of lamentation just breaks my heart a little.

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What if?

Hmm, but historically, in standard Finnish the sound ð (Tolkien's dh) became d, so wouldn't Modern Finnish speakers be lead astray here by the orthography? In other words, and as in Quenya incidentally, there's no -dh- sound in standard Modern Finnish, and -dh- is not found in the modern orthography. I'm not a Finnish speaker, so correct me if I'm wrong about that.

Anway, in general, an easy enough and helpful way to describe pronunciation to English speakers is exactly how Christopher Tolkien does it: give an example of the intended sound in an English word.

That is why "my-thros" is helpful [as I say above], at least for the sound of -ae- in Sindarin, but it still doesn't tell you about -th- here [in English -th- has more than one pronunciation]. So I used the English word "this" to describe the -th- sound (so we know it's not the same sound as in "thin". Christopher Tolkien used the English word "then" in The Silmarillion note on pronunciation). Technically Christopher Tolkien explains that ae and oe "are combinations of the individual vowels, but ae may be pronounced in the same way as ai..."

And earlier he gave the English word eye for ai.

Of course these examples illustrate the sounds that people might have problems with in the name Maedhros, obviously not every sound, but I would guess that it's usually the diphthong and the -dh- that throw folks off. Tolkien stated that he thought that -dh- looked "uncouth" to English speakers, and sometimes confused the issue by changing dh to d, calling it an anglicization! And to make matters wonderfully confusing, a later form of this character's name is written with a d...

... but it's not an Anglicization! Tolkien changed the meaning and derivation from Maedhros "Pale-glitter" to Maedros "Shapely-red-haired", where the -d- is the correct letter, from Sindarin maed "shapely, well-formed". Tolkien "realized" that in Aman the sons of Feanor must have had Quenya names [not "Noldorin" names. Long story], and so Maedros became a Sindarization, when the sons came to Middle-earth, of two Quenya names: Maitimo Russandol.

For the constructed Silmarillion of course, Christopher Tolkien just went with the older form Maedhros.