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Middle-earth Connections: Lore of the Rings
© Michael Martinez
Jul 14, 2000
Point 1: Time stands still for Rings of Power
"'How long do you think I shall have here?' said Frodo to Bilbo when Gandalf had gone.
"'Oh, I don't know. I can't count days in Rivendell,' said Bilbo...."
This exchange, recorded in "The Ring Goes South", is the first indication that Frodo Baggins and his friends have come into the presence of a Ring of Power other than the One Ring which Frodo has carried for many years (since Bilbo left the Shire). The Rings of Power were created to hold back Time, or to delay its effects. But what was the range of their power? Was there some sort of absolute limit to each Ring's chronoinhibition? Would the effects extend this far and no farther?
The curious matter is that the One Ring, the most powerful of all the artifacts so contrived as to hold back Time, only inhibited the effects of Time upon its keeper. The Shire didn't become timeless because Bilbo had brought the Ring there. Bilbo in effect became timeless, and Frodo after him. How is it, then, that no one else was affected, whereas in Rivendell and Lorien the entire lands (but apparently not the non-Elvish inhabitants) were preserved?
Studying the effects of the Rings of Power reveals many apparent inconsistencies in how they worked, and it may be no wonder that Saruman went mad with desire for possessing one (or all) of them.
When Elrond described the powers of the Elven Rings he said "they were not made as weapons of war or conquest: that is not their power. Those who made them did not desire strength or domination or hoarded wealth, but understanding, making, and healing." His description is quite different from Tolkien's description of the Rings' powers:
"The chief power (of all the rings alike) was the prevention or slowing of decay (i.e., 'change' viewed as a regrettable thing), the preservation of what is desired or loved, or its semblance -- this is more or less an Elvish motive. But also they enhanced the natural powers of a possessor -- thus approaching 'magic', a motive easily corruptible into evil, a lust for domination. And finally they had other powers, more directly derived from Sauron ('the Necromancer': so he is called as he casts a fleeting shadow and presage on the pages of The Hobbit): such as rendering invisible the material body, and making things of the invisible world visible.
"The Elves of Eregion made Three supremely beautiful and powerful rings, almost solely of their own imagination, and directed to the preservation of beauty: they did not confer invisibility...." (Letters, No. 131).
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