Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ruin Explorer" data-source="post: 9416498" data-attributes="member: 18">I mean, no.Not even slightly.The structures described in LotR are far beyond the high medieval and perhaps renaissance eras in terms of construction, let alone the neolithic/copper age/bronze age, and it really seems like people are using steel weapons and armour, riding horses (which didn't happen until like, the 1000s BC at earliest), with stirrups (like early AD, I forget when), building factories (!!!) and so on.If anything, all of that stuff about barrows and so on, which are clearly a thing of the deep past in LotR, suggests LotR is a thousands of years after its own neolithic/bronze age, which would necessarily be a whole other separate archaeological thing.Basically Tolkien knew a huge amount of legends and mythology, but was incredibly ignorant about archaeology to think that he could somehow "slip this in there". Even in the 1930s that was a profoundly silly idea.I don't think Tolkien would have agreed, and it's nonsensical.Also, let's be real about Tolkien's letters for a minute - he expresses a lot of ideas, but not all of them are consistent with either the actual works as written, or his own later letters, and this particular flight of fancy is probably best ignored.</blockquote>