#saruman
Thank god for seperate bags, took me days
You don’t realise just how big it is until you get a few floors in, its enormous, and youre still not halfway there!
Holding on hope for a Barad-Dur of equal size - can’t think of anything for the interior, though. A big Sauron minifigure would probably sell it
The sexy villain strut!
The hobbits of the villages had seen Saruman come out of one of the huts, and at once they came crowding up to the door of Bag End. When they heard Frodo’s command, they murmured angrily:
‘Don’t let him go! Kill him! He’s a villain and a murderer. Kill him!’
Saruman looked round at their hostile faces and smiled. 'Kill him!’ he mocked. 'Kill him, if you think there are enough of you, my brave hobbits!’ He drew himself up and stared at them darkly with his black eyes. 'But do not think that when I lost all my goods I lost all my power! Whoever strikes me shall be accursed. And if my blood stains the Shire, it shall wither and never again be healed.’
The hobbits recoiled. But Frodo said: 'Do not believe him! He has lost all power, save his voice that can still daunt you and deceive you, if you let it. But I will not have him slain. It is useless to meet revenge with revenge: it will heal nothing. Go, Saruman, by the speediest way!’
'Worm! Worm!’ Saruman called; and out of a nearby hut came Wormtongue, crawling, almost like a dog. 'To the road again, Worm!’ said Saruman. 'These fine fellows and lordlings are turning us adrift again. Come along!’
Saruman turned to go, and Wormtongue shuffled after him. But even as Saruman passed close to Frodo a knife flashed in his hand, and he stabbed swiftly. The blade turned on the hidden mail-coat and snapped. A dozen hobbits, led by Sam, leaped forward with a cry and flung the villain to the ground. Sam drew his sword.
'No, Sam!’ said Frodo. 'Do not kill him even now. For he has not hurt me. And in any case I do not wish him to be slain in this evil mood. He was great once, of a noble kind that we should not dare to raise our hands against. He is fallen, and his cure is beyond us; but I would still spare him, in the hope that he may find it.’
Saruman rose to his feet, and stared at Frodo. There was a strange look in his eyes of mingled wonder and respect and hatred. 'You have grown, Halfling,’ he said. 'Yes, you have grown very much. You are wise, and cruel. You have robbed my revenge of sweetness, and now I must go hence in bitterness, in debt to your mercy. I hate it and you! Well, I go and I will trouble you no more. But do not expect me to wish you health and long life. You will have neither. But that is not my doing. I merely foretell.’
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, “The Scouring of the Shire”
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“Yet in truth, Saruman’s spying and great secrecy had not in the beginning any evil purpose, but was no more than a folly born of pride. Small matters, unworthy it would seem to be reported, may yet prove of great moment ere the end. Now truth to tell, observing Gandalf’s love of the herb that he called ‘pipe-weed’ (for which, he said, if for nothing else, the Little People should be honoured), Saruman had affected to scoff at it, but in private he made trial of it, and soon began to use it; and for this reason the Shire remained important to him. Yet he dreaded lest this should be discovered, and his own mockery turned against him, so that he would be laughed at for imitating Gandalf, and scorned for doing so by stealth. This then was the reason for his great secrecy in all his dealings with the Shire….
But Gandalf knew of these visits, and guessed their object, and he laughed, thinking this the most harmless of Saruman’s secrets; but he said nothing to others, for it was never his wish that any one should be put to shame.”
— J.R.R. Tolkien, Unfinished Tales, “The Hunt for the Ring”
‘Who is Saruman?’ asked Pippin. 'Do you know anything about his history?'
'Saruman is a Wizard,’ answered Treebeard. 'More than that I cannot say. I do not know the history of Wizards. They appeared first after the Great Ships came over the Sea; but if they came with the Ships I never can tell. Saruman was reckoned great among them, I believe. He gave up wandering about and minding the affairs of Men and Elves, some time ago–you would call it a very long time ago: and he settled down at Angrenost, or Isengard as the Men of Rohan call it. He was very quiet to begin with, but his fame began to grow. He was chosen to be head of the White Council, they say; but that did not turn out too well. I wonder now if even then Saruman was not turning to evil ways. But at any rate he used to give no trouble to his neighbours. I used to talk to him. There was a time when he was always walking about my woods. He was polite in those days, always asking my leave (at least when he met me); and always eager to listen. I told him many things that he would never have found out by himself; but he never repaid me in like kind. I cannot remember that he ever told me anything. And he got more and more like that; his face, as I remember it–I have not seen it for many a day–became like windows in a stone wall: windows with shutters inside.’
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, “Treebeard”
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A strong place and wonderful was Isengard, and long it had been beautiful; and there great lords had dwelt, the wardens of Gondor upon the West, and wise men that watched the stars. But Saruman had slowly shaped it to his shifting purposes, and made it better, as he thought, being deceived–for all those arts and subtle devises for which he forsook his former wisdom, and which fondly he imagined were his own, came but from Mordor; so that what he made was naught, only a little copy, a child’s model or a slave’s flattery, of that vast fortress, armoury, prison, furnace of great power, Barad-dûr, the Dark Tower, which suffered no rival, and laughed at flattery, biding its time, secure in its pride and its immeasurable strength.
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers, “The Road to Isengard”
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Re-reading The Two Towers, I came upon this passage from the battle of Helm’s Deep:
“‘Yet there are many that cry in the Dunland tongue,’ said Gamling. ‘I know that tongue. It is an ancient speech of men, and once was spoken in many western valleys of the Mark. Hark! They hate us, and are glad; for our doom seems certain to them. “The king, the king,” they cry. “We will take their king. Death to the Forgoil! Death to the Strawheads! Death to the robbers of the North!” Such names they have for us. Not in half a thousand years have they forgotten their grievance that the Lords of Gondor gave the Mark to Eorl the Young and made alliance with him. That old hatred Saruman has inflamed.”
So basically, we have an indigenous people, whose land was claimed by conquerors from across the sea. When said conquerors couldn’t maintain control of the land anymore, rather than granting independence to the native people, the conquerors handed it off to a different set of foreign colonizers, who have refused to recognize the indigenous people’s rights for hundreds of years. No wonder the Dunlendings are upset! This is a war of liberation for them! Tragically, at the end of the battle, the Dunlending POWs are forced to labor at repairing Helm’s Deep as penance for their rebellion.
This all supports my headcanon that Saruman was the good guy in this portion of the war.
Turns out Tolkien more or less agreed with me. From the essay “Of Dwarves and Men,” in HoME XII:
Also it must be said that ‘unfriendliness’ to Numenoreans and their allies was not always due to the Shadow, but in later days to the actions of the Numenoreans themselves. Thus many of the forest-dwellers of the shorelands south of the Ered Luin, especially in Minhiriath, were as later historians recognized the kin of the Folk of Haleth; but they became bitter enemies of the Numenoreans, because of their ruthless treatment and their devastation of the forests, and this hatred remained unappeased in their descendants, causing them to join with any enemies of Numenor. In the Third Age their survivors were the people known in Rohan as the Dunlendings.
Silmarillion dudes for card #8 in my series - click through for all previous cards (and future!)
-bofurfor@mryarra
-thorondor for @cuarthol
-orodreth also for cuarthol lol
-saruman of the many colorsfor@wrathematics
-tuorfor@jaz-the-bard
-túrinfor@mad-hermit
next (last?) card is enbies…..enjoy!
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Artober 2020
17.) Wired
I mean the palantir’s basically a phone isn’t it?
2020 -old to new|new to old-
2019 -old to new|new to old-
2018 -old to new|new to old-
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And in that year the White Council met for the last time, and Curunír withdrew to Isengard, and took counsel with none save himself. ~ The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power (Art: “Saruman the White”)
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![[White Council cont.] To this Curunír now assented, desiring that Sauron should be thrust from Dol](https://64.media.tumblr.com/f4da13e6b96914fae170f1690c664c21/a367caccb9580d60-a7/s1280x1920/7e1f0faac1505e69da6fec199cadb37775ad469e.jpg "[White Council cont.] To this Curunír now assented, desiring that Sauron should be thrust from Dol")
[White Council cont.] To this Curunír now assented, desiring that Sauron should be thrust from Dol Guldur, which was nigh to the River, and should have leisure to search there no longer. ~ The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power (Art: “Saruman vs. Gandalf” by DiscoveringArtWorld on DeviantArt) #Tolkien
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![But [Curunír] spoke of none of this to the Council, hoping still that he might be the first to hear](https://64.media.tumblr.com/9d404cabc0a80cf8e375c45205f9c09f/d4d467c525584d92-45/s1280x1920/ebdc13addaaf753a63e698fd99cc7a80b80f003f.jpg "But [Curunír] spoke of none of this to the Council, hoping still that he might be the first to hear")
But [Curunír] spoke of none of this to the Council, hoping still that he might be the first to hear news of the Ring. ~ The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power (Art: “Of Gandalf and Saruman” by Mieronna on DeviantArt)
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![Then [Curunír] perceived that Sauron also had learned of the manner of Isildur’s end, and he g](https://64.media.tumblr.com/d04e93ffb43f74d68ad92395c290cb70/c97af23b0eb866c6-99/s1280x1920/33699ff470b538875d66a5bc8155fb231d477078.jpg "Then [Curunír] perceived that Sauron also had learned of the manner of Isildur’s end, and he g")
Then [Curunír] perceived that Sauron also had learned of the manner of Isildur’s end, and he grew afraid and withdrew to Isengard and fortified it; and ever he probed deeper into the lore of the Rings of Power and the art of their forging. ~ The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power
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Battle there was in Rohan, and Curunír the traitor was thrown down and Isengard broken… ~ The Silmarillion, Of the Rings of Power (Art: “The Wrath of the Ents” by Ted Nasmith)
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Middle-earth March - Day 15
White Lord of the Rings editions for Saruman the White! Before his fall, he was First of the Order of the Wizards and leader of the White Council. His studies of dark magic eventually led him to desire more power and the more time he spent with the Palantír (and so, Sauron), the more corrupted he became. Looking at what a great Maiar he had once been, makes his downfall even more tragic.
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‘No,’ said Gandalf. 'Nor by Saruman. It is beyond his art, and beyond Sauron’s too. The palantíri came from beyond Westernesse from Eldamar. The Noldor made them. Fëanor himself, maybe, wrought them, in days so long ago that the time cannot be measured in years. But there is nothing that Sauron cannot turn to evil uses. Alas for Saruman! It was his downfall, as I now perceive. Perilous to us all are the devices of an art deeper than we possess ourselves. Yet he must bear the blame. Fool! to keep it secret, for his own profit. No word did he ever speak of it to any of the Council. We had not yet given thought to the fate of the palantíri of Gondor in its ruinous wars. By Men they were almost forgotten. Even in Gondor they were a secret known only to a few; in Arnor they were remembered only in a rhyme of lore among the Dúnedain.’
- Gandalf on the origin of the seeing stones. Two Towers, The Voice of Saruman
On this day in 1922, a legend was born. Happy 100th birthday to actor, author, and singer Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee.
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been having some fun designing the maiar, so here’s the ones i’ve done so far
ëonwë | ilmarë | aiwendil | olórin | curumo | alatar and pallando
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Rest in peace Christopher Tolkien, and namárië.
On this day in T.A. 3019, Saruman dispatches his ruthless Uruk-hai warriors to track down the Fellowship of the Ring in a bid to obtain the One Ring for himself.
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On this day in T.A. 3019, Gandalf the Grey is separated from the Fellowship of the Ring and confronts the Balrog Durin’s Bane alone on the Bridge of Khazad-dûm.
Artwork by Gonzalo Kenny
On this day 20 years ago, Ian McKellen arrived in New Zealand and joined the cast on January 10, 2000 to begin filming Peter Jackson’s epic the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
Thank you for all the magical and wonderful memories.
