Tolkien Artwork

If that is supposed to be Sauron's hand, it must be a film version. In the book, Isildur cuts off one finger, the one the One Ring is on, while in the film Isildur swipes an Sauron's hand reaching for him, lopping off several fingers (though I forget how many went flying). Here it looks like three fingers are "incomplete" ...

Elbereth Vala Varda · Jun 4, 2023

Olorgando said:
If that is supposed to be Sauron's hand, it must be a film version. In the book, Isildur cuts off one finger, the one the One Ring is on, while in the film Isildur swipes an Sauron's hand reaching for him, lopping off several fingers (though I forget how many went flying). Here it looks like three fingers are "incomplete" ...

Good point. Furthermore, wouldn't Sauron not have a hand at all? How would he be able to take form like that without the One Ring, since we must assume from the context that he does not have the One Ring in this piece of art.

It's a great artwork, though! Very well done, just maybe not accurate.

Olorgando · Jun 4, 2023

Elbereth Vala Varda said:
Good point. Furthermore, wouldn't Sauron not have a hand at all?

Even better point! In the film he's a giant searchlight in the form of a badly inflamed eye on top of Barad-dûr! 😁

Elbereth Vala Varda · Jun 4, 2023

Olorgando said:
Even better point! In the film he's a giant searchlight in the form of a badly inflamed eye on top of Barad-dûr! 😁

True! (As much as I love those films, they have some serious issues with canon) But in both books and films, I don't think that he would be able to have a hand outstretched. I want to give them the benefit of the doubt that in this artwork it could be an Orc, since I don't think Sauron himself would stoop to the level of torturing Gollum personally, and also because of the fingers and hand. But, I don't know. It may have been intended as Sauron.

Berzelmayr · Jun 5, 2023

See also here:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1663732329502720004

Olorgando · Jun 5, 2023

Elbereth Vala Varda said:
But in both books and films, I don't think that he would be able to have a hand outstretched.

*scratches head*
I have this vague memory of Gollum telling Frodo and Sam, in Book Four aka the second half of Two Towers, that Sauron, whom he must then have met face-to-face, only had nine fingers. This would be a case for someone with a text-searchable file version of TT to scour for. At least today I don't have the nerve to do that kind of digging through the wood-pulp text (I gave the index a try, but found nothing pointing to my suspicion).

I just had this other thought: since Sauron apparently had to rebuild his bodily form from scratch in the Third Age - couldn't he have "repaired" the missing finger??? 🤔

Vorondil · Jun 6, 2023

Olorgando said:
*scratches head*
I have this vague memory of Gollum telling Frodo and Sam, in Book Four aka the second half of Two Towers, that Sauron, whom he must then have met face-to-face, only had nine fingers. This would be a case for someone with a text-searchable file version of TT to scour for. At least today I don't have the nerve to do that kind of digging through the wood-pulp text (I gave the index a try, but found nothing pointing to my suspicion).

I just had this other thought: since Sauron apparently had to rebuild his bodily form from scratch in the Third Age - couldn't he have "repaired" the missing finger??? 🤔

Gollum does say that Sauron only has nine fingers, but I'm not sure where in the book it is.

Ent · Jun 6, 2023

Elbereth Vala Varda said:
How would he be able to take form like that without the One Ring,

We must remember what we read in The Council of Elrond. Sauron began to "take shape" again in the south of Mirkwood, back in the times of Bilbo's journey, before he was driven from there.
... "‘Some here will remember that many years ago I myself dared to pass the doors of the Necromancer in Dol Guldur, and secretly explored his ways, and found thus that our fears were true: he was none other than Sauron, our Enemy of old, at length taking shape and power again. Some, too, will remember also that Saruman dissuaded us from open deeds against him, and for long we watched him only. Yet at last, as his shadow grew, Saruman yielded, and the Council put forth its strength and drove the evil out of Mirkwood – and that was in the very year of the finding of this Ring: a strange chance, if chance it was."

He began to 'take shape' the very year the Ring was again found.

The thought that he did not 'have form' and was only a "great eye" in Ent's view is a bit amiss, and without full support.
(Though once proven, Ent will certainly correct his opinion.)

Squint-eyed Southerner · Jun 6, 2023

It's an interesting subject, but perhaps better for a different thread, instead of one dedicated to art? How about this one, or one of the others linked there?

https://thetolkien.forum/threads/saurons-physical-form-in-the-third-age.23931/

Feel free to revive any or all of them! 🙂

Ent · Jun 6, 2023

OOOPSSSS... sorry.

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