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Tolkien Artwork

Although I already despise the upcoming series, I still have to admit, as mentioned elsewhere, that the graphics department has done some good work so far. I feel the design of some locations is pretty good:

Tirion:

I think this looks fantastic.

A haven city of Numenor, probably Romenna, or perhaps Andunie or Eldalonde. If it is indeed Romenna, I'm quite happy with that.
It reminds me slightly of Minoan haven cities or ancient Greek island fortresses.

What I don't quite like is the middle aqueduct on the left. That's a bit too much.

Some (obviously important) place in Lindon:

Although I like the setting itself very much here, I also see it critically at the same time. It looks too much like Lorien. The capital of Lindon is Mithlond, a High Elven port city, so it's a completely different category and doesn't really have that much to do with golden forests...
If the context fits, it could still be coherent.
 
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Well, yes, but I must nag at some details (ask members who have suffered through my posts in the last two-and-a-half years: I'm an incurable nag ).
It does go into more arcane parts of the legendarium, specifically volume 5 of Christopher Tolkien's "History of Middle-earth", "The Lost Road". It's in the largest chunk, starting about in the middle of the book, "Quenta Silmarillion". In my 1989 paperback reprint of the 1987 original, it's on page 215, or what may be easier to find, §29. And actually a footnote to the text - not by Christopher, but by JRRT himself.
The footnote starts "Other names in song and tale are given to these folk." The Three Kindred of the Elves. Plenty of names for each kindred. What is relevant for the above picture is the weaponry:

the Vanyar (here still called Lindar) are called the "Spear-elves";
the Noldor are called the "Sword-elves";
the Teleri are called the "Arrow-elves", just to be complete.

Just nagging.
 
I think I see some spears back there. . .but maybe they adopted swords recently; it might explain why the guy in the foreground is holding his a bit awkwardly. 😄
 
I think I see some spears back there. . .but maybe they adopted swords recently; it might explain why the guy in the foreground is holding his a bit awkwardly. 😄
No question; by my count, five. But perhaps I'm expecting something like the Macedonian phalanx - something that the Romans later improved on.

But I've found another nag point: the guy in the foreground has a (slightly) curved sword - though in contrast to "true" scimitars, it might actually have cutting edges at top and bottom. Scimitars were definitely the weapons of the Orcs. IIRC, JRRT envisaged the swords of his heroes to invariably (?) be of the straight-bladed, double-edged kind. nag nag nag ...
 
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