Survivors of the Downfall by SurgicalSteel

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Fanwork Notes

Thanks to Pandemonium213 for a pre-read and a couple of excellent ideas which were incorporated into this story.

Fanwork Information

Summary:

Sailors from Umbar realize that Numenor is no more.

Major Characters:

Major Relationships:

Genre: Drama

Challenges:

Rating: Teens

Warnings:

Chapters: 1 Word Count: 2, 256
Posted on 22 March 2009 Updated on 22 March 2009

This fanwork is complete.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Comments

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That's terrific. Love the entire concept. And thinking about the physical cause and effects of the destruction of Numenor. This is definitely a great contribution the how of the story. You completely convinced me that this is how it happened. Just wow! Thinking also, of course, of the pictures of the recent explosion of an underseas volcano.

Thanks so very much! I'm glad you enjoyed this, and you've got me blushing - the descriptions in Silm of the Downfall read very much like a catastrophic volcanic eruption (like Krakatoa, perhaps) to me, but I hadn't seen anyone actually write it that way before. I bounced the idea off of Pandemonium, who naturally egged me on.

Anyway. This was immense fun to write, thank you!

Vivisection's one of those all-too-real facts in the history of medicine - it's how Itialian anatomists figured out that the pulmonary circulation carries blood rather than air, by cutting open still living condemned criminals. I theorize that if it was used on the Faithful, it could explain the very deep distrust certain folks have of anatomic studies in Gondor 3000 years later.

Nemir? I believe he's one of Serinde's ancestors, yes.

Glad you enjoyed!

JRRT wrote -- and struck out -- the following footnote in his earliest version of the fall of Númenor:

Morgoth induces many to believe that this is a natural cataclysm.     

I guess I am of the devil's own party* then because the destruction of Númenor sounded more akin to the cataclysms of Krakatoa and Santorini than a flat world suddenly becoming round although the latter is a magnificent "Mannish myth."  

But just as horrifyingly magnificent is the massive eruption of a volcano whether in our primary world or in a secondary one.  JRRT's interweaving of science/geology into his mythology certainly suggests that Meneltarma was a volcano. And here, you've taken that concept and run with it in a most satisfying manner, taking scientific fact and blending it seamlessly into an imaginary history.  As usual, you've also introduced more intriguing historical tidbits and original characters in your vision of the Second Age.

As for the survivor, well someone here is smiling like the cat that ate the canary.  That someone might allow that although mythic exaggeration of arising "out of the deep and pass(ing) as a shadow and a black wind over the sea" serves to inspire fear and awe in the gullible, it's none too practical for ferrying a certain item of jewelry across the sea. ;^) 

Very well done! 

*It's also easier to stomach a "natural disaster" -- utterly impersonal -- instead of a vengeful deity (or its agents) wiping out an entire population which surely included innocents.

I was actually re-reading the 'Description of Numenor' from UT last night, and was struck by the description of the Meneltarma, that the summit had a sort of flattened depressed area with a lip around it - which sounds much more like the top of a long-inactive volcano than it does like the top of any of the numerous mountains around where I live. For it to suddenly become active again, whether a completely natural event or one nudged along by the Valar? Well, the description given by Tolkien fits.

On the survivor? Yep, if you allow for the flat world becoming round being a wonderful myth, then it's entirely possible that there's a less mythic explanation for a certain individual and his jewelry getting back to Middle Earth.

This was immense fun to write, and I'm glad you enjoyed it!

Most interesting! I love the concept of a kind of Santorini-like catastrophe in the Numenor case -- it's very believable (and it got me thinking, because actually most of the cataclysms that people could not explain once, were seen as gods' revenge, this idea works perfectly). Very good job of developing original characters. Above all else, that survivor... Utterly thrilling!

Thank you very much for sharing this. It was a joy to read.

Thanks so much! The descriptions of the Fall of Numenor really do sound like a catastrophic volcanic eruption to me, and it was immense fun to write it that way! And I'm glad you liked my original characters - I write lots of OCs, and most of them are quite near and dear to my heart.

Thanks again! I'm glad you enjoyed this!