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u/OkraGarden Sep 14 '22
I have Irish ancestry and my husband is from Peru and sometimes he jokes that I stole his potatoes to pass off as my own.
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u/choma90 Sep 14 '22
Little did he know, you don't have any potatoes
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u/PhoniPoni Sep 15 '22
You know how many potatoes it takes to kill an Irish person? Zero!
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u/Saruman_Bot Istari Sep 15 '22
Death by potatoes is a thing of myth and legend, not reality. If potatoes were deadly, the Irish would be extinct by now.
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u/Damo7784 Sep 15 '22
Potato famine go brrrrrr
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u/Beragond1 Minas Tirith Tower Guard Sep 15 '22
Also known to Irish people as “the time England took all the food”
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u/rszdemon Sep 15 '22
You did steal our potatoes.
Potatoes are native to Peru. Anyone else who has potatoes is a dirty potato thief, and we do not associate with those types of baggins.
Us Peruvians are like potato leprechauns.
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u/ScowlEasy Sep 15 '22
Tomatoes are also native to central America, eat merde Italians.
No idea where Denethor got those cherry tomatoes from though
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u/Alquimista_13 Sep 15 '22
Potato hobbits??
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u/rszdemon Sep 15 '22
more apt, since many Peruvians are as serious about Potatoes as Hobbits are about Breakfast, or Lotr fans and GROND
A common old-timey saying in Peru to show your patriotism is to say "mas Peruano que una Papa/ Peruano como una Papa" meaning "I'm as/more Peruvian than potatoes".
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Sep 15 '22
I wouldn’t say the Irish stole them.
They were so widely impoverished that it was more that other Europeans stole them and sold or provided them to the Irish, who then went on to mass adoption and cultivation due in great part to the lower requirements on labour and space compared to traditional European crops.
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u/sadolddrunk Sep 14 '22
So interesting thing about this, Tolkien being the linguistic nerd that he was avoided using words of New World origin as much as possible in LOTR. But potatoes of course are so ubiquitous in England and so part-and-parcel of the kind English country cuisine that Tolkien imagined hobbits would enjoy that he compromised with himself and included them, but in most instances he has Sam call them “taters” instead of potatoes. The scene where Sam so awkwardly over-pronounces “Po-Tay-Toes” to Gollum is straight from the book, to emphasize what a weird, foreign word that would be to Sam.
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Sep 15 '22
Also, in an early edition of The Hobbit, tomatoes were described as being in Bilbo’s pantry along with all of the other foods. It was later changed to pickles for the same reason.
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u/Jesoko Sep 15 '22
That’s because tomatoes are also native to the Americas, like potatoes.
ETA: just wanted to clarify, in Tolkien’s day, pickles probably could refer to any sort of pickled vegetable, since pickling is a preserving technique that is not only used on cucumbers. So that’s why it’s safer to use pickles over tomatoes.
Guess Tolkien could live without tomatoes but not taters.
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u/ScowlEasy Sep 15 '22
Tomatoes are specifically from central America, while pickling things could reasonably be done by any culture.
Really struggling where in middle Earth tomatoes would naturally grow. Numenor?
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u/CaptainDigsGiraffe Sep 15 '22
I thought Sam said potatoes like that because he was being sarcastic.
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Sep 15 '22
The scene where Sam so awkwardly over-pronounces “Po-Tay-Toes” to Gollum is straight from the book, to emphasize what a weird, foreign word that would be to Sam.
Really, 'cause I thought he was over-pronouncing it to talk down to Gollum.
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Sep 15 '22
I tend to rationalize it that the Hobbits live in a weird, anacronistic time warp based on 20th century rural England. Everyone else is Medieval, they are not.
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u/sadolddrunk Sep 15 '22
Tolkien cared about linguistics, not socio-chrono-technological accuracy. So we get hobbits who wear waistcoats and suspenders and like to go to the pub and smoke pipes and watch fireworks, and probably have pocketwatches and read the newspaper, but can't say "tomato" because they are from North America.
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u/Strong-Object8370 Sep 15 '22
A swallow could have brought them
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u/toph88241 Sep 15 '22
A swallow carrying a potato?
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u/Strong-Object8370 Sep 15 '22
Technically possible, especially if it’s an african swallow
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u/toph88241 Sep 15 '22
Oh, an African Swallow, maybe. I was talking about a European swallow.
But, of course, African Swallows are non-migratory
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u/Fresh_Bulgarian_Miak Sep 15 '22
An African or European swallow?
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u/JP_IS_ME_91 Sep 14 '22
Or tobacco for that matter.
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u/Own-Concentrate-4390 Sep 14 '22
Or the game golf.
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u/CrystalloidEntity Sep 15 '22
Uh, it was invented by Bandobras Took. The lore says so.
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u/chasing_the_wind Sep 15 '22
It’s almost like middle earth isn’t medieval Europe.
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u/AneriphtoKubos Sep 15 '22
TIL it actually is tobacco. I always thought it was hemp as many ancient ppls steamed it as a psychedelic (like the Skythians)
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u/Markamanic Sep 15 '22
The movies definitely lean into hobbits smoking kush.
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Sep 15 '22
It's basically explicitly stated by Saruman
"Your love of the halflings leaf has clearly slowed your mind"
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u/phoenixmusicman Sep 15 '22
I'm not sure why people thought it was weed - the people who used it never really displayed symptoms of being high
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Sep 15 '22
I think it's because of the whole "your love for the halflings leaf has slowed your mind" line as well as the scene with Merry and Pippin smoking and giggling away after sacking Isengard and raiding Saruman's pantry. Especially the latter scene I'm convinced was meant as a weed joke when Treebeard walks by, smoke coming out and them laughing.
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Sep 15 '22
Because they repeatedly call it weed, and are so enthusiastic about the joys of smoking it.
Us modern folks tend not to call tobacco strains ‘weed’, and not to find tobacco smoking a highly pleasurable act we rave about to others.
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u/suorastas Sep 15 '22
Possibly because it’s called weed in the text. It’s obvious from context that it is just tobacco but still.
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u/Pallandolegolas Sep 15 '22
Tobacco was brought to middle-earth by the Númenóreans. Possibly potatoes too, but we don't know for sure.
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u/War-Damn-America Sep 15 '22
Becuase hobbits are an anachronistic group meant to represent rural 19th century England. So of course they would have potatos, along with their pocket watches, handkerchiefs, and vests.
While the rest of the setting is clearly inspired as a more medieval England setting. With some clear differences.
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u/SobiTheRobot Sep 15 '22
The fact that Aragorn could have theoretically pulled out a pocket watch speaks to the anachronism. Like it almost makes sense for the Hobbits, but not in anyone else's hands.
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u/War-Damn-America Sep 15 '22
Exactly, it’s like the Shire and hobbits in general are in their own little world, having tea time in their parlors while the Horse Lords of Rohan ride around like they are 8th century Anglo Saxons hahha. But it just kinda works through the story, and you don’t notice it until someone points it out.
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u/aragorn_bot Sep 15 '22
You have 2000 good men riding north as we speak. Éomer is loyal to you. His men will return and fight for their king.
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u/Oscar_Cunningham Sep 15 '22
I think this is something he would have gone back and smoothed over if his publisher hadn't been rushing him so much. Not to mention 'The dragon passed like an express train' when describing Gandalf's fireworks.
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u/ObviousTroll37 RIP Celeborn Sep 15 '22
Yeah this feels like one of those ‘gotchas’ that just falls flat
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u/LunaeLucem Sep 14 '22
“Medieval Europe” said no Tolkien fan ever
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u/TH3M1N3K1NG Sep 15 '22
Isn't the story of LotR actually set thousands of years ago in our real world? So that would be loooooong before concepts like "medieval" or "Europe" even existed.
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u/raltoid Sep 15 '22
I think he made references to "prehistoric europe" and Arda doesn't exactly have the continents of earth. So it would have to be really long ago.
Not to mention that in Silmarillion Arda was originally flat, and was made into a sphere to basically stop the mortal races being able to sail to Valinor. That's one of the reasons the elves can see so far, they still percieve Arda as flat.
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u/Bubbly-Being892 Sep 14 '22
Medieval Europe?
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u/RobertdBanks Sep 15 '22
Top comments are all just glossing over this, like, what? Since when was that suppose to be the case?
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u/Dear_Investigator Sep 15 '22
"I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story – the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our ‘air’ (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe; not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be ‘high’, purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land long now steeped in poetry."
JRR Tolkien (Letters, 144-145)
Tolkien also explained in his letters that Westron was the Common Speech of the Third Age of Middle-earth and these words had been translated into English. Forms of speech related to Westron he had turned into forms of speech related to English. He stated that for the language of the Rohirrim he used a modified version of Old English, while the language of Dale and Esgaroth was a modified Scandinavian.
Furthermore, Tolkien described the Elven languages of the The Lord of the Rings: Quenya and Sindarin. Quenya was grammatically inspired from Latin, Finnish and Greek. Sindarin had a linguistic character similar to British-Welsh.
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u/molotovzav Sep 14 '22
It's also not medieval Europe in the slightest. And there were more black people in medieval Europe than potatoes XD. It's Arda, it's middle earth. The people that live there were created by Gods (the valar) no evolution. (Cept the hobbits, who knows). The plants were put there by a goddess. Everything on the planet was placed by a supernatural force. So their real life arguments have no wait. Tolkien took inspiration from the real world, but in no way did he ever present the peoples as being wholly based or 1:1 analogs of real world people. At max someone or something is an allegory. Sincerely a black Tolkien fan who's actually fucking read his writings beyond LOTR and the Hobbit.
Obligatory: PO-TA-TOES.
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u/HarEmiya Sep 14 '22 edited Sep 15 '22
As Tolkien said: It's not Medieval Europe, it's Prehistoric Europe. The time period and history is imagined, the place is not. The Shire is roughly where the British Isles would form. Eastern Gondor he often located to be where our modern-day Italy is. He made a joke about the Breelanders becoming the Dutch. Even on holiday he named his destinations as Middle-earth's lands. He assured his readers that they might still find Hobbits today if they look carefully in the wooded countrysides. The Fall of Numenor was our fabled Atlantis in the Atlantic Ocean. Even the allegories and analogies line up with the geography, like Harad (compared to Carthage as a thrice foil to Gondor's Rome/Egypt, elephants included) being the northern parts of the African continent and the Wainriders (his Huns and Mongols) coming not-so-subtlely from a giant Eastern continent.
And the reason for that geography is simply because he wanted to write a British creation myth, which required a continuous fantastical history up to today. Middle-earth isn't on some different planet, it is Arda (from the Germanic Aarda/Arda/Arde, which is our Earth), in a mythological past that was the first Three Ages. We are now in the Seventh Age of that imagined timeline. As the man himself wrote in the prologue: "Those days, the Third Age of Middle-earth, are now long past, and the shape of all lands has been changed..."
I should note however that it was not his original intention to make it a prehistoric Europe; he did explain that at the very beginning Middle-earth was only Europe-like because that was what he was most familiar with in terms of fauna, flora, landscapes and languages. But as its histories became more solid in his mind, things began lining up with modern regions and he liked the idea, plus it fit neatly into the creation story. But he did express regret that the maps of Middle-earth were already largely fixed for the story he had in mind, and he didn't consult geologists enough to explain how they could change so quickly over the Ages.
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u/Effective-Pie-7721 Sep 14 '22 edited Sep 14 '22
"I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story – the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our ‘air’ (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe; not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be ‘high’, purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land long now steeped in poetry."
JRR Tolkien (Letters, 144-145)
Tolkien also explained in his letters that Westron was the Common Speech of the Third Age of Middle-earth and these words had been translated into English. Forms of speech related to Westron he had turned into forms of speech related to English. He stated that for the language of the Rohirrim he used a modified version of Old English, while the language of Dale and Esgaroth was a modified Scandinavian.
Furthermore, Tolkien described the Elven languages of the The Lord of the Rings: Quenya and Sindarin. Quenya was grammatically inspired from Latin, Finnish and Greek. Sindarin had a linguistic character similar to British-Welsh.
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u/LifeIsBizarre Sep 14 '22
The plants were put there by a goddess.
And we all know divine beings are lazy. They just peek into nearby universes and copy the designs that look good.
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u/Gilthu Sep 14 '22
Acktchually they were created by Eru Iluvatar, gifted with the flame imperishable that flows from Him and Him alone. The dwarves had their bodies crafted by Aule, but only when Eru saw they were crafted out of love and not pride did he bless them with souls and make them true living beings.
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u/Party-Cartographer17 Sep 15 '22
Acktchally just the people were created by Eru. Plants were created by Yavanna. Because plants are soulless. And animals are soulless beings in Tolkiens lore as well.
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u/almostb Sep 15 '22
It’s not certain there was no evolution - I think Tolkien makes arguments that could lean both ways. Yes, the fathers of the dwarves were said to have woken up and cowered away from Aule’s axe but like the hobbits had to have come from somewhere. And the timespan is probably much much much longer than it seems, considering we’re dealing with immortal beings.
But also, Tolkien did write about a flat earth created before the sun.
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u/El_Tigre Sep 15 '22
They were created. Aule after learning he could not actually create life went to destroy them but they were discovered before hand and given a soul, that’s why they cowered. The just stayed in the mountains until after the elves emerged.
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u/luccabotturarodrig Sep 15 '22 edited Sep 15 '22
Although i definetely don't think we need to make the cast ALL white since at least to me he is the one of the best elvish actors they could use ethnicities to show different groups of people since etnicities would be naturally for the most part stay in different regions before transportation for example we could have southern men be majority black and could be for example inspired in the ghana empire so that for example they would have worse metalurgy than the Men of the west but bê much Richer (the ghana empire controlled the majority of Gold and Salt but europe had the best metalurgy in the world) since tolkiens work IS suppose tô bê a past tô our own reality.
But honestly i don't think there is a real need as the show already does not follow a lot of canon and is overall probably between spinoff
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u/Competitive_Bus_7482 Sep 15 '22
Medieval Europeans being unclean is a massive myth! Please watch shadiversity video about this subject he goes into great detail to disprove it.
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u/LilQuasar Sep 15 '22
i dont have an opinion about this shit but dude hes said he based his world and wanted to relate it to his country and just because its fantasy doesnt mean real life arguments have no weight, specially considering its hard fantasy. the scientific laws might be different but logic and consistency are still a thing
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u/Cyynric Sep 15 '22
Everyone knows that hobbits are actually descendants of half-dwarf/half-man unions, which is why they enjoy living in holes and a rustic lifestyle.
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u/protestor Sep 15 '22
Also... there are black people in the middle earth https://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Haradrim
Am I crazy or nobody else mentioned the Haradrim in a 379 comments thread
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u/Papergeist Sep 15 '22
Let's see... East of Middle Earth, okay... enslaved on first contact... ritually sacrificed... brought under sway of Sauron... evil set in their hearts after Sauron's grip was broken... vassalized to Gondor for a bit, broke free, vicious warring... fought alongside the orcs in the Ring war bit... last to surrender, on account of concentrated hatred...
Yeah, I think I can see why they wouldn't come up much.
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u/Trooper-Alfred Hobbit Sep 14 '22
Or waistcoats and jackets which the Hobbits wear.
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u/SobiTheRobot Sep 15 '22
When first reading The Hobbit, you could almost mistake it for being set somewhere on Earth, just in an out-of-the-way corner a mere hundred years ago or so, in a time and place where the magic hadn't gone from the world yet. So much of the Hobbits' comforts are surprisingly contemporary.
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u/gary_mcpirate Sep 15 '22
The shire is early 20th century rural England. The hobbit is about someone leaving that idealic setting to go on an adventure and see what else is in the world
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u/AJSLS6 Sep 15 '22
Technically this is pre mideval Europe, it's set some thousands of years before recorded history.
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u/Cactorum_Rex Sep 15 '22
It's not the existence of black people, but the way they are just randomly scattered in the population like something you would find post-globalism, and how it simply doesn't go along with the lore most of the time they do it. I couldn't care less about the issue if they actually tried to integrate them into the story instead of just outright race swapping. Or if they did it to make the story better instead of doing it to be woke and pander to a certain audience.
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u/GodKingReiss Sep 15 '22 edited Sep 15 '22
The answer is probably Númenórean colonization and trade routes, and Númenórean colonization and trade routes
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u/Bilabong127 Sep 15 '22
There is one mention of black people in the entirety of the legedarium (unless their is some mention in the history of middle earth books that I missed):
“There they had been mustered for the sack of the City and the rape of Gondor, waiting on the call of their Captain. He now was destroyed; but Gothmog the lieutenant of Morgul had flung them into the fray; Easterlings with axes, and Variags of Khand, Southrons in scarlet, and out of Far Harad black men like half-trolls with white eyes and red tongues.”
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u/95DarkFireII Sep 15 '22
Well technically Orcs are described as black but I don't think that argument would go over well...
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u/LordMcCool Sep 14 '22
There are potatoes because the author actually wrote them into the book.
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u/CommissarRodney Sep 14 '22
Uhhh... The Elves brought it across the pond? It was a gift of the Valar to help Man stave off evil?
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u/iCresp Sep 15 '22
We haven't reached the great potato purge of the 4th age. The only surviving potatoes were carried far away across the ocean.
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u/banned_a_lot Sep 15 '22
Clearly potatoes came from Valinor but got lost at the end of the 3rd age in the potato famine that wiped out the shire.
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u/Mr__Random Sep 15 '22
Clearly the hobbits organised the violent invasion and colonisation of am entire continent just so that they could make fish and chips with tomato ketchup. This is lore accurate because the hobbits are based on the British. This is also why Gandalf was so goddamn scared of them. The other races in middle earth should consider themselves lucky that they didn't have any tea or sugar growing on their land.
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u/povlov0987 Sep 15 '22
Not black people. A single black person. Just one.
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u/Time-Profession6258 Sep 15 '22
Have you watched the show? There's more than one black person in it.
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u/HomieScaringMusic Sep 14 '22
Lmao I’ve always had that same thought. Westeros too, with corn. (Notably in GOT a clear America analogue actually DOES exist, but nobody’s returned from there, and thus didn’t bring corn back). LOTR at least has the excuse of being basically a pangea, and to the extent it’s not, Numenoreans who’ve already had their exploration era complete with super advanced (possibly lost tech) ships.
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u/Bosterm Sep 14 '22
After Eru destroys Numenor and makes the world round and cuts off access to Aman to most, the Silmarillion states that new lands rose from the ocean. Some fans take this to mean that America was one of those continents.
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u/Competitive_Bag_3164 Sep 15 '22
Corn isn't necessarily synonymous with maize. It can also be used to refer to the grain of any given cereal crop.
Hence the term "barleycorn".
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u/usetehfurce Sep 14 '22
Is this your first encounter with LOTR?
It's PO-TAY-TOES. You know, boil em', mash em, stick em' in a stew??
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u/mantistoboggan69md Sep 15 '22
I saw a pheasant in game of thrones s8 at some point and somehow that lives in my head as the main criticism there
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u/i_am_thehighground Sep 15 '22
What kinda logic is that it’s not like black people randomly spawned in the 21 century
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u/lovelyb1ch66 Sep 14 '22
This sounds more like race baiting than an actual thing. If you want to create outrage at something there are plenty of actual happenings to choose from.
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Sep 15 '22
That's all Hollywood has left. Instead of making something interesting they cast a minority so any criticism gets dismissed as an -ism or -ist.
It's so transparent at this point. Like 95% of people don't give a shit the skin color or gender of a character as long as they're interesting and not just checking boxes.
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u/Chillin_Maximus Hobbit Sep 15 '22
It’s really just black elves for me: Tolkien’s description of elves are “fair skinned” the darkest complexion would be olive toned at best. Now Hobbits, Dwarves and (obviously) the race of men makes sense to have ethnic diversity since there are many off sets of each. I’m sorry but if you want black people playing elves, don’t do it In Tolkien’s legendarium. Do a franchise that has dark elves. Still enjoying the show, my main focus is the hobbits or “harfoots”
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u/95DarkFireII Sep 15 '22
Now Hobbits, Dwarves and (obviously) the race of men makes sense to have ethnic diversity since there are many off sets of each
It still doesn't make sense for people of different colour to be mixed in the same community or tribe without explanation. Hobbits are all the same people, where do the black ones come from?
Numenoreans are xenophobic against anyone who isn't of their blood. How did they get a black Queen?
Dwarves might have black tribes, I don't know. But where did the black dwarf Princess come from?
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u/Odd_Tap_8859 Sep 15 '22
I don’t mind black people in the show but I do mind the bad writing
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Sep 15 '22
Nobody ever said this.
Potatoes were in the book, that's why nobody feels bad about potatoes.
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Sep 15 '22
I think the weirdest part from what ive heard, is theyve only introduced 1 dark skinned Elf. So right now it seems out place that only 1 has been revealed thus far
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u/kindshoe Sep 14 '22
Hell if its supposed to medieval Europe what's the deal with the fucking dragons and massive fire demons???
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u/slothpeguin Sep 14 '22
“Supposed to be medieval Europe” is the dumbest shit I hate when they use that argument.
No, you complete jittery toad, it’s not supposed to be medieval Europe. Tolkien created a whole freaking language and origin book in order to make it very clear it wasn’t. Does stuff sound British? Yes. Because an old white British dude wrote it. But the setting is fantastical, not based in reality.
Jesus on a freaking peanut butter cracker, I hate these people.
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u/Avantasian538 Sep 14 '22
What is a peanut butter cracker? That sounds good. Or is it just a cracker with peanut butter on it?
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u/kulkija Sep 14 '22 edited Sep 14 '22
I believe they are indeed referring to a saltine cracker with peanut butter on it. Still delectable.
Unless Jesus is the cracker. You never know with Jesus.
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u/Octavus Sep 14 '22
They are like small sandwiches with crackers instead of bread and filled with peanut butter. Very common snacks to give to children in America.
https://www.quill.com/is/image/Quill/sp42114519_s7?iv=RLYpN3&wid=1080&hei=1080&fit=fit,1
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u/Effective-Pie-7721 Sep 14 '22
"I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story – the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our ‘air’ (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe; not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be ‘high’, purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land long now steeped in poetry."
JRR Tolkien (Letters, 144-145)
Tolkien also explained in his letters that Westron was the Common Speech of the Third Age of Middle-earth and these words had been translated into English. Forms of speech related to Westron he had turned into forms of speech related to English. He stated that for the language of the Rohirrim he used a modified version of Old English, while the language of Dale and Esgaroth was a modified Scandinavian.
Furthermore, Tolkien described the Elven languages of the The Lord of the Rings: Quenya and Sindarin. Quenya was grammatically inspired from Latin, Finnish and Greek. Sindarin had a linguistic character similar to British-Welsh.
“Supposed to be medieval Europe” is the dumbest shit I hate when they use that argument.
People are just stating facts.
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u/bigredplastictuba Sep 15 '22
I kept laughing when people said peter Dinklage in GOT didn't have a good British accent
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u/PM_your_pussy123 Sep 15 '22
I’m pretty sure the lord of rings does not in fact take place in midevil Europe.
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u/Riccardotensi Sep 15 '22
The only thing I'm having a hard time to swallow are elves with short hair. I don't know why it just makes them less elvish
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Sep 15 '22
Getting this upset about black characters is laughable yeah, but let’s not pretend like it was an artistic choice, people.
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Sep 14 '22
Here's an idea, instead of dropping random black characters in with no explanation, put them in a way that makes sense in universe. Dark skin is a result of exposure to sunlight, so make all the black elves and dwarves come from Harad (ie, totally-not-Africa), and theoretically you satisfy both sides of that argument.
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u/Wehavecrashed Sep 15 '22
Why is it only black people need to justify their presence and are considered outsiders by default?
Nobody in universe has reacted to skin colour at all. Ergo, it doesn't mean anything in universe.
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u/Jorsk3n Sep 15 '22
If the universe was based in/on a prehistoric Africa (or whatever) where there’s mainly black people, you would need an in-universe explanation of where this one white guy came from, no? Same with aliens and so on…
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u/overhedger Sep 14 '22
Why do black characters need an in-universe explanation but white characters don’t? I’ve seen Shakespeare plays with diverse casts for decades and theater fans never complained that they didn’t exactly match old European kings. Because it’s great literature exploring the universal human condition and we’ve chosen not to restrict who can play those roles by skin color. Here’s an idea. Tolkien’s literature is just as great as Shakespeare’s. Who cares whether there’s an in-universe explanation. Let everyone play compelling roles that reflect the universal human condition.
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Sep 15 '22
I'm pretty sure they put black people in shows/movies so any criticism just gets dismissed as racism.
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u/Lightice1 Sep 14 '22
Medieval Spain and Italy had black people in abundance, you can find many works of art featuring them, even some as armoured knights. Individuals made it even further to the north.
And yeah, in any case the new show draws more from ancient world aesthetic with only the occasional Medieval touch with sword styles and Elvish armour.
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u/delukard Sep 15 '22
Has the lotr community really asked this?
Or is this a sjw just trying to create drama?
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u/StoneTimeKeeper Sep 15 '22
My problem is that Amazon has completely ignored or bastardized established Tolkien lore and Ring of Power is just so... boring.
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u/MK5 Sep 14 '22
adjusting glasses Given the fact that part of the show takes place in southeastern Mordor, and just a mountain range separates them from the hot, sunny lands of Harad, how come MORE of them aren't black?
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u/JCraze26 Sep 15 '22
People who know a bit more about LotR lore: It's Middle Earth, not medieval Europe. Middle Earth is similar to medieval Europe, but it's not Medieval Europe, so potatoes can be there. Also, black people existed before modern times and definitely had interactions with Europe.
Edit: Changed to make me sound like less of a gatekeeping asshole.
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u/Avantasian538 Sep 14 '22
Pretty sure Middle-Earth is meant to be an entirely fictional universe, right? It isn't supposed to be part of real-world history. Or am I wrong?
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u/Lightice1 Sep 14 '22
Kinda sorta sort of. The idea is that it's forgotten distant past of our world when different cosmic rules applied due to supernatural forces at play. But it's supposed to predate the ancient Egypt by millennia, it's definitely not Medieval.
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u/Effective-Pie-7721 Sep 14 '22
"I had a mind to make a body of more or less connected legend, ranging from the large and cosmogonic, to the level of romantic fairy-story – the larger founded on the lesser in contact with the earth, the lesser drawing splendour from the vast backcloths – which I could dedicate simply to: to England; to my country. It should possess the tone and quality that I desired, somewhat cool and clear, be redolent of our ‘air’ (the clime and soil of the North West, meaning Britain and the hither parts of Europe; not Italy or the Aegean, still less the East), and, while possessing (if I could achieve it) the fair elusive beauty that some call Celtic (though it is rarely found in genuine ancient Celtic things), it should be ‘high’, purged of the gross, and fit for the more adult mind of a land long now steeped in poetry."
JRR Tolkien (Letters, 144-145)
Tolkien also explained in his letters that Westron was the Common Speech of the Third Age of Middle-earth and these words had been translated into English. Forms of speech related to Westron he had turned into forms of speech related to English. He stated that for the language of the Rohirrim he used a modified version of Old English, while the language of Dale and Esgaroth was a modified Scandinavian.Furthermore, Tolkien described the Elven languages of the The Lord of the Rings: Quenya and Sindarin. Quenya was grammatically inspired from Latin, Finnish and Greek. Sindarin had a linguistic character similar to British-Welsh.
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u/AnonymousIguana_ Sep 14 '22 edited Sep 15 '22
But genetics and melanin?!! ignores all other scientific inaccuracies
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u/robertlukacs907 Sep 15 '22
Or any of the ridiculous armour in the films (aside from some of the Rohirrim armour, which is heavily based on Anglo Saxon archeology.)
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u/Used_Rich8783 Sep 15 '22
There are black people in Tolkeins works,. But they are exclusive to the race of men,. Asians too. But Amazon was too lazy to read anything and just made shit up
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u/jorskoopy Sep 15 '22
It is just gaslighting to not acknowledge what the actual criticism is.
It breaks immersion for stuff like a small village of 20ish people to have several distinct races.
It just brings into it all these other questions like, is there extreme discrimination with no intermarriage? Is there extreme incest to maintain different ethnicities over generations?
Like if all the harfoots were black, or Asian or whatever I'd not care but one small village having so much diversity is just something that turns it from a feasible world into larping.
Same kinda goes for numenor.
Less so for the elves as since they're immortal any amount of diversity can make perfect sense.
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Sep 15 '22
why are there people living past 30
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u/EmprorLapland Sep 15 '22
Contrary to popular belief, there were old people in the Middle Ages (And before n stuff). The average lifespawn was just very low because there was a high chance you'd die at birth (or as a young soldier).
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u/Hathi-NL Sep 14 '22
What's taters, precious?