# LOTR questions about Ringwraiths
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [February 20, 2019, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864 "2019-02-20T00:56:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/1 "2019-02-20T00:56:07Z")
What does it mean to “kill” one?
In FOTR, the river washed them all away, but those in the know understood that they weren’t gone forever, they just had to re-assemble themselves somehow and get new pets to ride. How did that work exactly?
But in ROTK, the lead Ringwraith was “killed” by a human woman and a hobbit. Was he really forever-dead, or did his spirit just go off to get re-kindled? I’ve always assumed they would only be gone from Middle Earth forever when the one ring was destroyed, thereby destroying the power of their rings to keep them animated. Is that correct, and how do we reconcile that with the fate of the lead ringwraith?
Bonus question: what happened to the other eight Ringwraiths during that battle, after their leader was “killed?” It’s been a while since I read the book, so I don’t know if they are mentioned, but you don’t see them again in that battle in the movie.
Side note, and obviously not canon, but in the last Hobbit movie there is that battle between Elrond and Saruman on the one side, and the 9 ringwraiths on the other; the ringwraiths keep getting disintegrated and apparently coming right back, until they don’t any more (of course, it’s hard to tell, all ringwraiths look alike to me). Then, when they are vanquished, there they are again in Sauron’s pantheon, apparently ready to fight again. Did that representation make any sense at all, or was it just sop for the masses?
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/2 "2019-02-20T01:23:41Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#):
>
> But in ROTK, the lead Ringwraith was “killed” by a human woman and a hobbit. Was he really forever-dead, or did his spirit just go off to get re-kindled? I’ve always assumed they would only be gone from Middle Earth forever when the one ring was destroyed, thereby destroying the power of their rings to keep them animated. Is that correct, and how do we reconcile that with the fate of the lead ringwraith?
He was probably permanently killed, since he was killed with the aid of a Barrow-Blade specifically enchanted for the purpose. As somebody on another forum put it:
> [@](#):
>
> It wasn’t a sword of +5 versus Ringwraiths. It was a sword of +5 _“We hate the Witch King, we really hate him, hate him, hate him.”_
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### Author:  [@dzeiger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dzeiger)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/3 "2019-02-20T01:43:52Z")
More importantly than the blade, he was killed by prophecy. I don’t think the details of the sword mattered all that much.
As for the rest, I believe they retreated with the rest of the forces, were present at the fight at the Black Gate, were recalled when Sauron realized Frodo was at Mount Doom, but didn’t make it in time.
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/4 "2019-02-20T02:00:36Z")
To kill a ringwraith is, in simplest terms, the same as to kill a human: You separate their body and soul, usually by means of extreme trauma to the body. But what a ringwraith fundamentally is, is a spirit, with the body being assumed as basically a matter of convenience (this is also true of maia like Gandalf, Sauron, and the Balrog, though for a different reason). So they can still come back, by donning a new body. But they can’t do that instantly, and while they’re “naked” they’re much less capable of interacting with the physical world and with living people, so “killing” one still accomplishes something.
Now, the Witch-King, he was one mean sumbitch. Nobody had ever even been able to inconvenience him by shedding him of his body, and he believed that nobody ever would. He believed wrong, as a heroic shieldmaiden and halfling happened to point out to him. But even that would only have been a temporary setback, if it were not for the destruction of the One Ring shortly afterwards. With that, their once-human spirits were no longer able to linger in the World, and they faced the fate of all Men (whatever that is, and which they may well not have found to their liking).
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### Author:  [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 2:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/5 "2019-02-20T02:04:23Z")
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> To kill a ringwraith is, in simplest terms, the same as to kill a human: You separate their body and soul, usually by means of extreme trauma to the body. But what a ringwraith fundamentally is, is a spirit, with the body being assumed as basically a matter of convenience (this is also true of maia like Gandalf, Sauron, and the Balrog, though for a different reason). So they can still come back, by donning a new body. But they can’t do that instantly, and while they’re “naked” they’re much less capable of interacting with the physical world and with living people, so “killing” one still accomplishes something.
>
> Now, the Witch-King, he was one mean sumbitch. Nobody had ever even been able to inconvenience him by shedding him of his body, and he believed that nobody ever would. He believed wrong, as a heroic shieldmaiden and halfling happened to point out to him. But even that would only have been a temporary setback, if it were not for the destruction of the One Ring shortly afterwards. With that, their once-human spirits were no longer able to linger in the World, and they faced the fate of all Men (whatever that is, and which they may well not have found to their liking).
They were corrupted by Sauron and the RIngs…maybe a little leniency should be shown.
And to be pedantic (unless im wrong) The Barrow Blade didn’t kill him, it just brought down his shields right? Then whassername killed him. Right?
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### Author:  [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/6 "2019-02-20T02:37:11Z")
This is how the book describes the death of the Witch-King:
> [@](#):
>
> … a cry went up into the shuddering air, and faded to a shrill wailing, passing with the wind, a voice bodiless and thin that died, and was swallowed up, and was never heard again in that age of the world.
Which sounds a bit more significant than it is, since “that age of the world” would only last another two years.
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### Author:  [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/7 "2019-02-20T03:03:19Z")
> [@dzeiger](#):
>
> More importantly than the blade, he was killed by prophecy. I don’t think the details of the sword mattered all that much.
YMMV, but I always read the prophecy as descriptive rather than prescriptive. It wasn’t that he was magically protected from men and/or Men, it was just that the people who would eventually tag-team him with a magic sword (and the imminent de-Ringing of Sauron keeping him dead) were a woman and a hobbit. The guy Glorfindel was speaking to, OTOH, was both male and mortal, and Glorfindel was warning him not to get himself pointlessly killed.
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### Author:  [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/8 "2019-02-20T04:27:59Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#):
>
> He was probably permanently killed, since he was killed with the aid of a Barrow-Blade specifically enchanted for the purpose. As somebody on another forum put it:
> [@Chronos](#):
>
> To kill a ringwraith is, in simplest terms, the same as to kill a human: You separate their body and soul, usually by means of extreme trauma to the body. But what a ringwraith fundamentally is, is a spirit, with the body being assumed as basically a matter of convenience (this is also true of maia like Gandalf, Sauron, and the Balrog, though for a different reason). So they can still come back, by donning a new body. But they can’t do that instantly, and while they’re “naked” they’re much less capable of interacting with the physical world and with living people, so “killing” one still accomplishes something.
>
> Now, the Witch-King, he was one mean sumbitch. Nobody had ever even been able to inconvenience him by shedding him of his body, and he believed that nobody ever would. He believed wrong, as a heroic shieldmaiden and halfling happened to point out to him. But even that would only have been a temporary setback, if it were not for the destruction of the One Ring shortly afterwards. With that, their once-human spirits were no longer able to linger in the World, and they faced the fate of all Men (whatever that is, and which they may well not have found to their liking).
You two seem to embody, in your disagreement on this point, my main question. I think I agree with Chronos, and this doesn’t disagree necessarily with **markn+**'s quotation. If he had never been disembodied before, he might not have been able to pull himself together before the one ring was destroyed.
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### Author:  [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 4:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/9 "2019-02-20T04:34:33Z")
in case folks don’t know the prophecy:
“Do not pursue him! He will not return to these lands. Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man will he fall.” The Return of the King, Appendix A (I, iv).
Which means exactly that. No ‘man’ can kill him. However Éowyn is a woman - and Merry with a Dúnedain dagger (enchanted with magic deadly to the witch king) who also is not a ‘man’ but rather a male hobbit - the combined effort of the two finally and completely destroyed the witch king.
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### Author:  [@Clark\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clark_K)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/10 "2019-02-20T07:53:39Z")
The prophecy doesn’t mean no man _can_ kill the Witch King. It means that no man _will_ kill him.
It would have been physically possible for a man to do what Eowyn did. Glorfindel just had the foresight to know that it wouldn’t happen that way.
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### Author:  [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/11 "2019-02-20T13:24:19Z")
It’s worth noting that when the One Ring was destroyed, the power of all the other rings failed, so at that point the Nazgul would have finally and permanently died - which for Men in Arda means their spirits passed beyond the known world, and only Iluvatar knows their final fate. This is in contrast to Elves, who remain within the bounds of Arda (including Valinor) until the end of time.
It’s not really clear whether the Witch King’s soul departed when Eowyn destroyed his body, or when Smeagol destroyed the ring, at least as far as I remember. If Tolkien ever did clarify it, it would be in a letter somewhere.
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/12 "2019-02-20T15:07:25Z")
> [@Clark\_K](#):
>
> The prophecy doesn’t mean no man _can_ kill the Witch King. It means that no man _will_ kill him.
>
> It would have been physically possible for a man to do what Eowyn did. Glorfindel just had the foresight to know that it wouldn’t happen that way.
I was going to make this point. The prophecy doesn’t mean that the Witch-King has some supernatural protection against being killed by a man. It’s just Glorfindel’s foretelling of the actual way he will meet his fate.
However, there is some implication that the Witch King actually believes he has such protection, when he says to Eowyn:
“Hinder me? Thou fool. No living man may hinder me!”
To which Eowyn replies:
“But no living man am I! You look upon a woman.”
> [@China\_Guy](#):
>
> “Do not pursue him! He will not return to these lands. Far off yet is his doom, and not by the hand of man will he fall.” The Return of the King, Appendix A (I, iv).
However, this seems like a fudge by a linguist like Tolkien. “Man” without the article implies to me the word is being used in the sense of “mankind,” in which case it would include women (although maybe not hobbits). If it were an accurate statement, it should be “not by the hand of _a_ man.” So either Glorfindel’s statement, or its translation, is not precisely accurate.
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### Author:  [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/13 "2019-02-20T15:09:38Z")
Consider JRRT’s description of the event:
> [@](#):
>
> Merry snuck up behind him and plunged his sword into the back of Witch-king’s knee. \*\*The sword, made in Westernesse centuries ago, broke the magic of Sauron that kept the Witch-king anchored to this world. While the Witch-King was distracted, Éowyn drove her sword where the head of the wraith would have been, slaying him. \*\*
Merry’s blade broke the spell, Éowyn’s thrust killed him.
Later, JRRT reinforces this idea:
> [@](#):
>
> No other blade, not though mightier hands had wielded it, would have dealt that foe a wound so bitter, cleaving the undead flesh, breaking the spell that knit his unseen sinews to his will.
Thus killing him required first breaking the spell that had long chained him to earth in violation of Iluvatar’s gift to men, the gift of death. Second, killing him required, well, **killing**. Sword thru the head, all that.
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### Author:  [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/14 "2019-02-20T15:20:05Z")
> [@Colibri](#):
>
> However, this seems like a fudge by a linguist like Tolkien. “Man” without the article implies to me the word is being used in the sense of “mankind,” in which case it would include women (although maybe not hobbits). If it were an accurate statement, it should be “not by the hand of _a_ man.” So either Glorfindel’s statement, or its translation, is not precisely accurate.
Do Quenya or Sindarin have articles?
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### Author:  [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/15 "2019-02-20T15:23:32Z")
Maybe Neil Armstrong helped write that prophecy.
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### Author:  [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/16 "2019-02-20T15:59:48Z")
> [@markn\_1](#):
>
> Maybe Neil Armstrong helped write that prophecy.
That’s a giant leap of imagination.
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### Author:  [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/17 "2019-02-20T16:14:35Z")
> [@mbh](#):
>
> Do Quenya or Sindarin have articles?
Not any more; they are long dead languages.
What?
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/18 "2019-02-20T16:18:11Z")
> [@mbh](#):
>
> Do Quenya or Sindarin have articles?
It’s a translation of whatever Glorfindel said to English. He was speaking to Earnur of Gondor, so I’m not sure what language he would have been speaking. Whether or not to use the article in the translation should have depended on what sense Glorfindel meant “man”: a male human, or mankind in general. As stated in English, it implies mankind rather than just a male human. (See also the controversy over the meaning of Neal Armstrong’s quote on stepping on the moon. The article changes the meaning in English.) Perhaps whatever word Glorfindel used was ambiguous; or perhaps the translator got it wrong.
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### Author:  [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/19 "2019-02-20T16:37:11Z")
I wonder what other language admit this ambiguity, and I especially wonder how that part of the book was translated into languages that don’t.
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### Author:  [@Cuckoorex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cuckoorex)
#### Post date: [February 20, 2019, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/lotr-questions-about-ringwraiths/829864/20 "2019-02-20T17:04:07Z")
I wonder if the “No Man Can Kill” me thing would have been some kind of geasa.
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