From: genkidu@hotmail.com (Mario N. Brathwaite) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Elven population? Date: 28 Dec 2001 07:27:57 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 14 Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: 216.168.224.9 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1009553277 16859 127.0.0.1 (28 Dec 2001 15:27:57 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 28 Dec 2001 15:27:57 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!newsfeed.stanford.edu!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:67196 Does anyone have a good feel for what the elven population would have been at the following points in (Tolkien) history? - End of 1st Age - During the Last Alliance of Men and Elves - During the War of the Ring I've read the books several times and understand that the elf population was in decline for many years. I'm interested in how the census of the 3 times above compare to one another. Thanks. MNB ###### From: "Conrad Dunkerson" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: Subject: Re: Elven population? Lines: 30 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2462.0000 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2462.0000 Message-ID: Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2001 02:11:50 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 12.79.24.242 X-Complaints-To: abuse@worldnet.att.net X-Trace: bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net 1009591910 12.79.24.242 (Sat, 29 Dec 2001 02:11:50 GMT) NNTP-Posting-Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2001 02:11:50 GMT Organization: AT&T Worldnet Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!netnews.com!xfer02.netnews.com!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!portc03.blue.aol.com!wn4feed!worldnet.att.net!135.173.83.71!wnfilter1!worldnet-localpost!bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net.POSTED!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:67395 "Mario N. Brathwaite" wrote in message news:d9120716.0112280727.6ee35689@posting.google.com... > Does anyone have a good feel for what the elven population would > have been at the following points in (Tolkien) history? There is VERY little on which to base such numbers. Tolkien gave some 'proportions' amongst the different branches of the elves and listed 10,000 elves in the host of Gondolin. Based on those and some guesses about what percentage of the entire Noldor population was represented by Gondolin it would extrapolate back to only about 515,000 elves in all the world. > - End of 1st Age > - During the Last Alliance of Men and Elves > - During the War of the Ring Well, given the whole 'immortality and rebirth' thing the total number should only be able to grow over time. However, you are probably looking for totals in Middle-earth (not all of Arda). Again, going with the >one< reference number, the proportions from an early text, and some assumptions it might work out to around 375,000 at the start of the First Age... but from there it becomes pretty difficult to guess the casualty figures and number of departures. Especially since the starting figures are rather loosely derived to begin with. ###### From: "Colin Lord" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien References: Subject: Re: Elven population? Lines: 25 X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Message-ID: <9vfZ7.33336$wD1.193810@news-server.bigpond.net.au> Date: Fri, 04 Jan 2002 10:30:29 GMT NNTP-Posting-Host: 203.45.133.204 X-Complaints-To: news@bigpond.net.au X-Trace: news-server.bigpond.net.au 1010140229 203.45.133.204 (Fri, 04 Jan 2002 21:30:29 EST) NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 04 Jan 2002 21:30:29 EST Organization: BigPond Internet Services (http://www.bigpond.net.au) Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!out.nntp.be!propagator-SanJose!in.nntp.be!nntp-relay.ihug.net!ihug.co.nz!hub1.nntpserver.com!intgwpad.nntp.telstra.net!news-server.bigpond.net.au!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:69239 "Conrad Dunkerson" wrote in message news:GD9X7.313787$W8.11685821@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net... > "Mario N. Brathwaite" wrote in message > news:d9120716.0112280727.6ee35689@posting.google.com... > > > Does anyone have a good feel for what the elven population would > > have been at the following points in (Tolkien) history? > > There is VERY little on which to base such numbers. Tolkien gave > some 'proportions' amongst the different branches of the elves and > listed 10,000 elves in the host of Gondolin. > > Based on those and some guesses about what percentage of the entire > Noldor population was represented by Gondolin it would extrapolate > back to only about 515,000 elves in all the world. There are a few overall problems with these numbers (not your problem so much), such as the massive epic battles fought against Melkor, the 7 year seige of Mordor (unless Sauron just hid the entire time and didn't come out at all). One thing the elves have in their favour is that almost all males are of fighting age (no old ones anyway). Guessing the numbers is quite complex, but 500K is as good a guess as I've seen. ###### From: genkidu@hotmail.com (Mario N. Brathwaite) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: Elven population? Date: 4 Jan 2002 10:22:01 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Lines: 30 Message-ID: References: <9vfZ7.33336$wD1.193810@news-server.bigpond.net.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: 216.168.224.9 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1010168522 26703 127.0.0.1 (4 Jan 2002 18:22:02 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 4 Jan 2002 18:22:02 GMT Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!washdc3-snh1.gtei.net!news.gtei.net!feeder.qis.net!sn-xit-02!supernews.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:69722 The reason why I asked the population question the battle on the slope of Mount Doom in Peter Jackson's movie. I recall saying to myself "Damn! That's alot of elves. Orcs I can accept breeding like rabbits... but damn that's a lot of elves." MNB "Colin Lord" wrote in message news:<9vfZ7.33336$wD1.193810@news-server.bigpond.net.au>... > "Conrad Dunkerson" wrote in message > news:GD9X7.313787$W8.11685821@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net... > > "Mario N. Brathwaite" wrote in message > > news:d9120716.0112280727.6ee35689@posting.google.com... > > > > > Does anyone have a good feel for what the elven population would > > > have been at the following points in (Tolkien) history? > > > > There is VERY little on which to base such numbers. Tolkien gave > > some 'proportions' amongst the different branches of the elves and > > listed 10,000 elves in the host of Gondolin. > > > > Based on those and some guesses about what percentage of the entire > > Noldor population was represented by Gondolin it would extrapolate > > back to only about 515,000 elves in all the world. > > There are a few overall problems with these numbers (not your problem so > much), such as the massive epic battles fought against Melkor, the 7 year > seige of Mordor (unless Sauron just hid the entire time and didn't come out > at all). One thing the elves have in their favour is that almost all males > are of fighting age (no old ones anyway). Guessing the numbers is quite > complex, but 500K is as good a guess as I've seen. ###### From: "Yama" Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Subject: Re: Elven population? Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 02:43:22 +0200 Organization: University of Oulu Lines: 55 Message-ID: References: <9vfZ7.33336$wD1.193810@news-server.bigpond.net.au> NNTP-Posting-Host: rak054.oulu.fi X-Trace: ousrvr3.oulu.fi 1010191294 23784 130.231.6.54 (5 Jan 2002 00:41:34 GMT) X-Complaints-To: news@news.oulu.fi NNTP-Posting-Date: 5 Jan 2002 00:41:34 GMT X-Priority: 3 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Newsreader: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2600.0000 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2600.0000 Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!news.mailgate.org!newsfeed.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp!news.cc.tut.fi!newsfeed.song.fi!nntp.inet.fi!inet.fi!newsfeed3.funet.fi!newsfeeds.funet.fi!ousrvr3.oulu.fi!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:69351 "Mario N. Brathwaite" wrote in message news:d9120716.0201041022.1ca5ce17@posting.google.com... > The reason why I asked the population question the battle on the slope > of Mount Doom in Peter Jackson's movie. I recall saying to myself > "Damn! That's alot of elves. Orcs I can accept breeding like > rabbits... but damn that's a lot of elves." That was in the Second Age, when there still were many elves in ME, including enough High Elves to field a serious army. Said battle is btw one reason why there were considerably less elves in the Third Age. For example Mirkwood's Silvan Elf army lost 2/3 of it's strength. Considering that elves probably had larger % of their male population in the arms (being immortal et al) than humans, demographic loss must have been devastating. About the size of the elven population by the time of War of the Ring - almost only numerical clue is that Thranduil's army had "over a thousand" (guess: 1200-1500) warriors in the Battle of Five Armies (and it again suffered heavy losses). Most likely that did not represent all military might Thranduil had in his possession, but I find it unlikely he could have fielded larger army than 3 to 5 thousand men at best. If we assume elvish society could have maybe 30% of it's population in a field army (considering logistic problems and need to keep society running) then we get that Thranduil had around 10 to 17 thousand subjects. I would estimate that Mirkwood's elvin population was no greater than 20,000, and probably it was somewhat smaller. Of remaining Eldar realms, Mirkwood was probably largest. Lorien can be estimated as slightly smaller. I've seen no clue how populous Lindon was; but I very much doubt that there were more than couple of hundred Noldor left outside it, (guessing) 1 to 2 thousand in Lindon and Grey Havens, plus more Sindar and whatever Laiquendi there remained (Lindon being former Ossiriand). Of course by the end of TA, after near 7000 or so years, these peoples had probably mixed up quite throughly. Rough guess is that upper limit was maybe 10,000 elves. Rivendell was not very signifant population center: it was probably still capable of fielding some sort of armed force if necessary though not large enough to call it an "army". My guess is that there was at best 500 to 1000 elves. There might have been some scattered elvin populations here and there around Eriador; although at least Eregion is mentioned as throughly deserted. And then we of course do not know how much Avari still remained in the Eastern lands. Overall, my highly speculative estimate is that in the North-West Middle-Earth (west of Carnen/Celduin, roughly), by War of the Ring, there were maybe 40 to 60 thousand elves left. And no more than 100,000 total in all Middle-Earth, this depending how much Avari (if any) remained in the East. By comparison, offhand I estimate population of Gondor (based on the size of their armies) being in the 100-120,000 people range, not counting Rohan. ###### Lines: 12 X-Admin: news@aol.com From: mcresq@aol.com (Russ) Newsgroups: rec.arts.books.tolkien Date: 07 Jan 2002 17:46:51 GMT References: Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com X-Newsreader: Session Scheduler Subject: Re: Elven population? Message-ID: <20020107124651.15114.00000112@mb-ba.aol.com> Path: chonsp.franklin.ch!pfaff.ethz.ch!news-zh.switch.ch!newscore.univie.ac.at!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!newsfeed1.cidera.com!Cidera!portc01.blue.aol.com!audrey04.news.aol.com!not-for-mail Xref: chonsp.franklin.ch rec.arts.books.tolkien:70686 In article , genkidu@hotmail.com (Mario N. Brathwaite) writes: >The reason why I asked the population question the battle on the slope >of Mount Doom in Peter Jackson's movie. I recall saying to myself >"Damn! That's alot of elves. Orcs I can accept breeding like >rabbits... but damn that's a lot of elves." > Admiral! There be ELVES here! Russ