The promise
Twenty Great Rings, on a clock nearly five thousand years long. Four of them I can follow the whole way. Thirteen never have a holder with a name.
The Count
The count comes from the verse. Three Rings for the Elven-kings, seven for the Dwarf-lords, nine for mortal Men, and one for the Dark Lord. Three and seven and nine and one make twenty. Those are the Great Rings, and there were more rings than that. At Bag End, Gandalf tells Frodo that many Elven-rings were made in Eregion, and the lesser ones were “only essays in the craft.” Tolkien never says how many. They stay in the margin. The twenty are the rings he counted, so those are the ones I drew.
The Rules
Here’s the page. Time runs left to right, from the year 1500 of the Second Age, when the smiths of Eregion begin the Great Rings, to the autumn of 3021 in the Third, when the last of them sail from the Grey Havens. That’s four thousand, nine hundred and sixty-two years. We round up in the title. Each ring gets its own lane. Where Tolkien gives a holder and a year, I ink the lane solid. Where he gives neither, it stays in pencil. The counter in the corner keeps score of how many rings ever have a holder with a name.
The Forge
The smiths begin in 1500, with Sauron among them in disguise, calling himself Annatar. Celebrimbor finishes the Three around 1590, and he makes them alone. The other sixteen, the Seven and the Nine, are made with Sauron’s help, and the text never gives them a single year. Then in 1600, in the fire of Orodruin, Sauron makes the One. When he puts it on, the Elves know him at once, and in anger and fear they take their rings off.
The Fall of Eregion
War comes in 1693, and the Three are hidden. Celebrimbor gives Nenya to Galadriel. Vilya goes to Gil-galad, the High King in Lindon. Narya ends up with Círdan at the Havens, and the texts disagree on whether it passed through Gil-galad’s hands on the way. Four years later Eregion falls and Celebrimbor is killed. Sauron finds the Nine still sitting in the smiths’ house, ninety-seven years after the One was made, and takes them. The Seven are already gone. Under torture, Celebrimbor tells him where they went. About the Three, he tells him nothing.
The Keepers
Watch the top of the page. Some time after the war, Gil-galad passes Vilya to Elrond, which makes him the shortest keeper any of the Three ever had. Elrond keeps it at Rivendell to the end. Galadriel keeps Nenya in Lórien. Around the year 1000 of the Third Age, when the wizards come over the sea, Círdan gives Narya to Gandalf. While the One is on Sauron’s hand, the text says almost nothing about the Three being used. They sit hidden, and the lanes run on, quiet and solid, with a keeper’s name on nearly every stretch.
The One
The One has the busiest lane on the page. Sauron holds it until 3441, when Isildur cuts it from his hand and the Second Age ends. In the second year of the Third Age, at the Gladden Fields, it slips off Isildur’s finger in the Anduin and he’s killed. Then it lies in the river for two thousand, four hundred and sixty-one years. Déagol finds it in 2463, and Sméagol kills him for it. Bilbo carries it out of Gollum’s cave in 2941. Frodo has it from 3001. Even the empty stretch has an address: the bottom of the Anduin. Every year of this lane is accounted for.
The Seven
Now the Dwarves. Seven lanes, and one of them has a name and a year. It’s the ring of Durin’s house, passed from Thrór to his son Thráin, and in 2845 it’s taken from Thráin at Dol Guldur. He’s the last Dwarf to hold one of the Seven. For the other six, Tolkien gives one sentence, and gives it to Gandalf: “Seven the Dwarf-kings possessed, but three he has recovered, and the others the dragons have consumed.” That’s two more back to Sauron and four to the dragons. No names, no years, and no word on which dragon.
The Nine
The Nine are stranger. Sauron gives them to nine mortal Men, and the text never says when. In 2251 of the Second Age the Ringwraiths first appear, all nine under one date. Tolkien says they fell “one by one, sooner or later,” and gives no years. Only two are ever named, and one of those names is a title: the Witch-king of Angmar. The other is Khamûl the Easterling. The other seven are anonymous for good. Then the ending. On the fifteenth of March 3019, Merry and Éowyn destroy the Witch-king on the Pelennor. Ten days later, when the One goes into the Fire, the other eight go with it. No dates going in, and every one of them dated to the day going out.
Where the Dates Fall
Stop the clock and count the ink. Four lanes run solid from forge to finish: the Three and the One. Seven rings ever have a holder with a name. Thirteen never do. Now look at where the Seven and the Nine get their few dates. 1697, when Sauron takes the Nine. 2251, when his Ringwraiths appear. 2845, when his servants take Thráin’s ring. 3019, when they die with his Ring. Every date they have is a day they cross Sauron’s path. Between those days, all they get is a sentence.
The Last Ship
So this is the page. Twenty Great Rings, nearly five thousand years. Four I can follow the whole way, and thirteen never have a holder with a name. Of the Three, Gandalf told Frodo that Sauron’s “hand never touched them.” Their power ends with the One, on the twenty-fifth of March. Two and a half years later, in the last days of September 3021, Elrond, Galadriel and Gandalf sail from the Grey Havens with Bilbo and Frodo, and Gandalf wears Narya openly for the first time. Of the four lines that run the whole way, one ends in the fire. The other three close out the story...on the last ship out of Middle-earth.
