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Old Straight Road
The Old Straight Road, the Straight Road, the Lost Road, or the Lost Straight Road, is J. R. R. Tolkien's conception, in his fantasy world of Arda, that his Elves are able to sail to the earthly paradise of Valinor, realm of the godlike Valar. The tale is mentioned in The Silmarillion and in The Lord of the Rings, and documented in The Lost Road and Other Writings. The Elves are immortal, but may grow weary of the world, and then sail across the Great Sea to reach Valinor. The men of Númenor are persuaded by Sauron, servant of the first Dark Lord Melkor, to attack Valinor to get the immortality they feel should be theirs. The Valar ask for help from the creator, Eru Ilúvatar. He destroys Númenor and its army, in the process reshaping Arda into a sphere, and separating it and its continent of Middle-earth from Valinor so that men can no longer reach it. Elves can still set sail from the shores of Middle-earth in ships, bound for Valinor: they sail into the Uttermost West, following the Old Straight Road.
Scholars have noted the importance of the theme to Tolkien, as he revisited it repeatedly. His early mention of the Straight Road as being a level bridge recalls Bifröst, the bridge between the earthly Midgard and the gods' home of Asgard in Norse mythology. Other possible inspirations for the theme include a literary crux in Beowulf in the shape of the character Scyld Scefing. He arrives in the world as a baby in a boat filled with gifts, and he departs from it in a ship-burial, with the odd feature that the ship is not set on fire, as in the typical Viking ritual. The scholar Tom Shippey suggests that Tolkien may have felt that Scyld is being sent back to the gods across the Western sea via a kind of Straight Road, and that Tolkien perhaps created his Valar and their home Valinor to explain that gap in Beowulf. His poem "A Walking Song", which occurs in different versions at the start and end of The Lord of the Rings, also alludes to the theme.
In the Second Age of Middle-earth, the godlike Valar give the island of Númenor, in the Great Sea to the West of Middle-earth, to the three loyal houses of Men who had aided the Elves in the war against Morgoth. Through the favour of the Valar, the Dúnedain were granted wisdom, power and longer life, beyond that of other Men. The isle of Númenor lay closer to the Valar's earthly paradise of Valinor, on the continent of Aman, than to Middle-earth. The fall of Númenor came about through the influence of Sauron, the chief servant of the fallen Vala Melkor, who wished to conquer Middle-earth.
The Númenóreans took Sauron prisoner. He quickly enthralled their king, Ar-Pharazôn, urging him to seek the immortality that the Valar had apparently denied him. Sauron persuaded them to wage war against the Valar to seize the immortality denied them. Ar-Pharazôn raised the mightiest army and fleet Númenor had ever seen, and sailed to Valinor. The Valar called on the creator, Ilúvatar, for help. When Ar-Pharazôn landed, Ilúvatar destroyed his forces and sent a great wave to submerge Númenor, killing all but those Númenóreans, led by Elendil, who had remained loyal to the Valar, and who escaped to Middle-earth. The world was remade, and Aman was removed beyond the Uttermost West, so that Men could not sail there to threaten it.
The Elves, however, can still sail into the "Uttermost West", on what to Men is the Lost Road to Valinor; Cirdan the Shipwright, at the Grey Havens of Lindon, still builds ships in the Third Age for Elves who wish to leave Middle-earth. Sauron's physical form was destroyed.
Tolkien wrote "The Fall of Númenor" in 1936. After the island had been drowned and the world remade, the loyal Númenóreans retained a memory of the Old Straight Road, and some tried to build ships that could "rise above the waters of the world and hold to the imagined seas." The "old line of the world" lingered like
a plain of air, or ... a straight vision that bends not to the hidden curving of the earth, or to a level bridge that rises imperceptibly but surely above the heavy air of earth. And of old many of the Númenóreans could see or half see the paths of the True West, ... [able perhaps to make out] the peaks of Taniquetil at the end of the straight road, high above the world.
Tolkien made two attempts at a time travel novel, both remaining unfinished: first in the 1936 The Lost Road, and then in 1945 The Notion Club Papers. In both of them, he provides a frame story in which a father-and-son pair of modern Englishmen visit past times in dreams, successively going further back until they reach Númenor and discover the story of the Lost Road. In each case, one of the time travellers has a name which means "Elf-friend", tying him directly to the loyal Númenórean Elendil, whose name has the same meaning in the classical Elf-language, Quenya.
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Old Straight Road AI simulator
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Old Straight Road
The Old Straight Road, the Straight Road, the Lost Road, or the Lost Straight Road, is J. R. R. Tolkien's conception, in his fantasy world of Arda, that his Elves are able to sail to the earthly paradise of Valinor, realm of the godlike Valar. The tale is mentioned in The Silmarillion and in The Lord of the Rings, and documented in The Lost Road and Other Writings. The Elves are immortal, but may grow weary of the world, and then sail across the Great Sea to reach Valinor. The men of Númenor are persuaded by Sauron, servant of the first Dark Lord Melkor, to attack Valinor to get the immortality they feel should be theirs. The Valar ask for help from the creator, Eru Ilúvatar. He destroys Númenor and its army, in the process reshaping Arda into a sphere, and separating it and its continent of Middle-earth from Valinor so that men can no longer reach it. Elves can still set sail from the shores of Middle-earth in ships, bound for Valinor: they sail into the Uttermost West, following the Old Straight Road.
Scholars have noted the importance of the theme to Tolkien, as he revisited it repeatedly. His early mention of the Straight Road as being a level bridge recalls Bifröst, the bridge between the earthly Midgard and the gods' home of Asgard in Norse mythology. Other possible inspirations for the theme include a literary crux in Beowulf in the shape of the character Scyld Scefing. He arrives in the world as a baby in a boat filled with gifts, and he departs from it in a ship-burial, with the odd feature that the ship is not set on fire, as in the typical Viking ritual. The scholar Tom Shippey suggests that Tolkien may have felt that Scyld is being sent back to the gods across the Western sea via a kind of Straight Road, and that Tolkien perhaps created his Valar and their home Valinor to explain that gap in Beowulf. His poem "A Walking Song", which occurs in different versions at the start and end of The Lord of the Rings, also alludes to the theme.
In the Second Age of Middle-earth, the godlike Valar give the island of Númenor, in the Great Sea to the West of Middle-earth, to the three loyal houses of Men who had aided the Elves in the war against Morgoth. Through the favour of the Valar, the Dúnedain were granted wisdom, power and longer life, beyond that of other Men. The isle of Númenor lay closer to the Valar's earthly paradise of Valinor, on the continent of Aman, than to Middle-earth. The fall of Númenor came about through the influence of Sauron, the chief servant of the fallen Vala Melkor, who wished to conquer Middle-earth.
The Númenóreans took Sauron prisoner. He quickly enthralled their king, Ar-Pharazôn, urging him to seek the immortality that the Valar had apparently denied him. Sauron persuaded them to wage war against the Valar to seize the immortality denied them. Ar-Pharazôn raised the mightiest army and fleet Númenor had ever seen, and sailed to Valinor. The Valar called on the creator, Ilúvatar, for help. When Ar-Pharazôn landed, Ilúvatar destroyed his forces and sent a great wave to submerge Númenor, killing all but those Númenóreans, led by Elendil, who had remained loyal to the Valar, and who escaped to Middle-earth. The world was remade, and Aman was removed beyond the Uttermost West, so that Men could not sail there to threaten it.
The Elves, however, can still sail into the "Uttermost West", on what to Men is the Lost Road to Valinor; Cirdan the Shipwright, at the Grey Havens of Lindon, still builds ships in the Third Age for Elves who wish to leave Middle-earth. Sauron's physical form was destroyed.
Tolkien wrote "The Fall of Númenor" in 1936. After the island had been drowned and the world remade, the loyal Númenóreans retained a memory of the Old Straight Road, and some tried to build ships that could "rise above the waters of the world and hold to the imagined seas." The "old line of the world" lingered like
a plain of air, or ... a straight vision that bends not to the hidden curving of the earth, or to a level bridge that rises imperceptibly but surely above the heavy air of earth. And of old many of the Númenóreans could see or half see the paths of the True West, ... [able perhaps to make out] the peaks of Taniquetil at the end of the straight road, high above the world.
Tolkien made two attempts at a time travel novel, both remaining unfinished: first in the 1936 The Lost Road, and then in 1945 The Notion Club Papers. In both of them, he provides a frame story in which a father-and-son pair of modern Englishmen visit past times in dreams, successively going further back until they reach Númenor and discover the story of the Lost Road. In each case, one of the time travellers has a name which means "Elf-friend", tying him directly to the loyal Númenórean Elendil, whose name has the same meaning in the classical Elf-language, Quenya.