War in Middle-earth - The War of the Elves and Sauron

[@DarthGandalfYT]

Hey everyone. I have to point out that you might hear the sounds of birds in the background during this video, especially during the latter half. I live in a rainforest, so there's a lot of wildlife around, and unfortunately, I can't command them to be quiet when I record. I can reduce the noise to a certain extent, but doing it too much effects the overall quality of the audio. So sorry for the birds, I hope they don't annoy you as much as they annoyed me.

[@vixendoe2545]

Never apologize for the sounds of nature in your vids. They lend a nice ambiance especially when speaking of the Elves.

[@shadowcloudspher]

@Darth Gandalf would you be willing to do a interview with History Of Middle Earth's channel on a podcast?

[@Morgoth1889]

Random question I had why did sauron not take the form of a balrog after all balrogs where just maier like sauron so why did they become fire demons while sauron became black armour

[@johnt.inscrutable1545]

I love birds.

[@AJ0223]

Ex-pat?

[@vixendoe2545]

Really appreciate these Elvish histories. So many people seem to have the idea that the Elves had pretty much turned their backs on Middle Earth and didn't take any part in the War of the Ring.

[@andreasderycke42]

For the War of the Ring, that's kinda true tho. Only Legolas, Elrohir and Elladan fought in it of the elves

[@scerkann3966]

​@@andreasderycke42lothlorien, Thrarnduils elves fought in the war

[@andreasderycke42]

@@scerkann3966 They did not. The only thing they did in the War of the Ring taking the Fellowship captive, which I don’t really count as military participation in the War of the Ring.

[@scerkann3966]

@@andreasderycke42 lothlorien got attacked by dol guldur 3 times and mirkwood got attacked once.. so they most probably absorbed most of the forces from the 2nd seat of power

[@scerkann3966]

@@andreasderycke42 Have you just watched the movies?

[@EluThingol1919]

You’re a legend. Helped me massively in my understanding of the Silmarillion. Cheers!

[@bladerunner951]

It seems in this video that Sauron actually accompanied his army during this war. That's kinda interesting. For one thing it is a bit of a deviation from Morgoth's leadership style, mostly remaining in Angband, and secondly, it's also a stark contrast to how Sauron would also mostly stay behind in Barad-Dur in his later years.

[@michelmorio8026]

I don‘t think he was all the time around, or his army wouldn‘t have suffered that much under the „small“ attacks of Celeborn, Elrond and the Dwarves... but he was most certainly there when they took Ost-in-Edhil and tortured Celebrimbor!

[@concept5631]

He was a lot more confident after creating the One Ring. After he lost it he became way more cautious.

[@ThePalaeontologist]

_Rule Britannia_ also nice summary, totally agree, it's so under-appreciated, the War of the Elves and Sauron.

[@khamulthewack4732]

I know all of this by heart and I watch it anyways. Love you're stuff my guy. Keeps things nice and condensed and still informative. Keep it up. Cheers

[@chefitaly7339]

Me too lol I can never get enough

[@Imperialistic82]

I wonder what kind of army Sauron used in this war. Orcs, haradrim and easterlings are certain. He probably had hundreds of trolls, probably protected by dark clouds from his magic. His generals were orcs with Sauron himself joining the battle directly. I can see him having black armor and a helmet without a face cover since he still has a beautiful appearance.

[@MrTrakiiski]

And I imagine Ost-in-Edhil and the whole episode somehow like Gondolin and its Fall - perfect Noldor settelment destroyed by the forces of evil, even though the elves were superbly equiped smiths and lots of them trained from the battles of the First age. There are 3d images in the internet of elves in shiny armor with warhammers

[@specialnewb9821]

From material released after this video, it's likely Sauron uses the powerful semi-independant eastern orcs.

[@sageofcaledor8188]

Great video! This is one of my favorites so far

[@tominiowa2513]

The dwarves would have had to open the West-gate of Moria in T.A. 2994 for Óin to be taken by The Watcher in the Water, while the Fellowship arrived at the West-gate in T.A. 3019.

[@OrchestrationOnline]

10:41 "...and these doors would not be opened until the Fellowship arrived thousands of years later." That can't be so, because we hear from Gandalf that he opened them with a simple thrust of his hands from the other side when he first passed through Moria years before. Also, surely the Dwarves under Balin also used that gate, as the Watcher in the Water kills Oin? We don't really know if it might also have been used by many others before then either; Orcs or even Dwarves fleeing westward from the Balrog. Remember, Khazad-Dûm was inhabited for quite a while past the Second Age.

[@SenseiWu476]

They were only opened from the inside

[@OrchestrationOnline]

@@SenseiWu476 By Gandalf in his first journey, you mean. But they were easily opened from the outside using the password. We don't know how many others might have come and gone, using the password to get in. Even an Orc could have done it. Most probably it was used many times.

[@zackf3688]

Sauron must have had overwhelming numbers as Elves are generally more than a match for orcs.

[@Not-Ap]

Perhaps you could a video on eregion in the future. Of course the rings of power were forged there but many other great artifacts were as well. Personally I would love to know more about this little noldorin kingdom and it's other minor settlements besides Ost-in-Edhil. It was the last of the petty noldorin realms in middle earth with nothing else like it existing afterward. Rivendell being more of city state and Lothlorien being more sindarin/nandorin.

[@MrTrakiiski]

I am also interested of what they might have been creating there, because nothing other than the rings are mentioned....and what about the lesser rings?

[@KertaDrake]

Sauron: "And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling kids!"

[@randomletterhead6681]

Awsome dude,love when you do history vids on eleves. It would be cool if you could do more vids on the easterlings and black numenoreans.history or statistics. Also maybe in the future some alternate history vids.

[@michelmorio8026]

If there was just more information... but there simply isn‘t... Tolkien just died too early and a lot of what isn‘t LotR and Hobbit is put together from notes and early scripts by his son Christopher, which is also why there are so many contradicting informations over several books...

[@thorshammer7883]

Can you do a video about the population of Middle Earth being way too small for its time since for example when the Roman Empire was ruling Europe at the height of its power they had around 60 million citizens and 450,000 soldiers at it's peak military strength? While the way the population density of the men, elves, and dwarves combines in middle earth suggest they are only in about a few million or maybe dozen million in population. And Middle Earth is huge it has more land mass then Europe and far more open terrain for kingdoms to settle and increase in population growth. So how come in the 3,000 - 6,000 years since Morgoth's defeat does it seem the population is always stagnant? I mean Sauron only appears a few times and rarely do the Orcs create a huge threatening army and the Great Plauge that hit Middle Earth and especially Gondor only killed about a million or so people and never came back after a year. And Sauron wouldn't of appeared until several centuries after the Great Plauge was over so I think Gondor would of easily recovered from such a pandemic after a few decades realistically and the Elves were never affected by the Great Plauge so they were quite fine. What are your thoughts on why Middle Earth's population is so stagnant to the point it allowed Mordor to have a military force that rivaled the Roman Empire's to be a continental threat to all kingdoms? I would of realistically expected the population of Middle Earth to have been around 80 million or a 100 million.

[@hazzmati]

Well you're drawing a false comparison. You're comparing the roman during its glory days with full might and resources with middle a middle earth that has fallen on bad times at the end of the 3rd age. The roman empire was in a similar situation during the 14th and 15th century. If you go back in middle earth history you would have had the powerful kingdoms of Gondor and Arnor and even further back you had the superpower that was Numenor.

[@thorshammer7883]

@@hazzmati Uhh I was talking about the Roman Empire NOT the Holy Roman Empire there's a massive difference between the two empires especially time period.

[@thorshammer7883]

@@hazzmati And second off I was also talking about how the plauges like the Great Plauge wouldn't have been so devasting to Middle Earth and Gondor should of recovered after a few decades because it only killed about a million people which pretty small compared to the Black Death in real life.

[@michelmorio8026]

Thor's Hammer first of all, it‘s a FANTASY World... so real world comparisons don‘t fit into a world where the continents are changed by the influence of basically (semi-)gods and their warfare! It seems especially elves and dwarves aren‘t that reproductive... I mean we have noble (is that the right term concerning elves and dwarves 😅) families like Elrond‘s house, living over 6000 years with only 1, ONE generation (Elladan, Elrohir, Arwen) born in that timeframe... Galadriel and Celeborn are even older and from their perspective, it‘s just two generations with their daughter and the 3 named above grandchildren! Then there are the examples of Gil-Galad and Cirdan that didn‘t even bother to marry/have a relationship in thousands of years 🤷🏻‍♂️ You could call the elves quite lazy in reproduction... some of them should have dozens to hundreds of children, 1000‘s of grandchildren and so on With dwarves it‘s even more tricky! If you go through some dwarven family trees, daughters are quite rarely, as are families of more then 3 children (there are often just 1-2, and mostly sons) and in comparison to the elves, they don‘t live for ages, „just“ what, around 300 years?!? And IF they go to war, they have often quite heavy losses due to their fighting style without that much armed soldiers... do here we have a mixture of quite the mortality rate and little reproduction For humans it is quite strange I have to admit! It seems Numenor had more Dunedain inhabitants as north-Western Middle-earth has population overall... but then again, it‘s a fantasy world of an author... the circumstances have to fit his story/narrative... you could also argue that in over 6500 years of Second and Third Age, there was basically no technological progress! Quite the contrary, First Age stuff of Gondolin is FAR superior to basically EVERYTHING, chainmail (well, Mithril is cheating 😅) still seems to be the best armor humans and elven have, out of perhaps some dwarven stuff from the Iron Hills 🤷🏻‍♂️ In comparison to our world that would mean ancient Egypt that just started to build pyramids (roughly 4000 bc) would be higher technically developed then we are nowadays, 6000 years later Then you have to take into account that our war‘s certainly didn‘t have First that high numbers of participants like in Lord of the Rings, nor were casualties that high... most armies in our history, especially the ancient world and medieval, weren‘t obliterated/devastated as they often are in these stories! It‘s almost every time total warfare in Middle-earth whereas in our world, war was either a tool of politics, to enlarge your territory, gain a city, to plunder or just to have better chances in negotiations! Over out history, there were seldom wars like the Thirty years War, the Seven years war or WW I and WW II that devastated whole nations and influenced while continents... we basically just had these since the 17th century

[@thorshammer7883]

@@michelmorio8026 But that doesn't explain the population size for humans even for the Roman Empire whose technology is on par with Gondor had around 60 million civilians living in their borders and they were on constant warfare and famine.

[@parastwfarhan4832]

thanks very good👍

[@HagalSkrymir999]

No way the Dwarves of Khazad Dum had only 5000 men at Khazad Dum. At this point Durins Folk was still vastly powerful. Khazad Dum had seen no major wars and calamities in the First Age. At the start of the Second Age they were bolstered by populations of Belegost and Nogrod who were probably not small either. I'd say at this point the army of Khazad Dum alone is probably 20 000 strong. And that is probably low balling it if you think even the Elves of Lindon have an army of 30 000.

[@goshlike76]

How about a video about Eregion?

[@ScottyThompson-t5e]

I'm curious to know how many years apart is the wars of elves and sauron and the war of the Last alliance of elves and Men ?

[@ryancarter1080]

wonder where the ents were as they lived in the forest of eriador and I would have expected them to object to the mass destruction of their forest by the forces of sauron and later the numenoreans. while I can accept they didn't have the numbers to fight them in direct battle they could have fought a gureilla campaign attacking patrols and raiding parties. Cause remember they still have the entwives at this point so there were more of them plus they could replenish their losses, so some casulties could be sustained

[@andrewskerritt667]

Just wondering what your source was for temporary elvish settlements near to/on Lake Evendim

[@DarthGandalfYT]

"When they entered that region there were many Noldor in their following, together with Grey-elves and Green-elves; and for a while they dwelt in the country about Lake Nenuial (Evendim, north of the Shire)." From Concerning Galadriel and Celeborn, Unfinished Tales.

[@sayagarapan1686]

Sauron has special eyes

[@ryancarter1080]

Why don't you create a video on the religions of middle-earth or the lack of it.

[@1CASSIODORUS]

The west gate of Moria is not sealed until the Fellowship comes at the end of the Third Age . The realm of Moria continues after Sauron is overthrown - there is no reason to believe that the Longbeards never issued from their west gate ever again .

[@kurtuhlig2553]

The West Gate wasn’t opened again from the outside until the Fellowship.

[@mannnimded8032]

epic

[@trevinhadley9161]

Why didn’t Gil Galad get a ring

[@factanonverba7547]

You forget that galadriel is of the house of fëanor

[@DarthGandalfYT]

Finarfin. Galadriel disliked the Feanorians.

[@factanonverba7547]

@@DarthGandalfYT and I can't believe I forgot that, I cry your pardon, sai.

[@michelmorio8026]

What I always found quite unrealistic in Tolkien‘s stories -> the numbers of the armies and the length of campaigns! There is basically no way armies of the size of 150.000-200.000 can siege a city like Ost-in-Edhil and operate in an area as small as Eregion for what, 2-3 years (1695-1697 SA)?!? They would start to starve themself pretty quick! The same goes for Elrond and his forces! I mean, the land isn‘t that dense populated that you could live from the small folk, which was common in military campaigns back in the day. Same goes for the Last Alliance 1700 years later... they sieged Barad-Dur for 7 years... in the Gorgoroth, which is basically a desert of ashes... I really hope their years of preparation in Imladris, while Anarion defended Gondor alone, consisted more of baking Lembas bread then smithing armor and weapons 😂 for such a big force The siege of Angband over basically the first century of the First Age falls into the same category 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@salez9830]

The numbers you give are not canon. As for siege of Angband and Barad-dur, it was not a problem to get food from nearby, friendly lands.

[@michelmorio8026]

@@salez9830 dude, I’m not claiming these numbers are canon! I just used and talked about the numbers he gave for Sauron‘s forces in the video 😉 Never mind, my argument still stands, the armies given by Tolkien are almost impossible to provide with enough food, especially given the scarce/thin population, and the armies they used! The countryside would be empty/a waste in mere days! They would need hundreds of carriages every day with provisions and food. These are no standing armies, it’s basically called-in farmers, citizens, craftsman regarding the dwarves, elves and men... if they are campaigning for years, who the fuck cares for the harvest? (In feudalism, the lords could not call in the Peasants longer then a couple of months or else, the harvest and therefore survival was endangered) In the Hundred Years war, the Englishmen under Edward III and Henry V were mostly short-handed in numbers in comparison to the French... not alone, cause France had a greater population, but because supplies were hard to get as soon as they left the coast of Normandy and living of the countryside was just an option for several weeks, then everything would be already eaten, burnt or taken by the French! The first and the Third Crusade must have been an absolute nightmare for those who had to care for constant supplies, especially for those Armies that went the route over the Balkans, Constantinople and all through Asia Minor (it is estimated Holy Roman Emperor Frederic I had around 100.000 men with him)

[@salez9830]

@@michelmorio8026 Your arguments don't stand at all. Historically, there are a lot of conficts that last much longer (30-year War, 100 year war, etc.). This confict is similar to those. There are just a few major battles, Sauron isn't fighting all the time, as he's more in dominating business. That's why it takes him years to actually start attacking Lindon - he doesn't fight all the time.

[@salez9830]

Also, it wouldn't be a problem to gather food from rich lands of Eriador and it's subdued people.

[@michelmorio8026]

@@salez9830 first of all, I never said there was constant fighting in these long conflicts! Your examples are spot on for that... you have campaigns that Last for a couple of years and then there are phases of halt, regroup and resupply and fortify for the next phase. The problem is just, how much is Lindon or Eriador actually populated in that timeframe? I would doubt just from the picture we have from the third age, that there live enough humans, elves or whatever species so there is enough food available to supply an army in at least the ten thousands constantly to siege a fortified place for weeks, let alone months! Akkon for example was besieged for almost 2 years by just a few hundred crusaders, but had to be supplied constantly by Genoese and Venetian ships while Saladin also sieged the besieging crusaders so they couldn‘t live from the countryside. Such things were hard enough in real history! Again, I just wanna say Tolkien isn’t the best at portraying such campaigns in a plausible manner! and I know there are plagues and conflicts until the third age... but like you said, we had long conflicts and plagues in history too but actually recovered pretty fast from them in comparison, a few decades till a century, fastened by immigration, whereas in Middle-earth, millennias go by and well, nothing much happens population wise out of the Orcs growing so fast in numbers! The area I live in Europe (Rhineland Palatinate) was hit pretty hard by the Black Death (50-60% of population died) in the 15th century and the atrocities of the 30 years war (75% of population died) and the constant warfare of France and the Holy Roman Empire of German Nations in this area from the 1690‘s to the end of the Napoleonic wars in 1815 with cities like Mainz, Heidelberg, Speyer besieged, sacked and burnt pretty often

[@gumbyshrimp2606]

Too me it seems like there’s too many wars in the third age that are all similar. Sauron invades middle earth and an alliance of elves men and dwarves push him back and defeat him, but wait that already happened before. I feel like numenor’s downfall should have been part of the same event as the war of dwarves and elves.

[@michelmorio8026]

?!? There are just a few Wars, well at least directly against Sauron or his 9... Second Age: 1) Elves vs. Sauron War just post ring smithing (Lindon, Eregion, Khazad-Dum, Lothlorien?; late: Numenor) 2) War of the Last Alliance (Gondor; late: Lindon, Arnor, Imladris, Woodlandrealm, Lothlorien, Khazad-Dum) Third Age: 3) Angmarian Wars (Arthedain, Cardolan; late Lindon, Imladris, Lothlorien?, Gondor) 4) Battle of the five armies (Iron Hills, Woodlandrealm, Dale; late Eagles and Beorn/-ings?) 5) War of the Ring (Rohan, Gondor, Lothlorien, Woodlandrealm, Dale/Erebor) Over a period of 6000+ years, not really that much Besides, in the war of the ring, they don‘t defeat him militarily... they would get beaten over time! Just the fact that the ring got destroyed saved the free peoples ass

[@melkor3496]

;)

[@mrnord4096]

Nice refference to the british Empire at the Second world war

[@adamloverin4125]

Do you mean "three" or "free?" I'm really trying to understand this.

[@SvengelskaBlondie]

15:12 The consequences WILL NEVER BE THE SAME