Nine Rings for Mortal Men - powers, history and lore

sauron made nine rings of power for mortal men and the men who wore them became the nazgul we know that the one ring and the three elven rings had specific powers but what about the nine what powers do they have hi everyone this is robert welcome to in deep geek this video is brought to you by my fantastic patreon community if you want more videos on jrr tolkien and the lord of the rings as well as other great fantasy and science fiction like a song of ice and fire and the witcher then please do click on the subscribe button in the bottom right of your screen and the bell icon we know the rhyme of course of there being nine rings for mortal men doomed to die and we understand that they were given to the men who became the nine ringwraiths but are they really just generic magic rings the three elven rings all have names and specific powers i did a video on that elsewhere in this playlist if you're interested but what about the nine what do we actually know about these hugely powerful magic items and they are hugely powerful the nazgul are feared across the land because of the power of the rings and what do we know about the people they were given to let's start by recapping on the history sauron devised his cunning plan to create rings of power that would ultimately be under his control about 1200 years into the second age of middle earth he disguised himself and ingratiated himself with calibrimbor their elven craftsman and over many years literally about three centuries they crafted sixteen rings of power the seven that ended up with the dwarves and the nine we're talking about here that ended up with humans after he'd forged them with calebrimbor he headed back to mordor to forge the one mastering while calebrimbor forged the three that ended up with the elves this was when saron's plans started to go wrong the elves realized what was going on and hid the three from him sauron sensing the ruse was over launched an attack on aregyon he succeeded and captured the 16 rings that were there and set about distributing them i'll talk about the seven he gave to the dwarves another time but the long and short of it is that sometime around the year 1700 of the second age things moved very slowly by today's standards saron had the nine rings in his possession the silmarillion picks up the story about what happened to the nine to men he gave nine for men proved in this matter as in others the readiest to do his will and all those rings that he governed he perverted the more easily since he had a part in their making and they were accursed and they betrayed in the end all those that used them this was of course sauron's plan he kept the one ring for himself and through that controlled those who used the other rings but who were they these nine humans the short answer is that we don't know exactly if you dig through the various collections of tolkien's notes and unpublished works collected and edited by christopher tolkien we can find some hints though the leader of the nazgul and most powerful was the witch king of angmar the angmar part of his title is a reference to where he ruled in the early part of the third age rather than where he came from though however he probably was one of the three great lords of numenor that were tempted into accepting rings of power we will surely meet these three in the upcoming amazon tv show which will be focusing on numenor and the second age i'll talk about that in another video we know the name and place of origin of one of the others kamul the easterling he rose to be second in command of the nine as for the other five we simply don't know it makes sense that they were spread geographically around middle-earth sauron's plan was to conquer all the peoples of middle-earth not just a few corners of it and as for what positions they all held when they received the rings again we don't know rather than that the new minorians were great lords but it makes sense for sauron to pick the most powerful people he could the rings of power seem to multiply the existing power of their holders hence hobbits being relatively resistant to the one ring's power and gandalf and galadriel daring not to even touch it so these will have been lords kings magic users and the like those who have power and want more finally as an aside we shouldn't rule out that one or more of them may have been female as a semi-canon source iron crown enterprise's middle-earth role-playing game had one of the ring wraiths as being female and that was cleared by the tolkien estate their general rule seems to be that as long as a semi-official plot or character innovation doesn't contradict anything tolkien wrote then it's within the realms of possibility even if it's never actually canon so the nine rings were given to nine powerful humans in various places in middle-earth including three in numenor and at least one to the easterlings the silmarillion picks up the story again those who used the nine rings became mighty in their day kings sorcerers and warriors of old they obtained glory and great wealth yet it turned to their undoing they had as it seemed unending life yet life became unendurable to them they could walk if they would unseen by all eyes in this world beneath the sun and they could see things in worlds invisible to mortal men but too often they beheld only the phantoms and delusions of sauron and one by one sooner or later according to their native strength and to the good or evil of their wills in the beginning they fell under the thraldom of the ring that they bore and under the dominion of the one which was sauron's and they became forever invisible safe to him that wore the ruling ring and they entered into the realm of shadows so whoever these nine were when they received the rings they became mighty rulers magic users and conquerors the power of the rings increased their own powers and ambitions and abilities in addition the ring could turn them invisible and allow them to see things on the ethereal plane in their day they must have been some of the most powerful people in the whole world and most people probably didn't know the source of their power and their natural lifespans were extended so their reign and rule would have been long until slowly they descended into the wraiths we know we are told that the nazgul appeared in the year 2551 of the second age so they could each have ruled for centuries as humans falling under the power of sauron intriguingly we have no physical description of the rings themselves and not much clarity about whether the nazgul even still wore them as wraiths or whether sauron kept them in mordor frodo certainly doesn't seem to see the wraiths wearing rings during his encounter with them at weathertop and there are contradicting reports in the lord of the rings but if we are to imagine them we should probably think of something closer to the three elven rings than the one ring which was plain at rivendell gandalf refers to the nine seven and three rings as each having their proper gem this does open up the possibility that each of the nine like each of the bearers of the nine had different powers the three elven rings did for example might the nine rings have all had powers of invisibility and long life but each individually have had powers suited to the individual one in a particular kind of magic another in control over others and so on certainly the witch king himself seems to have particular magic powers and strengths that the others do not but we'll pick up on that in a video focusing on him later the point about these rings though is that this was what sauron's plan was how it was supposed to work the three elven rings escaped the taint of his personal involvement in their forging the seven dwarven lords proved more resistant to the rings powers than anticipated but the nine rings this was what sauron intended if we're looking for a distilled version of sauron's plan this is it humans were more susceptible to a lust for power than elves or dwarves and so ultimately they came under its control more easily for a long time they must have thought that they were in control but once they realized it was too late and then sauron could send them forth to take control of lands across middle-earth the tragedy of the nine rings is that it wasn't sauron forcibly taking control of the ring holders it was them and their desire for power that led to their own end if you'd like to see more videos on the world of jrr tolkien and the lord of the rings please click on the link to the playlist on the left of your screen or if you'd like to support this channel or get access to some content i produced just from my patrons please click on the link to my patreon page on the right of the screen thanks for watching that's all for this time and i'll see you again soon

Channel: In Deep Geek

Views: 160,653

Rating: 4.954411 out of 5

Keywords: in deep geek, deep geek, lord of the rings, the lord of the rings, tolkien, middle earth, history, lore, history and lore, ringwraiths, nazgul, black riders, nine rings for the mortal man, nine rings for mortal man, nine rings for mortal men, doomed to die, 9 rings, 9 rings for the mortal man, 9 rings for mortal men, power, powers, explained

Id: NfrS0WAnUcw

Length: 9min 40sec (580 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 17 2020