Middle Earth Ranger Forum

Elleth wrote:Oh.... I really like that second one especially.

The not-quite-Mediterranean art and Irish form *really* reminds me of some of the old "Sea People" proto-Celt vibe I think The Professor was channeling in his later Numenorean writings.

Incredible!

Oh, you're right! It echoes the work in a lot of Minoan and Mycenaen pottery. I've been looking for Egyptian analogues, but that's closer.

This is an illustration of a Gondorian pitcher by Margrethe II of Denmark. Although it's a (I suppose) secondary source, I include it here because the queen was one of the few artists active during his lifetime whose work Tolkien actually liked; her style is somewhat similar to his own, and he liked it so much he gave his approval for her to illustrate the Danish edition of LotR. So we might consider this a somewhat-Tolkien-approved interpretation. It definitely puts me in an early-Mediterranean, (perhaps Cycladic?) style.

Hunh....

Wow.

The large urn looks spot on to some of flower drawings.

COOL!

A new nugget of Numenor I've dug up for y'all to make use of. Some stylized vegetative designs, an elvish-named plant 'Pilinehtar', and a Numenorean-style border. This is plate #45 in Pictures by JRR Tolkien.

Nice, thanks for finding that

Udwin wrote:A new nugget of Numenor I've dug up for y'all to make use of. Some stylized vegetative designs, an elvish-named plant 'Pilinehtar', and a Numenorean-style border. This is plate #45 in Pictures by JRR Tolkien.

I’ve seen these illustrations before. But had no indication they were Numenorean. How do we know they are Numenorean? Is it noted in the text? Also I assume that the pilinehtar is the grass above the label; or the flowering shrub or the vining plant?

Definitely fills in some gaps. Gives more examples of Numenorean interlace and adds a more naturalistic take than the last set. Also shows that Numenorean interlace is more akin to art nouveau interlace than to Celtic or migration era knotwork.


What I’d really like to see: Tolkien sketch of animal interlace as described in “The Lost Road”.

Very interesting to see the similarities between historical artistic styles and the Professor's own sketches. I haven't seen plate #45 before and I'm rather taken by the more naturalistic and "wild" style and by that border at the bottom. It reminds me of Elleth's border earlier in this thread. I'll echo caedmon by asking if that plate is confirmed Númenórean?

Which leads me to wonder how it would have developed through the years until the end of the 3rd Age. As has been pointed out in this thread, typically art styles do not stay very static for long. Pure conjecture as to the evolution of their art is probably the only recourse at this point but the pictures you posted Udwin do seem more Dunedain to me. (For lack of a better term.)

caedmon wrote:I’ve seen these illustrations before. But had no indication they were Numenorean. How do we know they are Numenorean? Is it noted in the text? Also I assume that the pilinehtar is the grass above the label; or the flowering shrub or the vining plant?
Definitely fills in some gaps. Gives more examples of Numenorean interlace and adds a more naturalistic take than the last set. Also shows that Numenorean interlace is more akin to art nouveau interlace than to Celtic or migration era knotwork. What I’d really like to see: Tolkien sketch of animal interlace as described in “The Lost Road”.

Sorry, I misspoke, no indication that they're Numenorean. In the plates they're just listed as 'Floral Designs'. The pilenehtar IS the rush or reedy grass in black. At this point his work is so recognizable for me it's hard to differentiate between what's just doodling and what's a cultural artifact.

Hopping back into this thread because I’m starting some work on a new project, and I’m wondering if I can get a little input. I’m just in the design phase at the moment, and I’m trying to come up with a complete plan before I begin the actual construction, but something that keeps coming to mind is the idea that medieval items were almost never left un-decorated - they embellished EVERYTHING to some degree (this is certainly a broad generalization, but still).

So basically, I would like to make something that is going to involve a number of borders and straps, and I would like to give them *all* some small amount of detail to add to the cultural richness of the item. I’ve seen more and more of the projects on this forum starting to reflect this ideology, and I absolutely love it, so I want to make this consistent with that idea.

That being said, does anyone here have any designs or ideas for designs that might adorn straps and such on the kit of a Dúnedan Ranger of the 3rd age? Simple is fine (probably better), but I want them all to be somewhat complementary.

I'm a fan of the simple nested arcs on caedmon's new mug.

They've got the resonance of old Numenor, but are such a simple pattern a plain homesteader could carve them out on by the fire in an evening.

Hmmmm... True. I do like the apparent ubiquity of arcs like that, so they’ll almost certainly make their way onto this project ins some way.
I’ve also been considering doing some stuff with vines/scrollwork. It has a very nice “Medieval-esque” vibe to it, and I feel like it does have a precedence in the Professor’s sketches.

On some level, I wish we could work up like... a packet of clip-art style designs that we could all share and modify and use for whatever projects we may need. It would be nice to just have a catalogue to choose from rather than trying to reinvent the wheel every time. I may have to start working on a few designs like that in ProCreate.

I used my absolute favorite patterns from this thread on this project last year: https://www.ranger.budgetauthenticity.o ... =35&t=4133

well - I have the .eps files around here somewhere for the band on my cookpot and I think some renderings of a Gondorian rosette and border: if you want to put together a PDF, I'll happily shoot the files to you.

Elleth wrote:well - I have the .eps files around here somewhere for the band on my cookpot and I think some renderings of a Gondorian rosette and border: if you want to put together a PDF, I'll happily shoot the files to you.

That would be awesome, actually! I would love to work up a compilation of various re-useable motifs into a shareable PDF doc, so something like that would be most welcome!

I'm also super interested. I'm making a new cloak, and trying to decide what if anything I want to add to it trim-wise.