#i Love this

aamuusva

Finrod and snowy landscape inspired by Ukrainian artist Stepan Kolesnikoff 

aragornsrockcollection

If we consider that Glamdring was made for Turgon… who is in the running for Tallest Elf, a title with steep competition that must put him at 8ft+… well, I’m not a weapon expert, but Glamdring must be long as hell?

And Gandalf is tall… but we’re never told that he in his Istari form is freakishly tall amongst men.

So I kind of wonder… was it a shortsword for Turgon, or does Gandalf wielding it just look slightly comical?

Anime style huge sword on an old man.

golwenlothlindel

[Speculation based solely on LotR and historical evidence] Well, there is a problem with making your swords extra long because you're tall: which is that they would also weigh more. But, making your sword as long as possible does have the advantage of letting you hit your enemy before he hits you. This would make designing a sword for someone like Turgon an interesting challenge. Part of the trouble here is that men over the height of six feet rarely used swords historically: so there actually aren't very many examples of oversized swords. If you have the height to take advantage of a battleaxe, giant fuck-off mace, or massive club, why wouldn't you? The ones that do exist, I must point out, don't look like cartoon swords because they are merely long rather than being both too long and too wide. They actually tend to look very delicate, because they are longer and skinnier than is typical for their design. Think a sport epée (which are in fact deliberately too long in order to make hits less likely) rather than anime sword. Turgon's armorers would have two options for dealing with this problem of weight versus reach:

1) make the blade a standard length, but put it on a longer handle. Handles, being made of wood, aren't as heavy. This is how you get something like the naginata, or the Chinese dao swords. The downside of these is that they require two hands despite their low weight.

2) make the blade and edge out of different materials. The edge of a sword has to be made of a certain type of steel: otherwise it won't stay sharp. However, the rest of the blade can be made from a different alloy: perhaps involving something like titanium. In the real Middle Ages they couldn't melt titanium, but we can handwave that with Songs of Power.

I must point out here that the movie's depiction of Glamdring as a medieval longsword is wildly inaccurate to the text anyway. Tolkien repeatedly uses Byzantine and Japanese motifs in his depiction of Gondolin. As it happens the Byzantines and Japanese both converged on using single-edged sabred longswords (the παραμηριον and katana are more or less the same concept differing only in materials and manufacture), so if Glamdring was made as a longsword it would definitely be single-edged, and it would be curved rather than straight (that's what distinguishes a sabre). The Byzantines used a double-edged shortsword (spatha), the Japanese made their shortswords single-edged (wakazashi) but that was mostly because of lacking good steel. Since Gondolin doesn't seem to have a shortage of good steel, they would likely use a type of spatha. Something to keep in mind though is that spatha-type swords are intended for stabbing more than slashing, so they really need to be used with either a main hand sword or a shield. [end of speculation based solely on LotR content and history]

[Silmarillion-based speculation] Now, the way the Silmarillion describes the Nirnaeth makes it sound like Turgon is leading his infantry. His infantry which is specifically described as a "phalanx", which is the only use of that word in the entire Legendarium. This is one of those Byzantine motifs. So, let's equip Turgon as a σκυτατος (skoutatos) and then modify his kit for a commander. He wears: a padded shirt and skirt, a mail hauberk, and a lammellar cuirass, with a surcote or jupon (you know those things that video games insist on calling "tabards"), and a helmet of course. He carries: a longspear, a single-edged longsword, a double-edged shortsword, and an oval or kite-shaped shield.

Now, as a commander, Turgon likely dispenses with the spear and shield most of the time (i.e. he would probably have them in a saddlebag or being carried by a squire, so he wouldn't bother naming these weapons). He's smart enough to realize that commanding from the back ranks of the phalanx is more effective (you can see the entire formation), and those guys aren't carrying spears and shields (they wouldn't do anything). So, Turgon's typical loadout is a shitload of armor and two swords. This means he's not using a naginata-like weapon. So we could give him an oversized katana and σπαθιον (spathion) made principally from a lightweight alloy with standard weapons-grade steel used only for the edges.

As it happens, there is another sword in the Legendarium said to be Turgon's: Hadhafang. Though to be fair this is only mentioned in the Etymologies, which aren't necessarily compatible with Silmarillion-canon. Hadhafang means "throng-cleaver", and Glamdring means "cold shout". So, it's a pretty safe guess actually that Hadhafang was the longsword and Glamdring was the shortsword. So yes, the goblins are totally shitting themselves over Turgon's offhand sword (at least in one version of the Legendarium). [end of Silmarillion-based speculation]

guerrillatech

yeahiwasintheshit

neofolk-telvanni-wizard

What a nice Celebrimbanner you got there