The Revived Tolkien Trivia

Wingless birds...Aha!

Fifteen birds in five fir-trees,
their feathers were fanned in a fiery breeze!
But, funny little birds, they had no wings!
O what shall we do with the funny little things?
Roast 'em alive, or stew them in a pot; fry them, boil them and eat them hot?
Hobbit, Ch VI, Out of the Frying-Pan, Into the Fire.

Gandalf, Bilbo and thirteen dwarves, treed by the Wargs, and being taunted by Goblins.
 
Righty-ho.

You'd find hemlock, wood-parsley, fire-weed, rough grass and thistles, all together here; but where? Location will do, plus the missing plant.
 
The only mention of hemlock I recall is in the poem about Beren and Luthien that Strider recites at Weathertop, but I can't find the other plants there, nor in the bit of the Silmarillion dealing with B&L.

We seem to be in a woodland glade or edge, in summer or early autumn, and I'm guessing the "missing plant" is a giveaway as to the location. Any of that wide of the mark?

ETA: doh! I had a delayed reaction to typing "woodland glade" -- it's the glade in the Old Forest, and the missing plant is nettles.
 
Yep, it's the Bonfire Glade, where the trees have never grown back over the area where the Bucklanders burned the wood from the clearance of the strip by the High Hay.

A slightly muffled wooden bell to the Smeerp - and it's his go.
 
Hollin in the "mannish" name for Eregion, the land west of the Misty Mountains from Rivendell in the north down to at least the gates of Moria, and I think, bounded on the west by the Loudwater. Does Hollin mean holly?

But I can't see any forest to expand within it.

If Eregion went further west, I suppose it could include the Old Forest and the Chetwood next to Bree.
 
Great trivia....

I woke up this morning to post that I did not have a clue. I was going to post about the Mapping Fiction exhibit I saw at The Huntington Library last spring. I was wondering if @HareBrain 's question dealt with original manuscript maps that were in pencil that Tolkien copie over in ink or some such.

Then on a lark, I looked the maps in The Hobbit. I'd not really looked at these maps in forty years. I'd memorized the maps from the trilogy and from The Silmarillion thirty-five years ago... so I figured The Hobbit's maps were beneath my level of understanding. But @HareBrain 's trivia was staring me right in the face.... oh, it's a tricksy bit of trivia to be sure.

@farntfar was on the right track with Hollin.

If you look at Bilbo's map, not Thror's, you'll see the double line on the west side to demark the civilized lands from Wilderland. But the map maker did not allow enough room to fit Hobbiton completely to the left of the line.

It reads Hobbitolln.

Then if you look at the map from The Fellowship of the Ring.... and imaginatively impose that double line from Bilbo's map upon it..... it could easily separate the n in Hollin.

Hollilln.

Just like on Bilbo's map... the n in an H place is cut off from the rest of the word. The result is the word Holli.... or Holly.

Well, this is my explanation.

The Hobbit.jpg


TLotR2.jpeg
 
Very inventive, @Boaz. Alas, wrong.

Hollin is relevant, though. So is the focus on maps and the names on them. (A clue: "expand" in the question might mean "lengthen".)
 
Back to the drawing board.

OK, so Hollin is also called Eregion. My new thought process will be that Eregion is related to Region, the largest of the forests that made up the realm of Doriath.

I could just start guessing, Neldoreth, Nan Elmoth, Fangorn, Lothlorien, but I don’t know why the answer could be correct. I don’t understand the answer even if I could blindly guess it. Someone else is gonna have to figure this one out.
 
HareBrain said:
What forest could you expand and end up with only holly?
Click to expand...
HareBrain said:
Hollin is relevant, though. So is the focus on maps and the names on them. (A clue: "expand" in the question might mean "lengthen".)
Click to expand...

Boaz said:
OK, so Hollin is also called Eregion. My new thought process will be that Eregion is related to Region, the largest of the forests that made up the realm of Doriath.

I could just start guessing, Neldoreth, Nan Elmoth, Fangorn, Lothlorien, but I don’t know why the answer could be correct. I don’t understand the answer even if I could blindly guess it. Someone else is gonna have to figure this one out.
Click to expand...

You had the answer! Region! What forest can you expand or lengthen to end up with only holly? You expand/lengthen Region by adding an E and you get Eregion, which means land of holly (and is also called Hollin to boot).

All I wanted was for someone to link the two names, which I guess you've done, so over to you.
 
Who is the first person declared to be an 'Elf-friend' by an Elf during the Hobbits' Third Age narratives?

No takers? Let me say that the person in question was quickly unfriended by another group.
 
Well, it seems that I've once again stolen the impetus from this thread. Funny enough, the character in question gained elven admiration for stealing.
 
Sorry Boaz, I haven't got round to really hunting for this one yet, but i will (if no one gets there first).
 
@HareBrain I'm not looking to give a guilt trip... I'm always concerned that I've derailed the thread with poor trivia.
 
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