Is there a hierarchy to the Rings of Power?

chattingmyth

New Member
Hi Professor Olsen,
I was re-listening to Episode 130 (I watch the episodes first one YT) and I had a thought about the rings of power after you mentioned it was be “better safe than sorry” to have the One Ring destroyed, lest it continue to exist with its primary function to dominate the other rings. I began to wonder whether there was a hierarchy of power among the rings of power. Do we know that the Three are stronger than the Seven? The Seven stronger than the Nine? The Nine than the lesser rings? Do we have any evidence to prove yay or nay?
 
I’d suggest that the question needs better definition.

A hierarchy of power could been defined by strength, or by dominance. These might seem the same at first blush, but while the Three are certainly stronger than the uncounted lesser rings, there’s nothing I’ve seen to suggest that the Three have a power of command over them in the way that the One has over all of the others. This seems to have more to do with design intent than relative power.

That said, based on Gandalf’s descriptions, they seem to fall into three general bands (pardon the pun) of strength:
1. The One Ring
2. The other Great Rings (3, 7, & 9)
3. The lesser rings.
 
I’d suggest that the question needs better definition.

A hierarchy of power could been defined by strength, or by dominance. These might seem the same at first blush, but while the Three are certainly stronger than the uncounted lesser rings, there’s nothing I’ve seen to suggest that the Three have a power of command over them in the way that the One has over all of the others. This seems to have more to do with design intent than relative power.

That said, based on Gandalf’s descriptions, they seem to fall into three general bands (pardon the pun) of strength:
1. The One Ring
2. The other Great Rings (3, 7, & 9)
3. The lesser rings.

Hey Anthony,
You are right, I was not clear enough I guess. I didn’t mean a hierarchy in terms of dominance (although we know that is what the One does), but just in terms of the individual power scaling of the ring sets. I wasn’t sure if there was any information at all to what the Seven did (beyond helping the Dwarves to amass wealth) or Nine do for the kings of Men. If the Three have the power to guard lands — I’m no ring lore expert, though I know each have their attributes and virtues— I wonder if those capabilities make them *stronger* than the others. Or do we simply not have enough evidence?
 
Hey Anthony,
You are right, I was not clear enough I guess. I didn’t mean a hierarchy in terms of dominance (although we know that is what the One does), but just in terms of the individual power scaling of the ring sets. I wasn’t sure if there was any information at all to what the Seven did (beyond helping the Dwarves to amass wealth) or Nine do for the kings of Men. If the Three have the power to guard lands — I’m no ring lore expert, though I know each have their attributes and virtues— I wonder if those capabilities make them *stronger* than the others. Or do we simply not have enough evidence?

A related question is how much of the Nazgul's powers for fear and dominance come from their Rings, and how much from other arcana that we don't have details of.
A data point we have is the Morgul blade. It has a power for both physical and spiritual harm, but does that derive from a Ring of Power, or is it from some ritual (that Aragorn seems to try to divine or counter through his chanting) or other power not explained anywhere.
Another data point is the great ram Grond:
"Great engines crawled across the field; and in the midst was a huge ram, great as a forest-tree a hundred feet in length, swinging on mighty chains. Long had it been forging in the dark smithies of Mordor, and its hideous head, founded of black steel, was shaped in the likeness of a ravening wolf; on it spells of ruin lay. Grond they named it, in memory of the Hammer of the Underworld of old."

Tolkien seems to give us enough information to know the questions to ask, but not enough to answer them definitively.

I don't think I've seen enough evidence to give a meaningful answer, as Luthien does things without a Ring of Power that the Nazgul don't seem able to accomplish with theirs. So the inherent power of the wielder seems to also play a part here.
 
Just spitballing here, but could the numbers of the rings correspond to the numbers of the people they were given to? Three for the dwindling Elves, seven for the reclusive but prosperous Dwarves, nine for the ascendant Men? I don‘t think there’s ever been an official census of Middle Earth, but from context clues I gather that is the relative order of their populations.
 
Originally there were nine of each. And they were all wraiths -- Men, Dwarves, and Elves -- the Elves were not immune. Tolkien just fumbled around in the process of writing the story, deciding it didn't make sense for Elves to be 'wraith-able' for example, and eventually settled on what now seems like this profoundly meaningful canon.
 
Originally there were nine of each. And they were all wraiths -- Men, Dwarves, and Elves -- the Elves were not immune. Tolkien just fumbled around in the process of writing the story, deciding it didn't make sense for Elves to be 'wraith-able' for example, and eventually settled on what now seems like this profoundly meaningful canon.
You seem to be misremembering the details in The Return of the Shadow.

Tolkiengateway.net has a summary of the details:
http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Of_Gollum_and_the_Ring
 
Back
Top