So, Janice asked me a question I cdn't answer. In TotR Orcs occasionally refer to other orcs as having identification numbers. She asks: Who keeps track of the enormous bureaucracy this wd generate?
I'm rereading The Lord Of The Rings for the first time in years and I have questions! John is absolutely no help.
In Book 6 Chapter 2 during a dust-up a soldier orc threatens to report a tracker orc. The tracker demands to know to whom he'll be reported and the soldier responds, "I'll give your name and number to the Nazgûl." What is this number? Who assigns it? What is it used for? Is there a Mordor Department of Orc Relations? Is there a separate Mordor Department of Human Relations for the easterlings? Do they share office space? I have so many questions.
There's a hint sharing something of the same attitude in Tolkien's anger in his comments to the Zimmerman script at the rooms in the inn at Bree having been assigned room numbers.
--John R.
For me, this raises the question: who numbered the Gamgee's hobbit-hole at 'Number 3 Bagshot Row'? Did the Hobbiton post-office enforce unique addresses?
ReplyDeleteI assumed that was pure practicality by the hobbits themselves, IIRC, Bagshot Row had 4 hobbit holes, so numbering them to tell which was which made sense and could have been a purely local thing. Bag End isn't numbered, after all.
DeleteThere wouldn't have to be an enormous bureaucracy, would there? I can imagine an Orc captain with, say, 50 soldiers. At muster they call out their presence in numerical (not alphabetical) order. This could be important given the quarrelsomeness of Orcs, compelling them to follow this discipline. One could imagine an Orc captain, in turn, commanding an enumerated company, and reporting to a higher-order field commander accordingly. Would things need to go beyond this level?
ReplyDeleteDale Nelson
At boot camp in the Corps each recruit is given a number that is unique to his specific platoon. I recall I was #52 (yeah, I remember over 30 years later). I was 52 because of my last name, I'm certain #1 had a last name starting with an A. Since it is a very pragmatic way of organizing men, I imagine Tolkien saw the same or a similar system in use in his own military service. It possibly goes as far back as the ancient Greeks, where you might have a # according to your file or even your lochos, corresponding to where you stood in a phalanx. The legions had a similar system. So it isn't particularly anachronistic.
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