Minas Morgul

Minas Morgul ([ˈminas ˈmorɡul]. Sindarin: Tower of Black Sorcery), also known by its earlier name of Minas Ithil (Sindarin: Tower of the Moon), is a fictional fortified city in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth. Its full name is Minas Ithil in the Morgul Vale, since the city is located in a deep valley of the same name.

Etymology

Minas Ithil was also called the Tower of the Moon, the Tower of the Rising Moon, and the Moon-tower. Minas Morgul was also called the Dead City and the Tower of Sorcery.

Minas Ithil means "Tower of the Moon" and Minas Morgul means "Tower of Black Sorcery." The word minas means "tower." The word ithil is a poetic name for the Moon from sil or thil meaning "shine with white or silver light." The word morgul means "black sorcery." The element mor means "black, dark." The element gûl means "sorcery, magic" from the stem ngolor nólë meaning "long study, lore, knowledge."

History

Second Age

Minas Ithil by Matěj Čadil

After the destruction of Númenor, Isildur and Anárion, the sons of Elendil, landed in Gondor. Isildur built Minas Ithil at the south end of a pleasant valley in Ithilien near the mountainous border of Mordor, while Anárion built Minas Anor further west across the Anduin. The brothers had their thrones side by side at Osgiliath. Isildur planted a sapling of the White Tree Nimloth outside his home in Minas Ithil, and one of the seven palantíri was kept in the tower. The city's white marble walls, buildings, and tower were designed to catch and reflect the moonlight, and shone with a soft silver luminescence.

When Sauron returned after escaping Númenor's destruction, he attacked the exiles of Númenor, and his forces took Minas Ithil by force in S.A. 3429. Though the White Tree was burned, Isildur and his family managed to escape down the Anduin with a seedling, seeking his father Elendil. The city was later retaken and while Isildur, Anárion, and Elendil assaulted Mordor, Isildur's younger sons Aratan and Ciryon were sent to garrison Minas Ithil in order to intercept Sauron if he attempted to escape from Mordor to the west.

When the Last Alliance defeated Sauron in S.A. 3441, Minas Ithil was restored as a city/fortress and prospered for many years, though it was now under the rule of Anárion's son Meneldil, as Isildur planned to take up rule of his father's kingdom of Arnor. Isildur planted the seedling of the White Tree at Minas Anor in memory of Anárion, who had been slain during the War.

Third Age

Minas Ithil suffered greatly as a result of the Great Plague in the year T.A. 1636. Its population and garrison were diminished, and the watch on Mordor inevitably became lax. In the year 1980 of the Third Age, the Nazgûl returned to Mordor, after the defeat of the Witch-king of Angmar in the north of Middle-earth by a joint force of Elves, Dúnedain, and men of Gondor under the command of Prince Eärnur.

In preparation for Sauron's return, the Ringwraiths laid siege to Minas Ithil in 2000, and they took the city for their dark master two years later. Minas Ithil was occupied by fell creatures and its walls were studded with menacing fortifications. The palantír kept in the Tower was also captured and later installed at Barad-dûr. As a result, the city became a foul, evil place, and it came to be called Minas Morgul, "The Tower of Dark Sorcery" in Sindarin; the valley in which it stood likewise came to be known as Morgul Vale. In response, Minas Anor was likewise renamed Minas Tirith, "The Tower of Guard," to indicate Gondor's eternal vigilance against the threat of the Witch-king.

After Eärnur became King of Gondor in 2043 the Witch-king, Lord of the Nazgûl, challenged him to single combat in order to finish a disputed duel between them at the Battle of Fornost years earlier. In 2050 Eärnur accepted a second challenge, rode with a contingent of knights to Minas Morgul and was never heard from again. Eärnur was believed to have died in torment in Minas Morgul. Because he had no heirs and was never declared officially dead, the line of the Stewards of Gondor ruled the kingdom in his stead until the return of an heir of Isildur, beginning with Eärnur's own Steward, Mardil. Terror and war were directed against Gondor from Minas Morgul until Ithilien was deserted.

Sauron returned secretly to Mordor in 2942 and in 2951 he declared himself openly and began to gather power again. Sauron claimed the Ithil-stone and with it he was later able to ensnare Saruman and deceive Denethor, Steward of Gondor, who each had one of the other palantíri.

At the time of the War of the Ring, the Witch-king of Angmar and most of the Nazgûl dwelt in Minas Morgul; two or three other Nazgûl occupied Dol Guldur in Mirkwood. Numerous Orcs, including Gorbag, were also stationed in Minas Morgul and the Silent Watchers were ever-vigilant.

On June 20, 3018, the Witch-king rode forth to lead an assault on Osgiliath, and then he rode north with the Nazgûl in search of the Hobbit who bore the One Ring.

City of the Nazgûl

Under the Ringwraiths Minas Ithil was perverted into a horribly corrupt version of its former beauty. Its gate was described to be a cavernous mouth. The top-most course of the tower revolved slowly, showing a different leering head with each turn, and the marble walls of Morgul shone not with reflected moonlight, but with a pale, frightening light of its own which Tolkien described as "a corpse-light" that "illuminated nothing". Where Minas Ithil was, in its day, likely a bustling, noisy city like Minas Tirith, Minas Morgul was as silent as the grave. The walls and tower of Minas Morgul had many windows, but they were all unlit and revealed nothing of the horrors within. The dark magic that permeated Morgul Vale was so great that it could drive men mad if they came too near the city. A white stone bridge ran across Morgul Vale to the city's gate on its northern wall, and at each end of the bridge were hideous statues of twisted men and animals. On either side of the Vale were fields of blighted flowers which gave off a rotten scent.

When Frodo Baggins, Samwise Gamgee and Gollum passed by the city on their way to Cirith Ungol, the One Ring almost succeeded in compelling Frodo to run right to the city gates. As they climbed the stairs of Cirith Ungol soon afterward, Frodo, Sam and Gollum watched as a red flash erupted from Barad-dûr to signal the start of the assault on Minas Tirith. Immediately afterwards a similar flash of intense green light was emitted from the tower of Minas Morgul as its garrison, led by the Witch-king of Angmar, marched out to lay siege to Minas Tirith.

The War of the Ring and the Fourth Age

During the War of the Ring, Minas Morgul continued to act as the base of operations for the Witch-king and was a major garrison and forward base for Sauron's forces. The army of orcs and trolls that attacked Osgiliath and besieged Minas Tirith came from Minas Morgul.

It seems that at some point the orcs of Minas Morgul became isolated from those of the greater force of Mordor, utilizing not the eye of Sauron as an emblem, but a skeletal crescent moon. It is possible that there was a difference even in breeds of orc (as suggested in Peter Jackson's adaptation), but their leaders (Gorbag) shared time with other orcs from Mordor proper. The strain between them and the standard "Mordor orcs" at Cirith Ungol was critical in the quest to destroy the Ring of Power.

As the Army of the West made their way past Minas Morgul to their last stand at the Morannon, they destroyed the bridge leading to the Morgul Vale and set its fields aflame. Aragorn's forces met no opposition from the Tower as the city's entire garrison had been killed at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. Prince Imrahil of Dol Amroth had proposed to attack Mordor via Minas Morgul but others feared that the evil in the valley would drive the men of Gondor mad. Gandalf also reasoned that the Ring-bearer would go through Morgul to reach Mount Doom, thus it was preferable not to draw attention to Morgul by attacking it.

After the War of the Ring, when Aragorn was crowned as King Elessar, he made Faramir the Prince of Ithilien. Faramir made his abode in the Emyn Arnen, southeast of Minas Tirith, and ruled from there with his new bride, Éowyn. At his coronation, King Elessar also decreed that Minas Ithil in the Morgul Vale be utterly destroyed and made clean for seven years, and that afterwards no man would dwell there. It has not been made known whether Minas Ithil and Osgiliath were ever rebuilt, as the major population of Ithilien became based around Emyn Arnen.

Portrayal in adaptations

Minas Morgul as depicted in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

The city features in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, the third film of the trilogy directed by Peter Jackson. Minas Morgul, the Staircase and Tower of Cirith Ungol, and Shelob's Lair were all designed by John Howe, with the Morgul road using forced perspective into a bluescreened miniature. Unlike Minas Tirith, official artwork of Minas Morgul is extremely rare and inconsistent, which gave Howe considerable liberty in designing the city for the film. Howe's design of Minas Morgul was inspired from the experience of having wisdom teeth pulled out: in the same way, the Orcs have put their twisted designs on to a former Gondorian city.^[1] Cirith Ungol was based on Tolkien's design, but when Richard Taylor felt it as "boring", it was redesigned with more tipping angles.^[2] The interior set, like Minas Tirith, was built as a few multiple levels that numerous camera takes would suggest composed a larger structure.^[3]

References

This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by introducing more precise citations where appropriate. (June 2008)

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• [4](Spanish link)