[HairOfTheDog]

OK historians, what about the passage of time in these books? The ages of the hobbits seem within reason to our ages... and the reader is given the idea that hobbits mature more slowly, at 33 Frodo is just now "coming of age".

This is clearly off-chapter but important, but how do we file Aragorn's age? He is clearly a young man by his description, although he says he is "older than he looks" he still appears to be a man in his prime. Any insight on the ages in Middle Earth?

[JenB]

Yup! Aragorn is of Numenorean descent, and they are a long-lived race. Elros lived several hundred years - five hundred? and his descendants are also long-lived. Aragorn has a lifespan 'thrice that of lesser men'. So, divide his 90 by three, and you get thirty. But that's no longer normal for Middle-Earth, even among those of Numenorean descent. Aragorn's long life is, I believe, a special gift to him.

[Publius]

Aragorn, like the other "lost" kings of Gondor, could live to a very late age and would age slowly. He also had the ability and right to decide the time and place of his own demise. Having descended from the line of Elros of Numenor, brother of Elron, there was the promise of long life and wisdom.

[Anitius Severinus Boethius]

Elros, the brother of Elrond, chose to live as a mortal, but the elvish blood that was in him did not disappear. His decendants, the Numenoreans, had a direct and relatively pure blood line back to Elros, and as a result had life-spans of 500 years or so. (Yes, inbreeding creates twelve-toed hillbillies, but it also creates Sweden.) Aragorn, who had a very pure bloodline, recieves the longevity that it imbues. Most others who came from Numenorean stock had their bloodline diluted and so very few elvish qualities, such as long life, could be seen in them.

It seems to me that Tolkien basically doubled the age of English countrymen from his time to set the events normally seen in hobbits. Coming of age is 33 (16 to 17), 111 is an auspicious age (55 or so) and Bilbo living to around 130 before sailing off would be a ripe 65 for a early century English countryman.

[Carolina]

Aragorn was born in 2931, Third Age and Bilbo's Farewell Feast was in 3001, T.A. So that puts him at 70 at the open of the first chapter.

Source is Appendix B.

[sphinx]

Re: Aragorn's age. I don't have my copy handy to check, but (having reread recently) I seem to recall that either Celeborn or Galadriel mentions, when the followship reaches Lothlorien after Moria, that it has been "three and eighty" years since Aragorn first came to Lothlorien. One more clue to throw into the puzzle.