Riddles in the Dark

[Periantar]

Woodhall/Woody End saw the comings and goings of elves, which in the Shire vernacular, would've been "queer." the Elves gloomily recollecting, the Hobbits trepidatious. While the elves would've passed with carefree strides, the Black Riders passing through would've been like black streaks that rumbled as they passed by.

[Periantar]

Already posted once and didn't seem to work, so I'll post again...

I'm thinking Woody End or Woodhall. Here we had the Elves passing East to the Grey Havens, we also have the Black Riders "streaking" through on "rumbling" mounts. We have the "tentative recollections" of the elves, and the "gloomy trepidation" of the hobbits leaving the Shire.

Of course, depending on how broadly we look at this, we could be looking at almost any number of zoom settings on the world of Middle-Earth. Then it just occurs to me also, that across Tolkien's books, the Shire itself, see many crossings East and West, which would have been considered quite queer indeed, and have invoked all of the aforementioned emotions. So there's another 'scope' that we could look at this through.

Then again, there's the more, "real world," concept, where by, (as Drifa told us this covers/refers to more than one paragraph) we could be looking at a chapter of a book - I'm leaning towards, "A Shortcut to Mushrroms," there, with various comings and goings.

Ahh, I feel like a hobbit in a lolly shop - so manyu options, which shall I choose?

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Dwarf, will you come and lash us for our wrong answers? i had thought the great summer Dwarf feast was over and we might get some decent service in here again. But no. I am almost missing Afird Spitaxe.

@Periantar, please, please, please - so i can sleep - go to Lore and give your expert opinion. Please!

[Drifa]

You are too far West, Arnyn! The Brandywine and the Withywindle are closer to the mark.

No correct guess. I am considerably shorter than the East-West Road by a country mile or two.

You seem to like it, so take this, Dragon !! Guess again!!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

You seem to like it, so take this, Dragon !! Guess again!!

Ouch! But i felt that one!

But i am content. Now in my 30 minute break i can return to the journey through the Shire. But here is a thing, possibly my brains are now porridge, but East-West = the Hobbits (or Elves) are rather returning home. So i will go see if it has something to do with being arrested by the shirrifs.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Bucklebury Ferry, Brandywine Bridge, string, or nothing?

[Drifa]

Hahaha. No!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Fuin Elda

[Chrysophylax Dives]

i found a detailed map of the Shire. i never knew of loads of these places. here is an Overhill on the other side of Bag-end Hill. Also a Newbury, three places up North: Brockenborings, Scary, and Querry, and Standelf to the south of Brandy Hall. So, from this collection (and more), are you:

Whitfurrows (just the other side of Budge Ford and a little east of Frogmorton)?

[Fuin Elda]

@Chrysophylax Dives I am thinking! (And making pickles and cakes and feasts as it's been Canadian Thanksgiving and my mothers birthday!) So my next guess has been done and it was a no.

So I shall try 'The Wandering Companies' (I don't think I've seen this guessed) but Gildor speaks of letting the other wandering companies know of Frodo and his travels they also speak about the black riders and as a part of a wandering company does nicely fit in the multiple paragraphs hint, and is based around Woodhall.

[Drifa]

My way has seen many
a queer and wary passing
From East to West
Carefree strides and
Streaks that rumble;
Tentative recollections and
Gloomy trepidations
What am I?

No. Whitfurrows is a village, and I am not a Wandering Companies.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

More like a wandering compass. i am suspecting a Dwarf confusion of East and North, as on the map of Thror.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Thistlebrook (leading to Willowbottom)?

Why are lashes involved at all??

Personally, I am not usually in favour of lash or whip use. Such means are not gentle, are to be used only at the last resort, and leave uncomfortable marks. But those who attend to the ongoing Case for Lore (attend = with glasses on nose) will understand why, in the case of this particular Dwarf, at this particular moment in time, I am making an exception.

[Drifa]

No, Dragon. I am not a tiny stream. You're too far south now.

[Periantar]

@Drifa
The Marishhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

[Drifa]

Hi @Periantar! No, but I am in the Marish.

[Periantar]

@Drifa
Ferry Laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaane

[Drifa]

Halfway there, @Periantar!

edit, and I mean that you have half the answer to the riddle solved.

[Periantar]

@Drifa Presumably you are both Ferry Lane and the Bucklebury Ferry/the Ferry crossing.

[Drifa]

Not that half.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

There aint much in the Marish. So I guess that you are the large tree that the Hobbits pass on the way to the House of Farmer Maggot?

[Periantar]

@Drifa are you by any chance, the area/village of Bucklebury itself? being on both the East and West sides of the Brandywine and having entertainsed many a varied and queer crossing?

[Periantar]

@Chrysophylax Dives
I tend to find that the dwarf's hints are more cryptic than the riddles from whence they come.
Let us review:
-- I am in the Marish (The Marish was a region ... on the western banks of the ... Brandywine between Stock and Rushey, and a road circled around its the north end. The two villages were connected by the Causeway, which traversed the Marish. The Stock-brook traversed the region.) from Tolkien Gateway.

-- I presumably run East to West (though it just occured to me that a road running North South can still be crossed Easty West)

-- Ferry Lane solves half the riddle, yet it is not Ferry Lane and the Bucklebury Ferry, with which Ferry Lane would logically be put

-- I am fairly certain the Ferry itself and/or the Ferry crossing have been guessed a multitude of times

-- We have been told it is not so big as the Brandywine Rivery

-- the lines of "strides" and "streaks" suggests to me the Hobbits walking, and the Black Riders thundering at speed, which causes me to consider roads, I can not find any other roads that are lanes (if he said I was halfway there because of the word "lane")

For me, this leaves the village of Bucklebury, or, I may lodge a formal guess of, the Causeway, as even though it runs North-South, as I mentioned, it does get crossed East-West.

[Drifa]

You guessed, Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

@Chrysophylax Dives
I tend to find that the dwarf's hints are more cryptic than the riddles from whence they come.

At last! Someone else understands. Yes. That is exactly the modus operandi of this Dwarf. Draw us in with the riddle, but only once we are inside begin to insert the mind-needles, one by one over a protracted period of time, a kind of sadistic Dwarvish acupuncture. What still kills me is on the riddle that you solved, where I got to Chubb but then someone else noted a lock named Masters and the Dwarf gave this nod and indicated that this was on the right track!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

You guessed, Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

Dwarf, you do not know what trouble is. Yet.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

You guessed, Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

Alright, it has to be something like: the road from Maggot's house to Ferry Lane.

Or possibly, the road to Maggot's house and then beyond to Ferry Lane.

But basically, you are (were, and always will be) a short cut to a mushroom.

[Drifa]

Yeah, something like that. But what is it called, this way?

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Yeah, something like that. But what is it called, this way?

The Golden Perch

[Drifa]

Ah, come on!! Who said it was a road??

[Periantar]

@Chrysophylax Dives
I tend to find that the dwarf's hints are more cryptic than the riddles from whence they come.

At last! Someone else understands. Yes. That is exactly the modus operandi of this Dwarf. Draw us in with the riddle, but only once we are inside begin to insert the mind-needles, one by one over a protracted period of time, a kind of sadistic Dwarvish acupuncture. What still kills me is on the riddle that you solved, where I got to Chubb but then someone else noted a lock named Masters and the Dwarf gave this nod and indicated that this was on the right track!

Don't even try to fathom the depths of this thought!

[Periantar]

Yeah, something like that. But what is it called, this way?

@Drifa that would be The Causeway?

[Drifa]

You guessed Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

When I say you have half the answer to the riddle solved, I mean you solved half by guessing Ferry Lane. One of these words is in the answer.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

You guessed Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

When I say you have half the answer to the riddle solved, I mean you solved half by guessing Ferry Lane. One of these words is in the answer.

I feel like we are in the very end game of this one. All the white mice are dead, or have escaped, bar the Hobbit-mouse, who is just about still standing, and myself, only half conscious and collapsed in a puddle on the floor alongside two dead goldfish. And now the Dwarf employs the electrodes on the Hobbit-mouse, who squeals silently. Meanwhile, you gotta feel for the Dwarf. The answer has now been spelled out before us, and it must be so frustrating to look upon the wretched mices whose brains are now so addled that if you showed us a door marked EXIT we would assume it was another clue and start looking on the edge of the map of the Shire for the lost half of Penny Lane.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Alright, Dwarf, you are a lane with no proper name

At that point [the road] bent left and went down into the lowlands of the Yale making for Stock; but a lane branched right, winding through a wood of ancient oak-trees on its way to Woodhall. ‘That is the way for us,’ said Frodo.

There was a sound of hoofs in the lane, some way behind, but coming slow and clear down the wind.

The hobbits sat in shadow by the wayside. Before long the Elves came down the lane towards the valley.

The woods on either side became denser; the trees were now younger and thicker; and as the lane went lower, running down into a fold of the hills, there were many deep brakes of hazel on the rising slopes at either hand. At last the Elves turned aside from the path. A green ride lay almost unseen through the thickets on the right; and this they followed as it wound away back up the wooded slopes on to the top of a shoulder of the hills that stood out into the lower land of the river-valley.

[Drifa]

There is someone's lane that no one has mentioned.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

The lane leading to the house of Maggot. Bamfurlong.

[Drifa]

Bingo! I will explain it later. I am deep in a mine shaft at the moment. It's a tight squeeze. No time to play.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Bingo! I will explain it later. I am deep in a mine shaft at the moment. It's a tight squeeze. No time to play.

'Mind Bilbo doesn't eat all the cakes!' they called. 'He is too fat to get through key-holes yet!'

[Periantar]

You guessed Ferry Lane, @Periantar. I said you had half of the answer to the riddle solved. Or a part of the answer, if that makes more sense. Haha, my old dwarven patois always gets me in trouble.

When I say you have half the answer to the riddle solved, I mean you solved half by guessing Ferry Lane. One of these words is in the answer.

I feel like we are in the very end game of this one. All the white mice are dead, or have escaped, bar the Hobbit-mouse, who is just about still standing, and myself, only half conscious and collapsed in a puddle on the floor alongside two dead goldfish. And now the Dwarf employs the electrodes on the Hobbit-mouse, who squeals silently. Meanwhile, you gotta feel for the Dwarf. The answer has now been spelled out before us, and it must be so frustrating to look upon the wretched mices whose brains are now so addled that if you showed us a door marked EXIT we would assume it was another clue and start looking on the edge of the map of the Shire for the lost half of Penny Lane.

You are now my true hero, unexpectedly tying the Beatles into LOTR!

[Periantar]

Dwarf writes a riddle to an obscure laneway, lets Dragons, Hobbits infact, all and sundry, agonise for weeks over which precise point in Middle Earth he could possibly be referring to with his highly specific, and yet entirely general descriptions. Finally, out of the mire of darkest despair, the likes of which, not even Shelob in all her evil, could have conjured up, one comes who is able to crack the riddle at last, and the Dwarf responds with...

"Bingo! I will explain it later. I am deep in a mine shaft at the moment. It's a tight squeeze. No time to play."

*walks away into the afternoon muttering something indistinguishable under his breath*

[Drifa]

My way has seen many
a queer and wary passing
From East to West
Carefree strides and
Streaks that rumble;
Tentative recollections and
Gloomy trepidations
What am I?

Farm Maggot's lane has seen many a queer and wary passing. Carefree strides refers to Tom Bombadil, who was friendly with Farmer Maggot and who he got news from. Streaks and rumble refer to a Black Rider who hissed at Maggot and then rode through the gate and up the lane towards the causeway like a bolt of thunder. Tentative recollections refer to Frodo's telling of his terror of the dogs and Maggot as the four hobbits crossed the fields to Bamfurlong and made their way up the lane. Gloomy trepidations refer to the hobbits' departure from Bamfurlong up the lane towards the causeway as the night was chilled and the mist began to crawl over the hills.

You up, dragon. Hit us with your best shot!

[Chrysophylax Dives]

My way has seen many
a queer and wary passing
From East to West
Carefree strides and...

Farm Maggot's lane has seen many a queer and wary passing. Carefree strides refers to Tom Bombadil...

But why are these queer and wary passages from East to West, o good Drifa?

[Chrysophylax Dives]

New riddle for a new week (posted Friday to give you all a headstart).

Three ships is what I see,
Sailings of a mythical history.
One brings the king to Middle-earth
On wings of storm as the world is bent.
One bears on a sea-wind
the king who returns.
One sails out of Middle-earth
Taking on the straight road
Not the king but his Stone.
Three ships, as they appeared to me.
A mythic end of my own history.
A frame of story sharp and keen,
The riddle is what next was seen?

Edit. Tidied the verse a little before you get started.

[Drifa]

The lane seemed to run that way, and it looked good in the riddle. The Causeway ran north to south. The lane ran off it vertically, Bamfurlong more easterly and the lane heading west.

[Periantar]

@Chrysophylax Dives

I imagine that my first imaginings would be way off the mark, but I kind of see the mind of Tolkien in this. The verse (I love it by the way) feels quite omniscient, bringing to mind Eru, or Tolkien. The line, "Sailings of a mythical history," make me think not Eru, as for him, this was his literal creation, nothing mythical about it. On the other hand, of Tolkien it has been said, and I think he suggested himself, that he was trying to create a mythical history for Britain.

Just realised (silly me) that the riddle is "what next is seen." That took me a while, clearly my love of the halfling's leaf has clouded my mind.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Just realised (silly me) that the riddle is "what next is seen." That took me a while, clearly my love of the halfling's leaf has clouded my mind.

You and me both, mate. Yeah you have the right idea - this is an attempt to frame something deep in the writings. But it is made in the style I have learned from Drifa - in other words, the riddle verse does match a bit of text in the stories and to solve it you just need to find that text.

:)

[Periantar]

@Chrysophylax Dives
If one ship is sailing out of Middle Earth via the straight road, I might assume that the next thing seen could be, "The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all turns to silver glass, and then you see it," that is, Valinor.

[Chrysophylax Dives]

Ah! With all these shenanigans of late I had quite forgotten the deepest pleasure of riddling - which is reading a really good answer, which illuminates the riddle, and still being able to say:

No. What I saw next was not Valinor.

[Drifa]

Time for a guess. Is it 'the Afterworld' (Fourth Age)?