Free Republic

A battlefield of 3,250 years ago in Germany is yielding remains of wounded warriors, wooden clubs, spear points, flint and bronze arrowheads and bronze knives and swords. The gruesome scene, frozen in time by peat, is unlike anything else from the Bronze Age in Northern Europe, where, researchers thought, large-scale warfare didn’t begin until later. Analysis of the remains of the 130 men, most between ages 20 and 30, found so far shows some may have been from hundreds of kilometers away—Poland, Holland, Scandinavia and Southern Europe. The hand-to-hand combat of the battle, which may have involved thousands of people...

Turkish court to decide if comparing Erdogan to 'Rings' character Gollum a crime It can't be flattering to be compared to "Lord of the Rings" character Gollum, but a Turkish court is trying to determine if it is a crime. A doctor who likened President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to the pasty, cave-dwelling creature is facing up to two years in prison in Turkey, where insulting the president is a crime, reports said Wednesday. Bilgin Ciftci is accused of sharing images of the two, but it is up to a court to determine whether a comparison to the muttering, gangrel creature...

An important, and frankly amazing Tolkien document has emerged, recently discovered loose in a copy of The Lord of the Rings once owned by illustrator Pauline Baynes. The Guardian reports that Baynes removed the map from a previous version of the novel as she was working on a then new color map for a new edition that was published in 1970. The map then had “copious” notes made by J.R.R. Tolkien in green ink and pencil. Baynes then made her own notes on the map. It is essentially a map annotated by Tolkien himself.

A just-unearthed cave formed more than 1 million years ago could yield new insight into the geological history of the American West, according to scientists, who called the discovery a major find. Four amateur cave explorers uncovered the vast caverns, stretching more than 1,000 feet into a remote mountainside, in August. Visitors to the cave, dubbed Ursa Minor, described seeing millions of crystals that shimmered like diamonds lodged in its walls. Translucent mineral curtains hung from the ceiling, and a lake possibly 20 feet deep filled one of the cave's five known rooms. Passages leading into darkness suggested there was...

Lord of the Rings actor John Rhys-Davies decried Islamic terrorism and political correctness in an interview with podcast king Adam Carolla Monday night. “There is an extraordinary silence in the West,” Rhys-Davies told Carolla. “Basically, Christianity in the Middle East and in Africa is being wiped out – I mean not just ideologically but physically, and people are being enslaved and killed because they are Christians. And your country and my country (Wales) are doing nothing about it.” “Why is it so evolved not to judge?” Carolla replied, identifying political correctness as the culprit. “This notion that we’ve evolved into...

A lost story set in the "Lord of the Rings" universe is about to see the light of day in a new book out later this summer. "The Story of Kullervo" is about the titular Kullervo, a boy sold into slavery who vows revenge on a cruel wizard who killed his father. Here's how the novel's Amazon listing describes it:

Christopher Lee, the British film icon known for his roles in "Star Wars" and "Dracula," has died. He was 93.

Just before gay marriage was legalised in Ireland, JK Rowling tweeted that she was hoping Gandalf and Dumbledore would be able to get married. Now that’s set to become a reality this weekend with LGBTQ rights activist group Planting Peace staging a wedding between the fictional wizards. The nuptials will take place in their rainbow-coloured headquarters opposite the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas. The church threatened to picket the wedding if it ever happened....

(CNN)In 1610, after he built his telescope, Galileo Galilei first spotted enormous Saturn's gigantic rings. More than 400 years later, astronomers have in a sense dwarfed that discovery with a similar first. Using powerful optics, they have found a much larger planet-like body, J1407b, with rings 200 times the size of Saturn's, U.S. and Dutch astronomers said. It lies some 400 light-years away from Earth. For decades, scientists have believed that many moons around large planets formed out of such ring systems. But this is the first one astronomers have observed aside from Saturn's, they said. It was discovered in...

J.R.R. Tolkien, the British author best known for The Hobbit and his epic trilogy, The Lord of the Rings, was an astute critic of socialism and utopianism and a passionate defender of liberty, says Jay Richards, co-author of The Hobbit Party, which he calls “a study of the political and economic implications of Tolkien’s thought.” “Certainly anyone that’s seen The Lord of the Rings, for instance, at the movies knows that he was deeply concerned about the dangers and the temptations of absolute power. "The symbol of the one ring, of course. It’s not just a symbol of the sort...

The soundtrack to the Lord of the Rings film trilogy has been deemed the best of all time, beating John Williams' 1977 Star Wars score into second place.Composer Howard Shore's accompaniment won the Classic FM listeners' accolade for the fifth consecutive year.Hans Zimmer's music to Gladiator, Schindler's List by John Williams and John Barry's soaring Out of Africa score made the top five.

1. Nicolas Cage passed up the role of Aragorn because of “family obligations.” 2. Daniel Day-Lewis also turned down the role multiple times. 3. The same fight choreographer and fencer who worked on Lord of the Rings also worked on The Parent Trap and Star Wars. 4. And he said that Viggo Mortensen was “the best swordsman [he] ever trained.”

Ever wished you were a hobbit? Well now you can experience how Bilbo and Frodo Baggins live by visiting Balade Des Gnomes, a unique hotel in Belgium. Near the picturesque town of Durbuy in Belgium, the wooden topsy-turvy rooms feature carved wooden beds that look like they are nestled in the hollow of a tree, a dining table perfect for goblin guests and a gothic, ornate bath. The Hobbit, travel, holiday, short breaksFANTASY: La Balade Des Gnomes is the perfect location for Lord Of The Rings fans [CATERS] The Hobbit, hotel, travel, short breaks, holidayCOSY: Wooden beds look like they...

In a recent interview, Richard Armitage revealed that he was quite emotional about the completion of the trilogy. The 42-year-old actor spoke with BANG Showbiz about finally wrapping the trilogy and how now that the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogy was completed, he was very moved. "It will be 15 years of Peter Jackson's work, there'll be six movies to watch, but it could be the final time. There's something moving about that," he said.

According to the Tolkien Society and confirmed by Amazon UK a 60th Anniversary hard copy edition box set of "The Lord of the Rings" to be published in the United Kingdom (probably in the US soon afterward) on June 18th, 2014. It is not cheap. Right now it is listed at £80 ($133). This year, new editions of other Tolkien novels will be released including a new illustrated copy of The Hobbit for children and adults of all ages and new edition of The Simarillion and Unfinished Tales.

If you remember the first film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings, the 1978 animated version by Ralph Bakshi–the legendary outsider director behind Fritz the Cat, Wizards, American Pop and Fire and Ice–you’ll recall the experience was a mixed bag. The movie was a dark, moody, oversaturated vision of Tolkien’s world, with stunning design and many memorable scenes. Bakshi used rotoscoping to trace live footage for animation, and posterization to give it a rough, hand-made look. Both techniques allowed many corners to be cut, but at the time, the film’s PR claimed Rings was the “the first movie painting.”

The harrowing battle scenes and heartache in J.R.R. Tolkien’s fantasy masterpiece The Lord Of The Rings were inspired by the author’s own First World War nightmare and the death of close friends from Birmingham.

Peter Jackson has made some remarkable movies. There’s no denying that his sprawling Lord of the Rings trilogy was the very definition of epic—filled with massive battles, touching moments, and beautiful cinematography, not to mention a lovely score.

WH Auden attempted to persuade JRR Tolkien to drop the romance between Aragorn and Arwen from the storyline of The Lord of the Rings, describing it as "unnecessary and perfunctory", an unpublished letter by the author has revealed. The 1955 letter sees Tolkien writing to his publisher about the difficulties of completing The Return of the King, the third and final part of his magnum opus, in which Aragorn and his men face a final battle with Sauron's troops, as the hobbits Frodo and Sam continue on their journey to destroy the One Ring. At the end, Aragorn is crowned...

Some may see the films or books as just entertainment, but Tolkien spent a lifetime creating a mythos with far more detail than most writers ever imagine. An Oxford professor, he approached his writing as if it were a scholarly pursuit. Yet it was still entertaining and captivating, full of themes and message (though he never intentionally preached, so to speak, his beliefs informed his work). That’s why it has endured for so long (The Hobbit was originally published in 1937, mainly directed at children. Don’t see many children books like this anymore, do we?). Tolkien drew on many influences...