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tarcolan
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Post Hobbit clocks
on: February 28, 2012 11:42
"Nine o'clock we'd call it in the Shire." Pippin says in Minas Tirith. Even the dwarves abide by clock time in The Hobbit. Whatever it is seems particular to hobbits. Could they have had some sort of crude hour clock or was Tolkien using poetic license in his 'translation' of the Red Book?
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SongofNimrodel
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Post RE: Hobbit clocks
on: March 02, 2012 08:29
Well, Bilbo does have a watch.
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tarcolan
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Post RE: Hobbit clocks
on: March 03, 2012 09:19
Duh! I forgot about the clock on the mantelshelf, but I can't remember a watch, though. Where's that?
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RiverWoman
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Post Re: Hobbit clocks
on: March 06, 2012 03:48
I find the clock interesting. Toliein states elsewhere that Hobbits don't use tools more complicated than forge bellows. Clocks are way more complex than that, although still something that can be made using pre-industrial methods. It is possible that if he had known when he wrote the Hobbit how much it would end up integrated into the story of Middle Earth he would have left out the clock. But I think it is something that Hobbits would have liked to have, if only wealthy persons such as Bilbo. Hobbits value order and courtesy, and being able to tell the time contributes to that lifestyle. Being able to say you would be someplace at a particular time and then being prompt would appeal to Hobbit virtues, even if most Hobbits told time by the sun and they did live under the kind of clock tyranny we do, where you have to clock in at a job and being even a minute late is a problem.
tarcolan
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Post Re: Hobbit clocks
on: March 06, 2012 04:31
Yes RiverWoman, clock time does seem to suit them, especially their obsession with mealtimes. I can imagine a simple hour clock, even made of wood and set at midday, a very Hobbity occupation. Not much harder than mill technology. But a watch?! I still can't find it, SongOfNimrodel.
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SongofNimrodel
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Post Re: Hobbit clocks
on: March 08, 2012 01:49
I might have misremembered that one... but my copy of the Hobbit is not currently in my room... i'll have to hunt it down.

Now that i think of it, i'm almost positive i was misremembering. Probably thinking of the clock.
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tarcolan
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Post Re: Hobbit clocks
on: March 08, 2012 11:42
Or probably thinking of the White Rabbit, easy to confuse the two. Said Alice.
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RimmoldadTheWizard
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Post Re: Hobbit clocks
on: March 09, 2012 10:06
Oh, SongofNimrodel, you may or may not have been thinking of Bilbo's handkerchief in The Hobbit. And to RiverWoman, the clock could have just been made out of crude wooden gears and had something to power it, say, the smoke and heat from the fireplace. This is just what I think, though.
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