What historical group resembles Rohan the most?

Probably Hungary/Polish/Franco

>le ebin memes

Rohan = Poles
Gondor = Austria
Mordor = Turks
Dwarves = Orthodox
Moria = Constantinople
Sauron = Lucifer
Saruman = Luther
Uruk-Hai = Protestants
Oathbreakers = Serbs
Elves = Saints
Hobbits = Catholic peasants
Gandalf = Pope
The Ring = Death

They were basically a mix of Anglo-Saxons, Vikings, and the Winged Hussars.

So Germans in 1939 (yes, 1939) were only slightly more advanced than that?

LOTR is not allegorical in anyway. The cultures of Middle Earth were inspired by various real world counterparts but there are no direct parallels to historical events, there was never intended to be. Straight from Tolkien's pen.

>Germany lost ~1000 armoured vehicles destroyed or disabled to that
How fucking embarrassing

Yep
After all, the only things Germans had Poles didnt are tanks, aircrafts and trucks

You forgot Tom Bombadil = God.

source = my ass

That's the point. This ones do because that's what they lacked irl. It's kind of a power fantasy.

There are plenty, they were basically Anglo Saxon in a horse, so People like the Lombards or the Alani would do. Sarmatians if you want to go more ancient.

Both sides had the same kind of technology. The difference was in numbers, generation of planes and I don't think Polish army had (many) heavy tanks if any but in 1939 both used for example cavalry in exactly the same way. And then the Soviets came and of course they weren't really better.

I think it was Tolkien's fantasy of Anglo-Saxons with cavalry. Since the Normans had much superior cavalry to the Anglo-Saxons, perhaps the Norman conquest could've been prevented if they had good cavalry.

>The difference was in numbers, generation of planes and I don't think Polish army had (many) heavy tanks if any
Most importantly Germany had good inter-service communications that allowed them to get CAS where it was needed

nice meme, my guy, please keep it up! :^)

Poland hate thread?
Poland hate thread

Finnish was used as base for Tolkien's Elvish because he knew about the hyper war. Pre-autism ray Finns were perfect in all senses.

The correct answers. The "Polish Hussars" is a red herring given legitimacy from /pol/ fan fiction.

Their language and names are heavily based on old english. Specifically Anglo-Saxon. Place-names are Norse and Anglo-Saxon. Names for people from Rohan are usually literally just words from old english.

>Eorl (first King of Rohan)
An Anglo-Saxon title of nobility.
>Theoden
Old english is Peoden. It means lord/prince/chief
>Eomer
Anglo-Saxon words "eoh" ("war-horse"), and possibly "mere", ("grand, excellent, famous").
>Eowyn
It means "horse lover" in Anglo-Saxon (L-Lewd) or "horse-friend" (less lewd).
>Grima
Means mask in Anglo-Saxon and old Norse languages.

You'll notice that their names are also their characters. Theoden was the King, Eomer was a skilled war leader on horseback, Eowyn is a girl and girls like horses :^) and Grima is a deceptive liar that hides behind a mask.

Tbh this is similar to how lots of names worked in Anglo-Saxon England. Kings would have fancy names meaning stuff like "wise" or "noble" an example would be Aethelwulf which means Noble Wolf.

he gave anglo-saxon cavalry because some people think they'd have been able to repel norman if they had good cavalry yes tolkien was a larper

tolkien hated allegoria so no

They're Mercians with a horse-riding culture added in, but deliberately imperfectly; despite the fact that they supposedly ride horses, every time the narrative focuses on their tactics and organization, it seems to be based around heavy infantry and shield walls, wheras the cavalry actions are described in far less detail.

Tolkien fucking loved Anglo-Saxons
He was one of those LARPing nerds the "my ancestor!" meme pic refers to

This made him hate the 1066 Norman invasion to the point of trying to avoid French words in his books
Needless to say he failed hard because it's impossible to speak English without them (it's possible to use as few as possible of them though, but it looks retarded so he didnt do that either and eventually limited his Anglo-Saxon loving autism to proper names only)

Anglo-Saxons on horses. They exist because Tolkien felt the Anglo-Saxons would have won Hastings if they had a cavalry contingent, thus sparing Anglo culture and language from being NORMANED

>Ctrl+F
>scythians
Shame

My favorite pokemon
His red evo is ugly tho

It's not /pol/ fanfiction for the hussars. The Battle of Pelennor Fields is inspired by the siege of Vienna where the Polish had the largest cavalry charge in history to break the siege. /pol/ tries to use that to make lotr memes about muslims being orcs despite Tolkein hating allegory.

Retard. They were anglo-saxons, not Mercians.

the "Tolkien hated Normans" meme is so bizarre. Even dumber than the "Tolkien hated Latin/Greek" meme. LOTR is chock fucking full of Romance roots. Also the Rohirrim aren't Anglo-Saxons, as Tolkien himself writes in the appendices:

>This linguistic procedure [of representing the relationship of the Rohirric language to the Common Speech by representing it as Old English] does not imply that the Rohirrim closely resembled the ancient English otherwise, in culture or art, in weapons or modes of warfare, except in a general way due to their circumstances: a simpler and more primitive people living in contact with a higher and more venerable culture, and occupying lands that had once been part of its domain.

Japanese samurais

uhh

Tolkien had them speaking Anglo-Saxon poems and having Anglo-Saxon names.

Beyond that nothing really. An entirely all close combat cavalry force seems to have never existed in history.

The Goths are the closest, but that's only because horses were used as battle taxis and the infantry dismounted for a fight.

All connections between existing peoples and peoples in the Lord of the Rings are PURELY linguistic. Not a single battle or people is allegorical in any way, as confirmed by Tolkien himself.

>An entirely all close combat cavalry force seems to have never existed in history.

It doesn't exist in LOTR either, the ride of the Rohirrim from Dunharrow to Mundburg isn't like a normal standing army thing, it's Theoden summoning everyone in the kingdom who has a warhorse to get their butts down to Gondor NOW because it's about to be besieged. Rohan's armies are mostly foot most of the time (Erkenbrand at Helm's Deep, Eomer at the Morannon). The Rohirrim aren't heavy cavalry (contrast them with the swan-knights of Dol Amroth) and are clearly based on Tolkien's then-current conceptions of Migration Period warfare with Gothic/Hunnic/whatever barbarian riders lightly armored with spear and bow, with the high nobility bearing swords, and horses mostly used to maneuver and raid before shield wall tactics. I'm not gonna say his understanding was historically accurate but even within the story the riding of Theoden at the Pelennor is portrayed as an exceptional, desperate, and very bloody undertaking (going by the estimates of Eomer and Elfhelm's forces after the Battle of the Pelennor in "The Last Debate", they lost 2000 men and 2500 horses out of 6000, in a battle that they won!!).

And what was supposed Tolkien to say?
Similar to Sapkowski, when asked if Witcher games made books more popular. Butthurt Sapkowski said, that Witcher games are shit, and there were only successful thanks to his books.
I like how you specified "close combat", so you can disregard every such army
>Yeah, it was full cavalry army, but one guy had crossbow so it doesn't count

Not culturally. He just bit the entire plot of the battle of the Siege of Vienna.

>The battle of Pelennor Fields was based on the siege of Vienna.

[citation needed]

And no not just "lol they're similar", Tolkien had to constantly shove down people's throats that it was just fantasy. Did he allude to this Vienna shit anywhere?

This.

I'd like to add that their similarities are limited to "relief forces is cavalry". That's somewhat simplistic and a lot of people could think of it.

And I would like to add in to both of you that

A) Tolkien deliberately works through a series of unreliable narrators
B) Even the "cavalry" that the Rohirrim describe pay more attention to how they fight on foot than how they fight on horseback.

It is entirely possible to interpret the Rohirrim as a bunch of later writers We Wuzzing without much of a grasp as to how cavalry tactics work.

What?

>And no not just "lol they're similar", Tolkien had to constantly shove down people's throats that it was just fantasy. Did he allude to this Vienna shit anywhere?
>It was just fantasy
Yet other anons before already talked about, how rohhirims are similar to anglo-saxons, especially with equipment and names. Or was is this just a coincidence?
>similarities are limited to "relief forces is cavalry"
Let's see.
>Relief forse is cavalry
It was a big fucking charge, in both cases greatest in each world.
As for more similarities, thanks to which pelennor fields is compared to Vienna, not for example Helm's deep, where there was also "cavalry relief force"

>Main road is blocked by Angmar forces, so Rohhirims are guided by Drúadan Forest by some local creatures
>Ottomans blocked main road, and Poles were guided through Vienna woods by Hungarians

>White city of Minas Tirith
>White city of Vienna

After both battles allies forces go on offensive
In both battles "the main guy" doesn't lead the army, but the second most important guy. Witch king/grand vezier.

You can find many little similarities, and if you are die hard, you can count something like Osgiliath=Constantinopole.
Also, Tolkien himself admit, that he based few things on real life geography. Of course I am not saying, that both battles are calk copy of each other, but disregarding similarities, because Tolkien never openly said so, is retarded.

>impossible to speak english without them

youtube.com/watch?v=IIo-17SIkws

Go re-read the introduction to the Fellowship of the Ring. Tolkien uses the found manuscript conceit; he didn't "really" write the tale. He translated and edited an older work, which purportedly draws all the way from the Red Book of Westmarch written by Bilbo, Frodo, and Sam, and then edited by others; in fact, it's not clear how many others, before it gets to him.

You can see this preoccupation with how the information develops into the tale in some of his other works, most especially in the Disaster of the Gladden Fields, in Unfinished tales.

You are not reading a fictional story as to "What happened in the year 3019 of the third age". You are reading a fictional story as to what a bunch of fictional characters wrote about the year 3019 in the third age, and then more fictional characters came and scribbled over. It is probably not accurate. In fact, you can already see the beginning of errors creeping into the tale, with how Ioreth talks to her unnamed kinswoman about what Frodo did in Mordor.

Not the guy you're responding to but:
>It was a big fucking charge, in both cases greatest in each world.
6,000 horsemen is not the biggest cavalry charge in the fictional history of Tolkien's world. Nirneath Arnoediad and the field of Celebrant both feature larger ones, and given the sizes of some of the armies being thrown around in the second age, it's probable that battles in the War of the Last Alliance have bigger ones too.

I would also point out that the bigger relief force by far is the one Aragorn leads, which is also on foot.

>thanks to which pelennor fields is compared to Vienna, not for example Helm's deep, where there was also "cavalry relief force"
Please read the books. old.ahmadtea.ua/userfiles/files/Tolkien/Lord Of The Rings - Part 2 - The Two Towers By J R R Tolkien.pdf Page 94.

>There suddenly upon a ridge appeared a rider, clad in white, shining in the rising sun. Over the low hills the horns were sounding. Behind him, hastening down the long slopes, were a thousand men on foot.

Angmar is thousands of miles and thousands of years away from Minas Tirith; their forces are not blocking the road, it's other troops from Minas Morgul. There are also plenty of other historical cities with white walls, as are ones where "the good guys" go on the offensive.

This, but, it kinda is allegorical. Just that, as you say, it's not that direct. The ring is not nuclear power, but just power in general.
He wanted to keep is allegories more open, he disliked when they were forced upon the reader.

>There are also plenty of other historical cities with white walls
It's not about white walls, Vienna just means "whity city/settlement/whatever"

>as are ones where "the good guys" go on the offensive.
Yes, but that's how similarities work, you need a bunch of them at the same time. Just because Vienna isn't only case of changing from defensive to offensive, it doesn't discard whole argument. That's like saying,
>Tolkien was lying, when he said his book is pure fiction without any analogies. Look, this guy has description of wearing armours, and armours exist historically.

There's a difference between

>I can point to some similarities

And a claim that a fictional event is based on a real one.

>It's not about white walls, Vienna just means "whity city/settlement/whatever"
And Minas Tirith means "tower of the guard". The color of its walls is incidental.

>Yes, but that's how similarities work, you need a bunch of them at the same time. Just because Vienna isn't only case of changing from defensive to offensive, it doesn't discard whole argument. That's like saying,

And again, you need more than just similarities to claim that it was based on something. You could just as easily claim that Pelennor Fields is *really* based on the battle/siege of Guan Du as it is Vienna, and you have a lot of the same elements; a belagured, trapped force in a fort, flanking attacks, a sortie from the city turning against a weakness and into an unexpected victory.

Tolkien said there were no ALLEGORIES in his books. Or, in the words of the author himself

> I think that many confuse applicability with allegory, but the one resides in the freedom of the reader, and the other in the purposed domination of the author.

And Minas Morgul was Constantinople, the corrupted city

Except it is fanfiction. Tolkien is literally quoted as saying he based the battle on the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains. A battle between a coalition of Western Romans (Men of the West) and their germanic ally fedorati (Led by King Theoderic, who dies in the battle) and Attila the Hun and his coalition of allied Germanics. Attila was besieging a city in Gaul and ended up caught by the coalition forces and defeated. Something peolle didn't think was possible.

Tolkien liked late antiquity and the early dark ages, he based his entire setting on the perod. Gondor being great builders with stone is a nod towards the stone walls the Romans built all over Europe.

Definitely not perfect but
>Spanghelm and Vendel helmets with nice plumes
>scale-armor and chain-mail
>largely unarmored horses
>"Horse-rider" people who live in permanent settlements
>fight with one-handed lances and cavalry swords
>nice, flowing long hair
sounds like the Greuthungi (Steppe-goths) or possibly the later Ostrogoths

The Goths, who ruled a vast empire in Poland / the Ukraine before the coming of the Huns.

This is explicitly the basis, Rohan is the Goths with an Anglo-Saxon language.

Culturally it's a patchwork, probably indeed based on Saxon and Goth. Military it's light cavalry. Like e.g. late Roman auxiliaries.

>No one has any idea what it is
>Someone mentions Goths
>Four posts in a row now just says "yeah dude theyre goths for sure"

Really makes you cogitate

Obviously Anglo-Saxon.

Their language is basically Old English.

youtube.com/watch?v=mkjeoINcK_w

>Moria = Constantinople
Minas Morgul is Constantinople, the corrupted city

>this whole thread
I'm genuinely happy to see there are people who are as into Tolkien and history as I am

poles

Can't speak for anyone else but I had the whole "Rohan must be Ostrogoths" thing going as soon as I watched the film again.

Dwarves are meant to be Jews.

They were meant to be Anglo-Saxons with horses

Coincidentally they resemble Goths the most

> The ring is not nuclear power, but just power in general.

No its not. The Ring is the Ring. Its exactly what it is as described in Tolkien's books, and nothing else. It is not allegorical.

You could find similarities like that with thousands of battles that happened in history. That is because there are obviously going to be recurring themes in warfare. Lord of the Rings is NOT allegorical.

They are obviously Anglo-Saxon. Having cavalry is just a superficial quality when you consider the language and culture of Rohan is obviously based off of Anglo-Saxon England. It's like saying the Shire isn't based off of the English countryside because Hobbits are too short.

Dwarves = Romans and Greeks
Elves = Celts (Language is very similar to Welsh)
Men = Anglo Saxons
Hobbits = Brits

It merges the modern and ancient:

Gandaulf and Saruman are the same character. Gandaulf represents Petain at Verdun, Petain was a hero and regarded as the greatest defensive tactian of the war, Petain was associated with pic related.

Saruman represented Petain in WWII, where he joined the Nazis and led the Vichy government which fought with the Germans.

> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Pétain
> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vichy_France

The Dunedain is based upon Byzantine aristocracy, yet Rohan also represents the Siege of Vienna. Truly amazing how so much of history can be represented in one story.

All of this is bullshit

Tolkien's work is based upon WWI and WWII. See pic related

From the mouth of Gimli himself
> www.bbc.co.uk/guides/zgr9kqt

Hungary. The word Rohan means "rush" or "run" in Hungarian and they're famous for being horse riding people living on the plains.

it's based upon world wars in the same way everything you write is based upon facebook and mtv

In the movies Saruman is kind of Sauron's lackey but in the books he's more like an independent warlord doing his own stuff and not even liking Sauron.

Why do people always bring this stupid ebin
muh siege of vienna orcs = turks allegorical shit to LOTR? Can't you people fuckin read or something

>way everything you write is based upon facebook and mtv
I come from an alternate reality to you, those things play little, to nothing in my writings/thoughts

>Tolkien said it's not an allegory, so it cannot be!
I hate this argument so much and it's always the go-to argument of a brainlet who wants to appear smart.

No it is not. WW1 influenced Tolkien because he was a human being alive during those times (and present there), and as such has influenced his writing. This does NOT mean that his works are in any way BASED ON those events.

>I know better than the author

Maybe you should become an English teacher

He said they were. In response to question about Hitler being Sauron, he said LotRs is more influenced by WWI.

He's kinda right, even if Tolkien didn't directly use analogies, he couldn't help it but be influenced by historical events.

You should learn the difference between influence and allegory.

phallacious piece of shit

> 2017 and trying to save face by being a retard spouting fallacies

You're on an anonymous image board, who gives a shit if you're wrong.

>the author cannot lie

What in God's name are you talking about?

fucking mongoloid

Better question is why do /pol/tards and similar types love Tolkien so much?

That's assuming that Tolkien was being honest. Fantasy genre as a whole is 90% just renamed historical peoples, events and locations.

>Tolkien was a liar

If you want to believe that, I can not argue against it.

> Fantasy genre as a whole is 90% just renamed peoples, events and locations that Tolkien made up

fyp

I am a fish, but there is better bait to be bitten.

Robert E. Howard wrote fantasy literature that was independent of Tolkien and he did so because he originally wanted to write historical fiction, but he lacked education and literature about it so he just made up his own shit VERY loosely based on real things.
Tolkien obviously didn't lack this education, he was very knowledgeable about history and utilized this knowledge to the fullest extent. To think LOTR isn't based on real history is retarded if you actually know history.

Tolkien was a linguist, and used this to create languages for his fantasy world. Your claim that the Lord of the Rings is based on real history is completely unfounded and backed only by insults and false appeals to unestablished authority.

>completely unfounded
It's been elaborated on in this very thread, there's a pretty solid foundation.

Except it has not. Just a bunch of random people claiming random things: "Rohan is x, minas tirith is y".
Meanwhile the author of the books ardently rejected any assumption of allegory in the books.