In Chapter 11 of The Hobbit, Bilbo and the Dwarves finally reach the Lonely Mountain, but they don’t know where the hidden door is. Then they find the door, but they don’t know how to open it. Fortunately, they do have an ancient map and a very lucky Hobbit with them, and they’ve arrived just in time. While Bilbo looks back to the west, missing his hobbit-hole, we talk once again about how he is the only person keeping this quest afloat. Plus a foolish Tolkien Fun Fact, and astronomical calculations to confusticate your average Dwarf… or podcast host.
Looking for the studies of personal insults referenced in our Tolkien Fun Fact? Look no further!
For Lee Smith’s compilation of personal insults in The Lord of the Rings, please see “Personal Insults in LotR” at her blog Lee’s Myth, here:
http://leesmyth.blogspot.com/2018/02/personal-insults-in-lotr.html
For Joe Hoffman’s further analysis of the prevalence of “fool” as an insult, please see “Network of Fools” at his blog Idiosophy, here:
http://www.idiosophy.com/2018/02/network-of-fools/
Recommended Reading:
Tolkien, J. R. R. The Hobbit (Mariner Books, paperback) pp. 186-194, “On the Doorstep”
Tolkien, J. R. R. and Douglas A. Anderson, ed. The Annotated Hobbit (HarperCollins, hardcover)
Rateliff, John D. The History of the Hobbit (HarperCollins, one-volume hardcover)
Tolkien, J. R. R. (Christopher Tolkien, ed.) The Silmarillion (Mariner Books, paperback)
Fonstad, Karen Wynn. The Atlas of Middle-earth (Revised Edition) (Houghton Mifflin, Paperback)
Olsen, Corey. Exploring J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit (Mariner Books, paperback)
01:15:30 (Durin’s Day) I’ve listened to Shawn’s explanation, and I’ve read the discussion on Facebook, and I’d like to add a couple of points:
Yes, 76 years is the time for the Moon to come to the same phase on the same day in the solar calendar. However there’s no reason why a particular calendar day, such as October 19th, should display the effect in question.
Namely, the Moon sets at the same time as the Sun: “The little Moon was dipping to the horizon. Evening was coming on … the sun sank, the moon was gone, and evening sprang into the sky.”
This presumably is the defining property of Durin’s Day. Usually a visible New Moon sets a couple of hours after the Sun. However the Moon’s orbit is tilted, such that its path in the sky takes it up to 5 degrees above or below the Sun. If the new(ish) Moon was at the southern (lowest) extreme it might set simultaneously with the Sun. The effect would be greater at high latitudes, like with Erebor.
However none of this explains how the new(ish) Moon could be visible in daytime, as it would still be quite near the Sun. Unless it’s some Middle-earth atmospheric effect. I did various searches and I could find no record of any such event.
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I did find a potential inspiration, albeit speculative. There was a remarkable New Moon seen in Yorkshire on May 2, 1916. This sparked a correspondence in the Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer of May 6, May 8 and May 10 1916:
https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/
(searchable, paywall)
At this time Tolkien was doing Army training at Otley, also in Yorkshire. (He left for France in early June.)
This New Moon was remarkable because it was sighted visually only 14 hours after astronomical New Moon, a record for many years. The observation is described in a letter from a Mary Ackroyd in Scarborough, printed May 10: “I write to assure you that the new moon was seen here by two of my maids” (those were the days!). The maids saw the Moon from an upstairs window about 8 pm GMT on the 2nd, half an hour after the Sun had set.
Another talking point in the correspondence was a daytime apparition of Venus. My theory is therefore this: unusual New Moon + celestial object visible with sun in sky –> Durin’s Day.
I don’t have hard evidence that Tolkien saw the Yorkshire Post correspondence. However there is an interesting detail in one of the Venus letters, also printed May 10. The writer recalls having viewed the planet in daytime, many years before, via its reflection in a pail of water. (Although he does not say so, a possible mechanism would be polarization selectivity.) At any rate it is rather like Gimli, Frodo and Sam seeing Durin’s crown in the Mirrormere.