Sam awakens from his nap (honestly, the guy can sleep anywhere) to find Frodo standing before the Rangers of Ithilien, as if on trial. Faramir presses the witness for information about his quest, but the conversation keeps coming back to Boromir as Sam listens in steadily rising anger at the implications being made towards his master. We see what happens when a hobbit gardener gets his fill of “sauce”, discuss Faramir’s quality (not for the last time), and learn just how special the wild Kine of Araw really are… but are their horns actually that loud?
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Recommended Reading:
Tolkien, J. R. R. The Two Towers: Being the Second Part of The Lord of the Rings (Mariner Books, paperback) “The Window on the West”, pp. 648-51
Tolkien, J. R. R. The Hobbit (Mariner Books, paperback)
Tolkien, J. R. R. (Christopher Tolkien, ed.) The Silmarillion (Mariner Books, paperback)
There is an interesting coincidence of names between Araw (the Sindarin name of Orome) and Arawn, King of the Celtic Otherworld. In the Mabinogion Prince Powyll meets Arawn while they are both out hunting; Arawn has a horn. Tolkien refers to this story in “English and Welsh”, claiming (rather amusingly) that an Anglo-Saxon poet would have made a better job of it than the Welsh writer did.
In your fanciful reasoning as to why Faramir heard Boromir’s horn blowing but Frodo and Sam did not, you reasoned that Faramir was “within the bounds of Gondor, as the realm was of old,” while Frodo and Sam were across the river and so out of the bounds of Gondor. Appendix A(iv) gives the maximum bounds of Gondor under Hyarmendacil (around 1050) as “north to Celebrant and the southern eaves of Mirkwood…east to the inland Sea of Rhun…” Frodo and Sam at the time were lost in the Emyn Muil on the east side of the river, and so well within the “bounds of Gondor.”
There was some question as to how long Boromir had been travelling to reach Rivendell. At the Council of Elrond, Boromir stated, “a hundred and ten days I have journeyed all alone.” So over three and a half months; Boromir set out from Minas Tirith on July 4, 3018.