On Wights and Wraiths
More Middle-Earth Musings Inspired by my Lord of the Rings ACKS Campaign
As I mentioned in my prior article, On Wargs and Wolves, I recently ran a campaign set in Middle Earth using the Heroic Fantasy Handbook for Adventurer Conqueror King System. I called the campaign LOTR-ACKS and shared some of my campaign progress on the Autarch Patreon.
Me being me, when I decided to run a Middle Earth campaign, I did a very deep dive into the Tolkien Legendarium. In the process I came to some interesting conclusions about a number of creatures in the Middle Earth bestiary. Given the disrespect with which Rings of Power has treated Middle Earth, I thought Tolkien fans might enjoy discussing something a little more grounded in the real Legendarium. Hence this series of articles!
Today we’re going to discuss undead. From careful reading of the History of Middle Earth, Volume X: Morgoth’s Ring, I’ve been able to piece together a coherent theory of how undeath works in Tolkien’s world.
Bodies and Spirits
Every sapient creature in Middle Earth has a fëa (spirit) and a hröa (body).
While a sapient creature is alive, its body is the house for its spirit. When a sapient creature’s body dies or is slain, its spirit becomes houseless.
A houseless spirit is called to the Halls of Mandos. From there it either proceeds to its unknown fate (if Man) or remains in the Halls until Mandos allows it to be rehoused (if Elf). However, in some circumstances, a spirit can refuse the call. A spirit that refuses the call to the Halls of Mandos is known as a ghost. The most well-known example of ghosts in the Legendarium is the Army of the Dead that appears in Return of the King.
A ghost is incorporeal and invisible. It can manifest by making itself visible to the spirit of a living creature, but even a manifested ghost remains incorporeal. A ghost's chief weapon is fear, which can be so powerful as to actually slay a Man. (Elves, being immortal, cannot be frightened to death by ghosts.)
A ghost who encounters a living creature can possess its body. It can do so fully (like demonic possession) or partly (dealing harm to the body psychosomatically). Tolkien did not establish a specific term for living creatures possessed by ghosts.
Through necromantic magic, a ghost can possess a dead body or skeleton. A ghost which has possessed a dead body is known as a wight. The barrow-wights that appear in The Fellowship of the Ring are evil ghosts sent by the Witch-King to inhabit the bodies of fallen kings. (They are explicitly not the ghosts of the kings themselves.)
Fading Bodies, Lingering Spirits
If a sapient creature's body lives long enough, its body fades. Its spirit enters a state that Tolkien calls lingering. A lingering spirit with a faded body is called a wraith.
For immortal Elves, fading is a natural process in which the spirit gradually brings the body into the Unseen World. All Elves who dwell in Middle-Earth are condemned to fade. It is to prevent fading that the Elves often choose to travel West, to Valinor, where they are sustained by the Valar. It is also to prevent fading that the Elves created the rings of power, which were designed to hold back the effects of time. Had Galadriel not been pardoned by the Valar in the course of The Lord of the Rings, she would have faded away once the rings of power ceased to work following the destruction of the One Ring.
For mortal Men, fading is a distinctly unnatural process. Absent sorcery, a Man dies long before he fades. However, a Man who uses a ring of power for long enough will fade into a wraith. A Man who is stabbed by a morgul-blade also may fade, and much more swiftly than from using a ring. In these cases, it is the object, not the creature's spirit, that causes the fading. The Ringwraiths are the most notable example of this.
“A mortal, Frodo, who keeps one of the Great Rings, does not die, but he does not grow or obtain more life, he merely continues, until at last every minute is a weariness. And if he often uses the Ring to make himself invisible, he fades: he becomes in the end invisible permanently, and walks in the twilight under the eye of the Dark Power that rules the Rings.
“They tried to pierce your heart with a Morgul-knife which remains in the wound. If they had succeeded, you would have become like they are, only weaker and under their command. You would have become a wraith under the dominion of the Dark Lord…”
It is important to understand that a wraith's body has not been destroyed, but is instead shapeless. In order to interact with the world, the wraith’s body must take form. This is called being clad. For the lingering spirits of Elves, taking form is an exertion of the spirit, since it is the spirit that has caused them to fade.
For Ringwraiths, however, taking form requires the magic of their ring of power, since it is their ring that has caused them to fade. Since Sauron holds the Ringwraith's rings, he controls whether they can take form. To give them form, he casts certain (unspecified) spells and clads them in special garb.
Destroying the cladding of a wraith returns it to shapelessness. The wraith is thereafter unable to affect the physical world. However, being reduced to shapelessness is not the same as being slain. When the Ringwraiths are swept away at the Fords of Bruinen in Fellowship of the Ring, they were left shapeless, but not slain.
“Eight out of the Nine are accounted for at least,” said Gandalf. “It is rash to be too sure, yet I think that we may hope now that the Ringwraiths were scattered, and have been obliged to return as best they could to their Master in Mordor, empty and shapeless.”
Because a lingering spirit does have a body, that body can be slain. However, since its body is faded into the Unseen World, it can only be slain in the Unseen World via magic weapons, spells, and so on. Destroying the faded body of a wraith reduces it to a houseless spirit. This is the fate of the Witch-King of Angmar when he is slain by Eowyn and Merry at the Battle of the Pelennor.
Making it Work in ACKS
The interpretation above is my own, and is not necessarily accepted by Tolkien scholars. Those scholars have had an opportunity to read unpublished material, and might have reached different conclusions. But I believe the theory I have developed explains the three major undead we encounter in the books (barrow-wights, ghosts, and wraiths); it squares with Tolkien's later writings on his mythology; and it explains the difference between what happened to the Ringwraiths at the Fords in Fellowship of the Ring (their bodies were unclad, reducing them to shapelessness) and to the witch-king in Return of the King (his clad body was destroyed, reducing him to a ghost).
Click here to download a 9,000-word PDF with ACKS characteristics for ghosts, wights, and wraiths inspired by Middle Earth’s Legendarium.
Capital City Casefiles #1 Now Available
In our last article, I announced the launch of Capital City Casefiles, a series of scenarios for Ascendant, my superpowered role-playing game. Capital City Casefile #1 is now available in premium-color softcover on DriveThruRPG for $15.00 . You can use this link to get your softcover copy for just $12.50. Everyone who buys the softcover using the special offer will also get the PDF, too. (If you already bought the PDF, you’ll have gotten a special coupon code with an even bigger discount on the softcover, so check your Inbox.)
Ascendant: Platinum Edition Kickstarter - Next Month!
In November, I’ll be launching a Kickstarter I’ve settled on calling Ascendant: Platinum Edition. It will be offering the revised second printing of Ascendant, the new Ascendant: Rogues Gallery, the Ascendant: Star-Spangled Squadron graphic novel and more. The centerpiece is of course Rogues Gallery, which blows open the Ascendant Universe with dozens of ready-made villains, plot hooks, and more. I hope you’ll support it when it goes live.
Now It is Time for the Clicking of the Links
Check out the links below for ways to get involved in the Autarch community. If you’re a fan, be kind and spread the word!
ACKS Patreon with a new article from our Axioms ezine every month
Ascendant Patreon with a new character and story hook every month
Autarch Facebook page with news and updates about our projects
Autarch Twitter channel with brief comments and witty quirks
Ascendant Comics Facebook page with sneak previews of the upcoming comics
Ascendant Comics Instagram page with tons of art and cosplay
Ascendant Comics Twitter channel with short messages and quirky wit
Well done, I enjoyed reading this and will re-read in coming days. I must point out tho that the ringwraiths can cast off their cloaks and ride invisible on horses. Frodo saw them do this. You can't ride unless you have a body but it's just invisible. It was stated that their cloaks gave them shape, but they've been known to cast them off and still interact with the physical world (like with the horses). So I don't think fading implies they don't have bodies that can interact with the world. I think it's just that they're invisible permanently, kind of like how you'd be if you permanently wore a great ring as a man.
Excellent synthesis! Morgoth's Ring is a seriously underrated book, and DMing certainly benefits from this sort of complete metaphysic that players might not fully grasp but that nonetheless serves as a world-puzzle and source of continuity.