#and that he is what happens when the hyper-competent PA snaps

[aragornsrockcollection]

Your post on Melian being the Maia of love, and how the Ainur all had their “domains” has got me wondering, what do you think Mairon’s would have been before corruption or if his corruption had never happened?

Always an interesting question, and thanks so much for being curious about my opinion!

I think his domain was the same before and after corruption, just like Melkor.

The chaos and extremes Melkor represents didn’t need to be evil, in fact they go into how his contribution is almost a way of swirling the domains of the different Valar together, like how Melkor’s influence on Ulmo’s domain creates clouds that allowed him to be close to Manwe… that’s off topic, but I want to point out that corrupted or not we should still be able to see Sauron hold down the same skills as he would as Mairon.

My initial instinct is that he is the Maia of Order, which intensifies into a need for control when he defects to Melkor. This gives us the idea of Sauron being the order in Melkor’s chaos, making his defection an inevitable part of his nature.

Tolkien was writing LotR in letters to his son fighting in WWII at one point, and the parallels between fascism and Mordor were not subtle as a result. Sauron seeks order and to implement that he needs control and for that he needs power. This drives him, and his understanding of systems and order makes him very, very good at getting it.

The rings are very neat and orderly in concept, a heirarchy of power created with numbers significant to each race- there were 3 original elves, 7 fathers of dwarves, and we can assume based on that pattern, 9 was the initial number of men.

But I also think a lot about his symbol being the red eye, and his perception being stifling and practically a weight characters have to bear. He was initially Melkor’s spy in the years of the lamps, so information might be his domain.

Now, Aule would definitely be the Valar of knowledge, so it’s not quite that, but he has a desire to share that knowledge (see creation of the dwarfs) and Mairon was initially one of Aule’s maiar. Also, can I just say that knowledge being the forbidden fruit in Christian mythology and Aule having as much if not more knowledge of the workings of the physical world as Melkor? Very clearly this is why his Maiar keep getting corrupted.

So if I were to marry the idea of order with the eye imagery which screams observation, I think it he would end up with a domain of…

Math.

I’m kidding but I’m also not kidding. Calculations and analysis that orders the world based on observation… hyper intelligence and recognition of patterns, association with chaos…

I think Mairon is the Maia of patterns and calculations… which is basically math.

Trust a liberal arts professor to make their villain a math guy, smh.

Really, information and organization of that information are his strengths, and I think it’s really significant that he ultimately falls because he did NOT have all the information and failed to understand all the factors until it was too late.

Ok, his domain is Order, final answer. But I still secretly think it’s math.

#the sad thing is I am not sure how much I am joking #I’ve always thought ‘order’ #and that he is what happens when the hyper-competent PA snaps #tolkien #the silmarillion #jirt #lotr #jrr tolkien #silm #Mairon #Sauron #maiar #Ainur #melkor #I’m sorry