[rook]

the mouth of sauron, also described as the lieutenant of barad dur, was a member of the black numenorean race. they were originally the "king's men" as opposed to members of the rebellion of elendil the elf-friend who fought against the increasingly evil kings of numenor who, out of pride and being deceived by sauron, tried to visit the undying lands which, not being for mortals, ended up having numenor demolished by the gods.

the remnant of the king's men settled in the south of middle earth, and i think became the haradrim (either the unfinished tales or the silmarrilion refer to 2 of such leaders as herumor and fuinur (sp?) who, i vaguely recall, fought against hte last such alliance of men and elves in elendil's time). 3 of hte nazgul are also black numenoreans. i think of all the races written of by tolkien, the black numenoreans are the most interesting. basically evil aragorns, proud killers obsessed with death and immortality, who sacrificed the king's men and delighted in destruction, warfare, piracy, and everything fun and awesome in the world.

in one of tolkien's later books, he gave a vague discussion of the origins of the mouth of sauron as a youth from a prominent gondorian family who was abducted and rose through the ranks of the mordor army because of his cunning. but this was scrapped in the return of the king. one thing that always intrigued me was how he was a sorceror when there were only 5 wizards. i guess sorcery as defined by tolkien is a separate entity than magic, as the witch king was also a sorceror, but i find the line to be very narrow and not well-defined by tolkien. also what's interesting is that he, a man, was one of the highest ranking people in mordor, as opposed to nazgul and other creatures.

one silly question:
with isengard and baraddur being depicted as immensely tall fortress towers of doom, you think they had elevators or did everyone have to take the stairs?