Sources of Lord of the Ring

The Worm Ouroboros: XXXI. The Demons Before Carcë

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*The Worm Ouroboros* (1922) by E.R. Eddison is a high fantasy novel written in an archaic, Jacobean prose style that self-consciously imitates Renaissance English. This excerpt depicts a war council scene in which the dark king Gorice XII of Witchland and his two chief generals, Corund and Corinius, assess their military readiness before an imminent battle against the invading Demon lords led by Juss. The council reveals a fractured alliance — several subject kingdoms have defected or delayed, leaving Witchland outnumbered — and a strategic debate between the cautious Corund (wait for reinforcements) and the aggressive Corinius (attack immediately), resolved by the king's command to hold the fortress of Carcë until Pixyland levies arrive. The excerpt closes with an omen — a blazing comet that both Corund and the king recognize as a death-portent for great men — and then a formal parley between the two enemy commanders before battle, staged with ceremonial grandeur. Eddison's most distinctive quality is his ornate, deliberately antique diction and his sympathetic treatment of the villains: Witchland's king and generals are rendered with genuine menace and even dignity, not mere evil, giving the conflict an almost Homeric moral weight.

The Worm Ouroboros: XXXI. The Demons Before Carcë

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