Tolkien's Ringwraiths are among the most iconic villains in The Lord of the Rings.
But although the Nazgûl's black cloaks and breathless voices
will strike fear into any fantasy fan, not everybody knows their whole story.
This is the whole story behind the Ringwraiths from The Lord of the Rings.
There's a good chance you've heard these creatures called a number of different names — and true
enough, they've got more titles than you could shake a Morgul blade at. Sauron's most dreadful
servants go by several different names throughout The Lord of the Rings, including, among others,
the Nazgûl, the Ringwraiths, the Black Riders, the Nine, the Fell Riders, the Úlairi, and the
Nine Servants. One orc in The Return of the King even refers to them as "filthy Shriekers."
But while the group as a whole are called many things, the names of the individual
Ringwraiths themselves have always been shrouded in mystery. The leader of the
Nine is commonly referred to by his titles; the Lord of Morgul, Lord of the Nazgûl,
and the Witch-king are most common, but even he isn't named. The only Nazgûl to
ever be directly named in Tolkien's writings is Khamûl. In the index of Unfinished Tales,
Tolkien succinctly describes Khamûl as "second to the Chief," "Shadow of the East," and "the
Black Easterling," giving a tiny sliver of personality to at least one of his Ringwraiths.
Unsurprisingly, the Ringwraiths are old — almost unspeakably old, in fact.
By the time of The Lord of the Rings, the Nazgûl, despite originally being mortal men,
are probably pushing 5,000 years of age. Their inception likely dates back to roughly halfway
through the Second Age, right after Sauron created the One Ring. Each of the Nazgûl
receives a Ring of Power around this time, which unnaturally extends their lives.
Over the next few thousand years, the Nazgûl gradually began to lose their physical form.
In The Fellowship of the Ring, Gandalf explains to Frodo why this happens, saying that:
"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."
Gandalf adds:
"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."
This is exactly what happened to the Nazgûl. Each of their rings gradually whittled away their
humanity, until they became little more than ghostly slaves to the whims of the Dark Lord.
Their faded existence means the Ringwraiths don't take up much physical space in the real world.
Sure, they can wear clothes, wield weapons, and ride horses,
but their primary existence is spiritual in nature. In essence,
they dwell in an unseen shadow realm through which they dimly interact with the real world.
This natural state in which the Nazgûl inhabit can often affect the people who encounter them.
For instance, when Frodo puts on the Ring, he too enters that spiritual dimension and is able to
see the Ringwraiths in all of their otherworldly horror. When Merry and Êowyn stab the Witch-king
in battle, both of their arms immediately go cold and numb. Their weapons also disintegrate,
with Merry's burning like a piece of wood and Éowyn's breaking into splinters.
In The Fellowship of the Ring, Tolkien even implies that characters like Gandalf, Aragorn,
and Glorfindel are uniquely suited to resist the Riders — not because of any physical prowess,
but because of their resilience against the effects of the spiritual realm.
With one foot in the physical world and one on "the other side," the Ringwraiths
end up using a range of different weapons to carry out their dirty work.
Some of these are pretty simple, such as their swords or the Witch-king's giant black mace.
But the weapons of the Nazgûl can be far deadlier and more terrifying.
In the novel version of The Return of the King, the Witch-King uses a "black dart" to kill
Théoden's horse, and Aragorn later suggests that their darts can kill much faster than the average
arrow. And then there's the Morgul-knife that the Witch-king uses to stab Frodo
on Weathertop. A notch of the cursed blade embeds itself into the hobbit's shoulder while the rest
of the weapon disintegrates. The splinter then begins to worm its way towards Frodo's heart,
only being stopped by the timely intervention of Elrond's healing
arts. If it had struck home, though, it would've turned Frodo into a wraith
under their command. The effect of the Morgul blade is so terrible, in fact,
that Frodo becomes ill on every anniversary of his stabbing, long after the Nazgûl are destroyed.
"It's been four years to the day since Weathertop, Sam. It's never really healed."
As terrible as the blades and arrows of the Nazgûl may be,
they're nothing compared to the Riders' unearthly weapons. While the exact details
remain largely unexplained in Tolkien's writings, the Ringwraiths wield a number
of mind-melting preternatural weapons that they regularly employ against their enemies.
Abject fear is one of these weapons, and the Nazgûl are able to wield fear to great effect,
striking pure dread into their foes even from a great distance.
In The Return of the King, during the siege of Gondor, the riders fly high over Minas Tirith,
shrieking and terrifying all below. Tolkien writes:
"At length even the stout-hearted would fling themselves to the ground as the hidden menace
passed over them, or they would stand, letting their weapons fall from nerveless
hands while into their minds a blackness came, and they thought no more of war,
but only of hiding and of crawling, and of death."
Then there's the Black Breath. In The Fellowship of the Ring, Merry first encounters this
phenomenon during his visit to Bree when he runs into a Nazgûl and almost immediately passes out.
Later, during The Return of the King, the Black Breath is connected to a
strange sickness called the Black Shadow. According to the novel:
"Those who were stricken with it fell slowly into an ever deeper dream,
and then passed to silence and a deadly cold, and so died."
So just how did the Nazgûl come to be? Well, their origin lies back in the Second Age,
long before the events of The Lord of the Rings. At this time, Sauron forges the Rings of Power,
including his One Ring. After failing to enslave the elves with his rings,
the Dark Lord redistributes them to the other races of Middle-Earth. Nine, of course,
go to the great lords of men. While he never explains who all of the nine riders are or where
each one comes from, in The Silmarillion, Tolkien reveals that of the Nine, three were great lords
of the Númenórean race. Númenór was the incredibly powerful island nation that frequently came to
blows with Sauron during the Second Age — and it's where Aragorn's ancestors hail from, too.
After they're given their rings, the Nine become mighty,
and are soon known as great kings, sorcerers, and warriors. They're bathed in glory, and,
of course, they also become incredibly rich. As time begins to creep by,
however, they begin to succumb to the long-term effects of the Rings of Power.
The Nazgûl first make an appearance around the year 2251 of the Second Age — roughly 600 years
after the forging of the One Ring. Very little detail is given about their activity at this time,
but they likely spend the next millennium helping Sauron conquer most of Middle-Earth.
Eventually, their great master tussles with the Númenóreans, which eventually leads to the
destruction of Numenor and the establishment of the new nations of Arnor and Gondor.
From there, the action picks up again, ending in the War of the Last Alliance,
in which Sauron is defeated and the One Ring passes to Isildur.
After his defeat at the end of the Second Age, Sauron is left unable to take on a physical form.
This leads to a generally peaceful period in Middle-Earth's history,
and as the Third Age kicks off, the Nazgûl fade into the shadows. Over time, however,
the shapeless Sauron once again begins to stir, using his most fearful servants as
his prime movers and shakers. Even so, it takes some time to get things going again.
Around a thousand years into the Third Age, the five wizards first arrive in Middle-earth
with the express task of assisting the people of Middle-Earth in their struggles against Sauron.
The Dark Lord himself secretly reappears around this time, too,
setting up the stronghold of Dol Guldur in Mirkwood. The Ringwraiths are most certainly
around at this point too. For a while, the White Council even believes that the
evil presence in Dol Guldur could be one of the Nazgûl. Of course, they couldn't be more wrong.
A few hundred years after Sauron's reappearance, the Nazgûl officially make their return. The
Witch-King then establishes the Kingdom of Angmar in the northern regions of Middle-Earth. While his
master slowly rebuilds his strength, the greatest of the Nine wages a centuries-long war with the
Kingdom of Arnor. Eventually, the Witch-King is defeated, but Arnor is destroyed in the process.
Then, just six years later, the Witch-King reappears in the uninhabited wastelands of
Mordor and gathers his eight fellow wraiths. 20 years later, they attack the Gondorian city
of Minas Ithil and capture it, renaming it Minas Morgul and making it their home.
"This is my hour!"
The Nazgûl spend the next millenia preparing Mordor for their master's return.
They also slowly chip away at the strength of his enemies,
especially Gondor, where they kill the king by luring him into single
combat — leaving the stewards to rule the kingdom until another king should return.
Many years later, the White Council finally attacks Dol Guldur and drives Sauron out of his
stronghold. He then makes his long-awaited return to Mordor… where he and the Nine prepare for war.
After Sauron's return to Mordor, three of the Ringwraiths are sent back to Dol Guldur
to hold it while their master is away — one of whom is named as Khamûl the Easterling.
Meanwhile, a messenger from Mordor arrives at the Lonely Mountain. In The Fellowship of the Ring,
he's described as "a horseman in the night" whose "breath came like the hiss of snakes" — clearly
suggesting that he was one of the Nazgûl. This rider brings a message of friendship
from Sauron and offers the dwarves their own Rings of Power. The dwarves refuse to listen,
but the messenger returns more than once, hoping to win them over to the Dark Lord's side.
Around this time, Sauron captures Gollum and
tortures him into revealing the location of the One Ring.
"Shire! Baggins!"
The Dark Lord then unleashes his Nine Riders in the so-called Hunt for the Ring.
The ring-bearer makes a very lucky escape at this point, since the wraith known as
Khamûl arrives at Bag End just after Frodo and his companions have left.
The Ringwraiths play a significant role in the War of the Ring. The Nine hunt
the hobbits on the road to Rivendell, and nearly recapture the One Ring on a number of occasions.
They later reappear acting as messengers and generals for Sauron, and wreak absolute havoc
in the war against Gondor. Soon enough, however, the first of the Nine is killed,
when Eowyn and Merry defeat the Witch-King during the Battle of the Pelennor Fields.
Later, as the armies of the West assault the Black Gate of Mordor, the eight remaining Ringwraiths
gather one last time. They're given their final task when Sauron orders them to hurtle towards
Mount Doom to stop Frodo from destroying the One Ring. But they arrive too late. In The
Return of the King, their final moments are described in fiery detail. Tolkien writes:
"The Nazgûl came, shooting like flaming bolts,
as caught in the fiery ruin of hill and sky they crackled, withered, and went out."
And so comes the end of Sauron's greatest servants.
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