[Ottis413]

Ok, so I wright this story and figure I'll do the research later to finish it up. The stories a short one about Merry and Pippin at the time of Bilbos 111th birthday party... So, the wife and I sat down to figure up their ages (we had never thought about it before) and here's what we came up with;

Name-----------------------year born------------age at Bilbos party(3001/1400SR)
Bilbo Baggins,............... Bn 2890 / 1298SR......................111
Frodo Baggins,...............Bn 2968 / 1367SR.......................33
Samwise Gamgee,..........Bn 2983 / 1382SR......................18
Peregrin Took,................Bn 2991 / 1390SR.......................10
Meriadoc Brandybuck, ....Bn 2983 / 1382SR......................18

(Eomer was also bn in 2991, same as Pip, ... Eowyn bn in 2995)

Is this true??? Pip was 10 years old at the time? If this is right then it screws the story I just wrote, unless I just add a note saying it's based on the movies, where their ages were closer together. (Merry and Pip in their late "tweens" and Frodo 33, and Sam about the same age... but I really don't like to do that. (but I do think it's a good story )
So what's your opinion ?? Rewright it to happen at a later date? or call it a "movie-based story?

[NeumeIndil]

I'd make it movie cannon since your math is accurate to the books and re-writing to reset the thing is gonna be a pain in the... back 40. Frodo was 50+ in the books when he left the Shire, sold the house etc. etc.. Pippin and Merry (And... Fredgar Bulger I think was his name) had become a bit like Frodo had been to Bilbo before the "adoption"- the youngsters he ran around with to keep himself from stagnating. I always figured that was why Pippin missed Gandalf's fireworks so much- he would have been one of the little shavers trying to catch the butterflies and such while Merry and Sam were girl watching or drinking ale or whatever 18 year old Hobbits do.

There's nothing wrong with using movie cannon, especially if you add an Author's Note explaining this ^ stuff. I know people who prefer it because they don't know cannon well or only know the movies. Personally, cannon or movie based doesn't stop me from reading a good story, I just like to know before I go into it if I'm in an Altered Universe or the Movie world.

[Ottis413]

Thanks for the input, My wife just made the comment that she doesn't remember Pip being mentioned as being at the party, (in the book, tho I'm sure he was) like you said, they were prob busy doing different things, and didn't get to be real close frends till later...

[NeumeIndil]

Btw, thanks. You pointed out Eomer and Eowyn's birthdays in your figuring up there and made me look again at timelines for one of my own fics (femme fatal/ horse lord smut)... turns out I screwed up my math and my OC's age was bass-ackwards.

And they say people in West Virginia can't do math! (jk)

Thanks again,

One of the OSA Useless Nuts

[Rhapsody]

Something to consider Ottis is that Hobbits were considered as tweens up until the age of 33. They reached maturity at that age.

Also Frodo is family of Merry and Pippin, so that explains their close bond. Hobbit children are called faunts.

I went to a different list (Stories of Arda) and one of the Hobbit writers, Dreamflower gave this explanations:

Question asked: Ok how does it work, I was reading a fic where they had the Hobbit age and the Human age and I noticed that the
older the Hobbit got the longer the distance between Human and hobbit age became. Is there a reason for that?

The answer:
It is because the ratio is approximately two-thirds. Two-thirds for a three year old is two,with a difference of one year; two-thirds for a fifteen year old is ten, with a difference of five years; two-thirds for a thirty-three year old is going to leave a difference of about eleven years, and so forth.

Some people have it that the age gap closes up as the hobbits get older, but I don't really see a reason for that. Other people ignore it altogether, and some people have it that the age is the same up until hobbits become tweens, where they have an extended adolescence, and then goes back to being the same when they come of age. All of that ignores the hints that JRRT gave us in his etters, however.

Dreamflower

[SilverMoonLady]

Just a little thing, not everybody agrees on the age calculation... and what that means for development, social & physical. But that's a whole other ball of wax

[Ottis413]

[ghettoelleth]

Ottis, best little piece of advice I'm ever going to give you, passed down to me from the really old peeps (ahem, not nancy or inglor, really). Go to the books, all of this information is there and its not diluted with perception. That's how you get canon. If you have questions or need a scan, let someone know. You know how that works.

[Rhapsody]

Ghettoelleth is, as far as I am concerned, the canon queen. If she doesn't know..

[SilverMoonLady]

[ghettoelleth]

No, wait, cross that out stoopid and put the expectant weeble who for some odd reason gets no props among the others but hey, maybe its suppose to be a secret.

[SilverMoonLady]

eh?

*disappears in a puff of logic, to the great relief of everyone involved*

[Rhapsody]

[SilverMoonLady]

It ain't so much the math that bugs me as the socio-cultural stuff that comes of it... *shrug* But then, I'm an anthropologist and rebel...

[Rhapsody]