View Full Version : Was Éowyn learned in sword fighting? What does Shieldmaiden mean?
Diabless
01-12-2003, 04:21 AM
I got the feeling that in the book, Eowyn simply wanted to give her life her country and gain gloary but she did not care if she was inexperienced. I had the feeling, she borrowed some armor and it runed out to be a prophecy that she would kill the Witch King. But was she prepared for combat. Was she trained except on horseback?
i ask this because in the movie it's portrayed otherwise and also in interviews it said she was already a warrior.
Then I thought maybe Shieldmaiden is shield for a reason, she shields and protects her people but does not draw a sword, hence she is not called a warrior maiden...
Rúmil
01-12-2003, 02:36 PM
Shieldmay: also shield-maid, shieldmaiden: a warrior woman, oft. an Amazon or Walkyrie. (Oxford English Dictionnary)
Still she did not blench: maiden of the Rohirrim, child of kings, slender but as a steel-blade, fair but terrible. A swift stroke she dealt, skilled and deadly. The outstretched neck she clove asunder, and the hewn head fell like a stone. Backward she sprang as the huge shape crashed to ruin, vast wings outspread, crumpled on the earth; and with its fall the shadow passed away. A light fell about her, and her hair shone in the sunrise. She seems to be to be extremly skilled, and long trained and exercised in the art of fighting with a sword.
Diabless
01-13-2003, 12:47 AM
Thank You Rumil!
I guess we dont see this until she proves herself in battle..
I think the word 'skilled' sells it for me because all of it could have been sort of figurative I thought, 'a steel blade' in thought and intentions but not necesarrily in reality.
Also in the movie, Aragorn says
You are a shiledmaiden of rohan, I do not think that ill be your fate which is why maybe they're making it metaphorical in that line...
Please relpy again, btw:)
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