The Two Towers: Book Four: Chapters 1-3

by J.R.R. Tolkien
In the second part of The Lord of the Rings, the fellowship is broken. Two hobbits are kidnapped by orcs, while Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli help fight the forces of Saruman, an evil wizard. Meanwhile, with Gollum as their guide, Frodo and Sam make their way to Mordor to destroy the One Ring.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Book Three: Chapters 1-3, Book Three: Chapters 4-7, Book Three: Chapters 8-11, Book Four: Chapters 1-3, Book Four: Chapters 4-6, Book Four: Chapters 7-10

Here are links to our lists for other works by J.R.R. Tolkien: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Return of the King, The Hobbit
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. despondent
    without or almost without hope
    He stood despondently with hunched shoulders beside Frodo, and peered out with puckered eyes into the gloom.
  2. livid
    (of a light) imparting a deathlike luminosity
    But always they found its outward faces sheer, high and impassable, frowning over the plain below; beyond its tumbled skirts lay livid festering marshes where nothing moved and not even a bird was to be seen.
  3. vehemence
    intensity or forcefulness of expression
    ‘No! Not if I can help it,’ said Frodo with a sudden strange vehemence.
  4. spate
    a sudden forceful flow
    Rills of water began to run down; soon they grew to a spate that splashed and fumed on the stones, and spouted out over the cliff like the gutters of a vast roof.
  5. hitch
    a knot that can be undone by pulling against it
    ‘I may not be much good at climbing, Mr. Frodo,’ he said in injured tones, ‘but I do know something about rope and about knots. It’s in the family, as you might say. Why, my grand-dad, and my uncle Andy after him, him that was the Gaffer’s eldest brother, he had a rope-walk over by Tighfield many a year. And I put as fast a hitch over the stump as any one could have done, in the Shire or out of it.’
  6. fray
    wear away by rubbing
    ‘Then the rope must have broken — frayed on the rock-edge, I expect,’ said Frodo.
  7. sentry
    a person employed to keep watch for some anticipated event
    ‘You sleep for a bit Sam and take my blanket. I’ll walk up and down on sentry for a while.’
  8. clammy
    unpleasantly cool and humid
    Before Sam could get a hold, long legs and arms were wound round him pinning his arms, and a clinging grip, soft but horribly strong, was squeezing him like slowly tightening cords; clammy fingers were feeling for his throat.
  9. smolder
    have strong suppressed feelings
    His eyes smouldered with anger, but he could not avenge himself: his miserable enemy lay grovelling on the stones whimpering.
  10. throttle
    kill by squeezing the throat of so as to cut off the air
    ‘Oh hasn’t he!’ said Sam rubbing his shoulder. ‘Anyway he meant to, and he means to, I’ll warrant. Throttle us in our sleep, that’s his plan.’
  11. vile
    morally reprehensible
    What a pity Bilbo did not stab the vile creature, when he had a chance!
  12. fawn
    try to gain favor through flattery or deferential behavior
    Gollum raised himself and began pawing at Frodo, fawning at his knees.
  13. cur
    an inferior dog or one of mixed breed
    At once Gollum got up and began prancing about, like a whipped cur whose master has patted it.
  14. rebuke
    censure severely or angrily
    He would cackle with laughter and caper, if any jest was made, or even if Frodo spoke kindly to him, and weep if Frodo rebuked him.
  15. rift
    a narrow fissure in rock
    It was not difficult, for the rift was at this point only some fifteen feet deep and about a dozen across.
  16. dainty
    excessively fastidious
    ‘He looks fair famished. Not too dainty to try what hobbit tastes like, if there ain’t no fish, I’ll wager — supposing as he could catch us napping. Well, he won’t: not Sam Gamgee for one.’
  17. morsel
    a small amount of solid food; a mouthful
    Gollum watched every morsel from hand to mouth, like an expectant dog by a diner’s chair.
  18. reproachful
    expressing disapproval, blame, or disappointment
    Various reproachful names for himself came to Sam’s mind, drawn from the Gaffer’s large paternal word-hoard; then it also occurred to him that his master had been right: there had for the present been nothing to guard against.
  19. innards
    the organs in a body, collectively
    This waybread keeps you on your legs in a wonderful way, though it doesn’t satisfy the innards proper, as you might say: not to my feeling anyhow, meaning no disrespect to them as made it.
  20. mire
    a soft wet area of low-lying land that sinks underfoot
    On either side and in front wide fens and mires now lay, stretching away southward and eastward into the dim half-light.
  21. noisome
    offensively malodorous
    Mists curled and smoked from dark and noisome pools.
  22. unfurl
    unroll, unfold, or spread out
    He first saw one with the corner of his left eye, a wisp of pale sheen that faded away; but others appeared soon after: some like dimly shining smoke, some like misty flames flickering slowly above unseen candles; here and there they twisted like ghostly sheets unfurled by hidden hands.
  23. cesspool
    a covered cistern for waste water and sewage
    Often they floundered, stepping or falling hands-first into waters as noisome as a cesspool, till they were slimed and fouled almost up to their necks and stank in one another’s nostrils.
  24. dappled
    having spots or patches of color
    The naked waste, as far as the eye could pierce, even to the distant menace of the mountains, was dappled with the fitful moonlight.
  25. burdensome
    not easily borne or endured; causing hardship
    In fact with every step towards the gates of Mordor Frodo felt the Ring on its chain about his neck grow more burdensome.
  26. habitation
    housing that someone is living in
    Frodo knew just where the present habitation and heart of that will now was: as certainly as a man can tell the direction of the sun with his eyes shut.
  27. potency
    capacity to produce strong physiological or chemical effects
    He was facing it, and its potency beat upon his brow.
  28. buttress
    a support usually of stone or brick
    Out from their feet were flung huge buttresses and broken hills that were now at the nearest scarce a dozen miles away.
  29. arid
    lacking sufficient water or rainfall
    Dreadful as the Dead Marshes had been, and the arid moors of the Noman-lands, more loathsome far was the country that the crawling day now slowly unveiled to his shrinking eyes.
  30. entrails
    internal organs collectively
    The gasping pools were choked with ash and crawling muds, sickly white and grey, as if the mountains had vomited the filth of their entrails upon the lands about.
  31. obscene
    offensive to the mind
    High mounds of crushed and powdered rock, great cones of earth fire-blasted and poison-stained, stood like an obscene graveyard in endless rows, slowly revealed in the reluctant light.
  32. oblivion
    the state of being disregarded or forgotten
    They had come to the desolation that lay before Mordor: the lasting monument to the dark labour of its slaves that should endure when all their purposes were made void; a land defiled, diseased beyond all healing — unless the Great Sea should enter in and wash it with oblivion.
  33. garrison
    station in a fort
    Now the watch-towers, which had fallen into decay, were repaired, and filled with arms, and garrisoned with ceaseless vigilance.
  34. shrewd
    marked by practical hardheaded intelligence
    While these doubts were passing through Sam’s slow but shrewd mind, he stood gazing out towards the dark cliff of Cirith Gorgor.
  35. mantle
    cover like a cloak
    Westward, to his right, it turned, skirting the shoulders of the mountains, and went off southwards into the deep shadows that mantled all the western sides of Ephel Dúath; beyond his sight it journeyed on into the narrow land between the mountains and the Great River.
  36. incompatible
    not aligning with other facts
    It had always been a notion of his that the kindness of dear Mr. Frodo was of such a high degree that it must imply a fair measure of blindness. Of course, he also firmly held the incompatible belief that Mr. Frodo was the wisest person in the world (with the possible exception of Old Mr. Bilbo and of Gandalf).
  37. hobnob
    associate familiarly, especially with someone of high status
    ‘You seem to know a lot about what He’s doing and thinking,’ said Sam. ‘Have you been talking to Him lately? Or just hobnobbing with Orcs?’
  38. wile
    the use of tricks to deceive someone
    But even if Gollum could be trusted on this point, Frodo did not forget the wiles of the Enemy.
  39. sullen
    showing a brooding ill humor
    But the name of Aragorn had put Gollum into a sullen mood.
  40. pinion
    wing of a bird
    They were very small to look at, yet he knew, somehow, that they were huge, with a vast stretch of pinion, flying at a great height.
Created on Sun Feb 04 17:06:20 EST 2018 (updated Tue Feb 20 17:04:48 EST 2018)

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