The funeral of Theoden serves to bridge the past and the future for the people we have loved and followed through their journeys. Theoden is the last of the major heroes to be honored, and his final rites, with all their ceremony and song, symbolize both his and Rohan's greatness; his story of personal redemption and courage is also that of his people. Yet there are small glimpses of personal bereavement in Tolkien's description--Theoden's minstrel Gleowine never sings again after farewelling his master, and Merry, drawn from the first to serve and love the Rohirric king-cries for him from the heart, lamenting the loss of one who was a father to him, "if only for a little while."

At the funeral feast, newly crowned Eomer presides over a company that puts aside sorrows of the past to look forward to a new era of close relations between Gondor and Rohan. His own deep love for Aragorn is part of that bond, and the ties are royally and permanently cemented in the ceremony which trothplights Eowyn of Rohan with Faramir, Prince of Ithilien. " Thus, said Eomer, is the friendship of the Mark and of Gondor bound with a new bond, and the more do I rejoice." Eowyn and Faramir, having emerged from their own personal darknesses into the light, are living symbols of a brand new world.

For Eowyn, the troth plighting is especially liberating, for she is now free from the sorrow of the unrequited love she bore Aragorn. And he is free of the pain it caused him

This is a day that is marked by partings, and some of them are very final.

Today is that foreseen, but no less poignant day when Arwen takes her final leave of her father and grandparents, where Tolkien calls it "bitter...that should endure beyond the ends of the world". One can only surmise that she would meet her brothers again in the future since they have chosen to remain in Middle-earth. Perhaps that brings her some small solace today.

But even in parting, there are those who are hopeful and destined for meetings and reunions in the future. Merry's parting from Éomer and Éowyn is one of those that forbodes many joyous meetings in days to come.

As someone who has long loved the character of Aragorn, today feels like it is truly the breaking of the Fellowship, and the culmination of Tolkiens marvelous tale.

Galadriel, Celeborn, Elrond, and Gandalf have spent some seven days in quiet conference about many things--from ages gone to the recent events of the War of the Ring and the possibilities of the time yet to come. The Lords of Lorien need to return to their realm, where Galadriel will stay but a short time before she departs from the Grey Havens, leaving Celeborn and Middle Earth behind. Indeed, it seems as though the departure is already underway for the three who will go, for their conversation takes place as a meeting of mind only, and they seem to be only partly present in Middle Earth. "If any wanderer had chanced to pass, little would he have seen or heard and it would have seemed to him only that he saw grey figures, carved in stone, memorials of forgotten things now lost in un peopled lands." It is a foreshadowing of the future of Elven folk.

Elrond, Gandalf, and the hobbits go on from Eregion to Rivendell after the Lords of Lorien leave. Frodo and his friends seek Bilbo out before they do anything else, and in his simple greeting "So you've come back." the Quest of the Ring has come almost full circle. For two weeks they rest in the Last Homely House, and then it is time for the hobbits and Gandalf to leave on the last stage of the journey home. Frodo and Bilbo leave Elrond, but like Galadriel, the parting is temporary. The Grey Havens wait.