#mathoms

The very first mathom I’m posting on this blog... is not technically a mathom. lol Mathoms are specifically useless but beloved objects. And this is my crochet kit: it is very definitely useful!

I only recently started crocheting again after a year-long break, and I couldn’t find any of my ergonomic crochet hooks or my yarn needles, so I decided to buy a crochet kit. I got this one on Amazon. (There are similar kits with different fabric bags.) It contained yarn needles, a set of ergonomic crochet hooks, and a small bag of stitch markers, and it was surprisingly cheap! The only thing I needed in a kit that it didn’t have was scissors, so I also bought some yarn snips. Now my kit is complete, and I’m really happy with it! It’s so compact.

Extract from a fabulous article about Mathoms : 

...“Tolkien’s knowledge of the Anglo-Saxon tradition of Gift Giving is clearly present in The Lord of the Rings. Christopher Tolkien points to the ancient horn given to Meriadoc by the Lady Eowyn as an example of “the word mathum used in Rohan for a ‘treasure’ or a ‘rich gift’” (HoMe XII p. 39, p. 53). 

In the scene that Christopher Tolkien is referencing, Éomer also uses the modern word gift(s) in his address to Meriadoc.

Kings of old would have laden you with gifts that a wain could not bear for your deeds upon the fields of Mundburg; and yet you will take naught, you say, but the arms that were given to you. This I suffer, for indeed I have no gift that is worthy; but my sister begs you to receive this small thing, as a memorial of Dernhelm and of the horns of the Mark at the coming of the morning (R.316; VI.6, emphasis added).

Having been raised with elves, Aragorn understands this subtle flirtation much better than any other non-elf in the Fellowship