sorry not to keep glorfindel posting but I'm obsessed with the bells he has on his horse. after all this time following the hobbits & strider as they creep carefully along to have this character show up covered in bells as though he's almost daring someone to notice him, to fuck around and find out as it were, is thrilling. how powerful do you have to be to not worry about being heard
#glorfindel entering the scene like bad boys bad boys whatcha gonna do
@sindar-princeling that's all I'm gonna hear now thank you so much
I was delighted to find this about the use of bells on horses in medieval Europe, so I'm passing it on to you.
Jason Kingsley makes the point that the bells make different sounds at different gaits, and so let's people know how quickly someone is coming. He also hypothesizes that since the sound of the crotal bells is very much like the jingling of armor, it may serve to habituate horses to their sound.
(Plus his genuine curiosity and enthusiasm is infectious and the horse is gorgeous.)