It seems that no matter what Middle Earth story is told, Sauron is inescapable. His machinations always seem to happen in the background, even if he isn’t the central villain of a particular story. This trend doesn’t seem to be changing with Amazon’s upcoming Rings of Power series. Sauron again seems to be the biggest threat, but this time it’s much earlier in his story. The show may focus more on Sauron’s origins, if not at the very beginning, at least much sooner than when the audience meets him in the Lord of the Rings movies.
As one of the greatest threats to Middle Earth’s security, Sauron has always been a protagonist in its history. But where exactly did he come from? What created this force of evil, and what was Sauron’s grand design for Middle Earth? It will be interesting to see how much of its history the show will eventually uncover as its story is certainly far reaching and fascinating.
Sauron was one of the most powerful Maiar, the spirits who descended to Arda to help the Valar shape the world. They were all incredibly powerful creatures and there were many other characters that were well known in Middle Earth such as the wizards like Saruman, Gandalf and Radagast. Sauron was created by Ilúvatar – the supreme deity – before he even started the Music of the Ainur, which essentially created the physical universe. In that sense, Sauron is older than Middle Earth itself. His name wasn’t always Sauron in the beginning either; he went through a name change, like many characters in Lord of the Rings are just to do.
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Originally, Sauron was known as Mairon and was one of the Maiar of Aulë. He was considered strong, surpassed only by the master Smith of the Valar, Aulë herself. Mairon liked planning and order, and disliked chaos. While order can be a good thing, his obsession with it soon overshadowed his concern for Arda’s sentient beings, and absolute order became his ultimate end goal. He became very interested in Melkor (aka Morgoth), the greatest of the Ainur who defied Ilúvatar and fell from grace, eventually becoming one of the main forces of evil in the world.
Mairon admired Melkor’s strength and ability to make all his plans come true in such an efficient manner. He became Melkor’s most trusted servant and was known to the Sindar of Beleriand as Gorthaur and to most others as Sauron. Although Sauron admired Melkor, they did not share the same vision. While Melkor wanted to completely corrupt and undo the world, Sauron wanted to take over and rule it, and do whatever he wanted with Arda and the people in it.
In the First Age, Melkor built his main fortress of Angband in the northwest, and appointed Sauron as commander. The Valar managed to capture Melkor during the Battle of the Powers, but when they searched Angband, Sauron had managed to escape. Sauron continued Morgoth’s nefarious schemes until Morgoth was unleashed and destroyed the Two Trees of Valinor, when men were born in Middle Earth. Morgoth put Sauron in charge of the war when he set out to corrupt the newborn men.
Sauron led many attacks during the War of Wrath, but was eventually overtaken by the Host of the West (aka the good guys). After Morgoth’s demise, Sauron assumed “fair form” and repented of his evil deeds to the Valar. They ordered him to return to Valinor to receive Manwë’s judgment, but he found the idea too humiliating, and instead he fled and hid his form in Middle Earth.
In the second era (in which The rings of power will be set), Sauron began to stir again. He had judged that the Valar had forgotten Middle Earth and would no longer notice him, so he began his campaign of evil again. Many men had already been corrupted by Melkor and immediately followed Sauron. He decided to make Mordor his base of operations and also enlisted Elves (as they were much more powerful than men). He disguised himself as a creature called Annatar (Lord of Gifts) to get people to trust him, although more powerful creatures like Elrond and Galadriel never did.
He used Elvensmiths to forge the Rings of Power, as he promised them that these rings would help maintain their powers over Middle-earth. In reality, of course, he only wanted the power of the One Ring for himself. When the Elves realized what was going on, they refused to use the rings and did not give them to Sauron, triggering his war against them. Sauron began to ravage the lands of Middle Earth in his quest for power, including destruction during the battles on Númenor.
The destruction on the island was too much, so Ilúvatar stepped in and the whole thing sank under the sea. Sauron still sat on it and was caught in the flood, though his spirit survived and managed to return to Middle-earth. His spirit rested in Mordor, waiting for enough strength to return to physical form, which he did – just before his finger (carrying the One Ring) was cut off by Isildur.
From here on, his story is fairly well known, as evidenced by Under the spell of the Ring. There is currently no way of knowing for sure how much of his story will be told in The rings of powerbut it looks like he will definitely be a key player in the story again.
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