Eye of Mordor/US dollar bill mashup tee

Threadless's dschwen and murraymullet created this Eye of Mordor/US-dollar-bill-pyramid mashup and have put it to the vote on Threadless. I'm for it! I think the Elvish script under the sigil really makes this.

The All Seeing Eye by dschwen (via Super Punch)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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querent

I’d buy it.
Frank W

So true.
Flaminica

Has anyone tried translating the Elvish? C’mon, this is Boing Boing; I know we have Tolkien nerds!
- querent
  
  Supposedly Antinous can do it.
  
  Antinous?
kridje

Um, it’s actually the Eye of Sauron, not Mordor… but we knew what you meant. And yeah I would totally rock that shirt.
elisd

That’s not elvish. It is the language of Mordor, which I will not utter here.

[actually have no idea, but couldn't resist]
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  What kind of episode was Elrond having when he said that that language had never been uttered in Rivendell? People were using ‘nazgul’ regularly. Maybe they only used ‘ulairi’ when he was in the room.
Phlip

Guys, the “floating eye above a tower” was Peter Jackson hamming it up, not Tolkien canon.

The real “eye” was only a feeling of being watched, and the badge of Mordor’s troops. (And from Mt Doom, the Barad Dur would have been as tall as a quarter inch on your thumbnail at arm’s length. Mordor was not shaped like a plate with a salt and pepper shaker on it for Mt Doom and the Dark Tower!)

The “eye” was the feeling of Sauron’s presence, radiating from the “Window of the Eye” on Barad Dur’s top floor. As an evil and corrupt Maia, Sauron lost the ability to hide his true power in a fair form. Tolkien’s letters state he should be imagined as simply “man-like”, with normal eyes.

In summary, Peter Jackson’s movies admirably reveal the power of the printed word.
Phlip

TOL-kee-YEN
Jon

I’ll take a couple T-shirts, just let me know when they come out!
peterbruells

Shouldn’t that be “one bill to bind them”?
jtf

I’m not entirely familiar with the black speech mode, and I don’t think anyone ever will be considering there’s only the one sample, but the text above is copied off of the one ring:

Ash nazg thrakatulÃ»k agh burzum-ishi krimpatul

which of course means “One ring to rule them all and in the darkness bind them.” Unfortunately to those of us nerdy enough to have learned to read Tengwar, the guys who made that design missed the last two diacritics (tehtar) which cuts out two vowels, so the design actually reads

Ash nazg thrakatulÃ»k agh burzum-ishi krimptl

which means “one ring to rule them all and in the darkness learn to spell”

Also the two markings on the right are a decorative flourish that appears on the one ring’s inscription, but the corresponding markings are missing on the left hand side.
dr.hypercube

Will this teeshirt cause security cameras to ignore me?
- Silent_Guru
  
  Nope, TSA will still grope your “Precious”
Antinous / Moderator

It’s easy to recognize the ring verse because lines one and three look like they end in ‘elf’ in uncial script.
grikdog

I find the implication that Tolkien was a Mason Jar ring.

Poll: Do you say TOL-KEY-EN or TOL-KEEN? Which is correct?
MrsBug

Wow, that is such a perfect graphic for the underlying power of the US. Moneymoneymoneymoneymoney.
Anonymous

Novus Ordo Malum
sirkowski

One Wiki to Leak them all, in the Black Speech of Mordor.