The Scouring of the Shire
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"The Scouring of the Shire" is the penultimate chapter of J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy The Lord of the Rings. The Fellowship hobbits, Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin, return home to the Shire to find that
An ancient pedigree: Odysseus, returning home after long years of war, scours his home of the suitors of his wife Penelope, in Homer's tale. Greek skyphos, 440 BC
Tolkien related the chapter to his childhood experiences at Sarehole as it was taken over by the industrial growth of Birmingham, and the old mill there fell into disrepair.
Saruman's use of "Ruffians" to tyrannise the Shire has been compared to the Nazis' handling of dissent, here by marching people off to an internment camp in Serbia.
The export of "wagonloads of pipeweed" (here, tobacco, in a 1916 American photograph) from the Shire suggested postwar England's "gone for export" explanation of shortages.
Pippin Took
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Peregrin Took, commonly known simply as Pippin, is a fictional character from J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel The Lord of the Rings. He is closely tied with his friend and cousin, Merry Brandybuck, a
Pippin (left) and Merry, in Ralph Bakshi's animated version of The Lord of the Rings
"Pitch-perfect" casting: Billy Boyd as Pippin in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring