Ages past by with the comings and goings of other folk, and I taught whoever would learn. It was the people of Elwe Thingol, or Thingol Greycloak as he is often known, who took the greatest interest in my teachings. The great elves learned of the land and nature, and of the stars and the universe. It was Thingol Greycloak that eventually gave me my name Ranthenid, meaning Law-Seeker.

In my travels and passings, I met with Dwarves and Men, Trees and Birds, and other creatures. It was the Dwarves who took the greatest interest in my teachings of ores and precious metals. Though at first they said that I seemed to have my head in the clouds. They came to call me Bund-u-shathùr, Head in the Clouds, or more accurately Head OF the Clouds. Eventually they learned of the particals that formed stone and ore and mastered the manipulation of them.

Men, too were interested, however, their longing for power could have been too devastating with access to certain areas of my knowledge, and these I have to this day withheld from these beings.

So it past that for many ages I traveled and taught, all the while studying the land and heavens, not to learn as much as to monitor, as was the directions I was given during my departure from the West.

Eventually I grew restless with teaching and tired of the affairs of the folk of the land. I felt an unwavering need for new knowledge. I departed for the sea, eager to study the waters and the great depths. I spent what would be half my life traveling the seas and my knowledge grew substantially. Eventually, the folk that had first heard my teachings again consumed my thoughts. Returning to the land, I found a much changed environment.

Again, I traveled the land and met with folk. This time, however, I did not stop to teach my lores, for these folk had come to understand everything they needed to live upon it. Observing became my primary focus, and eventually I found myself here at Isengard, though it was not named that.

Finding, my own kind - learners, teachers and lore masters - I felt very at home. It was then that I first saw this very book, though at the time I felt no need to document my histories, for I felt I played no large role, I simply taught and observed. It was soon after I reached the tower that I took notice of what seemed to be a favorite pastime of my fellow Istari. This they called ’Magic’. It intrigued me, for being a master of the makings of matter and interactions, I was immediately aware that this did not seem to follow the laws and principles that I new. I came to learn of magic but my interests lied not in practicing it, but in studying it. I was concerned with the Laws behind magic, just as I was concerned with the Laws of the land and universe. Some explained to me that this magic was not bound by the same laws as matter, but that it was of a whollly different thing, hence why the Istari were intrusted to contain it. I, however believed that it was bound by the same Laws as everything else, though maybe on a much more fundamental scale. My opinions, though not bannishable, were frowned upon in the tower. Eventually, I was looked at as an outcast and I departed to the far north to study on my own.

It was in the far north-east of Formenor thatm, until this point, I dwelled. I studied magic for long ages, and learned a great deal of the fundamental makeup of these powers. But without the lores experience of other ’magicians’, my discoveries were bound by my own limitations. Hence, I have travelled back to Isengard to consult with the order of these things, hoping that times have changed and my views would be more widely accepted, or at least not frowned upon.

So far, my fellow Istari have proved to be very interested in my knowledge and studies of magic (which I have found to be of a power indeed greater than any on this land, for magic is of the stars). For this, I am very grateful, for I have always loved being with others who sought to learn, and to teach in turn.