XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: jcb@inf.ed.ac.uk   
      
   On 2013-03-02, Stan Brown  wrote:   
   > I don't think Sauron was _ever_ uncertain whether the Ring had been   
   > destroyed.  Gandalf tells us (and Tolkien, too, in Letters IIRC) that   
   > Sauron simply could not conceive that anyone coming into possession   
   > of the Ring would do anything but claim it and try to become Lord.   
      
   When talking to Frodo in Hobbiton, Gandalf says:   
   He believed that the One had perished; that the Elves had destroyed   
   it, as should have been  done. But he knows now that it has /not/   
   perished, that it has been found. So he is seeking it, seeking it, and   
   all his thought is bent on it. It is his great hope and our great fear.'   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)