<P> The Fellowship of the Ring, the first volume of The Lord of the Rings, begins with Bilbo's "eleventy - first" (111th) birthday, 60 years after the beginning of The Hobbit . The main character of the novel is Frodo Baggins, Bilbo's cousin, who celebrates his 33rd birthday and legally comes of age on the same day . </P> <P> In T.A. 2989 (S.R. 1389), Bilbo, a lifelong bachelor, adopted Frodo, the orphaned son of his first cousin Primula Brandybuck and his second cousin Drogo Baggins, and made him his heir . Though Frodo was actually "his first and second cousin once removed either way", the two regarded each other as uncle and nephew . </P> <P> All this time Bilbo had kept his magic ring, with no idea of its significance, using it mostly to hide from his obnoxious cousins, the Sackville - Bagginses, when they came to visit . Gandalf's investigations revealed it to be the One Ring forged by the Dark Lord Sauron . The Ring had prolonged Bilbo's life beyond the normal hobbit span, and at 111 he still looked 50 . While the Ring did not initially corrupt him as it had its previous owners, it was beginning to affect him; over the years, it had begun to prey on his mind when out of his sight, and he lost sleep and felt "thin, sort of stretched...like butter that has been scraped over too much bread". </P> <P> On the night of his and Frodo's birthday, Bilbo threw himself a party and invited all of the Shire . He signed his home, Bag End, and estate over to Frodo . He then gave a farewell address to his neighbours, at the end of which he put on the Ring and vanished from sight . As Bilbo prepared finally to leave the house, he reacted with panic and suspicion when Gandalf tried to persuade him to leave the Ring with Frodo . Bilbo refused to give up the Ring, referring to it as his "precious"--just as Gollum had . Gandalf lost his temper with his old friend and talked some sense into him . Bilbo admitted he would have liked to be rid of the Ring, and he left it behind, becoming the first person to do so voluntarily . He left the Shire that night, and was never seen in Hobbiton again . </P>

How old was bilbo when he found the ring