Kryptic Tales of Middle-earth - Page 5
© Michael Martinez
The Nazgul were especially good at bringing down neighborhoods. Centuries before the Lord of the Nazgul had gone north to establish the Witch-realm of Angmar. Men served him, but also Orcs, Trolls, and other creatures, including wraiths. He taught or encouraged the hill-folk of Rhudaur to practice sorcery, especially necromancy, and in the war with Cardolan and Arthedain in the year 1409 the Lord of the Nazgul sent wraiths to inhabit the ancient barrows in Tyrn Gorthad near Bree. These spirits became the Barrow-wights. They animated ancient bones and filled the land with dread and fear. Their power was so great that many generations later King Araval's efforts to recolonize Cardolan failed because people could not live near Tyrn Gorthad.
When the last remnants of the northern Kingdom were overthrown evil creatures filled its last capitol, Fornost Erain, though only a few months later they were destroyed or driven out by a great army from Gondor and Lindon. Much of the land was cleansed when Angmar itself was destroyed, but the Barrow-wights remained, and the Men of Bree became fearful of the ruinous Fornost Erain, eventually calling it Deadmen's Dyke, because they could only remember the horror which had briefly held sway there.
Arnor was nearly emptied of peoples, and ruins were left everywhere: Annuminas, Fornost, Tyrn Gorthad, the hills of Rhudaur, the Weather Hills. Tharbad, the last city of Arnor, dwindled and became a river-town, and eventually was abandoned after severe floods destroyed it. Nearly all of Eriador was an empty, desolate land with forgotten cities and haunted tombs.
It is a bit strange that the hobbits who set out from the Shire in 3018 weren't more fearful of the world around them. They had legends about the Old Forest which stood on the borders of Buckland, a strange land where the trees could move of their own will and harbored an ancient hatred for things which walked on two legs. Tolkien notes that "even in the Shire the rumour of the Barrow-wights of the Barrow-downs beyond the Forest had been heard. But it was not a tale that any hobbit liked to listen to, even by a comfortable fireside far away."
But Frodo and his friends knew nothing of the terrors which lay beyond the Barrow Downs and their wights, or of the legends that haunted the lands still, though the creatures which gave terror to the tales were long gone. If they had gone seeking old ghost stories instead of a way to destroy the One Ring they would have found enough legends to fill a book. There was the old monster living high in the mountains above Minas Morgul, the strange and ominous trees of Fangorn Forest, the dark and slimy Watcher in the Water, the spirit of fire and shadow which haunted the lost caverns of Moria, cold and cruel Caradhras, and dark flying things which blocked out the stars at night, and the Nazgul themselves.
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