Before the Numenoreans Came - Page 4
© Michael Martinez
In short, the War of Wrath must have produced two waves of migration: one coming from the east to the west as new lands rose up and destroyed the Sea of Helcar, one coming from the west to the east as people and evil creatures fled the destruction of Beleriand. Caught in the middle would have been the Nandorin Elves, Dwarves, and Edainic Men of Eriador and Wilderland.
In the three years following the War of Wrath Eonwë travelled throughout Middle-earth, summoning Elves once again to pass over Sea to the West. Many of the Elves seem to have heeded his call. Of those who remained, the majority appear to have become (or to have been) the Silvan or Wood Elves of the Vales of Anduin. These Elves were descended from Avari and Nandor who had mingled together.
But Gil-galad and Cirdan must have somehow become reconciled to the remaining Feanorians during the final three years of the First Age. It must have been at that time that the Elves abandoned Balar. Did the island sink or did Gil-galad and Cirdan simply feel it was time to return to the mainland, now that Morgoth was gone? We'll never know.
The Edain of Beleriand also migrated east, but they settled in Lindon along the new coastlands. They apparently never attempted to communicate with the Edain of Eriador. In Unfinished Tales the third note to "Aldarion and Erendis" says that the Numenoreans believed "that the Men left behind were descended from the evil Men who in the last days of the war against Morgoth had been summoned by him out of the East." The Edain of Beleriand must therefore have lost all memory of their more distant kinsfolk in the east, and that loss implies that all their lore-masters must have perished in the wars. The generations which grew up in slavery must have learned very little of their origins, and the Elves could probably tell them very little.
This sundering of Edain had a profound effect upon their cultures. When the Numenoreans returned to Middle-earth in the year 600 of the Second Age, "they looked upon...Men who could have walked in Numenor and not been thought aliens save in their clothes and their arms." To the Edain of Eriador the Numenoreans "resembled rather Elvish lords than mortal Men in bearing and apparel". The early Edain had been welcomed to Numenor by the Eldar of Tol Eressea, survivors of Beleriand, who brought the Edain many gifts and taught them new lore. But the Edain had also been taught by Eonwë in Middle-earth.
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