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Something Wicked This Way Comes

© Michael Martinez

Numenor had sunk into the sea almost 1200 years before Hyarmendacil won his final victory. It had been nearly 1230 years since Ar-Pharazon humbled Sauron near Umbar, bringing what had been to that time the mightiest post-Beleriandic army to Middle-earth. The memory of Numenor must have been overshadowed, among other nations, by the (somewhat) more recent memory of the Last Alliance of Elves and Men, which had assembled the greatest post-Beleriandic army ever and destroyed Sauron's military power utterly. Sauron himself was slain, and his empire so totally overthrown that it effectively never rose again. In the wake of Sauron's overthrow, three vast spheres of influence emerged in northwestern Middle-earth. Gil-galad's ancient Elven realm of Lindon still existed but it was rendered so weak that many of its people either sailed over Sea or migrated east to live near Elrond in Imladris. The High Kings of Arnor became the dominant powers in the northern world. But east of the Misty Mountains there remained at least two Elven realms and the vast realm of the Longbeard Dwarves. And Gondor annexed but never colonized Mordor itself, eventually expanding outward. Arnor's power dwindled. Gondor's power grew. But what about the power of the Longbeard Dwarves? Their capitol of Khazad-dum was their chief city, but they claimed all of the Misty Mountains and the Grey Mountains as far east as the Iron Hills. They seem to have had more than one city or colony. They maintained the ancient Men-i-Naugrim, the great eastern road which ran down from the High Pass to the Anduin, crossing the river by a stone bridge, traveling east through Greenwood and then turning northeast to run to the Iron Hills. That road had to serve some useful purpose. It wasn't simply that the Longbeards wanted to engage in trade. They needed to maintain the peace and stability which nourished trade. Lothlorien, the small Elven kingdom which lay between Khazad-dum and Anduin, was home to Noldor, Sindar, and Silvan Elves. But though it maintained close ties with Khazad-dum and Imladris, Lothlorien seems to have been too weak to dominate the region. There were Men of Edainic descent living nearby, on both sides of the Anduin. The woodmen of Greenwood had, according to "The Disaster of the Gladden Fields", joined or at least been friendly to the Last Alliance. They, like their northern kindred near Erebor, seem to have flourished in the peaceful centuries which followed Sauron's downfall.