Middle-earth seen by the barbarians: The complete collection including a previously unpublished essay (6 page)

The early third millenium was the age of a colonisation programme, invoked by king Tar-Atanamir. ‘
In that time the Númenóreans first made great settlements upon the west shores of the ancient lands; for their own land seemed to them shrunken, and they had no rest or content therein, and they desired now wealth and dominion in Middle-earth, since the West was denied. Great harbours and strong towers they made, and there many of them took up their abode; but they appeared now rather as lords and masters and gatherers of tribute than as helpers and teachers. And the great ships of the Númenóreans were borne east on the winds and returned ever laden, and the power and majesty of their kings were increased; and they drank and they feasted and they clad themselves in silver and gold.

In all this the Elf-friends had small part
.’
(
AK
)
In 2350 SA, they founded their own great commercial and naval port, Pelargir. It quickly outshone Lond Daer whose importance, without its populated hinterland of Eriador, shrank to that of an intermediate station on the course to Lindon: Lond Daer Enedh, the Great Haven at Half the Distance. The inhabitants of Pelargir became at last aware of the pre-Númenóreans of the Ered Nimrais as they ‘
ventured north of their great haven at Pelargir and made contact with Men who dwelt in the valleys on either side of the White Mountains
.’
(
DM
)

These men had ‘
relapsed into the service of the Dark
’ and worshipped Sauron, as did the notorious ‘
King of the Mountains
’
(
RK
)
who ruled over the pre-Haladin people of Dunharrow. Yet the military force of Númenór was too much even for Sauron to handle, ‘
and he feared them, lest they should invade his lands and wrest from him the dominion of the East. But for a long time he did not dare to challenge the Lords of the Sea, and he withdrew from the coasts.
’
(
AK
)

1. The Faithful and the early Realms in Exile
   

Then Ar-Pharazôn landed, and seemingly subdued the Dark Lord, and Pelargir won the pre-Númenóreans over: they repented while Sauron was in Númenór, supported by the fact that his absence had relieved the Elves from pressure, and ‘
the power of Gil-galad had grown great …, and it was spread now over wide regions of the north and west, and had passed beyond the Misty Mountains and the Great River even to the borders of Greenwood the Great, and was drawing nigh to
[Mordor].’
(
RP
)
Further south, however, in Umbar and beyond, Ar-Pharazôn’s men ‘
sailed now with power and armoury to Middle-earth, and they came no longer as bringers of gifts, nor even as rulers, but as fierce men of war. And they hunted the men of Middle-earth and took their goods and enslaved them, and many they slew cruelly upon their altars. For they built in their fortresses temples and great tombs in those days; and men feared them, and the memory of the kindly kings of the ancient days faded from the world and was darkened by many a tale of dread.
’
(
AK
)
This less concerns the desolate regions of Minhiriath and Enedwaith but mainly the Harad whose natives now had to serve as oarsmen on Ar-Pharazôn’s great fleet – until they were helplessly and unfairly drowned by the intervention of a well-meaning and good god.

The cataclysm of 3319 SA must have inflicted terrible losses upon the indigenous peoples of western and north-western Middle-earth as the coastlines were inundated and earthquakes and storms demanded tremendous tolls. ‘
The Bay of Belfalas was much filled at the east and south, so that Pelargir which had been only a few miles from the sea, was left far inland, and Anduin carved a new path by many mouths to the Bay. And the Isle of Tolfalas was almost destroyed, and was left at last like a barren and lonely mountain in the water not far from the issue of the River.
’
(
YS
)
Survivors were found only in and near the White and the Misty Mountains, from where they slowly repopulated Enedwaith and Minhiriath, and in the interior of Eriador.

1. Middle Men (green), Drúedain (reddish) and pre-Númenóreans (dark grey) in the early Third Age
   

It is one of the most irritating consequences of the Drowning of Númenor that it should victimise so many innocent pre-Númenóreans though it was aimed at their oppressors.

When the Elendili, the last surviving Faithful, established the Realms in Exile, conditions stabilised for the Middle Men and ‘
many Men turned … from evil and became subject to the heirs of Elendil
’,
(
RP
)
‘
and though their lore and craft was but an echo of that which had been ere Sauron came to Númenor, yet very great it seemed to the wild men of the world
.’
(
AK
)
The latter term unmistakably refers to the Middle Men and pre-Númenóreans of Eriador and Gondor.

Among the latter, however, the notion stayed popular that they would have little reason to love the Dúnedain now, since they did not know or mind the disputes of the political parties of Westernesse. After all, any Númenórean was indiscriminatingly to blame both for their personal losses and for the apparent destruction of their god-king, Sauron, and it was certainly not overlooked that even the Faithful revered the famous landing of Ar-Pharazôn despite its dire consequences. The result was that ‘
yet many more remembered Sauron in their hearts and hated the kingdoms of the West.
’
(
RP
)

Others feared the Dark Lord so much that they refused to fight on either side, among them the King of the Mountains who first swore allegiance to Isildur, ‘
but when Sauron returned and grew in might again, Isildur summoned the Men of the Mountains to fulfil their oath, and they would not: for they had worshipped Sauron in the Dark Years.
’ Isildur knew no tolerance for the faintheartedness of others. His curse against the pre-Haladin of Dunharrow may have been the only one recorded that doomed an entire nation – not even Morgoth had achieved such a feat! The Men of Dunharrow ‘
fled before the wrath of Isildur, and did not dare to go forth to war on Sauron’s part; and they hid themselves in secret places in the mountains and had no dealings with other men, but slowly dwindled in the barren hills.
’
(
RK
)
Eventually, they faded into the Dead Men of Dunharrow, haunting the vales of Ered Nimrais. This was the end of the pre-Númenóreans of Gondor.

The Third Age was a time of fading for many indigenous cultures and languages. The Middle Men, who in the later part of the Second Age had again ‘
passed into the empty lands
’ of Eriador, were initially somewhat better off because they were successfully ‘númenórised’ by the exiled Dúnedain. Ultimately, they ‘
had become subjects of the North Kingdom of Arnor and had taken up the Westron tongue.
’
(
LP
)
Arnor, after all, developed neither the resources nor the capacity to resort to anything but careful integration. Though Isildur’s son ‘
Valandil took up his abode in Annúminas, … his folk were diminished, and of the Númenóreans and of the Men of Eriador
[i. e. the Middle Men]
there remained now too few to people the land or to maintain all the places that Elendil had built; in Dagorlad, and in Mordor, and upon the Gladden Fields many had fallen
.’
(
RP
)

This lack of power brought the expansionist phase to an early halt and, after a brief consolidation, possibly even prevented the central rule of the whole and provoked that unique deviation from the Númenórean succession law which caused Arnor’s disintegration ‘
into petty realms and lordships
’,
(
RP
)
though perpetual separation was certainly not intended, and two of its three parts, Arthedain and Cardolan, stayed allies till the bitter end. When the Hobbits immigrated in the early 2
^nd
millenium TA, their subjective impression - in comparison to the Vale of Anduin - was that ‘
Men were still numerous there, both Númenóreans and other Men related to the Atani, beside remnants of Men of evil kinds, hostile to the Kings
.’
(
DM
)
Still, none of the divided kingdoms would ever recover enough to compensate the crucial lack of resources across Eriador.
^[1]

^[1]
  The division of Arnor may have been inspired by the fate of Charlemagne’s realm but more closely resembles the Roman tetrarchy installed by Diocletian. Certainly, joint rule in a federation had been the purpose in Arnor as well, not violent opposition. But, as history shows, such attempts are always an easy prey of power-mongers.

1. T
   HE
   T
   HIRD
   A
   GE
   
   1. The Middle Men of Arnor and the Hillmen of Angmar and Rhúdaur
      

The númenórisation of the indigenous peoples was most effective in the Western parts of Arnor (Arthedain). Elsewhere it failed, particularly in Rhúdaur were the Dúnedain upper class had always been thinly spread. Also, Isildur’s curse against the Men of Dunharrow may have left a lasting impression of how the Dúnedain would deal with subjects reluctant to follow them into evident disaster. And the epithet ‘Men of evil kinds’, quickly dealt out, did not help to relieve the tension any more than Valandil’s relocation closer to his subjects’ problems did. Thus, when Angmar was founded by the Witch-king, almost bordering at Rhúdaur, there ‘
gathered many evil men
’
(
KR
)
for there were quite a few who considered that a serious alternative to the Northern Realm.

Rhúdaur was immediately exposed to severe pressure by ‘
Hillmen of the North
’, mysterious people who entered the chronicles of the West now for the first time. In the 14
^th
century they began to ‘
build dark forts in the hills
’.
(
HE
)
It is not known whether those ‘remnants of Men of evil kinds’ were descendants of Bórrim or other Swarthy Men from Beleriand or how significant was the proportion of Middle Men among them. A remarkable notion is that the Hillmen may have been capable of magic. Some (contested) sources claim that they were ‘
much given to sorcery
’
(
YT
)
.

The Hillmen slowly gained dominion over the few Dúnedain of Rhúdaur until, at an unknown date, their throne was ‘
seized by an evil lord of the Hillmen, who was in secret league with Angmar
’
(
KR
)
. At this time, there were still loyal minorities that had retreated beyond the Weather Hills. But after the fatal year of 1409 TA, all of Rhúdaur ‘
was occupied by evil Men subject to Angmar, and the Dúnedain that remained there were slain or fled west
.’
^[1]
(
KR
)

The Hillmen were ultimately doomed, however, for ‘
all were destroyed in the war that brought the North Kingdom to its end
.’
(
FR
)
Plainly spoken: genocide. Much of Eriador fell into further desolation then and never recovered. Both Rhúdaur and Cardolan were deserted, and Cardolan withstood attempts to resettle it from Arthedain
(
HE
)
that claimed the disused name Arnor again, though it was by now a petty affair in the eyes of the Gondorians. Rhúdaur was now at any rate inhabited only by fell non-human creatures.