Amon Ereb

From Tolkien Gateway
Amon Ereb
Hill
Peter Xavier Price - Amon Ereb.jpg
"Amon Ereb" by Peter Xavier Price
General Information
Other namesEreb
LocationEast Beleriand; West Eriador?
TypeHill
DescriptionStanding alone hill and military base
People and History
InhabitantsNoldor
EventsWars of Beleriand
GalleryImages of Amon Ereb

Amon Ereb (S. "Lonely Hill"), sometimes just Ereb, was the broad, shallow-sided hill that dominated the southern plains of East Beleriand.[1]

History[edit | edit source]

The hill was the highest point in that region and the easternmost hill of Andram, but was standing alone. Within sight of the Gelion, it had tremendous strategic importance, because it guarded the eastern passage around the Long Wall of the Andram into the southern parts of East Beleriand and the northern Taur-im-Duinath.[2]

It was here that Denethor of the Nandor met his end in the First Battle.[3] Much later, Caranthir fortified it to guard his escape into the south after the Dagor Bragollach[4] and the Fëanorions withdrew there after Nirnaeth Arnoediad.[5]

Fate[edit | edit source]

Collage of maps showing where Amon Ereb would be (if surviving the submersion of Beleriand).

A small circle appears in Forlindon on Tolkien's early draft map for The Lord of the Rings.[6]:302 Christopher Tolkien cannot explain this feature[6]:301 and notes that in his own 1943 redrawn map, the circular area is no longer present.[6]:322 It is possible to create a collage of the Beleriand and the Eriador maps to show the small circular area on the Third Age map coinciding with the location of Amon Ereb.[7] Noad suggests that Amon Ereb may have been once thought to have survived the submersion of Beleriand, although there is no textual evidence for it, and other Tolkienists such as Karen Fonstad have reconciled the two maps in a different way [8].

Etymology[edit | edit source]

Amon Ereb is Sindarin "Lonely Hill", from amon "hill" + ereb "isolated, lonely".

Portrayal in adaptations[edit | edit source]

1982-97: Middle-earth Role Playing:

In MERP, Amon Ereb does indeed survive the destruction of Beleriand.

References

  1. J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Silmarillion, "Quenta Silmarillion: Of Beleriand and its Realms"
  2. J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Silmarillion, "Map of Beleriand and the Lands to the North"
  3. J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Silmarillion, "Quenta Silmarillion: Of the Sindar"
  4. J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Silmarillion, "Quenta Silmarillion: Of the Ruin of Beleriand and the Fall of Fingolfin"
  5. J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The War of the Jewels, "Part Two. The Later Quenta Silmarillion: Of Beleriand its Realms (Chapter 11)"
  6. 6.0 6.1 6.2 J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Treason of Isengard
  7. See notably the maps reconstructed by Charles Noad, "A Note on the Geography of the First Age" in Amon Hen no. 38, April 1979, reprinted in Mallorn no. 27, September 1990, p. 40; Ronald Kyrmse, "The Geographical Relation between Beleriand and Eriador" in Mallorn no. 26, September 1989, pp. 25–27; Didier Willis, "Du Beleriand aux confins de Rhûn" (French) in Tolkien, le façonnement d'un monde (2014), vol. 2, pp. 197-212.
  8. Karen Wynn Fonstad, The Atlas of Middle-earth, p. 37