Brown Lands
The Brown Lands (S. Berennyr[1][2]) or Noman-lands was a region east of the Anduin between Mirkwood to the north and the Emyn Muil to the south.[3]
The area was the home of the Entwives who made their gardens there; but during the War of the Last Alliance at the end of the Second Age, they were driven away when Sauron ruined the land against the advance of the Allies down the Anduin.[4] Thenceforth the area became a desolate desert with arid moors.[5] The Ents vainly had crossed the Anduin in search of the Entwives. Treebeard appeared convinced that the Entwives were not all destroyed but were "lost".[6]
Even by the end of the Third Age, when the Fellowship of the Ring drifted by in boats upon the Great River, they saw only long, formless slopes with a withered look, without trees or even grass. What had caused such desolation not even Aragorn could tell.[7]
Etymology
J.R.R. Tolkien describes in his unfinished index (for The Lord of the Rings) the Brown Lands as a 'translation' of Berennyr (a pluralized compound of Sindarin baran 'brown, yellow-brown' and dôr 'land') "a devastated region, east of Anduin, between Lórien and the Emyn Muil".[1]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull (eds), The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion, p. 343 (quoting from the manuscript "Index questions")
- ↑ Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, "Addenda and Corrigenda to The Lord of the Rings: A Reader's Companion (2005, 2008, 2014) Arranged by Date", Hammond&Scull.com (accessed 3 August 2015)
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, "The West of Middle-earth at the End of the Third Age" [map]
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien; Humphrey Carpenter, Christopher Tolkien (eds.), The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter 144, (dated 25 April 1954)
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers, "The Passage of the Marshes"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers, "Treebeard"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, "The Great River"
