Iron Mountains
The Iron Mountains or Ered Engrin were an immense mountain range in the north, stretching across Middle-earth from east to west. In the west it bend north a hundred leagues from reaching Helcaraxë.[1]
Of old the Iron Mountains connected the Blue Mountains (Ered Luin) of the West to the Red Mountains (Orocarni) of the East, but in the wars between the Valar and Melkor the mountain range was distorted.
Melkor's great fortresses of Angband and Utumno were built in the mountains. North of the range lay the regions of ever-lasting cold.
After the War of Wrath the Iron Mountains were broken and disappeared for a great part of their length.
Fate
Remnants of the range in the East could perhaps be all the northern mountain ranges of Eriador and Rhovanion: the Mountains of Angmar, Gundabad, the Ered Mithrin, and the Iron Hills, still occupied by Orcs and Dragons until the Third Age.[2]
These mountains, if imagined to belong to a greater range, indeed occupy the same location as the Iron Mountains in Tolkien's map in the Ambarkanta.[3]
References
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Lost Road and Other Writings, "Part Two: Valinor and Middle-earth before The Lord of the Rings, VI. Quenta Silmarillion", p. 259
- ↑ Karen Wynn Fonstad, The Atlas of Middle-earth p. 78
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The Shaping of Middle-earth, "V. The Ambarkanta: Map IV"
| Remnants of Drowned Beleriand | |
| Isles: | Himring · Tol Fuin · Tol Morwen |
|---|---|
| Mainland: | Lindon |
