Mordor and Adjacent Lands by J.R.R.Tolkien

Author:J.R.R.Tolkien [J.R.R.Tolkien]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2011-03-05T06:00:00+00:00

by sheer black barren cliffs — Udûn. Tolkien described Gorgoroth from Lithlad were all absent until late in the vale as being encircled by arms sent out by the the story.30 The near-encirclement of Gorgoroth and two ranges.19 The symmetry of the valley suggests addition of Nurn to its south on The Lord of the Rings either a caldera or a ring-dike. A caldera is the remnant map left Lithlad in its original placement — east of of a volcano that has exploded and/or collapsed. A Gorgoroth, south of the Ash Mountains.31 Even the ring-dike is a circular ridge of cooled igneous rock southern Ephel Duath were changed, originally bulg-surrounding a deep valley. It occurs when a round ing in two arcs nearly 150 miles wide toward Harad, block subsides into an underlying magma chamber and and narrow only at the Nargil Pass, at the source of the fluid magma is forced up around the edges. Often the southern river feeding into the Sea of Nurnen.32

the upwelling is intermittent, leaving passes such as the Isenmouthe and Cirith Gorgor.20 Either process could have resulted in the feature shown by Tolkien, although compared with our world either would have been gigantic. Imagine the original height of a volcano with a forty-five-mile base. This colossus would have towered almost 29,000 feet! In contrast Mt. Doom was only seven miles across and stood 4500 feet.21

As the Hobbits turned east and south from Udûn, they faced the final path across Gorgoroth, a lava plateau.22 Its level would have been higher than that of Udûn (a “deep dale”) and the plain of Lithlad.23

Tremendously thick layers of flood basalts were deposited through the years by slow upwelling from the many fissures that pocked the landscape. These were supplemented by flows from volcanoes, most of which had previously been active but had left only the skel-etons — necks and dikes, low mounds, and in the southeast where erosion was more advanced, mesas and buttes. At the time of the quest, fissures were numerous, and the remnants of activity gave the plateau its rugged and evil appearance;24 yet none was more imposing than the smoking peak at the very heart — Mt. Doom.

The plateau was barren, and had all Mordor been of that formation Sauron would have had little to feed his countless troops; but conditions were somewhat better in Lithlad — the ash plain. There the flows of more solid material were apparently less, or were mostly eroded. If the rock were highly weathered, the resulting soil would have been quite fertile. In the semi-arid climate, water was in short supply, for the bitter Sea of Nurnen (with its interior drainage) was salty.25 Still, a recent deposition of ash would have helped with conservation (for ash is a highly effective mulch, reducing evaporation),26 allowing dry-land farming in the “great slave-worked fields.”27

Originally, the geography of Mordor was rather dif-ferent, notably in the northwest. Gorgoroth was pres-ent from the beginning, but extended almost to the Sea of Nurnen, and only the eastern ridge with Barad-dûr at the end was shown.

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