I think Tolkien took inspiration from the late West Roman Empire for this one, like how during the later years of the Western Empire they changed their capital from Rome to Ravenna
While you are generally correct, Ravenna did not become a permanent imperial seat until long after the emperors abandoned Rome itself. Honorius moved his seat to Ravenna from Mediolanum (Milan).
I think the mystery of Annuminas is part of its appeal. A remote and tranquil northern city, far from the main centres of civilisation, yet tantalisingly close to the elves and their havens, has its appeal. The lakes and hills nearby and the fertile lands of the Shire to the south almost sound like an ideal holiday destination. It's a place of peace, healing, and lore that we see valued so highly in Tolkien's works.
I always saw it as a sacred city being built by Elendil positioned close to the elves the embodiment of the faithful numenorians in exile frankly I’m surprised and disposed that the city was completely abandoned it made no sense .At least the city should should have been maintained as the Coronation sight for the kings of arnor where they would go to be crowned before they took up residence in Fornost The same way that n our real world during the period Russian empire in our real world even the political capital was moved to St. Petersburg Moscow was still the spiritual heart of Russia the czars would go to be crowned in the kremlin. Or in Japan Kyoto the original capital is still held great cultural significance even after the emperor moved to Tokyo
Visiting Annuminas in LOTRO when it first came out all those years ago was a big part of getting me interested in the 'deep lore' of Middle-earth, so I definitely share your feelings and inspiration from the subject! Great video as always.
Excellent video. My own thinking is that Annuminas was never fortified as there had never been a need until the Rise of Angmar. Even during the 3 Kingdoms period there was no record of any great invasions coming from CArdolan or Rhudaur into the heart of Arthedain, Fighting seemed to have centered around Amon Sul. The Kings of Arthedain would have spent more time in Fornost due to the military situation. It is also possible that the Great Host coming out of Angmar in 1409 swept through Bree and the lands that would be the Shire with units even reaching Annuminas. Only help form the Elves allowed the newly crowned king Araphor to repel the enemy from Fornost. The Great Plague would also have put the death knell on Annuminas much like what happened to OSgiliath and people moved to the higher elevations. This also explains why the Hobbits were granted the Shire. Another reason why the Kings of Arthedain abandoned Annuminas is more symbolic in that they felt they could not rule from there until the the realm of Arnor was reunited. Aragorn rebuilt Annuminas as his Northern Capital within the 1st century of the 4th Age.
this makes a lot of sense. Annuminas perhaps was initially so far from any hostile border that significant fortifications wouldn't have seemed necessary. Then with the areas around the Brandywine being depopulated, it would have gone into economic decline as it was heavily dependent on river trade. Granting the Shire to the Hobbits would have made sense, as they were friendly and could slowly build the economy back up.
Well, look at King Tarondor of Gondor. He relocated the King's House to Minas Anor after the Great Plague in 1640, but Osgiliath was not abandoned until 2475, 835 years later! It's possible Annuminas was inhabited maybe until 1973, when Arvedui called all the men to Fornost for the attack he knew was coming and sent the others to Lindon. It also possible that the women and children were relocated to Annuminas, after which they 'were forced over the Lune and into Lindon'. Also, when Arnor was broken up into three petty realms, it made sense to establish a new capital as Annuminas was the capital of Arnor and Arnor no longer existed! Also, Annuminas was the 'City of Elendil' so some might have lived there as it was near the elves, good for fishing, trade with the elves and hobbits later. Whilst 'the Heirs of Valandil' may have removed to Fornost, it never says the city was abandoned by the Dunedain. It's also possible the Dunedain lived there whilst establishing their hidden refuges in Eriador.
i agree with the idea that population of Arnor gradually shifted out of lake Evendim andd future Shire area towards Fornost Erain due to trade and to Cardolan (which was same fertile land as Shire)
This video is clutch. Fills in so many of the gaps that ive always wondered about regarding the north of Eriador. Thanks for digging deeper than i ever have and giving such great summary and speculation. Cheers!
The problem is that neither Morgoth nor Sauron had ever really mastered naval warfare, as Ulmo's waters tended to resist their dark powers. Granted, the rulers of Arnor were generally idiots. Annuminas was more defensible than Fornost, even if Fornost was more central. In fact, Fornost being central only made it a better target for the Witch-king and the forces of Angmar. The change in capital might well have been one of the mistakes that led to the fall of Arnor.
The thing about trade from the "shire" was so important, it seems most of the dunedain lived west of the baranduin, according to the texts of the silmarillion and since so many of them died in the war there would have been far less trade and people around there as you said
An empire with a mythical origin that split at two, the western part collapsed later after numerous wars but the eastern part survived with its capital famous for its huge walls and kept fighting for centuries invaders from East and South. Are we talking about Roman Empire or Gondor?
Also if you take the river Anduin to be the Bosphorus Strait and Minas Tirith/Anor to be the West and Eastern banks of the Bosphorus or Dardanelles it makes a compelling argument for the capital city being a representation of Constantinople.
Annuminas was a massive port city built on a lake whose outlet river did not have easy access to the sea due to a massive ford and an artificially built bridge. For it to to reach it's full potential, the entire Brandywine river would have had to have been dredged and the bridge been torn down to allow easy access for boats up and down the river all the way to the sea. It was not allowed to flourish as a port, and thus due to economic reasons was eventually abandoned in favor of Fornost.
Eh, I don't know about "the waterfront was difficult to maintain." In pre-modern societies, generally the waterways are much more important for trade and transportation than roads. Roads also have to be maintained and historically are more difficult for pre-modern societies to maintain as they require built infrastructure over long distances. Like yes, large political entities like China, Rome or even the Celts built roads (the Celts often built theirs out of wood), but road traffic was dwarfed by river traffic in most large societies until the industrial revolution. It seems more likely that something happened that devastated the river trade on the Brandywine. This could have been during the war of the last alliance, even if Annuminas and Fornost never fell. While it would have been difficult to besiege either city, it would have been relatively simple to destroy the countryside farms, towns, and villages that supplied the Brandywine river trade, on which Annuminas would have depended. If that area was depopulated while the areas along the road to Fornost weren't, that would vastly shift economic importance to the latter.
I think the split of Cardolan turned Baranduin from a water-way into a border river, thus making any sea-trade from Annuminas impossible, especially considering that it already was not a very efficient route due to Sarn Ford and uninhabited areas around the mouth of Baranduin, Another possible problem might be a transition of Arnor economy from agriculture into sheep-herding. Agriculture is generally more efficient, but sheep-herding require less people and is better protected against raiding (you can hide a herd in a castle, but you can't hide a field of grain). So for a depopulated kingdom during a period of civil wars that transition made sense. And since it is easier to transport grain by water, but it is easier to transport sheep by land, Fornost became more economically important..
Some other possible reasons: 1. Maybe the Dunedain of Annuminas suffered heavier losses during the War of the Last Alliance then the Dunedain of Fornost. It seems likely that they were led by Elendil personally and thus were in the midst of fighting. And most of the knights lost in the Disaster of the Gladden Fields were probably from Annuminas. It is said that the main part of the army of Arnor returned to Fornost after the War of the Last Alliance. 2. It is possible that the returning army was led by a lord of Fornost, who then would be the most powerful noble of Arnor and the de-facto ruler of the country during the period of Isildur's absence and Valandil's infancy. Thus Fornost would recover more quickly during that initial period and become a rival to Annuminas as the most important city of the kingdom and an unofficial second capital. 3. It is possible that Amlaith of Fornost was the lord of Fornost during the reign of his father (he was 135 years old when his father died, surely he had some important position). That would explain both his byname and his preference to Fornost, where he would have the most loyal supporters, which was especially important in the times of starting civil war. Also, I do not think that Annuminas was completely abandoned even after 861 T.A. Sure, the capital was officially removed, so courtiers and many craftsmen and merchants moved to Fornost, but it is quite possible that there were some people (fishermen, for example) living in Annuminas for centuries after that. They might even continue to live there till the Fourth Age - it doesn't seem that Annuminas had any reputation for being a haunted or evil place.
@@DarthGandalfYT There was also a Lord of Amon Sul "The Kings of Arthedain, who were plainly those with the just claim, maintained a special warden at Amon Sûl, whose Stone was held to be the chief of the Northern palantíri, being the largest and most powerful and the one through which communication with Gondor was mainly conducted." Unfinished Tales
One interesting thing is that with the time scale of Tolkien's world, you have many places that just get kind of lost in the dustbin of history. Maybe there were records regarding the decline of Annuminas, but they went to the bottom of the Ice Bay of Forochel with the last King of Arnor or were lost in the abandonment of Fornost in the face of the Witch-King's army. So the written records are pretty much gone for the Numenorias. Maybe the elves in the Gray Havens or Rivendell have records on that, and maybe not as Annuminas would be of little consequence to them. With their long lifespans elves may easily forget things not written down even if they were alive to have experienced something. It's hard to imagine a mind being able to remember things a hundred years ago clearly, let alone a thousand or more. Certainly no humans would be alive without 100 years of the fall of Arnor who could really remember much about Arnor except perhaps what the elves had preserved, what was in the archives in Gondor (Which would have been increasingly sketchy as the kingdom in the north faded), or what the Dunedain rangers managed to write down or pass down orally. Factor in that the Dunedain were relatively small in numbers and hard pressed at times over the intervening years, and they may have lost much of the knowledge unless they were the rare person like Aragorn fostered by Elrond and given access perhaps to history that might be secondhand (Elves recording events of men). If you think about in our world, how much knowledge of Ancient Greece, Egypt, China, Babylon, Persia, Rome, etc. is just lost to the damage of wars and disasters and the drift of language over time. Old languages perhaps die or change so much over time that they become unreadable. Texts on paper unless kept under highly controlled conditions decay to the point of being unusable. When you look at Tolkien's world and that there are over 10,000 years between the start of the first age and the end of the third, that is an unfathomable amount of time to keep any kind of accurate history of those early days. The only way it is even possible to keep some knowledge of that time so long ago is there are still some people walking around his world who were alive at that time and have magics that likely preserve some very old texts, but even those are hard to find. Imagine a library with thousands of editions of the Encyclopedia Britannica, world atlases, dictionaries, etc and trying to find something in that archive. First do you have some kind of organization system like a card catalog and shelves that allows you to find what you are looking for? Or are you just handed a key and a candle and told that if you find the bones of the last researcher who got lost in the archives to let them know if you make it out. Did someone return the book or document to the right place the last time it was viewed? If not, maybe it is there somewhere, but will only be found by dumb luck centuries later when someone stumbles onto it on the wrong shelf at the other end of the library. There would be books no one has seen in 100's if not 1,000's of years and finally when you go looking for it you find that section of the archive got infested with some bugs that burrowed through the books or got too dry or too humid and the pages deteriorated into dust or mildewed away.
Your speculations made me think about the western roman empire and how its capital was moved around when Rome became impractical. It is however not a 1-1 comparison, but some of the same dillemas can be considered :)
I wonder if there could be a "magical" aspect to this. Wasn't it Elven-enchanted? Didn't Galadriel and Celeborn dwell around Lake Evendim? Didn't the Nazgul think of the Brandywine as "Elvish" water? Maybe later generations of Arnorians got kind of spooked, even though they knew Elves like Gil-galad were their allies.
I'll give a meta reason. Annuminas was the capital of ancient heroes, - the seat of Elendil before the death of the final high kings of both men and elves. So in the creation of epic myth, the fall of Annuminas represents the fall of epic heroes. Which is why when Aragorn reclaimed the kingship, he reformed the city, - to symbolically represent the return of the epic hero to middle earth. Only a meta reason. I'm sure the in-world reason is accurately described in the video. But I love to extrapolate the symbolic meaning of the writing, just as much as the lore-ready meaning.
After the kingdom split into three kingdoms, there may have no longer been the money to maintain a capital that was somewhat symbolic rather than practical. Maybe think of it like Versailles in France. It was a nicer location for a capital, but was remote in terms of the roads and commerce of the area. Fornost may have always been the commercial center of the kingdom.
To me I think the reason why Anuminas lost favor and declined is because Gondor and Arnor split. When they were united it probably made sense since its likely you could sail directly from Anuminas down the Brandywine, along the coast and then up the Anduin to Osgiliath. There wouldnt of been as much of a point in the capitol being there though once the two Kingdoms split and so a slow decline makes sense followed by an eventual move Fornost which was at the end of an Important roadway and better situated to respond to the current needs of the Kingdom.
Elendil wanting to be close to his Elvish neighbors, and the city being more of a set-piece for those interactions has the ring of truth to it. When Elendil died, so to died the dream of Annuminas, though it took some generations to do so. The thing I find amazing is how remarkably close it is to the Shire, but isn't really threatening to the Shire. Nowadays we would call an entire abandoned city blight, and it would be filled with and radiate various dangers, but it seems like the Hobbits didn't suffer from that whatsoever, despite it being closer than Bree.
Suspect it was a combination of population decrease, economic decline and military necessity that saw Annuminass abandoned and capital moved to more defensible, easily reachable and strategically well placed fornost.
Likely, the lands that had been settled in Eriador by the Numenorean faithful fleeing persecution in Numenor would have been the fertile areas of Minhiriath, through Bree and north and in what became the Shire. Annuminas doesn't look like the most fertile area and may have been a fringe location for homesteading, like Rhudaur. Annuminas' location would appeal to a homesick Numenorean, being hilly near a large body of water, like the island of Numenor.
Misterys: u should see somethings about Middle Man as general bro... would like to hear sone thoughts of some uknown lore, as we all know about the other races... love these series bro, u really are one of the best in TH-cam LOTR lore, keep it up, cheers!
I can see why Fornost would be the more important city. Fornost would have been involved in trade and industry while Annunimas, being more remote, would only survive as a city if it was the center of government. Many cities in the west of the Roman Empire were economically parasitic because they were government centers with the businesses in the cities supporting the government. When the Western Roman Empire disintegrated the cities pretty much all died out, only being a fraction of their former selves. In the east the cities were centers of trade and industry so with the decline of government authority they still continued because there was an economic reason for their existence.
The low population density of northwestern Middle Earth was always a challenging idea. Regardless of the ebbs during war, the Dunedain were the most advanced people of the time and did not seem to have a consistent problem keeping up their population in Gondor (the Rohirrim were invited to the region after a plague). It ought to have been an attractive place for Gondorians to migrate after the defeat of the Witch-King, or during the Kin-Strife. Were there more Elves and Dwarves than discussed? Or did the climate worsen quickly north of the Shire?
Dunedain of Gondor did have a hard time sustaining their population, though. As Faramir said: "Kings made tombs more splendid than houses of the living. and counted old names in the rolls of their descent dearer than the names of sons." Minas Tirith itself was depopulated during the War of the Ring - it "lacked half the men that could dwelt at ease there". Most Gondorians (even in Lossarnach) were actually not Dunedain, but "sturdy folk of the sea-coast" and "hardy mountaineers" from the White Mountains (maybe with some Dunedain blood in them). This, according to Faramir, was a recent development, happening during the reign of Stewards. But even before that Kings of Gondor invited great numbers of Northmen from Rhovanion to settle in Gondor. (By the way, in Arnor Dunedain didn't mix with local population at all during the entire history of that realm, and even as Rangers continued to exist as a separate tribe.) And the climate of Eriador was pretty bad since about 1300 T.A., when "the land and clime of Eriador, especially in the east, worsened and became unfriendly" till the times of Bilbo, when "even the weathers had grown milder, and the wolves that had once come ravening out of the North in bitter white winters were now only a grandfather's tale." (We know that such invasion happened in 2911 T.A., when Bilbo was 21, and although he himself never heard wolf's howl before his adventures, his elder cousin did.) So that's about 16 centuries of bad climate, more than enough to prevent any migrations in Eriador.
@@АнтонОрлов-я1ъ Tolkien did through his characters comment on that... but if the seacoast folk not derived from Numenor have access to the superior Numenorean knowledge, why wouldn't they prosper in turn? I suppose Sauron could be blamed, e.g. spreading disease.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
Why wouldnt they just make a road when they founded annuminas? Isnt that just very bad city planning? Also maybe they abanden annuminas because lack of men coming home from the battles of the last alliance.
Annuminas, somewhere between Brasilia and the Detroit of Middle Earth. Favorite area of LOTRO. Annuminas, not Detroit. You need to be a pretty high level if you want to survive in Detroit.
Humanity in LTOR does seems to have reproductive capacity more akin to generic fantasy elfs than humans. Even with thousands years to relative peace between war of the last alliance and Angmar becoming a threat Arnor and successor kingdoms have only became less populous.
Dunedain specifically did reproduce pretty slowly - they were long-lived and influenced by Elvish culture. Also we do not know anything about the history of Arnor during the early Third Age. King Valandur died prematurely, for example, but we have no information why - there might be some wars that are not mentioned in the sources we have. But I think in 861 T.A. Arnor was significantly better populated than before the War of the Last Alliance, especially if we count the Middle Men as well. There weren't that many people in Eriador to begin with, but in 861 there were enough to support three kingdoms. The civil war after the split complicated matters, especially for the Dunedain, who were military elite, and I suppose the population of Eriador more or less stagnated till Angmar appeared, and after that the decline started. I don't think that Annuminas was abandoned due to overall population decline - it most likely was a political decision to change the center of power.
Let’s be real. Tolkien had no logic for populations declining in middle earth in general. Or for histories lasting thousands of years without technological advancement. It’s a symbolic universe rather than a plausible one.
The kingdom of arthedain was most certainly responsible for/the origins of all the insane victorian era tech the hobbits use in lotr and the hobbit. They had clocks, barometers, sulfur based matches, fireworks, umbrellas, and so much more. All stuff that are well beyond anything gondor ever produced, which the hobbits of the shire, the vassals of the king of arthedain would have had to get somewhere, and their extremly advanced and powerfull human countrymen is the only logical explanation for where they came from.
I love Tolkien and his worldbuilding but he was terrible about populations, and how he handled population when it comes to Arnor specifically has always really bothered me
This is just poor writing by Tolkien. He was going for something like how Roman emperors left Rome and governed from Ravenna. But it's not realistic to have everyone just abandon Annuminas and walk to Fornost. To do this well Tolkien would have had to do something like the real history of Rome, where battles rage around the city but it's not the capital, and it has something like an LOTR version of the Roman Senate struggling to preserve the city while the emperor and his armies are elsewhere. Tolkien didn't write the Lord of the rings like a modern fantasy novel. In many ways that's great. But if the Lord of the rings was written today these things would be explained better in a series of Aragorn POV chapters, rather than in data dump chapters like the Council of Elrond or conversations where folks explain things to the hobbits.
Tolkien was always clear that he wrote the LOR as 'hobbit centric. I prefer that to the 'modern' style of having multiple POV's. Part of the appeal of LOR is the sense that you are just scratching the surface, seeing glimpses or fragments of some extensive history, without it all being revealed. That better mirrors the reality of history where key information can be lost. A good example being the mystery that surrounds the provenance of the one ring.
I will Like comments that criticize Tolkien even if I think the particular criticisms are unfounded, because fans are mostly too reluctant or scared to criticize Tolkien.
@@coreyander286 Thanks, after 60+ years of praise for Tolkien's work I think it's time to lean into the criticism. Of course I love him and his world and his world, it's just less interesting to keep saying it all the time. I'd call this a minor writing mistake by Tolkien, one of a thousand things that if tweaked slightly would have improved the immersion and consistency of his secondary world.
Because Tolkein didn't understand economics or demographics. He was a linguist remember. Good with making up languages, absolutely rubbish at the rest of world building.
Wrong, he was more concerned with theme than these things you mention above. Worldbuilding serves only the story and characters; his worldbuiling is perhaps the best ever done simple by the proof of the popularity of his setting.
The intent of the material in question was world-building in its more pure form. The whole point of the appendix material in the LoTR was to give a brief summary history of the "world" the books took place in within a very small number of pages. It was mean to a somewhat incomplete and mysterious look back at 2000+ years of history covered in a very small number of pages. Attempting to cover 2000 years of detailed economic or demographic history would have been simply impossible.
"Just because a city is a capital doesn't mean it's the most important city." As a Pennsylvanian, I know this all too well.
Illinoisian here, can definitely relate.
I'm a Michiganian, and we have that here too.
Californian living in Sacramento reporting in.
Good job waltzing through those first grade geography facts.
Washington too
I think Tolkien took inspiration from the late West Roman Empire for this one, like how during the later years of the Western Empire they changed their capital from Rome to Ravenna
@@cynfaelalek-walker7003 Tolkien was the biggest mpron.
@@genovayork2468 what does mpron mean?
@@cynfaelalek-walker7003 ...Maybe a typo for "moron"? P is right next to O. As unthinkable as such a thought could be 😥
While you are generally correct, Ravenna did not become a permanent imperial seat until long after the emperors abandoned Rome itself. Honorius moved his seat to Ravenna from Mediolanum (Milan).
@@cynfaelalek-walker7003 Dumbo.
I think the mystery of Annuminas is part of its appeal. A remote and tranquil northern city, far from the main centres of civilisation, yet tantalisingly close to the elves and their havens, has its appeal. The lakes and hills nearby and the fertile lands of the Shire to the south almost sound like an ideal holiday destination. It's a place of peace, healing, and lore that we see valued so highly in Tolkien's works.
Yeah, it seems like it would be a beautiful spot. Fornost almost seems dreary in comparison. Maybe I've been influenced too much by LOTRO.
I always saw it as a sacred city being built by Elendil positioned close to the elves the embodiment of the faithful numenorians in exile
frankly I’m surprised and disposed that the city was completely abandoned it made no sense .At least the city should should have been maintained as the Coronation sight for the kings of arnor where they would go to be crowned before they took up residence in Fornost
The same way that n our real world during the period Russian empire in our real world even the political capital was moved to St. Petersburg Moscow was still the spiritual heart of Russia the czars would go to be crowned in the kremlin.
Or in Japan Kyoto the original capital is still held great cultural significance even after the emperor moved to Tokyo
Visiting Annuminas in LOTRO when it first came out all those years ago was a big part of getting me interested in the 'deep lore' of Middle-earth, so I definitely share your feelings and inspiration from the subject! Great video as always.
Really liked the LOTRO design tbh
Yeah, I think Annuminas and Fornost are both well done. Two very different cities for very different times.
Excellent video. My own thinking is that Annuminas was never fortified as there had never been a need until the Rise of Angmar. Even during the 3 Kingdoms period there was no record of any great invasions coming from CArdolan or Rhudaur into the heart of Arthedain, Fighting seemed to have centered around Amon Sul. The Kings of Arthedain would have spent more time in Fornost due to the military situation. It is also possible that the Great Host coming out of Angmar in 1409 swept through Bree and the lands that would be the Shire with units even reaching Annuminas. Only help form the Elves allowed the newly crowned king Araphor to repel the enemy from Fornost. The Great Plague would also have put the death knell on Annuminas much like what happened to OSgiliath and people moved to the higher elevations. This also explains why the Hobbits were granted the Shire. Another reason why the Kings of Arthedain abandoned Annuminas is more symbolic in that they felt they could not rule from there until the the realm of Arnor was reunited. Aragorn rebuilt Annuminas as his Northern Capital within the 1st century of the 4th Age.
this makes a lot of sense. Annuminas perhaps was initially so far from any hostile border that significant fortifications wouldn't have seemed necessary. Then with the areas around the Brandywine being depopulated, it would have gone into economic decline as it was heavily dependent on river trade. Granting the Shire to the Hobbits would have made sense, as they were friendly and could slowly build the economy back up.
Well, look at King Tarondor of Gondor. He relocated the King's House to Minas Anor after the Great Plague in 1640, but Osgiliath was not abandoned until 2475, 835 years later!
It's possible Annuminas was inhabited maybe until 1973, when Arvedui called all the men to Fornost for the attack he knew was coming and sent the others to Lindon.
It also possible that the women and children were relocated to Annuminas, after which they 'were forced over the Lune and into Lindon'.
Also, when Arnor was broken up into three petty realms, it made sense to establish a new capital as Annuminas was the capital of Arnor and Arnor no longer existed!
Also, Annuminas was the 'City of Elendil' so some might have lived there as it was near the elves, good for fishing, trade with the elves and hobbits later.
Whilst 'the Heirs of Valandil' may have removed to Fornost, it never says the city was abandoned by the Dunedain.
It's also possible the Dunedain lived there whilst establishing their hidden refuges in Eriador.
i looooove restoring both Annuminas and Fornost Erain as the Dunedain in Total War DAC... jus dreamy!
And then reuniting with Gondor and having Osgiliath restored as well! And inheriting all of Gondor's problems...
It might offer hints if we knew what Elessar had to do to restore Annúminas.
i agree with the idea that population of Arnor gradually shifted out of lake Evendim andd future Shire area towards Fornost Erain due to trade and to Cardolan (which was same fertile land as Shire)
This video is clutch. Fills in so many of the gaps that ive always wondered about regarding the north of Eriador. Thanks for digging deeper than i ever have and giving such great summary and speculation. Cheers!
The problem is that neither Morgoth nor Sauron had ever really mastered naval warfare, as Ulmo's waters tended to resist their dark powers. Granted, the rulers of Arnor were generally idiots. Annuminas was more defensible than Fornost, even if Fornost was more central. In fact, Fornost being central only made it a better target for the Witch-king and the forces of Angmar. The change in capital might well have been one of the mistakes that led to the fall of Arnor.
I was shore this video would eventually come
The thing about trade from the "shire" was so important, it seems most of the dunedain lived west of the baranduin, according to the texts of the silmarillion and since so many of them died in the war there would have been far less trade and people around there as you said
An empire with a mythical origin that split at two, the western part collapsed later after numerous wars but the eastern part survived with its capital famous for its huge walls and kept fighting for centuries invaders from East and South. Are we talking about Roman Empire or Gondor?
Basicaly. In the real world however Gondor/Byzantium does fall to Mordor/Islam.
Also if you take the river Anduin to be the Bosphorus Strait and Minas Tirith/Anor to be the West and Eastern banks of the Bosphorus or Dardanelles it makes a compelling argument for the capital city being a representation of Constantinople.
Gondor didn't split, mpron, East Rome fought much more north than south, mpron. Islam isn't a country, mpron. Byzantium was the most evl country.
@mr.creamy7778 Cities aren't banks, straits aren't rivers, mpron.
@@anonymous-hz2un Gondor isn't Byzantium, Islam wasn't a country, mpron.
It likely involves whatever reasons Annuminas had no great roads linking into the road system.
Annuminas was a massive port city built on a lake whose outlet river did not have easy access to the sea due to a massive ford and an artificially built bridge. For it to to reach it's full potential, the entire Brandywine river would have had to have been dredged and the bridge been torn down to allow easy access for boats up and down the river all the way to the sea.
It was not allowed to flourish as a port, and thus due to economic reasons was eventually abandoned in favor of Fornost.
LOTRO did a fantastic job with this zone thanks for the video
One need not look further than how cities often died in medieval and early modern Europe.
More ideas for places to explore:
- Tharbad
- Lond Daer
- the dwarven cities in the Blue Mountains
- Dorwinion
- Dol Amroth
Eh, I don't know about "the waterfront was difficult to maintain." In pre-modern societies, generally the waterways are much more important for trade and transportation than roads. Roads also have to be maintained and historically are more difficult for pre-modern societies to maintain as they require built infrastructure over long distances. Like yes, large political entities like China, Rome or even the Celts built roads (the Celts often built theirs out of wood), but road traffic was dwarfed by river traffic in most large societies until the industrial revolution.
It seems more likely that something happened that devastated the river trade on the Brandywine. This could have been during the war of the last alliance, even if Annuminas and Fornost never fell. While it would have been difficult to besiege either city, it would have been relatively simple to destroy the countryside farms, towns, and villages that supplied the Brandywine river trade, on which Annuminas would have depended. If that area was depopulated while the areas along the road to Fornost weren't, that would vastly shift economic importance to the latter.
I think the split of Cardolan turned Baranduin from a water-way into a border river, thus making any sea-trade from Annuminas impossible, especially considering that it already was not a very efficient route due to Sarn Ford and uninhabited areas around the mouth of Baranduin,
Another possible problem might be a transition of Arnor economy from agriculture into sheep-herding. Agriculture is generally more efficient, but sheep-herding require less people and is better protected against raiding (you can hide a herd in a castle, but you can't hide a field of grain). So for a depopulated kingdom during a period of civil wars that transition made sense. And since it is easier to transport grain by water, but it is easier to transport sheep by land, Fornost became more economically important..
Some other possible reasons:
1. Maybe the Dunedain of Annuminas suffered heavier losses during the War of the Last Alliance then the Dunedain of Fornost. It seems likely that they were led by Elendil personally and thus were in the midst of fighting. And most of the knights lost in the Disaster of the Gladden Fields were probably from Annuminas. It is said that the main part of the army of Arnor returned to Fornost after the War of the Last Alliance.
2. It is possible that the returning army was led by a lord of Fornost, who then would be the most powerful noble of Arnor and the de-facto ruler of the country during the period of Isildur's absence and Valandil's infancy. Thus Fornost would recover more quickly during that initial period and become a rival to Annuminas as the most important city of the kingdom and an unofficial second capital.
3. It is possible that Amlaith of Fornost was the lord of Fornost during the reign of his father (he was 135 years old when his father died, surely he had some important position). That would explain both his byname and his preference to Fornost, where he would have the most loyal supporters, which was especially important in the times of starting civil war.
Also, I do not think that Annuminas was completely abandoned even after 861 T.A. Sure, the capital was officially removed, so courtiers and many craftsmen and merchants moved to Fornost, but it is quite possible that there were some people (fishermen, for example) living in Annuminas for centuries after that. They might even continue to live there till the Fourth Age - it doesn't seem that Annuminas had any reputation for being a haunted or evil place.
I also considered the idea of a Lord of Fornost leading Arnors Army home and ruling until Valandil came of age. Isildurs Wife could also have ruled.
I do like the idea of Fornost being ruled by the second most powerful noble in the kingdom, or possibly even the heir.
@@DarthGandalfYT There was also a Lord of Amon Sul "The
Kings of Arthedain, who were plainly those with the just claim, maintained a special warden at Amon
Sûl, whose Stone was held to be the chief of the Northern palantíri, being the largest and most powerful
and the one through which communication with Gondor was mainly conducted." Unfinished Tales
Historically speaking, it was the shift of the Roman Emperors away from Rome to Constantinople and Ravenna.
Hmm. I wonder if the Brandywine was big enough for trade to move up and down it seeing as its source is Lake Evendim.
I think the middle portions were a bit rough?
One interesting thing is that with the time scale of Tolkien's world, you have many places that just get kind of lost in the dustbin of history.
Maybe there were records regarding the decline of Annuminas, but they went to the bottom of the Ice Bay of Forochel with the last King of Arnor or were lost in the abandonment of Fornost in the face of the Witch-King's army. So the written records are pretty much gone for the Numenorias. Maybe the elves in the Gray Havens or Rivendell have records on that, and maybe not as Annuminas would be of little consequence to them. With their long lifespans elves may easily forget things not written down even if they were alive to have experienced something. It's hard to imagine a mind being able to remember things a hundred years ago clearly, let alone a thousand or more. Certainly no humans would be alive without 100 years of the fall of Arnor who could really remember much about Arnor except perhaps what the elves had preserved, what was in the archives in Gondor (Which would have been increasingly sketchy as the kingdom in the north faded), or what the Dunedain rangers managed to write down or pass down orally. Factor in that the Dunedain were relatively small in numbers and hard pressed at times over the intervening years, and they may have lost much of the knowledge unless they were the rare person like Aragorn fostered by Elrond and given access perhaps to history that might be secondhand (Elves recording events of men).
If you think about in our world, how much knowledge of Ancient Greece, Egypt, China, Babylon, Persia, Rome, etc. is just lost to the damage of wars and disasters and the drift of language over time. Old languages perhaps die or change so much over time that they become unreadable. Texts on paper unless kept under highly controlled conditions decay to the point of being unusable. When you look at Tolkien's world and that there are over 10,000 years between the start of the first age and the end of the third, that is an unfathomable amount of time to keep any kind of accurate history of those early days. The only way it is even possible to keep some knowledge of that time so long ago is there are still some people walking around his world who were alive at that time and have magics that likely preserve some very old texts, but even those are hard to find.
Imagine a library with thousands of editions of the Encyclopedia Britannica, world atlases, dictionaries, etc and trying to find something in that archive. First do you have some kind of organization system like a card catalog and shelves that allows you to find what you are looking for? Or are you just handed a key and a candle and told that if you find the bones of the last researcher who got lost in the archives to let them know if you make it out. Did someone return the book or document to the right place the last time it was viewed? If not, maybe it is there somewhere, but will only be found by dumb luck centuries later when someone stumbles onto it on the wrong shelf at the other end of the library. There would be books no one has seen in 100's if not 1,000's of years and finally when you go looking for it you find that section of the archive got infested with some bugs that burrowed through the books or got too dry or too humid and the pages deteriorated into dust or mildewed away.
Seria muito fácil de se atacar, e sem os suprimentos provenientes de Cardolan e a defesa de Rudhur a cidade teria virado uma Orgiriath.
Your speculations made me think about the western roman empire and how its capital was moved around when Rome became impractical. It is however not a 1-1 comparison, but some of the same dillemas can be considered :)
Who would have thought that an elf's love shack would become the capital city of human civilization thousands of years later
Such a good video
LOTRO Annuminas is an awesome city to explore.
Arnor is so mysterious…I love it.
I wonder if there could be a "magical" aspect to this. Wasn't it Elven-enchanted? Didn't Galadriel and Celeborn dwell around Lake Evendim? Didn't the Nazgul think of the Brandywine as "Elvish" water? Maybe later generations of Arnorians got kind of spooked, even though they knew Elves like Gil-galad were their allies.
Annuminas sounds more fortifiable to me but who knows
I'll give a meta reason.
Annuminas was the capital of ancient heroes, - the seat of Elendil before the death of the final high kings of both men and elves.
So in the creation of epic myth, the fall of Annuminas represents the fall of epic heroes.
Which is why when Aragorn reclaimed the kingship, he reformed the city, - to symbolically represent the return of the epic hero to middle earth.
Only a meta reason. I'm sure the in-world reason is accurately described in the video. But I love to extrapolate the symbolic meaning of the writing, just as much as the lore-ready meaning.
After the kingdom split into three kingdoms, there may have no longer been the money to maintain a capital that was somewhat symbolic rather than practical. Maybe think of it like Versailles in France. It was a nicer location for a capital, but was remote in terms of the roads and commerce of the area. Fornost may have always been the commercial center of the kingdom.
To me I think the reason why Anuminas lost favor and declined is because Gondor and Arnor split. When they were united it probably made sense since its likely you could sail directly from Anuminas down the Brandywine, along the coast and then up the Anduin to Osgiliath. There wouldnt of been as much of a point in the capitol being there though once the two Kingdoms split and so a slow decline makes sense followed by an eventual move Fornost which was at the end of an Important roadway and better situated to respond to the current needs of the Kingdom.
I hope there will be a new video game that tells the story of early Dunedain kingdoms and sticks to the lore
There were not Dúnedain kingdoms, mpron.
@genovayork2468 is name calling really necessary?
@@John-qn1ho No.
Elendil wanting to be close to his Elvish neighbors, and the city being more of a set-piece for those interactions has the ring of truth to it. When Elendil died, so to died the dream of Annuminas, though it took some generations to do so.
The thing I find amazing is how remarkably close it is to the Shire, but isn't really threatening to the Shire. Nowadays we would call an entire abandoned city blight, and it would be filled with and radiate various dangers, but it seems like the Hobbits didn't suffer from that whatsoever, despite it being closer than Bree.
The Shire was protected by the Dúnedain.
@istari0 yep.
Suspect it was a combination of population decrease, economic decline and military necessity that saw Annuminass abandoned and capital moved to more defensible, easily reachable and strategically well placed fornost.
Likely, the lands that had been settled in Eriador by the Numenorean faithful fleeing persecution in Numenor would have been the fertile areas of Minhiriath, through Bree and north and in what became the Shire. Annuminas doesn't look like the most fertile area and may have been a fringe location for homesteading, like Rhudaur. Annuminas' location would appeal to a homesick Numenorean, being hilly near a large body of water, like the island of Numenor.
Who would have been regarded best by the Arnorians, Elendil or Isildur?
Misterys: u should see somethings about Middle Man as general bro... would like to hear sone thoughts of some uknown lore, as we all know about the other races... love these series bro, u really are one of the best in TH-cam LOTR lore, keep it up, cheers!
Was Elrond ever tempted by the One Ring?
no
I can see why Fornost would be the more important city. Fornost would have been involved in trade and industry while Annunimas, being more remote, would only survive as a city if it was the center of government. Many cities in the west of the Roman Empire were economically parasitic because they were government centers with the businesses in the cities supporting the government. When the Western Roman Empire disintegrated the cities pretty much all died out, only being a fraction of their former selves. In the east the cities were centers of trade and industry so with the decline of government authority they still continued because there was an economic reason for their existence.
Ah yes I remember Everswim very well. Spent a lot of time there :)
The low population density of northwestern Middle Earth was always a challenging idea. Regardless of the ebbs during war, the Dunedain were the most advanced people of the time and did not seem to have a consistent problem keeping up their population in Gondor (the Rohirrim were invited to the region after a plague). It ought to have been an attractive place for Gondorians to migrate after the defeat of the Witch-King, or during the Kin-Strife.
Were there more Elves and Dwarves than discussed? Or did the climate worsen quickly north of the Shire?
Dunedain of Gondor did have a hard time sustaining their population, though. As Faramir said: "Kings made tombs more splendid than houses of the living. and counted old names in the rolls of their descent dearer than the names of sons." Minas Tirith itself was depopulated during the War of the Ring - it "lacked half the men that could dwelt at ease there".
Most Gondorians (even in Lossarnach) were actually not Dunedain, but "sturdy folk of the sea-coast" and "hardy mountaineers" from the White Mountains (maybe with some Dunedain blood in them). This, according to Faramir, was a recent development, happening during the reign of Stewards. But even before that Kings of Gondor invited great numbers of Northmen from Rhovanion to settle in Gondor. (By the way, in Arnor Dunedain didn't mix with local population at all during the entire history of that realm, and even as Rangers continued to exist as a separate tribe.)
And the climate of Eriador was pretty bad since about 1300 T.A., when "the land and clime of Eriador, especially in the east, worsened and became unfriendly" till the times of Bilbo, when "even the weathers had grown milder, and the wolves that had once come ravening out of the North in bitter white winters were now only a grandfather's tale." (We know that such invasion happened in 2911 T.A., when Bilbo was 21, and although he himself never heard wolf's howl before his adventures, his elder cousin did.) So that's about 16 centuries of bad climate, more than enough to prevent any migrations in Eriador.
@@АнтонОрлов-я1ъ Tolkien did through his characters comment on that... but if the seacoast folk not derived from Numenor have access to the superior Numenorean knowledge, why wouldn't they prosper in turn?
I suppose Sauron could be blamed, e.g. spreading disease.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
@@josephfisher426 As far as I understand, Numenorean culture correlated not only with increased medical knowledge, but also with low birth-rate (Dunedain generally married late and didn't have a lot of children). So non-Numenorean peoples had high birth rates and high mortality (due to lack of medical knowledge) with stagnant population, while Numenoreans had low birth-rates and low mortality with declining population. As Numenorean culture spread in Gondor, local peoples had a period of high population growth, when birth-rate remained high while mortality decreased due to better medicine, but then birth-rates begin to decrease as well due to influence of Numenorean culture. This process is pretty similar to demographic transition in the modern day, although causes of it are somewhat different.
Arnor might be my favourite kingdom
Annuminas died out because of the Plague and the wars with Angmar.
Hi Darth
Can you maybe record with any lower microphone volume? 🤦♂️
I think it was never abandoned. The Dunedain spread rumors of its demise so they could make it their secret capitol.
Why wouldnt they just make a road when they founded annuminas? Isnt that just very bad city planning? Also maybe they abanden annuminas because lack of men coming home from the battles of the last alliance.
Annuminas, somewhere between Brasilia and the Detroit of Middle Earth. Favorite area of LOTRO. Annuminas, not Detroit. You need to be a pretty high level if you want to survive in Detroit.
Humanity in LTOR does seems to have reproductive capacity more akin to generic fantasy elfs than humans. Even with thousands years to relative peace between war of the last alliance and Angmar becoming a threat Arnor and successor kingdoms have only became less populous.
Dunedain specifically did reproduce pretty slowly - they were long-lived and influenced by Elvish culture. Also we do not know anything about the history of Arnor during the early Third Age. King Valandur died prematurely, for example, but we have no information why - there might be some wars that are not mentioned in the sources we have.
But I think in 861 T.A. Arnor was significantly better populated than before the War of the Last Alliance, especially if we count the Middle Men as well. There weren't that many people in Eriador to begin with, but in 861 there were enough to support three kingdoms.
The civil war after the split complicated matters, especially for the Dunedain, who were military elite, and I suppose the population of Eriador more or less stagnated till Angmar appeared, and after that the decline started.
I don't think that Annuminas was abandoned due to overall population decline - it most likely was a political decision to change the center of power.
Cus it took like 3 building projects instead of 1 to rebuild in CK3's LoTR mod (I think) lololol
Do the nameless thing mysterie
Let’s be real. Tolkien had no logic for populations declining in middle earth in general. Or for histories lasting thousands of years without technological advancement. It’s a symbolic universe rather than a plausible one.
The kingdom of arthedain was most certainly responsible for/the origins of all the insane victorian era tech the hobbits use in lotr and the hobbit. They had clocks, barometers, sulfur based matches, fireworks, umbrellas, and so much more.
All stuff that are well beyond anything gondor ever produced, which the hobbits of the shire, the vassals of the king of arthedain would have had to get somewhere, and their extremly advanced and powerfull human countrymen is the only logical explanation for where they came from.
Just look at Albany and NYC how many people actually know NYC isn't the capital
Finally some Arnor material, he avoids this like the plague
Funny enough, Arnor is his favourite part of the legendarium..
He really doesnt lmao
There isn't much material bro
When he first started his Channel I used to pester him all the time for a Arnor population Video. He even gave me a shout out lol
There just isnt that much to tell about it. Its just a failed kingdom, like its predecessor Numenor.
I love Tolkien and his worldbuilding but he was terrible about populations, and how he handled population when it comes to Arnor specifically has always really bothered me
In brazil the most useless city it's literally our capital, lol
One simple word: depopulation.
This is just poor writing by Tolkien. He was going for something like how Roman emperors left Rome and governed from Ravenna. But it's not realistic to have everyone just abandon Annuminas and walk to Fornost. To do this well Tolkien would have had to do something like the real history of Rome, where battles rage around the city but it's not the capital, and it has something like an LOTR version of the Roman Senate struggling to preserve the city while the emperor and his armies are elsewhere.
Tolkien didn't write the Lord of the rings like a modern fantasy novel. In many ways that's great. But if the Lord of the rings was written today these things would be explained better in a series of Aragorn POV chapters, rather than in data dump chapters like the Council of Elrond or conversations where folks explain things to the hobbits.
Tolkien was always clear that he wrote the LOR as 'hobbit centric. I prefer that to the 'modern' style of having multiple POV's. Part of the appeal of LOR is the sense that you are just scratching the surface, seeing glimpses or fragments of some extensive history, without it all being revealed. That better mirrors the reality of history where key information can be lost. A good example being the mystery that surrounds the provenance of the one ring.
I will Like comments that criticize Tolkien even if I think the particular criticisms are unfounded, because fans are mostly too reluctant or scared to criticize Tolkien.
@@coreyander286 Thanks, after 60+ years of praise for Tolkien's work I think it's time to lean into the criticism. Of course I love him and his world and his world, it's just less interesting to keep saying it all the time.
I'd call this a minor writing mistake by Tolkien, one of a thousand things that if tweaked slightly would have improved the immersion and consistency of his secondary world.
Because Tolkein didn't understand economics or demographics. He was a linguist remember. Good with making up languages, absolutely rubbish at the rest of world building.
Wrong, he was more concerned with theme than these things you mention above. Worldbuilding serves only the story and characters; his worldbuiling is perhaps the best ever done simple by the proof of the popularity of his setting.
He did. He just didnt feel the need to elaborate those kinds of things because theyre implied. He also didnt find them as interesting.
The intent of the material in question was world-building in its more pure form. The whole point of the appendix material in the LoTR was to give a brief summary history of the "world" the books took place in within a very small number of pages.
It was mean to a somewhat incomplete and mysterious look back at 2000+ years of history covered in a very small number of pages.
Attempting to cover 2000 years of detailed economic or demographic history would have been simply impossible.
@@LeRoiDuFresne So he was trash at world building. You're a restart.
@@waltonsmith7210 The legendarium is a mess because he was trash at them.