I was looking at the map of Middle-Earth and it made me wonder. Does Middle-Earth refer to the time frame in which the LOTR stories took place, or does it refer to the area in which the LOTR tales unfold? To help clarify what I'm asking: Is the rest of Tolkiens' unmapped world Middle-Earth too, or is Middle-Earth the era?
asked Sep 19, 2012 at 20:58
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If only we could flesh out @dlanod's point about "a mythology for our world" and combine it with Michael Edenfield excellent answer, I think we'd have a winner.– Joshua DrakeCommented Sep 20, 2012 at 17:06
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possible duplicate of In what time period does The Lord of the Rings take place in the real world?– phantom42Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 19:58
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5 Answers
Middle-earth is the name for the parts of the world in Tolkien's universe where men lived. It was based on the Old English/Norse term "Middangeard" as used, for example, in Beowulf. The term "middle" here comes from the Norse idea of nine connected worlds, of which men lived on the one in the center. This distinguishes Middle-earth from, for example, Valinor where the immortal Valar lived.
Tolkien's Middle-earth includes other places that are not on his maps of Middle-earth that are still part of that region, but there are also unmapped areas that are outside of Middle-earth. Tolkien described Middle-earth as basically being surrounded on all sides by ocean, so anything that was "across the seas" would be somewhere else.
In practice, Tolkien fans often just use "Middle-earth" to mean the setting of the novels, without being too concerned with where it stops and starts
answered Sep 19, 2012 at 21:11
Middle-Earth is the world as a whole, minus those parts removed from the world by Eru - the Undying Lands. This includes the unseen east and south, and could also be used to refer to our world if accepting Tolkien's intent of LotR as a mythology for our world.
Middle-earth is just archaic English for oκονμένη, the inhabited world of men. It lay then as it does. In fact just as it does, round and inescapable.
From Letter #151.
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2but the typo was not originated with dlanod. It's in electronic versions of letter 151, οκονµένη being what happens when the text is copy-pasted. e-reading.org.ua/bookreader.php/139008/… has two characters that are present - on either side of the o - that fail to render. the accented iota should render - but doesn't - and I have no idea what the other missing might be.– aramisCommented Sep 24, 2012 at 12:20
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Tolkien altered the concept of Midgard somewhat, and Middle-earth is clearly a continent roughly analogous to Europe. The planet as a whole is Arda. Commented Jun 11, 2015 at 22:29
It is complicated: it is certainly a time period, but it is also a position. In addition, it is certainly related to Midgard of Germanic cosmology.
In his conception, the author had the world flat (flat-ish and boat shaped), and the middle-earth of the Hobbit and LotR was pretty much in the middle (north middle). At one point, the world is changed and becomes round, and the middle portion become the farthest west, since the closer bit was lost to the sea (the western shore of the later maps was actually east of the shore of the earlier maps).
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nitpick: Tolkein produced both flat-earth and round-earth models of Middle Earth and neither of them can be considered "canonical" because neither was finished. Commented Sep 19, 2012 at 21:12
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6Nothing by Tolkein is canonical by this measure, he emended and revised LotR and the Hobbit nearly every printing. However: there are plenty of writings which attest to the idea that e.g. Numenorean mariners sailed the world and declared that it was indeed become round, the elves can take the straight way to the true west etc. At the least we can agree that I did not manufacture this very basic synopsis.– horatioCommented Sep 19, 2012 at 21:17
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no, I was clearly nitpicking (and I +1'd you anyway for pointing out the evolution). The difference being that Tolkein never published maps of his world geography on his own, so he never considered his conception of the world "as finished" as, e.g. LotR. Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 15:36
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Yeah a lot of his writing has been published later. I do recall seeing original drawings of the world as a boat (and a tree??)– horatioCommented Sep 20, 2012 at 16:24
I think that Middle-Earth refers to the way the world looked during the age of men. So that would make it both spatial and temporal in reference.
"Middle-earth is just archaic English for oκονμένη, the inhabited world of men."
I think this quote actually supports the idea of a temporal definition of Middle-Earth. For instance, The Shire is not so much physically inhabited by men, but it does exist within Middle-Earth in some sense.
I think middle earth is our world but in a time that humans had forgotten. It does say in Lotr that men took dominion over the earth and that there would be a time elves would be invisible to men and appear only to those whom they chose to manifest.
