Look! The Corsairs of Umbar are coming!

A celebration of the southern and eastern cultures of Middle Earth - (Easterlings, people of Umbar, Haradrim, and more) whose stories are rarely told.

[beruthielthequeen]

Berúthiel the Queen, Berúthiel-arî, lady of cats, sorceress of the Black Númenóreans, Once-Queen of Gondor. 

[m0rket]

A random Haradrim with his favorite elephant :з

[enanoakd]

ECHOES FROM THE TALATHRANT - A RHÛN FANMIX

Playlist based on the Rhûn lands between the Brown Lands in the west and the Talathrant River in the east, and from the Eered Lithui in the south to the Iron Hills in the North; and its people: the Easterlings. Influences from the canon lore and MERP story. Names here are totally fictional, same as the artists to avoid the restrictions. Proper credits on the back cover.

Listen here

[enanoakd]

http://rhun.comuv.com/

[vefanyar]

Queen Berúthiel was the nefarious, solitary, and loveless wife of Tarannon, first of the “Ship-kings” and the first childless king. She lived in the King’s House in Osgiliath, hating the sounds and smells of the sea, and the gardens of the house in Osgiliath were filled with tormented sculptures beneath cypresses and yews.

[enanoakd]

With love, from team Rhûn for team Gondor.

[tolkienbeifong]

The Haradrim

 were tall and dark-skinned with black hair and eyes.  Many Haradrim warriors were seen in bright clothing, such as scarlet robes, and were decorated with golden ornaments, such as collars, earrings, corslets of overlapping brazen plates; they braided their hair with gold. Some tribes painted their bodies. Scarlet and red was also the color of their banners, tips of their spears, and body paint. Their shields were yellow and black with spikes. It is also mentioned that at the end of the Second Age some of the Men in the south had weapons of iron.

And the King pardoned the Easterlings that had given themselves up, and sent them away free, and he made peace with the peoples of Harad; and the slaves of Mordor he released and gave to them all the lands about Lake Nu´rnen to be their own.

[omnomnomwisenom]

A request from anon (speedpaints made in years 2013 and 2015).

Thank you for dropping me a prompt!

[enanoakd]

With love, from team Rhûn for team Gondor.

[nenuials]

Forgotten Men Series - THE HARADRIMS

“‘More Men going to Mordor; Dark faces. We have not seen Men like these before… They are fierce. They have black eyes, and long black hair, and gold rings in their ears… lots of beautiful gold. And some have red paint on their cheeks, and red cloaks and their flags are red, and the tips of their spears; and they have round shields, yellow and black with big spikes. Sméagol thinks they have come out of the South beyond the Great River’s end…”

[enanoakd]

Khand (earlier “Kha-on”) stretched between the southeastern flank of the Ephel Duath and the northwestern edge of the Ered Harmal. It occupied the semi-arid plateau bordering northeastern Harad and thus commanded the great Khand Gap, the 100-mile wide pass facing southern Rhûn and eastern Mordor. Nûrad lay in the hills to the northeast.

Hot, dry, and windy, Khand was an unforgiving locale. Its flat, lowland areas afforded few means for stable settlement. Scrub and desert abound throughout Lower Khand. Here, horseherders moved their lightly-encumbered bands around a circuit of periodic shelters and encampments, their routes dictated by the location of springs, seasonal pools, and intermittent streams. The only permanent settlements lay along the broad, shallow Knife River, a tributary of the Harnen. Sturlurtsa Khand - the traditional capital of Lower Khand and the largest city between Umbar and the Talathrant - stood by the confluence of the rivers Knife (V. “Noz Peka”) and Gold-horse (V. “Medlóshad Peka”). It was the home of the powerful Ûrpof and Oléna clans.

Upper Khand, which comprised the eastern and northern quarters of the region, enjoyed a bit more rainfall and cooler temperatures. The more numerous tribes of the area were generally richer and more settled than their brethren to the west and south. Upper Khand’s principal city, Ûbésêsh-ûta-Pavéter (V. “Refuge from the Flailing Wind”), stood only about 170 miles east and upstream from Sturlurtsa Khand; however, it received twice the precipitation and a lot less heat than its larger and more important counterpart. The town was home to the Irbo clan.

Lâorkí was the sister city of Ûbésêsh-ûta-Pavéter and the second town of Upper Khand. The home of the Achef clan, it had produced most of the Variag kings. Ûvathar Achef, the greatest conquerer of the line, became the ninth of Sauron’s accursed Ringwraiths.

Ûvathar the Horselord (one of the nine Ringwraith, a.k.a. “Ûvatha”) was born at the Caves of Ôlbamarl. The vast caverns wind up and down through a mountain spur located in the southeastern part of the Ephel Duath (S. “Shadow-fence”). They include two permanent towns and seven shrines. Here, the bones of many Kings were entombed (the Variag successors stripped the meat from, and then ate, their fallen monarchs).

All seven of the Variag confederations spoke Varadja and shared a common culture rooted in an ages-old reverence for the horse. Superb riders and warriors, they were without peer as cavalry.

Khand originally was a gap and plateau between the southwestern shores of the Sea of Helcar (later to become the Núrnen) and the Ered Harmal. Khand was finally shaped when Sauron created Mordor by the volcanic activities of Mount Orodruin.The Lands of later Núrn and Khand by this time were populated by tribes of Iorag descent, the Ororath, Omodath and Vracarath which would become the ancestors of the later Variags.

The Ioriag would name the Lands between Núrn and the Ered Harmal Kha-on (“Land of Horses and Sun”) which would later evolve into Khand.

Following Sauron’s defeat, Khand, due to its distance from Gondor, proved to be the only major combatant to emerge succesfully from the Continuation Wars evading the destruction and havoc caused by the armies of the Reunited Kingdom to other allies of Mordor.

[enanoakd]

The Balchoth were a confederation of Easterling Tribes, close relatives to the wainriders but usually considered to have been more primitive.Like their relatives, the wainriders, the Balchoth were known to live and travel in large covered wagons or Wains.

In contrast to their relatives, the Wainriders who are descendants of the Ulgath, the Balchoth are usually seen as Tribes of Ioriag descent. Especially the Asdriags are identified with the Balchoth or are at least regarded as their early predecessors or forerunners of the later Balchoth. Original home to the tribes that later became the Balchoth was a region east of the known lands of Rhûn called the Kýkurian Kýn, but later the Balchoth moved westwards to the sea of Rhûn and settled down in the Talath Harroch, Lands east of Mirkwood once home to Northron Tribes as the Éothraim, the ancestors of the Rohirrim.The principal Head of the Balchoth is the Bôm, an elder presiding over a council patriarchs (two from each tribe).

After the deafeat of the Balchoth in T.A. 2510 two tribes, the Manvul and Hurgung remained with the Asdriags, Odhriags and Magriags as remnants of the Balchoth-federation in eastern Rhovanion.

In 2510 of the Third Age, they attempted, with the assistance of Orcs, an invasion of Calenardhon, a minimally populated northern province of Gondor. After pushing back the northern Gondorian army, they were repulsed by Eorl, who arrived with the Éothéod, after receiving the plea of Cirion late. The Balchoth were no match for the horsemen of the Éothéod, and during the Battle of the Field of Celebrant, they were hunted down and utterly destroyed.

[nenuials]

[teamedain]

HARAD | part of the Paths of Middle Earth collection & Forgotten Men Series

Your step is heavy and your gaze is clouded by the unending waves of heat, or is it the sweat that drips from your brow? The sand troubles your feet and your throat is ever thirsty, yet you decide to think once more on why you have taken the road into the lands south of Gondor and Mordor, where no northerner dares to journey. There were rumors, stories about the great Mumakil which roam free in these forests, and what wouldn’t you give for just a bit of shade. In the distance you see a rider that bears the sigil of a great black snake, or is it your imagination?

[enanoakd]

From the Redwater in the west, to the wide plains in the east, and from the barren wastes in the north to the Inland Sea in the south, the nomadic Logath tribes reign supreme. The Area is therefore known as the Logathavuld. Throughout this region, young Logath males follow the tribal herds through their annual grazing patterns; spending the warm months roaming the rocky hillsides, then descending tothe shelter of lowland valleys when the fierce winter winds arrive. Only a few times a year do their wanderings bring them home, to sheltered wain-camp sites where the tribal matriarchs rule. This traditional social organization has been practiced by the northern nomads since they settled theselands in the mid-Second Age. It’s a rare tribal elder that can recall the old stories that demonstrate that times have not always been this peaceful. The wide lands of Logathavuld are divided into a multitude of different tribal ranges, and only someone familiar with a particular region of Logathavuld will be able to point out the subtle tribal markers to the untrained eye of the occasional traveler. Among the most influential of the tribes are the Narkad, Barak, Utal, Gord,and the most powerful Ibar. Individual clans have their own traditional campsites within the tribal range, most of which are seasonally occupied. Each year, clan matriarchs evaluate the state of their herds and select a surplus group that will bedriven to the market at Sadvar, on the Ulumur. With the wealth gained through the sale of their cattle, the tribespurchase all those items that the market can provide, but the tribes themselves cannot produce. Sources: MERP

[zeroatthebone]

The sons of Ulfang the Black were Ulfast, and Ulwart, and Uldor the accursed; and they followed Caranthir and swore allegiance to him, and proved faithless.

Featuring Sayed Badreya as Ulfang, Naveen Andrews as Ulfast, Said Taghmaoui as Ulwart, and Sendhil Ramamurthy as Uldor.

[zeroatthebone]

At this time the Swarthy Men came first into Beleriand. Some were already secretly under the dominion of Morgoth, and came at his call; but not all, for the rumor of Beleriand, of its lands and waters, of its wars and riches, went now far and wide, and the wandering feet of Men were ever set westward in those days.

Featuring Kiron Kher as Lame Haná (the chief healer), Madhuri Dixit as Thisí (Ulwarth’s wife and Brodda’s sister), Danielle Hayes as a very young Khit (Ulfast’s wife and Bor’s sister), and Chrishell Stubbs as Tókhesh (Ulfast’s daughter).

[enanoakd]

Team Harad forever.