About This Map
Who made this map, what it is based on and where it simplifies.
Why the map is our own
Every published map of Middle-earth is someone's copyrighted artwork, so we could not use one and still give the file away. Instead the base map here is an original artwork made for this site, and everything on top of it, the labels, markers, routes and region outlines, is drawn by the site from data taken from the text. That split is what makes the interactive parts possible: each place is an object rather than a pixel, so we can zoom, search, highlight a region, draw a journey across it and measure between two points.
Sources
Positions and names come from the books: The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings with its Appendices, and The Silmarillion. Appendix A and the Tale of Years in Appendix B supply most of the dates and the history of Arnor, Gondor and Rohan. For distances we cross-checked against Karen Wynn Fonstad's Atlas of Middle-earth, which is the standard reference for scale, and we say when a figure is hers. Where the books and the Atlas differ, we give the book first and note the range.
Accuracy and simplifications
Tolkien's own maps disagree with each other in places, and some regions were never drawn in detail, so any map involves judgment. The coastlines and mountain chains follow the published maps closely enough to find your way, but river bends, forest edges and small hills belong to the artwork rather than to Tolkien. A few markers are placed where the text only implies a location, and those are noted on the page. Nothing east of Rhûn or deep in Harad should be treated as exact, because Tolkien left it blank.
Legal
This is an unofficial fan site. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to the Tolkien Estate, Middle-earth Enterprises, HarperCollins, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt or any film or television studio. All artwork, map data and written text on this site are original work created for it. Quotations from the books are kept short and are used only to identify places and events. If you hold rights and have a concern about anything here, contact us and we will respond quickly.