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Places in Middle-earth

Methedras

Type: Mountains, Hills, Promontories

Region: Rhovanion/Misty Mtns

Meaning: Last Peak

Location: The southernmost peak of the Misty Mountains; the source of the Entwash and Isen rivers; surrounds the Wizard's Vale and Isengard; borders the Gap of Rohan on the south and Fangorn on the east.

Description: [Northward from the Downs] and eastward they saw the windy uplands of the Wold of Rohan.... Northwestward stalked the dark forest of Fangorn; still ten leagues away stood its shadowy eaves, and its further slopes faded into the distant blue. Beyond there glimmered far away, as if floating on a grey cloud, the white head of tall Methedras, the last peak of the Misty Mountains.

The Two Towers, LoTR Book 3, Ch 2, The Riders of Rohan

At last the hobbits saw ... a steep dark land: they had come to the feet of the mountains, and to the green roots of tall Methedras. Down the hillside the young Entwash, leaping from its springs high above, ran noisily from step to step to meet them. On the right of the stream there was a long slope, clad with grass ...

Beyond them was a wide level space, as though the floor of a great hall had been cut in the side of the hill. On either hand the walls sloped upwards, until they were fifty feet high or more, and along each wall stood an aisle of trees that also increased in height as they marched inwards.

At the far end the rock-wall was sheer, but at the bottom it had been hollowed back into a shallow bay with an arched roof: the only roof of the hall, save the branches of the trees.... A little stream escaped from the springs above.... The water ...flowed ... out to rejoin the Entwash in its journey through the forest.

The Two Towers, LoTR Book 3, Ch 4, Treebeard

'I don't know quite where we are,' said Merry, 'but that peak is probably Methedras, and as far as I can remember the ring of Isengard lies in a fork or deep cleft at the end of the mountains. It is probably down behind this great ridge.'

The Two Towers, LoTR Book 3, Ch 4, Treebeard

The Isen came down swiftly from its sources above Isengard, but in the flat land of the Gap it became slow....

Unfinished Tales, Part 3, Ch 5, The Battles of the Fords of Isen


Etymology

ras 'horn' in Barad Nimras, also in Caradhras ('Redhorn') and Methedras ('Last Peak') in the Misty Mountains; plural rais in Ered Nimrais.

The Silmarillion, Appendix: Elements in Quenya and Sindarin Names

Contributors: Elena Tiriel 15Jan05

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