Composite Map of Tolkien's Arda
For the past few months I have been working on a composite map of Tolkien’s Arda, which attempts to resolve the placement of all of the different landmasses and geographical details described in the Silmarillion, The Hobbit and Lord Of The Rings, covering the thousands of years described in Tolkien's life's work. As reference material I sourced every map I could find, read all his published and posthumously published works, and researched maps and fan databases extensively online, and then enlarged, stretched and distorted the often contradictory and incomplete maps I found to create a new map that to my mind forms a one-off visual representation of the complex world he spent his life creating.
Is it accurate? That depends on your viewpoint. Many of the places never existed simultaneously, as vast swathes of Arda were destroyed and remade over millenia. Using artistic license, I also enlarged important areas to allow them room to contain the wealth of detail necessary, and shrank others of lesser importance. Is it geographically correct? As far as possible, considering a lot of the places were only ever described in text, but I also reduced the land mass some remoter outlying areas to keep the project manageable. Is it flawed? Absolutely. Trying to make a comprehensive two dimensional map of something so mutable in both time and space is a pretty stupid idea to begin with, and often when faced with a dilemma, I just made a call and went with it, so it is a very personal undertaking. Is it useful? For me, yes, very, as I have been looking for something like this for a long time, and never found anything that satisfied.
The end result of this work has angered some hard core 'experts', but delighted most people who have seen it, as of necessity this breaks some accepted mores and goes against some very personal opinions passionately held by some Tolkien fans. But in the end, Arda only ever existed in Tolkien's imagination, and much of the accepted 'lore' has been created after the fact, so this is as valid as anything else out there, to my mind. The map has a lot of detail, and includes as many places and objects as I was able to find reference to, and a hi-res png is available for purchase here for those who would like to contribute.
