Trade and traderoutes in M-E

[Rumil]

Hi Tuor and Mith,

Agree that the East-West Dorwinion-Erebor-Lindon traderoute was significant, North-South there seems to be very little evidence, apart from Shire-Orthanc under Saruman, doesn't mean that it didn't happen however.

I think one plausible mechanism is one that's been proposed for bronze-age Europe, where occasional Greek artefacts turn up in Britain etc. This is the chain of trade, so for example an item made in the Shire could be sold by a hobbit in Bree, picked up as a curiosity by a trader at the Prancing Pony, stolen by the Dunlendings, given as tribute to Saruman, sold on to a Rohirric trader by one of Saruman's agents, who throws it in as a sweetener for a horse deal with a Gondorian, who sells it in the market at Minas Tirith to a noble who thinks its amusing, who notices the Steward looking at it and gifts it to the Steward as an outlandish curiosity.

Hey presto - Denethor with an Umbrella

[Alfirin]

Originally Posted by Rumil

Hi Tuor and Mith,

Agree that the East-West Dorwinion-Erebor-Lindon traderoute was significant, North-South there seems to be very little evidence, apart from Shire-Orthanc under Saruman, doesn't mean that it didn't happen however.

I think one plausible mechanism is one that's been proposed for bronze-age Europe, where occasional Greek artefacts turn up in Britain etc. This is the chain of trade, so for example an item made in the Shire could be sold by a hobbit in Bree, picked up as a curiosity by a trader at the Prancing Pony, stolen by the Dunlendings, given as tribute to Saruman, sold on to a Rohirric trader by one of Saruman's agents, who throws it in as a sweetener for a horse deal with a Gondorian, who sells it in the market at Minas Tirith to a noble who thinks its amusing, who notices the Steward looking at it and gifts it to the Steward as an outlandish curiosity.

Hey presto - Denethor with an Umbrella

Quite possible. It suprising how far those trade chains (often more like a web than a single chain) can reach. To use an example I am familar with from history (please forgive my little digression). One of the hot items in Alexandria, Egypt from the late Hellenistic to early Roman periods (say about 100BC to AD100) were glass mosaic picture canes and beads made thereof (what we now usually call "millefiori") of great complexity (so complex in fact, that it is only in this century that glassmakers (and then only those who do one of a kind "art glass work" of the kind that can fetch several hundred dollars a bead) have been able to replicate what appaer to have been basic "meat and potatoes" level" canes of the period). As these were really popular as a trade item (durable, took up little space and had an enormous size to value ratio) they tended to go really far in trade to the point where it is possilbe to find beads or raw cane chunks (both were trade items) taken from the same cane, not the same design the same ACTUAL cane (Without getting too, technical a mosaic cane is a bit like a a stick of "cut rock" candy or slice and bake cookies the design runs through the whole thing and so if you take slices or chunks off of it the degin is on each one ) from as far apart as a Frankish burial site and a tomb in the middle of India.

[The Mouth of Sauron]

Remember Aragorn's assertion that boats used to travel south out of Wilderland down to Osgiliath, until only a few years before the War of the Ring. They must have been used for trade between Gondor and at least the men of the Anduin vale above the Gladden Fields - the Woodmen and the Beornings.

And it's certain that this North/South trade would cross over the Lindon - Bree - Beornings - Woodland Realm - Erebor - Esgaroth - Iron Hills - Dorwinion trade route.

[Rumil]

Hi Mouth,

interesting that, as you might think Dol Guldur controlled the river, or at least dsisputed it with Galadriel.

However it does fit that after the White Council booted Sauron out (seemingly), the evil activities would die down until a few years before LoTR, when big S re-occupied with sevenfold strength, and presumably by then didn't care who knew it!

So there's some boating connection between Rohan and Gondor on the one hand and Beornings and Woodmen on the other in between the 2940s and the 3010s. Possibly beforehand as well depending on how secretive Sauron was feeling? Agree that its likely to tie into the East West trade via this route as well.

[Tuor in Gondolin]

About the third leg of the trade routes (Fornost to
Gondor/Calenardhon), until c. 2000 of the Third
Age it would seem to have had the potential of being
not only a sort of Royal Road (like the Persian road from
their capitals through Asia Minor) but also a path of
commerce. Indeed into the Second Age also the Noldor in
Hollin and Moria dwarves would probably participate in
some form in trade and travel.

And continuing trade and travel potential is seen in Butterbur
observations after the War of the Ring.

It all comes from those newcomers and gangrels that
began coming up the Greenway last year, as you may remember;
but more came later. Some were just poor bodies running away
from trouble; but most were bad men, full o'thievery and mischief.

and Gandalf's prediction:

...the Greenway will be opened again, and his messengers
will come north, and there will be comings and goings, and the evil
things will be drivenout of the waste-lands. Indeed the waste in time
will be waste no longer, and there will be people and fields where once
there was wilderness.

There are several things here. One, who were these refugees and where
did they come from? Dunland? Perhaps a few. Rohan, maybe a handful of
Wormtongish- but doubtful. Perhaps people from some areas of South
Gondor going through Anfalas?
Two, Gandalf's comments suggest not a naturally barren land in Minhiriath
and Enedwaith but one almost unnaturally depopulated (shades of the
Dust Bowl?) Perhaps some New Deal CCC (Civilian Conservation Corp)
replantings and soil management was called for

The point is the basis for a trade route is there for a good bit of the Second
and Third Ages, and even in a form of Dark Ages for the region (including not
seeing to upkeep of fords) you'd think it would be marginally kept open by
entrepreneurs. Btw, had tobacco use spread to Gondor (perhaps Thorongil
brought the vice there ).

And then there's that potential sea route, Forlindon to Pelargir...

[The Mouth of Sauron]

I think I remember reading somewhere that Tharbad had a garrison of soldiers and engineers from Gondor until about a century before the War of the Ring. That would suggest that the maintenance of the bridge there was considered vital for North/South trade.

[Legate of Amon Lanc]

Originally Posted by Tuor in Gondolin

There are several things here. One, who were these refugees and where
did they come from? Dunland? Perhaps a few. Rohan, maybe a handful of
Wormtongish- but doubtful. Perhaps people from some areas of South
Gondor going through Anfalas?
Two, Gandalf's comments suggest not a naturally barren land in Minhiriath
and Enedwaith but one almost unnaturally depopulated (shades of the
Dust Bowl?) Perhaps some New Deal CCC (Civilian Conservation Corp)
replantings and soil management was called for

You basically answer yourself with the second remark: I always believed that apart from a few Dunlendings, these men were mainly from Enedwaith or Minhiriath, exactly those bits of "depopulated" people. Mainly, remember that Barliman says that at first mostly they were poor guys running away from trouble. What trouble, one must ask? The Dunlendings had no reason to run away from trouble, unless they were persecuted in their homeland because they disliked the alliances with Saruman. But I could imagine that the Dunlendings on the rise, supported by Saruman, could become a threat to the neighbouring peoples - and that includes the primitive and simple folk of fishermen and hunters (as said in the UT) in Enedwaith/Minhiriath (I never remember which one is which).

And then there's that potential sea route, Forlindon to Pelargir...

Yes, but in late TA nobody used it, probably since the fall of Arnor. There was this big army of Gondor coming to defeat the Witch-King, and they sailed to Lindon, but there did not seem to be any more contact reported later.

Originally Posted by The Mouth of Sauron

I think I remember reading somewhere that Tharbad had a garrison of soldiers and engineers from Gondor until about a century before the War of the Ring. That would suggest that the maintenance of the bridge there was considered vital for North/South trade.

I don't think was that way by then. It's in the UT, but I don't think there was any powerful garrison there by that time. It was just some population remaining there, and after the great floods (2912 TA) the city was completely deserted.

Okay, I actually found the quotes. As for the population of the regions:

Originally Posted by Unfinished Tales, The History of Galadriel and Celeborn, Appendix D

Since the Great Plague of the year 1636 of the Third Age Minhiriath had been almost entirely deserted, though a few secretive hunter-folk lived in the woods. In Enedwaith the remnants of the Dunlendings lived in the east in the foothills of the Misty Mountains; and a fairly numerous but barbarous fisher-folk dwelt between the mouths of the Gwathló and the Angren (Isen).

And here is the one about Tharbad and its garrison:

Originally Posted by Unfinished Tales, The History of Galadriel and Celeborn, Appendix D

A considerable garrison of soldiers, mariners and engineers had been kept there until the seven*teenth century of the Third Age. But from then onwards the region fell quickly into decay; and long before the time of The Lord of the Rings had gone back into wild fenlands.

Seventeenth century of the Third Age - that's actually quite a long time ago and Gondor was at its heights still back then. After the demise of the Northern Kingdom, it gradually lost its importance to keep a big garrison in Tharbad.