From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
In the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, Minhiriath is a land of Middle-earth.
Minhiriath (Sindarin for 'Between Rivers') is located in Eriador, a name for all the lands between the Misty Mountains and the Ered Luin. Minhiriath has no clear border in the north, but in the west, south and east it is bounded by water: the Great Sea or Belegaer, the river Brandywine and the river Greyflood. Minhiriath was nominally part of the Kingdom of Arnor in the early Third Age, and later it was seen as part of the kingdom of Cardolan. In the late Third Age, it was an empty land, and part of no kingdom at all. The area was once very forested, but by the time of the War of the Ring these woods were all gone, except for the still forested cape Eryn Vorn.
The inhabitants of Minhiriath (or Minhiriathrim) were related to the ancestors of the Atani the Númenóreans were descended from, but because they spoke an unintelligible language they were not classed as Middle Men. When the large deforesting of their land began under the Númenórean Ship Kings they became openly hostile, and were persecuted. By the late Third Age the Minhiriathrim were nearly all gone, and only small populations survived in Eryn Vorn, and across the River Gwathló in Enedwaith and Dunland. These became known as the Dunlendings. Some others forgot their heritage and mingled with the folk of Arnor, and from them came the Men of Bree. Minhiriath was further depopulated by the Great Plague, which was still in full force when it crossed the river Gwathló, and killed many of the last remaining Minhiriathrim.
In the far south of Minhiriath on both sides of the Gwathló lay the city of Tharbad, which had not been part of Arnor but rather was a northern outpost of the Kingdom of Gondor. However, Gondor retreated south during the Third Age, and by the time of the War of the Ring Tharbad had long been ruined and abandoned.
