bon olivier (order #42065) 83.114.187.4 - Fan Modules - Free

ISENGARD
g e o g r a p h y
The Misty Mountains run some
nine hundred miles from
their northern-most point all the
way down—past the fortresses of
Gundabad, Rivendell, and Moria—
to Methedras, the ‘Last Peak’ of the
mighty range. There, a great, sheltered
valley lies between the eastern
and western spurs of Methedras,
bordered on the south by the Gap of
Rohan. The river Isen runs southward
through this vale, also called Nan
Curunír, fed by many springs and
lesser streams from the rain-washed
foothills of the Misty Mountains.
Nan Curunír was once green and
fair, a pleasant and fertile land; of
late the region has grown into a rugged
wilderness choked by weeds and
brambles, overrun with rank grasses,
riddled with caves inhabited by small
beasts, increasingly devoid of trees
save the burned and hewn stumps of
once mighty groves.
Only within the great Ring of
Isengard remains some testament of
the natural grandeur of the Vale, for
here streams still feed a few acres of
green grasses, blooming gardens, and
copses of giant oak trees. Yet even this
last remnant of nature bears a secret
taint, for it is tended by the slaves of
Saruman, who are bent beneath his
overpowering will.
r oa d s a n d t r a i l s
‘[T]he highway became a wide street,
paved with great flat stones, squared
and laid with skill… deep gutters,
filled with trickling water, ran
down on either side.’
— The Two Towers
The most-travelled road in the
region is the Great West Road,
known as the South Road past the
Gap of Rohan in Dunland, and also
the Westfold Road where long-dead
Masters of the Westfold paved it with
broad stones in its course through
their land. The Great West Road
continues southward from the Fords
0
of Isen—the point where it crosses
the River Isen—toward Helm’s
Deep, on to Edoras, and, eventually,
to Minas Tirith.
The second most important travel-way
in the Wizard’s Vale is the
ancient highway known to the denizens
of Isengard simply as ‘the road.’
It begins just outside the gates of
Isengard, where the ground is firm
and level. Here it more resembles a
wide street than a road, for it is constructed
of massive slabs of stones,
so skilfully joined that not a blade of
grass shows in any joint. As it leads
southward, the road becomes rougher
and eventually meets the Isen, thereafter
following its western bank for
some thirty miles to the Fords of Isen,
where it intersects with the Great
West Road. Upon crossing the Great
West Road, the road from Isengard
becomes not much more than a trail
that continues southward along the
edge of the White Mountains, joining
a network of footpaths that cross
Drúwaith Iaur, Old Púkel-land.
To accommodate his ever-growing
armies of soldiers and servitors,
Saruman widened and fortified a network
of roadways leading eastward
from Isengard. Damming the Isen
created a fordable stretch of river in
the north of the Wizard’s Vale, and a
trail known as the High Path crosses
there, passing in switchbacks over the
high hills south of Methedras and
skirting the southern edge of Fangorn
Forest. Another track, the Low Path,
branches from the High on the eastern
side of the ford and heads south
before turning east to the Eastern
Outpost of the White Hand (see
pages 63–4) and beyond.
Of course, many lesser roads and
trails also cross Nan Curunír, most
created not by design, but by the
daily tramp of the boots and naked
feet of hundreds, if not thousands, of
Saruman’s soldiers and slaves going
about their master’s business.
bon olivier (order #42065) 8