The Plateau of Gorgoroth

“Gorgoroth, the valley of terror in the Land of Mordor. Darkness lay there under the sun.
Fire glowed amid the smoke. Mount Doom was burning, and a great reek rising.”

LOTR: FOTR B2 C10

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Gorgoroth was a vast plain or valley that lay in the northwest corner of Mordor. Encompassed by the Mountains of Shadow to the west and the Ash Mountains to the north, it’s southern and eastern boarders were formed by the Maegond Spur and the Mithram Spur which jutted out from these two mountain ranges. In the center of the plain raised upon a plateau was the mountain of fire, Orodruin, know in the common tongue as Mount Doom.

The land was rough and hostile and as one drew near the mountain, the plain was pockmarked with tumult of Orodruin, large fissures and flaming vents, that spewed forth choking fumes and smoke. It was a hot dry landscape of ash and slag and burnt stone, where thirst was a constant torment.

Yet upon this plain most of the servants of the Dark Lord lived and worked in preparation for war. Upon the western side of Mount Doom, between it’s rocky feet and the Morgai was a massive orc encampment that was the size of a small city, and around it dotted across the plain were smaller camps and settlements of orcs and men. On the eastern side of Mount Doom, the land was lower and more barren where all the fumes and molten fire settled. It was here, across this barren stretch of land, that the hobbits traveled on their way to the Cracks of Doom.

Frodo and Sam would eventually walk across the northern half of Gorgoroth, but Frodo received his first view of this terrible landscape, in a vision upon the High Seat of Seeing atop Amen Hen.

“Thither, eastward, unwilling his eye was drawn. It passed the ruined bridges of Osgiliath, the grinning gates of Minas Morgul, and the haunted Mountains, and it looked upon Gorgoroth, the valley of terror in the Land of Mordor. Darkness lay there under the sun. Fire glowed amid the smoke. Mount Doom was burning, and a great reek rising.”

From the The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring in the chapter ‘The Breaking of the Fellowship’

 

After traveling along the Morgai going north, Frodo and Sam climbed up to seek a way down to Gorgoroth.

“After much wandering and search they found a way that they could climb, and with a last hundred feet of clawing scrabble they were up. The came to a cleft between two dark crags, and passing through found themselves on the very edge of the last fence of Mordor. Below them, at the bottom of a fall of some fifteen hundred feet, lay the inner plain stretching away into a formless gloom beyond their sight.

The wind of the world blew now from the West, and the great clouds were lifted high floating away eastward; but still only a grey light came to the dreary fields of Gorgoroth. There smokes and fumes trailed on the ground and lurked in the hollows, and fumes leaked from fissures in the earth.”

From the The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King in the chapter ‘The Land of Shadow’

 

The hobbits from their high vantage point, were able to look down upon the dark plain of Gorgoroth. There among it’s ruinous tumult, they could see the armies of Mordor moving about the vast plateau below them.

“Frodo and Sam gazed out in mingled loathing and wonder on this hateful land. Between them and the smoking mountain, and about it north and south, all seemed ruinous and dead, a desert burned and  choked.

They wondered how the Lord of this realm maintained and fed his slaves and armies. Yet Armies he had. As far as their eyes could reach, along the skirts of the Morgai and away southward, there were camps, some of tents, some ordered like small towns. One of the largest of these was right below them. Barely a mile out into the plain it clustered like some huge nest in insects, with straight dreary streets  of huts and long low drab buildings. About it the ground was busy with folk going to and fro, a wide road ran from it south-east to join the Morgul-way, and along it many lines of small black shapes were hurrying.”

From the The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King in the chapter ‘The Land of Shadow’

 

There is much yet to be discovered in the Library of Shadow, about the Dark History of Gorgoroth and the part it played in the War of the Rings! As we seek among the faded scrolls and manuscripts and find out it’s hidden secrets, we will be adding more about the the valley of terror in the land of shadow!

 

“Another dreadful day of fear and toil had come to Mordor.”