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Places in Middle-earth

Northfarthing, The

Type: Kingdoms, Realms, Lands

Region: Bree/The Shire

Location: The northernmost district of the Shire; known for the cultivation of barley and the brewing of ale.

Description: The Shire was divided into four quarters, the Farthings already referred to, North, South, East, and West; and these again each into a number of folklands, which still bore the names of some of the old leading families ... Outside the Farthings were the East and West Marches....

The Fellowship of the Ring, LoTR Prologue, Of the Ordering of the Shire

[All] about them lay a tumbled heathland, grown with ling and broom and cornel, and other shrubs that they did not know. Here and there they saw knots of tall pine-trees. The hearts of the hobbits rose again a little in spite of weariness: the air was fresh and fragrant, and it reminded them of the uplands of the Northfarthing far away.

The Two Towers, LoTR Book 4, Ch 4, Of Herbs and Stewed Rabbit

Except on the high moors of the Northfarthing a heavy [snow] fall was rare in the Shire, and was regarded as a pleasant event and a chance for fun.

The Fellowship of the Ring, LoTR Book 2, Ch 3, The Ring Goes South

2747
Bandobras Took defeats an Orc-band in the Northfarthing.

The Return of the King, LoTR Appendix B, The Tale of Years: The Third Age

So ended the Battle of Bywater, 1419, the last battle fought in the Shire, and the only battle since the Greenfields, 1147, away up in the Northfarthing.

The Return of the King, LoTR Book 6, Ch 8, The Scouring of the Shire

3020
S.R. 1420: The Great Year of Plenty

The Return of the King, LoTR Appendix B, The Tale of Years: The Third Age

Altogether 1420 in the Shire was a marvellous year. Not only was there wonderful sunshine and delicious rain, in due times and perfect measure, but there seemed something more: an air of richness and growth, and a gleam of a beauty beyond that of mortal summers that flicker and pass upon this Middle-earth. ...

... everywhere there was so much corn that at Harvest every barn was stuffed. 'The Northfarthing barley was so fine that the beer of 1420 malt was long remembered and became a byword. Indeed a generation later one might hear an old gaffer in an inn, after a good pint of well-earned ale, put down his mug with a sigh: "Ah! that was proper fourteen-twenty, that was!"'

The Return of the King, LoTR Book 6, Ch 9, The Grey Havens

Contributors: Elena Tiriel 11May05, 31Oct05

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