Northmen (Middle-earth)

Northmen

Men of Dale, Lake-men, Beornings, Woodmen, Éothéod, Rohirrim
Attributes
Home world	Middle-earth
Base of operations	Rhovanion, Rohan
Language	Westron, Dalish, Rohirric

J. R. R. Tolkien adopted the term Northmen in his fiction; his "Northmen" were Men that lived in the north of Rhovanion in Middle-earth, and were friendly to Gondor.

The Northmen who dwelt in Greenwood the Great and other parts of Rhovanion were friendly to the Dúnedain and were after the Dúnedain the most noble Men in Arda, counted as Middle Men by the Dúnedain, and believed to have been descended from the same group of Men as the Edain, the Atanatári (similar to how the Noldor viewed the Sindar in the First Age). The only difference was that they did not cross the Ered Luin into Beleriand and therefore did not go to Númenor. The result of them not participating in the War against Morgoth was their considerably shorter lifespan as compared to the lifespan of the Dúnedain, whose lifespan was enhanced by the Valar after the War of Wrath. They were important allies of Gondor and served as a buffer against the Easterlings, and in the Army of Gondor. For a time many of them even became subjects of Gondor, as the realm extended beyond the river Anduin.

East of Greenwood the Great was the kingdom of Rhovanion, and this became the most important nation of the Northmen. In the fourteenth century of the Third Age, King Rómendacil II of Gondor sent his son Valacar as an ambassador to Vidugavia, king of Rhovanion. Valacar loved Rhovanion and its king's daughter Vidumavi. He married her, and she bore him a son whom she called Vinitharya in her mother tongue. Vinitharya succeeded his father as Eldacar, the first king of Gondor who was not of pure Dúnadan descent; a civil war, the Kin-strife, resulted.

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