Outline of Middle-earth

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to the real-world history and notable fictional elements of J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy universe. It covers materials created by Tolkien; the works on his unpublished manuscripts, by his son Christopher Tolkien; and films, games and other media created by other people.

Middle-earth – fantasy setting created by Tolkien, home to hobbits, orcs, ents, dragons, and many other races and creatures.

Primary sources

Authors

• J. R. R. Tolkien
• Christopher Tolkien

Published works

By J. R. R. Tolkien

• The Hobbit (1937)
  • 2nd Edition (1951) revised to align with The Lord of the Rings
  • 3rd Edition (1966) revised to assert copyright in US
• The Lord of the Rings
  • The Fellowship of the Ring (1954)
    • The Shadow of the Past
    • The Council of Elrond
  • The Two Towers (1954)
  • The Return of the King (1955)
    • The Scouring of the Shire - a "novelistic" chapter
    • The Tale of Aragorn and Arwen
• The Adventures of Tom Bombadil (1962)
  • Revised edition (2014) with addition of original poems, sources and images, and commentary by Christina Scull and Wayne G. Hammond
• The Road Goes Ever On (1967) – music by Donald Swann, penmanship by Tolkien. See also Audio recordings
  • Revised edition (1978) – including a setting for Bilbo's Last Song

Posthumously published

• Bilbo's Last Song (1974) – Dutch translation published 1973
• Guide to the Names in The Lord of the Rings
  (1975) – also known as "Nomenclature of The Lord of the Rings"
• The Silmarillion (1977)
  • Ainulindalë
• Pictures by J. R. R. Tolkien (1979) – text by Christopher Tolkien. Most of these pictures had been previously published in calendars by
  George Allen & Unwin
  (1974, 1976–1979), some of them coloured by H. E. Riddett.
• Unfinished Tales (1980)
• J. R. R. Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator (1995) – text by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull
• The Art of The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien (2011) – text by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull
• The Art of The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien (2015) – text by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull

Edited by Christopher Tolkien

These works present extended selections of Tolkien's legendarium (the large body of documents relating to The Silmarillion), with extensive notes and posthumous editing by his son Christopher. The separate 4-volume body of his comments on the drafts of The Lord of the Rings is included as volumes 6–9.

The History of Middle-earth

Early legendarium

1

The Book of Lost Tales 1

(1983)

2

The Book of Lost Tales 2

(1984)

3 The Lays of Beleriand (1985)

4 The Shaping of Middle-earth (1986)

5 The Lost Road and Other Writings (1987)

The History of The Lord of the Rings

6 [1]

The Return of the Shadow

(1988)

7 [2]

The Treason of Isengard

(1989)

8 [3]

The War of the Ring

(1990)

9 [4]

Sauron Defeated

(1992)

The later Silmarillion

10 [1] Morgoth's Ring (1993)

11 [2] The War of the Jewels (1994)

Further details

12 The Peoples of Middle-earth (1996)

Other stories

• Tales from the Perilous Realm
  both reprint The Adventures of Tom Bombadil

Additional materials from the legendarium, with Christopher Tolkien's commentary.

• The Children of Húrin (2007)
• Beren and Lúthien (2017)
• The Fall of Gondolin (2018)

Edited by other scholars

• The Annotated Hobbit (1988) – text of The Hobbit, with many related texts by Tolkien, edited and with commentary by Douglas A. Anderson (revised edition 2002)

• The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien (1981) – selected, introduced and edited by Humphrey Carpenter

• The Nature of Middle-earth (2021) – essays and fragments, including on Elvish linguistics, with commentary by the scholar Carl F. Hostetter

• The History of The Hobbit (2007) – 2 volumes on the construction of The Hobbit with commentary by the scholar John D. Rateliff

Audio recordings

• Poems and Songs of Middle Earth (1967) – poems read by Tolkien; songs sung by William Elvin, accompanied by composer Donald Swann (as published in The Road Goes Ever On)
• J. R. R. Tolkien Reads and Sings his The Hobbit & The Lord of the Rings (1975), Caedmon TC 1477, TC 1478 (based on an August, 1952 recording by George Sayer)

Graphical works

• Tolkien's artwork
• Tolkien's maps
• Tolkien's scripts
  • Cirth
  • Sarati
  • Tengwar

Translations

• Translations of The Hobbit
• Translations of The Lord of the Rings
  • Translation of The Lord of the Rings into Swedish
  • Translations of The Lord of the Rings into Russian

Adaptations and developments

Maps

• A Map of Middle-earth, meaning either of two posters:
  • by Barbara Remington (1965)
  • by Pauline Baynes (1970)
• The Atlas of Middle-earth (1981, revised ed 1991) by Karen Wynn Fonstad
• Journeys of Frodo: An Atlas of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings (1981) by Barbara Strachey

Spoken word

• The Hobbit (1974) – Nicol Williamson recorded an abridged, dramatic version for Decca Records on the Argo label
• The Lord of the Rings (1990) – unabridged recording by Rob Inglis for Recorded Books
• The Hobbit (1991) – unabridged recording by Rob Inglis for Recorded Books
• The Children of Húrin (2007) – Christopher Lee recorded an unabridged audiobook
• The Hobbit (2020) – Andy Serkis live-streamed an unabridged reading to raise money for NHS Charities Together
• The Hobbit (2020) – unabridged recording by Andy Serkis for HarperCollinsUK and Recorded Books
• The Lord of the Rings (2021) – unabridged recording by Andy Serkis for HarperCollinsUK and Recorded Books

Radio

• The Lord of the Rings (1955) – BBC: six 45-minute episodes for The Fellowship of the Ring, then six 30-minute episodes for all of The Two Towers and The Return of the King, adapted by Terence Tiller
• The Hobbit (1968) – BBC: eight half-hour episodes, adapted by Michael Kilgarriff
• National Public Radio: totalling over 11 hours, adapted by Bernard Mayes
• The Lord of the Rings (1981) – BBC: 26 half-hour instalments, later re-cut to 13 hour-long instalments, adapted by Brian Sibley and Michael Bakewell
• Der Herr der Ringe (1991) – Südwestrundfunk and Westdeutscher Rundfunk: German adaptation of The Lord of the Rings in 30 half-hour episodes, by Peter F. Steinbach [de]