Forodwaith

In J. R. R. Tolkien's fictional universe of Middle-earth, Forodwaith was the name both of a region and the people who lived there.

Geography

The Sindarin name Forodwaith translates loosely as Northern Waste and literally as Northern Realm, and was a name for the land north of the Iron Mountains of the First Age. Little was known of it, except that despite lying scarcely 100 leagues north of the Shire, it was an area of immense cold. This was due to its proximity to the Gap of Ilmen, and Morgoth's evil cold, which emanated, in ancient times, from his place of dwelling, and lingered still into the Third Age.

After the War of Wrath and the breaking of the World, the Iron Mountains were mostly destroyed, and the area of Forodwaith that lay north of Eriador became known as Forochel, together with the great ice-bay and cape that carried the same name.

The Lossoth

The Men of Forodwaith were a strange folk apparently unrelated to the Edain. During the Third Age their descendants were known as the Snowmen of Forochel or Lossoth. In Unfinished Tales it was stated that they could glide on ice by tying bones to their feet. The Lossoth made their houses of snow, and possessed "carts without wheels", probably sleighs. They believed that inhospitable weather was caused by the Witch-king of Angmar, and feared his supposed ability to cause storms so greatly that when at first King Arvedui arrived seeking help, they remained aloof. They dwelled mainly on the Cape of Forochel, whose location made them inaccessible to their foes, "but they often camped on the south shores of the bay at the feet of the Mountains."