Angle (Rhudaur)





The thin strip of fertile land that stretched along the Rivers Mitheithel and Bruinen, from Tharbad all the way to the Trollshaws, was called the Hoarwell Marches by the soldiers and politicians of Eriador. It had been the focus of economic and military activity in eastern Eriador for thousands of years. The northern end of the Marches was the En Egladil, or "Angle," of southern Rhudaur. The Mitheithel and Bruinen both left the fells, the broken country lying along the western flanks of the Misty Mountains, and wandered some sixty miles through rolling country before merging at Fennas Drunin. Along their banks and in some of the small valleys inland farming was possible, and so the " angle" between the two rivers had been fought over since the Elder Days. Traditionally, the Hillmen and anyone controlling the upper Gwathlo basin raided downriver, pillaging the farming communities of the southern marches; the civilized peoples campaigned upriver to punish the raiders and to conquer their lands for settlement. The Angle had changed hands repeatedly over the last five hundred years as the fortunes of the Rhudaurim and Cardolani waxed and waned. Feotar, at the southern end of the Hoarwell Marches, had endured the brunt of repeated raids by the Hillmen into Cardolan as well as Orc raids from the En Eredoriath. Consequently, they cooperated with the lords of the En Egladil and supported their efforts to remain independent In the I630's, before the Great Plague struck, King Ermegil of Rhudaur and Broggha, the Targ-arm of the Hillmen, campaigned to overrun the Angle and drove south into Feotar. Bemakinda, General of the Feotari throughout this period, led the fight against them and managed to restrain their depredations. In the aftermath of the Gteat Plague, he restored two keeps of the central Angle, Thuin Boid and Harnalda, to Eriadoran control.