Invasion of the Wainriders

There was peace after the great plague until the Wainriders attacked Gondor and what was left of the Northmen. The wars between the Wainriders and Gondor lasted nearly 100 years. "The Wainriders were a people, or a confederacy of many peoples, that came from the East; but they were stronger and better armed than any that had appeared before. They journeyed in great wains, and their chieftains fought in chariots" (p. 329, The Return of the King).

King Narmacil II gathered an army, including all that could be gathered from the Northmen, and battled the Wainriders. He, and a great many of his forces, were killed in the Battle of the Plains in 1856. This devastated the Northmen and a few fled and merged with the folk of Dale, some took refuge in Gondor, and another small remnant fled north between the Anduin River and Mirkwood forest and gathered many refugees. "This was the beginning of the Eotheod, though nothing was known of it in Gondor for many years. Most of the Northmen were reduced to servitude, and all their former lands were occupied by the Wainriders" (p. 289, Unfinished Tales).

There is some speculation that it was during this time, circa 1856, that the Ringwraiths re-entered Mordor with the destruction of the Northmen and the shrinking of Gondor's borders. Whatever the case it was later discovered that the Wainriders had been moved to war by Sauron's emissaries.

Middle-earth timeline: Third Age, 1851-1899

Today's reading comes from: Unfinished Tales, page 289; and The Return of the King, page 329