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[Deon]

Hello, I would like to have some help. While internet is a good place to look around, having some "experts" always helps. Maybe some of you researched the world of Tolkien much better than I did?

I've managed to compile a small list of plants and animals which should exist in Middle-Earth or could exist there because they were present on Numenor or mentioned otherwise.

Regarding domestic animals...
Cats, cows, dogs, goats, horses, ponies, rabbits, sheep and wolfhounds are definitely mentioned in the books. There are also Kine of Araw which were white oxen similar to aurochs, so aurochs seem fine.
I don't remember a direct mentioning of geese or chickens, but I guess those exist. Can anyone help me with this?

Regarding wild animals...
Apes, bats, bears, crows, deer, eagles, foxes, hares, owls, rats, ravens, seagulls, snakes, squirrels, swans, vultures and wolves were definitely mentioned in the books.

Regarding fantasy animals...
Great spiders, wargs were a canon. Crebain (sing. craban), sentient crows, were mentioned both in books and movies. Great eagles are a must. Mumakil, aka Oliphaunts, should not be forgotten for sure.
Mearas (sing. mearh) were wild and clever horses with a lifespan of a human.
Remembering Watcher in the Water, there must be giant octopi or sprouts liviing in some very dark places.
And of course Shelob, the shadow spider.

There was a mentioning of werewolves, but I don't know wether they had something to do with shapeshifting (like beornings) or they were just clever wolves, can someone make it clear?

[Deon]

Second part of the discussion.

I've made some exploration and discovered the following plants mentioned in various sources:

Trees: ash, beech, birch, cedar, elm, fir, holly, linden, oak, pine, rowan, willow, yews.

Real world plants: anemones, barley, blackberry, cherry, citrus, corn, cucumber, ferns, heather, hemlocks, iris, lichens, lilies, mushrooms (various), nasturtians, potato, rose, strawberriy, sweet briar, turnip, water-lilies and wheat.
Pipeweed was most likely tobacco or the like.

Fantasy plants: box-woods, elanor flower, evermind, gorse, hawthorn, kingsfoil, lissuin flower, mallos flower, niphredil flower, sages (blue, red, green), seregon flower, snowthorn, thrift, thyme.


If you could help me with the list, I would be most grateful.

[Tellemurius]

I believe most of wildlife are available, geese for instance i remember reading about Legolas firing off goose-feathered arrows. The clever wolves were the Wargs near the misty mountains that actually had a language between them.

[smakemupagus]

Thrushes, of course.

The hobbits recall Gandalf's fireworks as "great lilies and snapdragons and laburnums... " of fire.

Sauron, in the Silmarilion was a master of vampires and werewolves and could *shift into their form* at will, implying they were themselves a type of creature.  Consensus seems to be that a werewolf is a great wolf inhabited by an evil spirit, or a lesser maiar whose corporeal form is a wolf, as opposed to anything like a humanoid shapeshifter.  Vampires I think we know even less about.

Beorn and his folk of course is more like what we in DF would call a "were-bear," but Tolkien doesn't call him that.

Of course fish are referenced in many places, if not by species name.

Boxwood, gorse, sage, and thyme which you put under fantasy are all real world plants ^^

Some notable elven trees are Mallorn (the golden trees of the elves, one of which Sam brings back to the Shire as his gift from Galadriel).  And Yavannamire, the sacred tree of the mother goddess (evergreen with red berries). 

The two sacred trees of Valinor, like their decendant the white tree of Minas Tirith, I don't believe their species' names were ever given.

[Deon]

Boxwood, gorse, sage, and thyme are all real world plants ^^

Haha, well, it shows that I am not really good with english words . Of course translating them made it all clear. They just sounded fantasy-ish to me, heh.

[Putnam]

Just so you know, I have a middle-earth worldgen and a fairly shitty numenor worldgen lying around. Here they are.

I also have some Morgoth's army creature and entity raws as well as black speech and fairly shitty sindarin langauge files here.

[smakemupagus]

we could start using the formal botanists' Quenya names instead of laypersons english or russian
http://folk.uib.no/hnohf/botany.htm

I think Tellemurius point is a good one, Middle Earth is such a low fantasy world that most Earth flora and fauna are probably there too.

[Meph]

How has no one mentioned Lembas yet? The epic elven bread, made of lembas plants.

Fantasy animals: Ents. Trolls. Tom Bombadil.

Are we talking LotR or ALL Tolkien?

[Deon]

All Tolkien.

Also ehh... Meph, Lembas is the name for the waybread, it's made from special corn. There's no "lembas" plant .

[Meph]

I just assumed that lembas bread is made of lembas, like cave wheat gives cave wheat flour and cave wheat bread.

These are all fictional foods:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Middle-earth_food_and_drink

And animals :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Middle-earth_animals

And plants:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Middle-earth_plants

And weapons/armor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Middle-earth_weapons_and_armour

[Deon]

Heh, too many articles state that something is "a recipe kept secret" or "is not revealed how it's made"... Well, nothing hurts to speculate a bit, I just want to stay close to canon.

Also do you people agree that Mithril should be as Adamantine? AFAIK Balrog was released when dwarves dug too deep.

[Meph]

I guess your lembas will be trade-only from the elves then. That way you dont need to worry about reagents for reactions.

Mithril for Adamantine sounds good, it makes sense. Especially if you replace all demons with balrogs. For the hell floor (non-flying demons) you could take the "ancient beings that gnaw on the foundation of the world" Gandalf mentions... "older then Sauron"... its never explained anywhere what they are exactly, and seemingly contradict the creation of Middle Earth with Morgoth and the singing and all that... there was another line about the Spider, Ungoliant. Similar thing, not linked to Morgoth but there already.

EDIT: Ha, found it. http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Nameless_Things

PS: Dumbledore Easter Egg http://tolkiengateway.net/wiki/Dumbledors

[Vattic]

Boxwood, gorse, sage, and thyme which you put under fantasy are all real world plants ^^

Hawthorn too.

I guess your lembas will be trade-only from the elves then. That way you dont need to worry about reagents for reactions.

Depending on how strictly canon is being followed the elves really shouldn't be trading it with anyone. It was very rarely given to any non-elf as a gift, I wouldn't mind seeing it as a trade good, however.

[travellersside]

Fantasy plants: box-woods, elanor flower, evermind, gorse, hawthorn, kingsfoil, lissuin flower, mallos flower, niphredil flower, sages (blue, red, green), seregon flower, snowthorn, thrift, thyme.

Real world
box-wood - a bush often used in gardens
gorse -  a shrub, found pretty much everwhere, but mostly on moorland and scrubland
hawthorn - a tree
kingsfoil - very possibly 'Chimaphila umbellata', currently known as Prince's Pine, but once called King's Cure
sages (blue, red, green) - decorative, cooking and medicinal uses
thrift - an evergreen perennial, used decoratively in rock gardens
thyme - a herb commonly used in cooking

Fantasy
elanor flower, evermind, lissuin flower, mallos flower, niphredil flower, seregon flower, snowthorn.

Tolkien was English and all the real world plants above were common in Britain or Europe. The Shire was rural English, so anything that you'd find in England was to be found there. By and large, if you can find it in the real world, it's probably going to fit into the appropriate terrain Middle Earth. It wasn't a case of what real creatures you would find there, but what you would not.

[smakemupagus]

I think in middle earth Mithril was not only deep.  The elves were working with it in the first age, when settlements in ME were young.  But they mostly used it for fine craftswork, including magical runes and etc. 

The dwarven weapon-grade mithril was a metal made "of" truesilver (i think it is not explained whether that makes it an alloy or just a metal worked in a particular way.)  It was found in small quantities among silver veins, and in Moria they didn't delve so deep for many years, until they had depleted the nearer deposits, and they delved not only too deep but also in the direction of the cursed mountain Caradhras.

But, for DF gameplay reasons, I think that it occuring like adamantine is fine.