Drawing· c. 1970
Tolkien’s own notes on a loose map of Middle-earth
By the Editors · As reported by TheOneRing.net, 23 October 2015
FoundOxford, United Kingdom
Tucked inside The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
Among the papers of illustrator Pauline Baynes, a map of Middle-earth was found loose inside her copy of The Lord of the Rings. It was covered in Tolkien’s notes in green ink and pencil, made while Baynes was preparing an illustrated map of Middle-earth around 1970, with Baynes’s own jottings alongside. The notes place Hobbiton at roughly the latitude of Oxford and point to Ravenna as a model for Minas Tirith. Blackwell’s Rare Books exhibited it in Oxford in 2015 with a £60,000 price; the Bodleian later acquired it.
This is our summary of a find reported in the press. For the full story, photographs and any updates, read the original report in TheOneRing.net.