In a fantasy land for which millions of people have traveled with your own imagination, also helped by the films directed by Peter Jackson, now fans of the Lord of the Rings will be able to see Middle-earth as its creator JRR Tolkien did.
An unpublished map, drawn by the author's son, Christopher, and added with notes from Tolkien himself, is to be displayed for a single day. Bodelian Libraries acquired the recently discovered map of Middle-earth that reveals Tolkien's vision of the creatures, topography, and heraldry of his imagined world.
The map was a document that Tolkien and the acclaimed illustrator Pauline Baynes were working on in 1969 when she was commissioned produce a map of Middle Earth. At that time, The Lord of the Rings had never been illustrated, so Tolkien was interested to ensure that Middle-earth would be accurately depicted.
Your notes and marks can be seen in green ink or pencil on the map, mostly they indicate key places in Middle Earth with real world cities. The map Tolkien and Baynes wrote down was a printout that she had obtained from one of their volumes of The Lord of the Rings. The map was drawn for publication in 1954 by one of his sons, Christopher, and was included in the first of two volumes of The Lord of the Rings.
Annotations on the map indicate how Baynes followed Tolkien's suggestions in the creation of his map of Middle-earth published in 1970 and that many fans will recognize. It also reveals that the creatures seen on the map, such as wolves, elephants, camels, and horses, were suggested by Tolkien himself and drawn by Baynes in the same locations he specified.
Baynes was the only artist approved by Tolkien to illustrate their works during their lifetime.