Wainriders of Rhovanion

Easterlings

Wainriders

Wainriders of Rhovanion

The Wainriders were a people who dwelt in the distant East of Middle-earth, but at the encouragement of Sauron at least a part of this people set out to conquer territory in the west. Travelling on the great wains that gave them their name, they appeared in the lands south of Mirkwood. In III 1856 King Narmacil II of Gondor set out to give them battle, but he was slain and the Wainriders had the victory. These Wainriders settled in Rhovanion, driving out or enslaving the people who had formerly dwelt there and forcing the Gondorians back beyond Anduin.

The Wainriders established their power in Rhovanion for a time, but not without challenge. In III 1899, after more than forty years of occupation, their enslaved subjects rose up in revolt. At the same time King Calimehtar launched an attack from Gondor that caused them a great reverse, apparently causing them to withdraw from Rhovanion altogether.

The Wainriders did not take this defeat lightly, and over the following decades they built up an alliance with the Haradrim to the south. In III 1944 they reappeared in Rhovanion and threatened the territory of Gondor once more, while the Haradrim attacked simultaneously from the south. At first the Wainriders seemed utterly victorious, defeating and slaying King Ondoher as they had his grandfather Narmacil nearly a century earlier. As they celebrated their victory, the Gondorian captain Eärnil, who had defeated the Haradrim in the south, appeared suddenly and put the Wainriders to rout, burning their wains and sending many fleeing into the Dead Marshes. Thus the Wainriders of Rhovanion came to an end, and Gondor reclaimed its territories beyond Anduin.