Bree and the Barrow-Downs

From Tolkien Gateway
Bree and the Barrow-Downs
Merp bree.jpg
AuthorHeike Kubasch
PublisherIron Crown Enterprises
Released1984
FormatSoftcover
Pages36
ISBN0-915795-16-7
ICE stock no.8010

Bree and the Barrow-Downs is a module (in the Adventure-series) for Middle-earth Role Playing, 1st Edition.

Material from this product was included in Arnor, The Realm.

Cover/Jacket Text[edit | edit source]

Here at the crossroads of the northern Dunedain Kingdom is located the old surviving settlement of Hobbits, the village of Bree. Not far away lie the eerie barrow-tombs of the cursed Kings of Cardolan...

This adventure module contains:

  • NPC charts
  • color layouts of Bree-land, Silent-Head, and the villages of Bree, Archet, Staddle and Combe
  • more than 20 barrows including the mounds of the ancient Edain Kings.

In Bree you'll find

  • the haunted tombs of the fallen Edain Kings and the Princes of Cardolan
  • the evil Cormac and his small army of bandits
  • 6 pages of full color
  • detailed barrow layouts and descriptions.

BREE AND THE BARROW DOWNS: INTRODUCTION AND HISTORY

Bree-land is a small, settled area in central Eriador that lies just to the east of the Tyrn Gorthad, the ancient Barrow-downs. The region has been almost continuously inhabited since the First Age. In T.A. 1700 Bree is not much different than it would be at the time of the War of the Ring some 1300 years later - a prosperous, quiet but sometimes threatened farming community standing near the intersection of the Great East Road and the Greenway, the two major thoroughfares of the Kingdom of Arnor.

Bree-land is quite small and contains four villages within its boundaries: Bree, on the western slope of Bree Hill; Staddle, on the other side of the hill; Combe, a few miles to the east, and Archet, which lies a few miles northeast of Bree. The Chetwood, a good-sized but tame forest is also considered part of Bree-land and lies just north of Archet. The whole region is a generally pleasant, peaceful, and law-abiding spot where Men and Hobbits dwell together in peace, facing danger but rarely - unless one ventures to the Barrow-downs in search of gold and jewels and magic items, or is unfortunate enough to run into the bandits that plague the highways outside of Bree-land proper.

But the people of Bree-land generally ignore the haunted and foreboding Barrow-downs to the west. These grassy hills hold the graves of the Kings, Queens, Princes and aristocrats of Arnor. In the years after the Plague the mounds became haunted by evil spirits from Angmar and Rhudaur called Wights. The downs are rich in treasure and adventure, but it would be prudent for the adventurous to seek the council of the wise before trying their luck in the ancient and eerie tombs.