'The East Road was an East-West road which spanned from Mount Taras to the Bridge of Esgalduin, thus crossing the Ford of Brithiach, Dimbar, Nan Dungortheb, and Dor Dínen. While it's specific course north of Doriath was unclear, it lay outside the Girdle of Melian.
History
The road was built in peaceful days, before the return of Morgoth to Middle-earth[1] in Y.T. 1495. After his return, it became a dangerous route, used only by few hardy Elf or Dwarf travellers.[1]
The road at one time extended all the way westward to Mount Taras on the coast.[2]
When Aredhel escaped Gondolin, she sought to enter East Beleriand to visit the Sons of Fëanor. Her party was denied passage through Doriath by the march-wardens, but they advised her that the speediest way to use the East Road. As they crossed through Nan Dangortheb however, they became enmeshed in shadows and separated. Aredhel managed to find the East Road again and eventually came to Himlad, while her companions were set upon by spiders and barely managed to escape back west and returned to Gondolin.[1]
Other versions of the legendarium
Due to ambiguities, Christopher Tolkien omitted mention of the East Road in The Silmarillion. In The War of the Jewels, he addressed this:
From all these passages it is clear that when he wrote the original text of Maeglin in 1951 my father conceived of an East-West road running from the ford of Brithiach between the Mountains of Terror and the northern borders of Doriath, and across the rivers Esgalduin and Aros; and the fact that the first of these passages was allowed to stand in both typescripts seems to show that he still retained this conception in 1970. The only difference seems to be the introduction of a bridge, rather than a ford, over Esgalduin.
On account of these obscurities I excluded from the text of the chapter Of Maeglin in The Silmarillion the references to the ‘East Road’ and rephrased the passages; but on the map accompanying the book I marked in its course. This seems now to have been the wrong thing to do in both cases: for there certainly was an East Road, but its course is unclear and its destination unknown. Beyond Aros going east there is no indication of where it went: it is said in the passage cited above that it and the bridge by which it passed over Esgalduin were ancient works deriving from the ‘peaceful days’ before the return of Morgoth: it was not a road made by the Noldor for communication between the western realms and the Fëanorians. There is also no justification for marking it as turning S.E. after the Fords of Aros. Beyond Esgalduin going west it is said in this passage that travellers ‘would keep as close as they could to the Fences of Doriath’, which does not sound like the following of a beaten road.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), The War of the Jewels, "Part Three. The Wanderings of Húrin and Other Writings not forming part of the Quenta Silmarillion: III. Maeglin"
- ↑ J.R.R. Tolkien, Christopher Tolkien (ed.), Unfinished Tales, "Of Tuor and his Coming to Gondolin"