The Grey Havens

The Grey Havens, called Mithlond in the Elvish tongue, are the great Elven port on the Gulf of Lune (Lhûn) on the northwest coast of Middle-earth, west of the Shire and Eriador. From these havens the Elves set sail over the Sea on the Straight Road to the Undying Lands in the West, never to return. The Grey Havens are the last refuge of the Eldar on the shores of Middle-earth and the place of the great departures at the end of the Third Age.

The Havens are kept by Círdan the Shipwright, eldest of the Elves of Middle-earth and master of the building of ships, who has dwelt by the sea since the Elder Days and who tends the havens against the day when the last of the Elves will sail.

Geography

The Grey Havens lie at the mouth of the river Lune, on the long inlet called the Gulf of Lune, in the land of Lindon that survived from the drowned country of the Elder Days. The river divides the havens, and from their quays the white Elven-ships put out to sea. West of the havens lie the Tower Hills (the Emyn Beraid), on which stand three Elf-towers, the tallest crowned by a palantír that looked only toward the Sea.

History

Mithlond was established in the Second Age, after the wars and the drowning of the western lands, as the chief haven of the Elves who remained in Middle-earth. Círdan the Shipwright ruled there and built the ships that bore the Elves into the West. It was Círdan who first received Gandalf when he came to Middle-earth and gave to him Narya, the Ring of Fire, one of the Three Rings of the Elves. Through the long ages the Grey Havens remained the gateway between Middle-earth and the Blessed Realm, and from them the Eldar departed in ever greater numbers as their time in Middle-earth drew to its end.

In the story

The Grey Havens are the setting of the close of The Lord of the Rings. After the War of the Ring and the destruction of the One Ring, the power of the Three Elven Rings fades, and the keepers of those Rings prepare to depart. Frodo, wounded in body and spirit beyond healing in Middle-earth, is granted passage into the West. He rides to the Grey Havens with Bilbo, Gandalf, Elrond, and Galadriel, and there Sam, Merry, and Pippin bid him farewell as the white ship bears him over the Sea. Long after, Sam, the last Ring-bearer, is said also to have sailed from the Havens.