Geology of the Land?

[Durris]

Maybe there's enough specific description in TIW to answer this, but I don't remember it. I'm wondering what kind of mountains the Westron Mountains are--how they were formed and therefore what shape. Fold mountains, like our Appalachians, though taller? Fault mountains, jagged, like the Rockies? Volcanic like the Cascades?

[danlo]

I envision the Rockies personally.

[matrixman]

Durris, your question is a deep one: we're talking about large-scale forces that have sculpted the Land. SRD doesn't seem to have described the Westron Mountains much at all: only Melenkurion Skyweir is granted any detail. Karen Fonstad sums up the mountain's appearance in the Atlas of the Land:

The twin peaks of Melenkurion Skyweir are thus perpetually capped with snow, and glaciers gnaw the upper vales into sharply pointed spires. The lower slopes of the great mountain join a few thousand feet above the level of Rivenrock, but the juncture is always visible--almost as if the two Matterhornlike peaks were composed of differing rock.

This seems to hint at a fault line. Or is it? As for the rest of the Westrons, Fonstad depicts them as being sharp and jagged like Skyweir itself. The Westron mountains would appear to be somewhat younger than the other ranges in the Land--not as worn down by the forces of erosion. Seems to me the Westrons are like the Rockies.

Maybe Seafoam Understone can help us out here. He's our resident amateur geologist and cave enthusiast. Seafoam? Where are you, Seafoam?

[Iryssa]

I always envisioned the Alpes, myself (aren't they fault mountains too? I can't remember)...just because they've always seemed much harsher than the Rockies, which seem so tame to me (maybe this is just because I'm used to the Rockies...I grew up surrounded by them), and therefore more likely the Haruchai would have chosen to live among them.

[matrixman]

Good points, Iryssa. The Westrons may have been inspired by the Alps, for all we know. Maybe SRD threw together the Alps and the Rockies and--presto! The Westrons! Maybe there's some of the Himalayas, too? Melenkurion Skyweir could be the equivalent of Mt. Everest: the two tallest peaks of their respective worlds. Just as the continents of India and Asia collided to form the Himalayas, maybe the continent of the Land collided with this mysterious "Outer Earth" continent at the edge of the map to form the Westrons.

Hmm, we're getting into plate tectonics here. It's just the Worm...it's just the Worm...

[Dragonlily]

Durris, I visualize them as fault mountains, carved into their current shape by ancient glaciers, more rugged than volcanic cones. Aside from that, I don't think there's any need for them to be any particular mountains we have on Earth. They simply need to have the correct scenery and "trails" to fit the story.

[duchess of malfi]

I always imagined them to be like the Himalayas...and I have always wondered what lies on the other side of them.

And I have always imagined Landsdrop to be like the Mogollon Rim in Arizona...

[Iryssa]

Oooh, good one Duchess....I haven't actually seen the Mongollan Rim, but pictures...excellent comparaison.
...and I just realized I spelled the Alps in french last time

[Dragonlily]

Duchess, is that Mongollan Rim the setting for Zane Grey's Tonto Rim books?

[amanibhavam]

I'm much more interested what's _beyond_ the Westron Mountains...

[duchess of malfi]

I would love to know that, too.

Joy, I am unfamiliar with those books, so do not know. But the Mogollon Rim is a cliff that stretches for a good distance across the state of Arizona.
www.fs.fed.us/r3/coconino/recreation/mo ... llon.shtml
www.cpluhna.nau.edu/Places/mogollon_rim.htm

[Ryzel]

Is that a cliff like Landsdrop?

[duchess of malfi]

Yes, at least as I imagine Landsdrop to be. This is one about 200 miles long, crossing part of Arizona on an east-west line, and has about a 2000 foot drop in places. At the top it is a forested plateau.

[Dragonlily]

Joy, I am unfamiliar with those books, so do not know. But the Mogollon Rim is a cliff that stretches for a good distance across the state of Arizona.

Since Grey's heroine traveled there in a couple of days by train and stagecoach, from desert country, it sounds like it probably is.

[Mystikan]

I've actually given some thought to this, in working out the correct positioning for the sun in my pictures of Revelstone. Assuming the Land to be in the Northern Hemisphere of its planet (reasonable considering there's ice to the north and desert to the south), and assuming the planet to have the same sidereal period, orbital distance, diameter and axial inclination as the Earth (since SRD mentions only one moon like Earth's as well), I consider that Revelstone would be about 50 degrees north, with Doriendor Corishev about 35 degrees north using the scale of distances SRD gives for the Land. In LFB, Atiaran mentions that "the spring of the land arises from the southwest". This means that warm, moisture-laden air is carried up by a prevailing SW trade wind, rising over the Westron range to produce orographic cloud and rain. For this to be possible, the "Outer Earth" would have to be a coastal plain fronting a large ocean to the west and south, similar to the Rockies. Following this argument, the Westron range would be a fault-block escarpment paralleling an oceanic subduction zone. This also means that some vulcanism would be likely to occur in the area.

I might actually expand the book's maps to take in the rest of the planet; I consider that Bhrathairealm is on the same continent as the Land, but much further south on the opposite coast, so that the Great Desert north and east of it is the same desert as that south of Doriendor Corishev. If we then consider the Land and Bhrathairealm to be on the "America" continent of that planet, with Elemesnedene in the "Europe" and the Giants' "Home" in "Africa" or "Asia" equivalents, the form of the planet begins to take shape. Thus, in WGW the ice the ship runs into is the ice caps around "Greenland", which places the Soulbiter Sea in the North Atlantic.

Thoughts?

[matrixman]

Eureka! Mystikan, that's a beautiful piece of deduction! Of course, there's no way to prove your hypothesis one way or the other unless SRD deigns to reveal his world in detail come the Last Chronicles, but still...my brain is reeling. What an awesome post.

[Durris]

Fascinating, Mystikan! *bows fractionally*

You might find the "Questsimoon" thread in the Dissecting the Land forum interesting; Matrixman brought up there the fact that SRD doesn't reveal the geographic relationship between the Land proper and the lands encountered on the voyage of Starfare's Gem...and that the omission appears to be deliberate.

Do you play any version of Civilization, perchance? Visualizing a large unknown area of continent beyond the Westron range made me suddenly remember what it's like to start on a completely blackened map and be surprised by everything as it is revealed.

[Mystikan]

I don't play Civilisation, but I am an RTS freak - I play Age of Empires and Rise of Nations, both of which do the same thing. So yes, I've had considerable experience estimating the lie of the land on an unexplored map! Also, I'm the kind of person who (as George Lucas puts it) "All his life has he looked away - to the horizon, to the future". Whenever I read a book with fantasy-world maps, I always wonder what lies beyond the edge of the map; In LOTR, for example, where elven Cuivienen was supposed to be (east of Erebor and Rhun?), in Terry Brooks's Shannara books, the layout of the "Federation cities" in the Southland or Eldwist northeast of Graymark. In TC, I've often speculated about what lay beyond the Northron Climbs, the Outer Earth, and south of Doriendor Corishev... I've read the books sometimes with the explicit purpose of searching for information about where places are located and what direction they face!

Hmm, looks like I need a life...