Most of what we know is restricted to the Shire and the Reunited Kingdom, which is natural as these two regions were the source of the histories of the Third and earlier Ages.ĭuring this period, the Shire became more important in the wider politics of Middle-earth. Of the history of the Fourth Age we have little more than hints, and nothing at all of any substance after the second century of the Age. The Fourth Age was held to have begun with the passing of the Ring-bearers over the sea from Mithlond on 29 September III 3021, though in Gondor it was reckoned as beginning on 25 March of the same year (that date being the second anniversary of the Downfall of Barad-dûr). The last of the four ages chronicled by Tolkien, and the one about which least is known (including its length).
