Cirith Ungol
the pass of the Tower of the Spider; the cleft of the Ephel Dúath
Names and Etymology
Cirith Ungol — Sindarin for “the pass of the spider” — is the narrow, dreadful cleft in the mountain-wall of Mordor between the valley of the Morgulduin and the plain of Gorgoroth, and the name of the tower that stands in the pass. It is linked in the legends to Ungoliant — the great spider of the First Age — and in the later days to Shelob, “the spider” of Mordor whose lair was set in the tunnels of the pass.
Geography
- The pass climbs through the Ephel Dúath, the western rampart of Mordor, above the haunted valley of the Morgulduin (the river of the Witch-king’s vale) and the high Morgai ridge, and opens east toward the plain of Gorgoroth and Orodruin. It was the only road through that wall west of the Black Gate.
- Below the pass lay the valley of Minas Morgul; within its cliff-side gaped the great lair and tunnel of Shelob — the Torech Ungol, “the Spider’s Lair” — whose web-choked ways the Orcs feared and by which Frodo and Sam were drawn at last.
History
- The Tower of Cirith Ungol was built in old years by the men of Gondor to guard the western approaches to Mordor, a watch-tower of the peak; it long stood guard against the return of the Shadow.
- When Minas Ithil fell and the lands were blackened, the Tower of the peak passed into the hands of the Orcs and the servants of Sauron, who garrisoned it to defend the pass and to hold open the road to the Black Land; by the time of the War of the Ring it was an Orc-hold and a prison, with its stern fortress upon the summit and its gathered watches.
In the Tale
Through Cirith Ungol the last march of the Ring-bearer is played: Frodo and Sam are drawn into Shelob’s Lair, Frodo is stung, and Sam must pass the tower’s gate and enter it as an Orc-guised spy to attempt the rescue of the prisoner within. The pass and its tower thus frame the very last ordeal before the fire of Mount Doom — the “Tower of the Spider” above the cleft of Morgul.
Significance
Cirith Ungol is one of the strongest images of the darkness of Mordor: a place whose very name is bound to the primal spider of the Eldar Ages, whose tower is a broken tool of Gondor turned to the Shadow’s guard, and whose walls the hobbits must overcome in the story’s darkest hour — the last eastern gate of the enemy’s land.