Ithilien
the Moon-land; the garden of Gondor
Names
Ithilien, the Moon-land (from ‘‘Ithil’’, the Moon), is the name of the country that lay over the Great River from Gondor.
Geography
Ithilien was the fair land between the Anduin and the mountains of the shadow — the Ephel Dúath — a region of brooks, green woods and clean waters, with its fair sunny uplands looking west to the river and the white peaks on the far shore.
History
Of old it was the garden and pleasure-land of Gondor, held and fortified from the days of the South-kingdom, and its men and even its lords maintained their watch there through the long yielding of the boundary to the Shadow; in the dark years it remained the fair land of the Moon, though its eastern borders were disputed and its glades were trodden by war.