Show HN: An interactive map of Tolkien's Middle-earth

77 pointsposted 5 hours ago
by frasermarlow
(middle-earth-interactive-map.web.app)

16 Comments

imwally

11 minutes ago

Anyone know a decent place where I can buy a giant print of this for my wall?

blevinstein

29 minutes ago

Arda was supposed to be drastically changed after the First Age. This map is from the Second/Third Ages. Do the events from the First Age map currently into what is shown? Do some have to be excluded?

frasermarlow

12 minutes ago

Well I included 13 Silmarillion events, but most are actually Second Age events that map perfectly fine. Three of them are First age so it's a bit fudgy. The project has no Beleriand events... they literally cannot be placed because Beleriand sank beneath the sea after the War of Wrath. Cuiviénen it tricky. The Sea of Helcar where it sat was reshaped when Morgoth's strongholds were taken out, so that is approximate. Would love to make age-appropriate (ha ha) maps, but I only had this one to work from.

strider_2018

22 minutes ago

I made an account just to say thank you. Really great work. I would love to see a map of the first age events.

bananaflag

4 hours ago

I notice the map is the one from the movies (it shows the Orocarni a bit too close, but it's nice they appear on the map).

Maybe when describing historical events you should also put the year (it is given only for some of them).

Anyway, very nice work! I think it's appropriate especially for casual fans (especially movie fans) to delve (sorry) deeper into the lore.

frasermarlow

2 hours ago

Hey thanks. Good call, I will have Claude figure out the years for each event that can be pinned down.

shdh

3 hours ago

Using a tile server for this feels hilarious

balajeekalyan

2 hours ago

Wow! this is so detailed. You are putting vibe-code to genuine use.

frasermarlow

2 hours ago

Best use case I have found so far :-)

topherjaynes

3 hours ago

One doesn't simply vibe code into Mordor!(but seriously love this)

twostorytower

3 hours ago

This is awesome! Can you make the zoom in and out smoother? I have to pinch every single time to get to the next zoom level instead of continuously zooming as I pinch.

frasermarlow

2 hours ago

Yep, that zoom thing is a bit fiddly on mobile in particular. I will see what I can improve.

kilbey1

2 hours ago

Mad respect; I've been working on building maps and it's a LOT harder than it might seem.

frasermarlow

2 hours ago

Honestly the hardest thing for this was getting the pins in the right place. I had Claude create a tool for me to get the location and have it correct placements. Even after a dozen 'pins' were on the map, it still had problems placing the next pin (relative to the ones it had). Claude has gotten better and honestly I had not figured out Claude in the browser when I built this.