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Illustrated World of Tolkien: The Second Age
Go on a beautifully illustrated journey through the Second Age of Middle-earth’s history.
The Second Age has long been a “dark age” for readers of J. R. R. Tolkien, as none of his fiction provides an all-encompassing narrative of the events of that 3,500-year period of Middle-earth’s history. Only through the efforts of Tolkien’s son Christopher has the public been able to appreciate the full grandeur of the Second Age, which is revealed in Tolkien’s meticulous notes and unfinished works. The Second Age is made up of two great narrative on the one hand the rise and cataclysmic downfall of the island kingdom of Númenor and its aftermath, and on the other the forging of the Rings of Power and the rise of the new dark lord, Sauron. Illustrated World of The Second Age includes more than 120 illustrations depicting the characters and events of this period—along with insightful commentary from renowned Tolkien scholar David Day—making it an essential addition to the library of every Lord of the Rings fan.
This work is unofficial and is not authorized by the Tolkien Estate or HarperCollins Publishers.
The Second Age has long been a “dark age” for readers of J. R. R. Tolkien, as none of his fiction provides an all-encompassing narrative of the events of that 3,500-year period of Middle-earth’s history. Only through the efforts of Tolkien’s son Christopher has the public been able to appreciate the full grandeur of the Second Age, which is revealed in Tolkien’s meticulous notes and unfinished works. The Second Age is made up of two great narrative on the one hand the rise and cataclysmic downfall of the island kingdom of Númenor and its aftermath, and on the other the forging of the Rings of Power and the rise of the new dark lord, Sauron. Illustrated World of The Second Age includes more than 120 illustrations depicting the characters and events of this period—along with insightful commentary from renowned Tolkien scholar David Day—making it an essential addition to the library of every Lord of the Rings fan.
This work is unofficial and is not authorized by the Tolkien Estate or HarperCollins Publishers.
288 pages, Hardcover
Published December 12, 2023
About the author
David Day
288 books269 followersDavid Day (b. 14 October 1947 in Victoria, British Columbia) is a Canadian author of over forty books: poetry, natural history, ecology, mythology, fantasy, and children's literature. Internationally he is most notably known for his literary criticism on J. R. R. Tolkien and his works.
After finishing high school in Victoria, British Columbia, Day worked as a logger for five years on Vancouver Island before graduating from the University of Victoria. Subsequently he has travelled widely, most frequently to Greece and Britain.
Day has published six books of poems for adults and ten illustrated children's books of fiction and poetry. His non-fiction books on natural history include The Doomsday Book of Animals, The Whale War, Eco Wars: a Layman Guide to the Environmental Movement, Noah's Choice and most recently Nevermore: A Book of Hours - Meditations on Extinction (2012).
His Doomsday Book was a Time Magazine Book of the Year and became the basis for the 100 part animated-short TV series "Lost Animals of the 20th Century".
David Days best-selling books on the life and works of JRR Tolkien include: A Tolkien Bestiary, Tolkien: the Illustrated Encyclopedia, Tolkien's Ring, The World of Tolkien and The Hobbit Companion.
Day's Tolkien's Ring was illustrated by academy award-winning artist Alan Lee, as was Castles, The Animals Within, Gothic and Quest For King Arthur.
After finishing high school in Victoria, British Columbia, Day worked as a logger for five years on Vancouver Island before graduating from the University of Victoria. Subsequently he has travelled widely, most frequently to Greece and Britain.
Day has published six books of poems for adults and ten illustrated children's books of fiction and poetry. His non-fiction books on natural history include The Doomsday Book of Animals, The Whale War, Eco Wars: a Layman Guide to the Environmental Movement, Noah's Choice and most recently Nevermore: A Book of Hours - Meditations on Extinction (2012).
His Doomsday Book was a Time Magazine Book of the Year and became the basis for the 100 part animated-short TV series "Lost Animals of the 20th Century".
David Days best-selling books on the life and works of JRR Tolkien include: A Tolkien Bestiary, Tolkien: the Illustrated Encyclopedia, Tolkien's Ring, The World of Tolkien and The Hobbit Companion.
Day's Tolkien's Ring was illustrated by academy award-winning artist Alan Lee, as was Castles, The Animals Within, Gothic and Quest For King Arthur.
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
January 15, 2024
I think the author said it best: “In the end, again, such comparisons breakdown quite quickly, become tiresome and fail to throw any light on the wonder of Tolkien’s creation. Perhaps, as far as possible, we should try to engage with Tolkien’s world on its own terms, appreciating the influences that may have shaped them, but not allowing them too much ground.“
The irony is not lost on me that the bulk of this book was about making comparisons to Norse and Greek mythology, as well as the Bible and another historical events. Comparisons that aren’t based on fact but make some assumptions about what Tolkien may have been inspired by when writing.
However, the artwork is beautiful and I did come to understand The Silmarillion better!
The irony is not lost on me that the bulk of this book was about making comparisons to Norse and Greek mythology, as well as the Bible and another historical events. Comparisons that aren’t based on fact but make some assumptions about what Tolkien may have been inspired by when writing.
However, the artwork is beautiful and I did come to understand The Silmarillion better!
February 4, 2024
This book (and all of David Day's commentaries on Tolkien's works) are a very good look into the works of J. R. R. Tolkien concerning Middle Earth. In his books David Day goes into the numerous connections between Tolkien's works and mythology, history, and religion. It is fascinating seeing all of the connections that Tolkien intentionally (and sometimes unintentionally) put into his books. I highly recommend his commentaries on Tolkien and Middle Earth to those who enjoy The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, history, and mythology. This book goes into the more obscure Second Age of Middle Earth in which Numenor falls and the Last Alliance fights their long battle with Sauron at Mount Doom. It is fascinating seeing the layers of detail that Tolkien put in his books, and the many illustrators' illustrations are very good at capturing the diversity of Tolkien's knowledge and inspiration.
May 31, 2025
Beautifully illustrated and nice vignettes written beside each piece of artwork. I have never read the Silmarillion; therefore I don't have a great deal of foreknowledge about the Second Age of Tolkien's Middle Earth, but I would say this book captures a great deal of history, tie ins with The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, and also insight and inspiration to the various people groups, objects, and history that Tolkien drew from when writing the Silmarillion and all of his other works.
From a Christian perspective, and I know how Tolkien feels about allegory, I could appreciate how the writers would touch on Christian themes in Tolkien's writing and inspiration for his stories.
Pros: fantastic illustrations that bring the Second Age of Middle Earth and nice little backstories on inspiration and tie in to Tolkien's other stories.
Cons: none really. Some of the visual styles weren't my favorite, but they were all mostly very nice pieces of artwork.
Bottom line: anyone who is a fan of Tolkien and Middle Earth lore and history would enjoy this book.
From a Christian perspective, and I know how Tolkien feels about allegory, I could appreciate how the writers would touch on Christian themes in Tolkien's writing and inspiration for his stories.
Pros: fantastic illustrations that bring the Second Age of Middle Earth and nice little backstories on inspiration and tie in to Tolkien's other stories.
Cons: none really. Some of the visual styles weren't my favorite, but they were all mostly very nice pieces of artwork.
Bottom line: anyone who is a fan of Tolkien and Middle Earth lore and history would enjoy this book.
December 9, 2023
A beautifully illustrated discussion on Tolkien's writings on the Second Age, and his mythological and historic influences.
February 21, 2024
Interesting, illustrated overview of Tolkien's second age. Good for fans of Lord of the Rings and Tolkiens work.
January 31, 2025
4.5 ⭐️! Just gorgeous. I love the Second Age because within it lies the story of Númenor… one of my fave parts of Tolkien’s legendarium 🌬️🌊
February 28, 2025
Hermoso recorrido de la Segunda Edad, con mucha info de las inspiraciones de Tolkien en la historia y diversas mitologías. Las ilustraciones son espectaculares.
July 5, 2026
When my son thoughtfully gave this one to me for my birthday, I thought it was Tolkien kitsch, a series of drawings by people who’d read the trilogy once or twice and who wanted to share their fan-fictional imaginings.
This turns out to be a serious contribution to Tolkien scholarship, though.
Not to get too nerdy on you, but, in essence, Tolkien gives us the history of what he calls The Third Age of his legendarium in The Lord of the Rings. He gives us the history of the First Age in The Silmarillion. The Second Age, then, sits as a mostly blank space, one that it’s hard not to imagine filling if you love Tolkien’s work.
Some people have tried to fill it. The TV show Rings of Power did precisely that, trying to make a Lord-of-the-Rings style epic with the young Elrond, the she-doesn’t-look-middle-aged Galadriel and the befuddled Celebrimbor.
It didn’t work very well for multiple reasons (though, to be fair, it wasn’t all bad), among them the difficulty in making drama out of events that Tolkien understood as taking place over long periods. Gandalf arrives in Middle Earth. Celebrimbor makes the rings. The dwarves awaken the balrog. Numenor sinks. Those are not, in Tolkien’s telling, simultaneous events. In fact, they generally can’t be because often one incites the next. The show insisted they were, though, raising the pulse around events that weren’t meant to play out with the thrill of the finale of the Lord of the Rings.
In Tolkien’s telling, both in the scattered form in which we get details and in the way he imagines the narrative as a whole, it’s a broken narrative. Or, more precisely, it’s a chronicle of events rather than a novelistic impression of them.
David Day uses this book as a recognition of that quality of the material. He doesn’t try to write his own thriller around the fall of Numenor and the forging of the rings. Instead, he collects all the scraps that Tolkien provides and presents them. Each nugget gets its own discrete consideration and, intriguingly, its own illustration or illustrations.
As a result, Day doesn’t so much give us his imagined movie of the material as he allows us to imagine how each separate piece of the legend inflects a movie that doesn’t exist.
Along the way, he does two other patient things: he gives a sense of where the different pieces of the story are coming from – revealing an encyclopedic knowledge of the journals, letters, and drafts that Tolkien used to record his ideas – and he reflects on the significance of what he’s reporting. Sometimes that means drawing parallels to sources Tolkien might have been working with, and something it means reflecting on what Tolkien might have been trying to achieve with his inventions.
The result is a serious reflection of Tolkien’s full project without the arrogance of imagining that he could write what Tolkien never finished.
On top of that, the illustrations complement the project very effectively. There are, in total, 19 different artists, and each has a different sense of the material. As a consequence, we’re never allowed to settle into a single style of imagining the story as a whole. Some are expressionistic, some are Frazetta-style fantasy illustrations (but classed up), some borrow from Japanese tradition, and some are haunting and watercolor-like.
Most of the illustrations are good on their own, but the real success here is the way they pull the vision of the material in so many different directions.
There’s no central hero to these scraps of legend. Isildur has his moments, but he also fails to destroy the ring at the crucial moment. Most of the rest are background characters unless they’re villainous like Sauron or Ar-Pharazon. There’s no Bilbo and no Frodo. There aren’t even any Hurins, Turins, or Berens from the first age.
There is, in other words, no story, only the haunting sense that there is almost one.
And Day nails this work by refusing to give us a coherent story while still letting each sliver give a sense that there might have been one.
This turns out to be a serious contribution to Tolkien scholarship, though.
Not to get too nerdy on you, but, in essence, Tolkien gives us the history of what he calls The Third Age of his legendarium in The Lord of the Rings. He gives us the history of the First Age in The Silmarillion. The Second Age, then, sits as a mostly blank space, one that it’s hard not to imagine filling if you love Tolkien’s work.
Some people have tried to fill it. The TV show Rings of Power did precisely that, trying to make a Lord-of-the-Rings style epic with the young Elrond, the she-doesn’t-look-middle-aged Galadriel and the befuddled Celebrimbor.
It didn’t work very well for multiple reasons (though, to be fair, it wasn’t all bad), among them the difficulty in making drama out of events that Tolkien understood as taking place over long periods. Gandalf arrives in Middle Earth. Celebrimbor makes the rings. The dwarves awaken the balrog. Numenor sinks. Those are not, in Tolkien’s telling, simultaneous events. In fact, they generally can’t be because often one incites the next. The show insisted they were, though, raising the pulse around events that weren’t meant to play out with the thrill of the finale of the Lord of the Rings.
In Tolkien’s telling, both in the scattered form in which we get details and in the way he imagines the narrative as a whole, it’s a broken narrative. Or, more precisely, it’s a chronicle of events rather than a novelistic impression of them.
David Day uses this book as a recognition of that quality of the material. He doesn’t try to write his own thriller around the fall of Numenor and the forging of the rings. Instead, he collects all the scraps that Tolkien provides and presents them. Each nugget gets its own discrete consideration and, intriguingly, its own illustration or illustrations.
As a result, Day doesn’t so much give us his imagined movie of the material as he allows us to imagine how each separate piece of the legend inflects a movie that doesn’t exist.
Along the way, he does two other patient things: he gives a sense of where the different pieces of the story are coming from – revealing an encyclopedic knowledge of the journals, letters, and drafts that Tolkien used to record his ideas – and he reflects on the significance of what he’s reporting. Sometimes that means drawing parallels to sources Tolkien might have been working with, and something it means reflecting on what Tolkien might have been trying to achieve with his inventions.
The result is a serious reflection of Tolkien’s full project without the arrogance of imagining that he could write what Tolkien never finished.
On top of that, the illustrations complement the project very effectively. There are, in total, 19 different artists, and each has a different sense of the material. As a consequence, we’re never allowed to settle into a single style of imagining the story as a whole. Some are expressionistic, some are Frazetta-style fantasy illustrations (but classed up), some borrow from Japanese tradition, and some are haunting and watercolor-like.
Most of the illustrations are good on their own, but the real success here is the way they pull the vision of the material in so many different directions.
There’s no central hero to these scraps of legend. Isildur has his moments, but he also fails to destroy the ring at the crucial moment. Most of the rest are background characters unless they’re villainous like Sauron or Ar-Pharazon. There’s no Bilbo and no Frodo. There aren’t even any Hurins, Turins, or Berens from the first age.
There is, in other words, no story, only the haunting sense that there is almost one.
And Day nails this work by refusing to give us a coherent story while still letting each sliver give a sense that there might have been one.
February 5, 2024
My goodness, it’s always a good time to talk about Tolkien!
Here is a book full of gorgeous art depicting elements from the Second Age (and there’s also some other “Lord of the Rings” and Norse mythology art), while also going through and talking about all of the ideas that went into these elements in the story.
I don’t think Day’s analysis is always the best, which is in part because it’s so short–it’s at most a page caption or two for every subject. Even with that in mind, I do think some of them don’t quite pass inspection. His ruminations on Galadriel say something like, “I think Tolkien, as a product of his time, believed women needed to serve men, which is why Galadriel’s characterization is so interesting.” And to me that seems, uh, that is, at best, a very simplified take on Tolkien’s writing of female characters.
[That doesn’t mean Tolkien can’t be criticized in his writing female characters; he certainly can. I just think that’s a very bad take.]
There’s also a simplification of history, or weird ideas on historical alchemy that I strongly suspect take more from New Age movements than actual historical record (I don’t think there was a huge wave of alchemists being executed as witches–they were often punished or treated as charlatans, though). I do like some of the connections he makes though, and there are times when he says something to the effect of, “Okay, but let’s not forget that inspiration does not equal text, and sometimes we have to take Tolkien on his own terms rather than apply real-world baggage to it.” Which is kind of cool.
Still, the art? Is fantastic! There’s a bunch of artists who contributed to this volume (and there’s some of this art that appears in other Day books on Tolkien), so it’s not like you’re always seeing the same versions of everything. There are also helpful charts on things like Rings of Power and other artifacts, timelines of the Second Age, and lists of kings.
All in all, it’s far from a perfect guide to the Second Age; it is full of awesome art, though, and if nothing else you should at least pick it up and flip through it for that.
Here is a book full of gorgeous art depicting elements from the Second Age (and there’s also some other “Lord of the Rings” and Norse mythology art), while also going through and talking about all of the ideas that went into these elements in the story.
I don’t think Day’s analysis is always the best, which is in part because it’s so short–it’s at most a page caption or two for every subject. Even with that in mind, I do think some of them don’t quite pass inspection. His ruminations on Galadriel say something like, “I think Tolkien, as a product of his time, believed women needed to serve men, which is why Galadriel’s characterization is so interesting.” And to me that seems, uh, that is, at best, a very simplified take on Tolkien’s writing of female characters.
[That doesn’t mean Tolkien can’t be criticized in his writing female characters; he certainly can. I just think that’s a very bad take.]
There’s also a simplification of history, or weird ideas on historical alchemy that I strongly suspect take more from New Age movements than actual historical record (I don’t think there was a huge wave of alchemists being executed as witches–they were often punished or treated as charlatans, though). I do like some of the connections he makes though, and there are times when he says something to the effect of, “Okay, but let’s not forget that inspiration does not equal text, and sometimes we have to take Tolkien on his own terms rather than apply real-world baggage to it.” Which is kind of cool.
Still, the art? Is fantastic! There’s a bunch of artists who contributed to this volume (and there’s some of this art that appears in other Day books on Tolkien), so it’s not like you’re always seeing the same versions of everything. There are also helpful charts on things like Rings of Power and other artifacts, timelines of the Second Age, and lists of kings.
All in all, it’s far from a perfect guide to the Second Age; it is full of awesome art, though, and if nothing else you should at least pick it up and flip through it for that.
January 16, 2025
Anyone buying this book in order to have access to a faithful source of information (when it comes to Tolkien's legendarium) will probably have a bad time.
The build quality of the book is incredible, though, and so are most of its illustrations.
As far as I know, the usual David Day book warning goes as follows:
"If you don't mind reading a bunch of Tolkien fan fiction masquerading as legitimate information, you might be able to see this book as the dubious yet entertaining opinions of a man who has no ill intentions".
The Tolkien inspired illustrations are great, especially the ones by Mauro Mazzara. His "Nine Rings for Mortal Men" on pages 154 - 155 is just breathtaking.
Well, buy this book at your own risk. Regardless of the author's reputation, due to the build quality of this book and its amazing illustrations, it might be worth your money.
The build quality of the book is incredible, though, and so are most of its illustrations.
As far as I know, the usual David Day book warning goes as follows:
"If you don't mind reading a bunch of Tolkien fan fiction masquerading as legitimate information, you might be able to see this book as the dubious yet entertaining opinions of a man who has no ill intentions".
The Tolkien inspired illustrations are great, especially the ones by Mauro Mazzara. His "Nine Rings for Mortal Men" on pages 154 - 155 is just breathtaking.
Well, buy this book at your own risk. Regardless of the author's reputation, due to the build quality of this book and its amazing illustrations, it might be worth your money.
May 6, 2025
Tells how Tolkien was influenced by mythology, literature, and real-world cultures (Christian, Greek, Roman, Norse, British, Egyptian, etc.). It contains far too much speculation about what may have influenced Tolkien. I didn't like much of the art. I liked a few of the illustrations (e.g., battle movements, genealogies).
Notes
Rohirrim have similarities to Anglo-Saxons, Gondorians to Greeks and Romans, Easterners (e.g., Wainriders) to Goths and Mongols, Numenoreans to Egyptians (theologically, to Hebrews).
In a 1951 letter, Tolkien said Elendil was like Noah from the Bible.
Palantiri were created by Noldor in Valinor before 1st Age, later gifted to The Faithful.
Ring of Barahir was created by Noldor in Valinor before 1st Age, given to Man Barahir after Dagor Bragollach and passed to Elros and Numenoreans.
Narsil was made by Dwarf Telchar in 1st Age.
Notes
Rohirrim have similarities to Anglo-Saxons, Gondorians to Greeks and Romans, Easterners (e.g., Wainriders) to Goths and Mongols, Numenoreans to Egyptians (theologically, to Hebrews).
In a 1951 letter, Tolkien said Elendil was like Noah from the Bible.
Palantiri were created by Noldor in Valinor before 1st Age, later gifted to The Faithful.
Ring of Barahir was created by Noldor in Valinor before 1st Age, given to Man Barahir after Dagor Bragollach and passed to Elros and Numenoreans.
Narsil was made by Dwarf Telchar in 1st Age.
June 6, 2024
Spectacular art and message. Each page has a distinct correlation to the art, world, practice, craft, writing, and so on for Tolkien. Enjoying this as a beach read!
September 22, 2024
While the artwork was still great; the writing got a bit disjointed. I still learned quite a bit about the Second Age.
March 31, 2025
Inspirational. Really makes you want to sit down and create your own world while learning how many intricate layers really went into the beloved world of Lord of The Rings.
August 31, 2025
It's interesting. I love all the art inside the book and the explanations of Tolkien's legendarium linking it to mythology and philosophy. Great deep dive.
Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews