The Angle

The Stoors were a branch of the race of Hobbits, who crossed the Misty Mountains westward into Eriador during the middle years of the Third Age. They were said to have emerged from the Redhorn Pass in about the year III 1150, and from there they spread out across the wide lands, settling along their favoured riverways as far south as Tharbad and the Dunland borders. Their most noted settlement, though, was on the more northerly tongue of land - the Angle - between the Rivers Hoarwell and Loudwater, belonging at that time to the realm of Rhudaur.

The Stoors only remained in the Angle for some two hundred years before they moved on again, but at this point their kind divided. Some travelled west and north, and their descendants eventually merged with the other Hobbits of Bree and the Shire. Others returned across the Misty Mountains and travelled back down into the Vales of Anduin. At least some of these settled on the banks of the Gladden River and were the ancestors of Gollum's people.

The Angle of Eriador is not to be confused with the Angle of Lórien, between the Silverlode and Anduin. That Angle lay some two hundred and fifty miles eastward beyond the Mountains and was the province of the Elves of Lórien, the people of the Galadhrim.