The Variags were a people who inhabited the little-known land of Khand, which lay to the southeast of Mordor. Historically Khand had been an enemy of Gondor, but it had also been involved in wars with its neighbours in the East. At one time - more than a thousand years before the War of the Ring - Khand had resisted the southward expansion of the Wainriders, before the two peoples were able to make a pact and jointly attack Gondor. In this they failed, but inflicted significant damage on the South-kingdom. (It should be noted that the accounts of these events speak of 'Khand' as an entity, rather than specifically of 'Variags'.)3
The Variags marched to the summons of Sauron during the War of the Ring, and formed part of the reserve at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. They were initially held back from the main fighting alongside detachments of Easterlings and of Haradrim, but after the fall of the Lord of the Nazgûl, their commander, Gothmog, had them charge into battle. This attempt to bolster the assault failed, and Sauron's forces were ultimately defeated. If any of the Variags survived, they fled back across the Great River in disarray.
Among the many unknowns surrounding the Variags, we're given no definite description of their appearance, but we do have a description of one group of Men out of the East who fought for Sauron (they were said to be relatively short and broad, with Dwarf-like beards). These Men might have been Variags, but if so, they are not named as such, and their role was distinct from those Variags who fought in the main battle.
Notes
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Our only specific record of the Variags is at the Battle of the Pelennor in III 3019, so all we can say for sure about the Variags is that they existed at the end of the Third Age. We do, however, have references to the people of Khand going back at least a thousand years earlier. These people at one time fought against the Wainriders, before making common cause with them against Gondor. As a culture dwelling in Khand with old enmity towards Gondor, then, these may very well have been the Variags or their ancestors, but they are never specifically named as such.
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2 |
The name Variag comes from this people's own unknown language, and is not directly interpretable. There is, however, a potential real historical source for this name, as it was used of an eastern branch of the Vikings who roamed the rivers northward of the Black Sea. Its unclear whether Tolkien was influenced by these historical Variags, but if he was then the name descended ultimately from Old Norse Væringjar, thought to mean something like 'those sworn to service'.
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3 |
The relationship of the Variags to the land of Khand is not explained in any detail, other than a brief entry in Tolkien's extended index to The Lord of the Rings, where he simply lists Khand as a land 'inhabited by Variags'. That is perhaps slightly ambiguous, but it seems to imply that the Variags were the inhabitants or people of Khand, rather than a more specific group such as (for example) their warriors or their ruling class.
It does seem curious that the name 'Variags' has no evident connection to that of 'Khand' (whereas we might expect the people of Khand to be known as 'Khandians' or something of the sort). Perhaps this reflects some unknown event in Khand's history (for example, the Variags might have originated even farther to the East, and then conquered Khand at some point). Of any such event, if indeed it occurred at all, we have no details.
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- Updated 21 May 2026
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