The Complete Guide to Middle-earth

Robert Foster (b. 1949, Brooklyn) earned a Ph.D. in English and Medieval Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, and taught subsequently in the English Department at Rutgers University.[1][2]

The Complete Guide to Middle-earth is a major expansion of Foster's A Guide to Middle-earth, which was published in a limited edition by Mirage Press in 1971. Almost twice the length of the original (573 vs. 292 pages), the 1978 version incorporates extensive entries related to The Silmarillion (1977). A further revised edition (ISBN 0-345-44976-2) was published in 2001, in time for Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.

The Complete Guide to Middle-earth is widely recognised as an excellent reference book on Middle-earth.[3] Christopher Tolkien has commended it himself as an "admirable work of reference".[4]

However, as it does not include information on post-Silmarillion material (i.e. Unfinished Tales and the series The History of Middle-earth), the 1978 edition contains some assertions contradicted by later publications. For example, the Star of Elendil jewel (Elendilmir) is identified with the Star of the Dúnedain given to Samwise Gamgee, but Christopher Tolkien refutes this.[5] It also includes speculation on matters later confirmed in subsequent works. For example, Foster proposes that Gandalf and Olórin are one and the same – confirmed in Unfinished Tales.

A German edition, Das Große Mittelerde-Lexikon, revised and translated by Helmut W. Pesch, was published in 2002.[6]

A Guide to Middle-earth

Front of wrap-around dust jacket
Author	Robert Foster
Cover artist	Tim Kirk
Country	United States
Language	English
Subject	Tolkien's legendarium
Genre	Reference
Published	1971 (Mirage Press, Baltimore, Maryland)
Media type	Hardcover and Paperback
Pages	292
Followed by	The Complete Guide to Middle-earth (revised and expanded edition)

A Guide to Middle-earth was the first published encyclopedic reference book for the fictional universe of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, compiled and edited by Robert Foster. The book was published in 1971 by Mirage Press, a specialist science fiction and fantasy publisher, in a limited edition of 2000 copies (750 numbered hardcovers and 1250 unnumbered paperbacks). A paperback edition was issued by Ballantine Books in 1974.[7]

The author profile in the first edition describes Robert Foster as the then-"Tengwar Consultant" to the Tolkien Society of America. The book incorporates material previously published in the science fiction fanzine Niekas.

Lester del Rey praised the 1971 version for covering "literally everything you wanted to know about Middle Earth and were unable to discover before."[8]

• Drout, Michael (2006). J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-96942-5.
• Tolkien, J. R. R. (1998). Unfinished Tales. HarperCollins. ISBN 0-261-10362-8.