Inner Sea.

The Inner Sea was the great strait between Belegaer the western sea and the East Sea.

It was created in the battle which ended the Days before Days in the Valian Year 3450. The world was made in symmetry by the Valar and lying between Belegaer and the East Sea. But the falling of Helkar and Ringil crushed that shape for ever as the seas arose in tumult and the earth was shaking in pain. It is recorded in the memory of the Gods that especially the falling of Ringil and the flood of water ruined the southern and midmost lands and the water broke through to Belegaer from the East Sea. In that process the Dark Lands were torn apart from the great middle continent.

The Inner Sea is the water washing the shores of the Hither Lands from the narrows of the strait, near the land of Hildórien where the Inner Sea meets the East Sea, and down along the west-shores of the Dark Lands, who some call the South Lands, stretching about 5000 miles south and becomes the South-pole of the Earth.

But before it reach that pole it close in upon the cap of the Hither Lands where the strait into Belegaer is. About 3300 miles from strait to strait that sea is and at its widest more than 800 miles from the Hither Lands to the Dark Lands. Not many of the free peoples know or have seen this sea save the Númenorians who in the Second age travelled there upon their mighty ships and came even into the East Sea and saw the Walls of the Sun and the Gates of Morning.

Related Links.: Battles : War of Shaping Arda. Misc.: Reckoning of the Years.