Valinor
fictional kingdom in Aman
Valinor (Quenya: Land of the Valar), the Blessed Realm, or the Undying Lands is a fictional location in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, the home of the immortal Valar and Maiar on the continent of Aman, far to the west of Middle-earth; he used the name Aman mainly to mean Valinor. It includes Eldamar, the land of the Elves, who as immortals are permitted to live in Valinor.
The name "the Undying Lands" does not mean that the land itself causes mortals to live forever. Generally, only immortal beings are allowed to reside there. Exceptions are made for the surviving bearers of the One Ring: Bilbo and Frodo Baggins and Sam Gamgee, who dwell there for a time, and the dwarf Gimli.
Tolkien's myth of the attempt of Númenor to capture Aman has been likened to the biblical Tower of Babel and the ancient Greek Atlantis, and the resulting destruction in both cases. Scholars note, too, that a mortal's stay in Valinor is only temporary, not conferring immortality, just as, in medieval Christian theology, the Earthly Paradise is only a preparation for the Celestial Paradise that is above.
Others have compared the account of the beautiful Elvish part of the Undying Lands to the place dreamed of in the Middle English poem Pearl, and stated that the closest literary equivalents of Tolkien's descriptions of these lands are the imrama Celtic tales such as those about Saint Brendan from the early Middle Ages. The Christian theme of good and light (from Valinor) opposing evil and dark (from Mordor) has also been discussed.
Geography
Physical
Valinor lies in Aman ("Unmarred"), a continent on the west of Belegaer, the ocean to the west of Middle-earth.
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This entry incorporates text from “Valinor” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.