Lord Of The Rings: The Rings Of Power Timeline Explained

The "Lord of the Rings" trilogy is a complicated story. It traces Dwarves, Hobbits, Elves, and Men in a continent-spanning story that takes place over months of time (and requires a ridiculously long runtime to do so). In contrast, Prime Video's "The Rings of Power" series is juggling more characters in more places across a much longer period of time (even if showrunners J.D. Payne and Patrick McKay's adaptation has deviated from the author's source material by condensing and altering J.R.R. Tolkien's timeline).

Taken altogether, the first two seasons have added up to 16 episodes and nearly as many hours. These are just two of the five seasons the showrunners have mapped out for their story. Nevertheless, between the sheer amount of content available and the number of canon changes it creates, the first two seasons are already getting really confusing to follow.

If you're looking for a simple, streamlined primer to help you recap (or understand for the first time) what has happened to the different groups and individuals of Middle-earth so far, you've come to the right place. Let's run through a brief timeline of the six different people groups of the show thus far along with a recap of the journeys that Gandalf and Sauron have taken up to this point.

When the show begins, the Elves of Lindon rule a massive kingdom that spans across a large portion of north-western Middle-earth. The distant area of Eregion is also overseen by Celebrimbor (Charles Edwards) though it pays homage to Lindon and the high king Gil-galad (Benjamin Walker). In Season 1, the Elves discover that they are fading and the physical decay of their bodies requires them to leave Middle-earth.

Fortunately, they discover that the potent metal called mithril can prevent this fading and when they forge it into rings, it amplifies this effect. Celebrimbor forges three of these with the help of a Southlander king called Halbrand (Charlie Vickers), whom Galadriel (Morfydd Clark) discovered on her Middle-earth-trotting adventures to find the Dark Lord Sauron.

By Season 2, the three Elven Rings of Power are busily employed preserving the immortal folk, and together Celebrimbor and Halbrand, now revealed to be Annatar (but really, he's Sauron — it's complicated), forge more Rings of Power, with the first Seven for Dwarves and the next nine for Mortal Men. Eventually, it's revealed that Annatar is actually the Dark Lord, but by then the capital of Eregion, Ost-in-Edhil, is attacked by an Orc army. Sauron's machinations lead to the death of Celebrimbor, the complete destruction of Eregion and its people, and the near-annihilation of a relief army led by Gil-galad and Elrond (Robert Aramayo). The survivors retreat to an area that is very likely the future site of Rivendell. As the season ends, the Elves are still strong across Middle-earth, but the rising threat of Sauron and his armies is real and quickly spreading.

The Dwarves in "The Rings of Power" are thriving when the show starts. They live in the Misty Mountains in their subterranean mansion of Khazad-dûm. Their king, Durin III (Peter Mullan), guides them, and his son, Durin IV (Owain Arthur), is his right-hand man. Season 1 focuses on introducing Dwarven culture and the reunion of Durin IV with Elrond after a multi-year hiatus. Elrond convinces his friend to send mithril to save his people, but as the Dwarves seek the precious metal, they awaken a Balrog.

By Season 2, the Dwarves are more involved in the story. They interact with the nearby elves of Eregion, collaborate to build the powerful Doors of Durin, and get Seven Rings of Power for the Seven Dwarven clans. However, one of these rings drives Durin III mad for treasure, and in the process, he runs straight into the Balrog, which he dies fighting. Throughout this time, the rumblings of the Balrog have been blocking light and causing general trouble throughout the previously peaceful kingdom of Khazad-dûm. 

At the end of the season, an army of Dwarves marches off to help Elrond's army escape from the sack of Eregion. They are successful, but as the season ends, their king is dead, Durin IV's brother (who is thus far unnamed and made up for the show) is challenging his bid for power, and the Dwarves are aware that an active Balrog is literally undermining their society.

The story of the blessed Human nation of Númenor through two seasons is one of political strife and military bloody noses. In Season 1, Galadriel discovers the island nation while at sea and convinces its Queen regent, Míriel (Cynthia Addai-Robinson), to help her save the Southlands of Middle-earth from a looming attack of Orcs. The Númenóreans send a relief force, and the tiny group of a few hundred horsemen is initially successful. However, they are overwhelmed when the nearby mountain of Orodruin erupts, creating Mordor.

The surviving Númenóreans return to their island, where they find that their aged king, Tar-Palantir, has died. In Season 2, this power vacuum leads to a struggle on the island. The Faithful (a political faction that still holds true to the ancient Elvish alliances) backs Míriel, but the King's Men (a progressive, anti-Elvish coalition) supports her cousin, Ar-Pharazôn (Trystan Gravelle), who ends up usurping the throne. When Míriel's devoted military hero and friend, Elendil, is accused of treason, she faces the test of confronting a sea monster in his place. After surviving the test, Míriel appears to be on the cusp of regaining her power, but Ar-Pharazôn makes his move. As Elendil flees the city, the king and his forces overthrow the Faithful, seize control of the government, and begin sending colonizing missions out to Middle-earth.

The Hobbits don't exist in the Second Age of Middle-earth. Instead, we meet their precursors (or two of the three groups) in the form of the Harfoots and the Stoors. The former are in the spotlight in Season 1 as we watch them wander through the rich lands east of the Misty Mountains and south of Mirkwood. Their peaceful life is disrupted when an unnamed stranger (Daniel Weyman) with mysterious powers lands in a meteor-like crater near their community. They take him in, but his presence draws enemies, three witch-like mystics who burn their nomadic homes before being destroyed by the magic-wielding stranger.

In Season 2, the Harfoots are left rebuilding their lives while two of their kind, Nori (Markella Kavenagh) and Poppy (Megan Richards) head east with the Stranger. There, they discover another group of Halflings named the Stoors. This group lives in permanent holes called smials, and when their life is destroyed by a Dark Wizard, they follow Nori back west, likely to join with the Harfoots –  we're guessing the Fallohides, the third group of proto-Hobbits J.R.R. Tolkien wrote about.

J.R.R. Tolkien wrote about "other Men" who lived around Middle-earth and weren't related to the Men of Númenor. While none of these groups are specifically called "Southlanders," that is how they're represented on the show. The Southlanders are the descendants of the Men who once fought with Morgoth, the original Dark Lord and Sauron's master. In Season 1, the Southlanders are scraping by in their homeland, where Elvish wardens watch over their activity.

When a nomadic army of displaced Orcs arrive looking for a new homeland, they are led by their captain and father figure, Adar. Some of the Southlanders resist these attackers while others join them. Eventually, Mount Doom erupts and the surviving Southlanders join Adar's forces or flee to the nearby Númenórean haven of Pelargir.

In Season 2, Adar fears that Sauron is hiding in Eregion, so he leads his children in a war against Celebrimbor's people. In the siege of that city, the Orcs are victorious, but Adar dies and Sauron takes over the army, leaving this terrifying crew in the clutches of a Dark Lord seeking to conquer all of Middle-earth heading into Season 3.

As the first episode of "The Rings of Power" ends, a meteor is seen flying east from the Undying Lands away in the West of Middle-earth. When it lands, we meet a strange man with a beard who doesn't know his name or who he is. He is taken in by a nearby community of Harfoots and becomes friends with one of them named Nori. Together, they discover that he is an Istar, an angelic race embodied in incarnate form.

In Season 2, the Stranger and Nori head to Rhûn, where he meets the enigmatic Tom Bombadil (Rory Kinnear). Jolly Tom helps the Stranger realize who he is and embrace his destiny to face a nearby Dark Wizard (Ciarán Hinds) as well as the resurgent Dark Lord Sauron. Their lessons lead the Stranger to save the community of Stoors, which Nori leads off to safety, while he returns to Bombadil to share that he discovered his staff and his name — Gandalf.

The Second Age is a formative time for the Dark Lord Sauron. While he already has a long history of evil deeds, this is his first time out from under the thumb of the original Dark Lord Morgoth. Sauron initially uses his newfound freedom to try to control other beings — namely, the Orcs. When led by Adar, they turn on him and destroy his physical form, Sauron takes a new form — Halbrand. He makes up a past where he is a deposed king of the Southlands and is in this form when he meets Galadriel on a shipwreck at sea.

From there, he visits the island of Númenor (don't worry, he'll be back), before he is wounded helping the Southlanders fight Adar's Uruk children. When Mordor is created, Halbrand and Galadriel head to Eregion, where he befriends Celebrimbor and helps him make the Three Elven Rings of Power.

Season 2 picks up with Halbrand shifting guises to the angelic messenger Annatar, sent to help the Free Peoples of Middle-earth. He uses this fair form to manipulate Celebrimbor into forging seven Rings of Power for the Dwarves and then nine for mortal Men. By the end of this process, Sauron is forced to shed his disguise, but not before he's lured Adar's forces to attack Eregion and forced Celebrimbor to complete the Nine Rings. As the season ends, he kills Celebrimbor, defeats Galadriel in single combat to reclaim the Nine Rings, kills Adar, and takes over his army. This leaves him in a supreme position of power as Season 3 begins.