What real life river does the Anduin most resemble?

[nazgul_2000]

The Mississippi?

According to the Atlas of Middle Earth, the Anduin is ME's longest river, at a length of 1,388 miles.

This came up while playing Tales from Wilderland when a player wanted to swim across it.

I'm just looking for a real life example to help me imagine it.

[Glorelendil]

I always imagine the Rhine. Or maybe the Missouri.

[Pangea]

In the Silmarillion it states the Eldar "came to a great river, wider than any they had yet seen"… so I've always imagined at quite wide.

[Murcushio]

Probably the Mississippi.

The Anduin is deep and wide, but it isn't so wide that it can be mistaken for a lake in places, like some of the great rivers here on Earth (looking at you, Yellow) can be. It is also relatively swift throughout most of its length, and flows through temperate climes. It has a delta as well.

Climate-wise, that rules out the Amazon and the Nile, which are jungle and desert biomes respectively; you probably don't get piranhas in the Anduin. The Yangtze, Yellow, and Ganges also don't work out climate-wise, and they tend to meander and silt up heavily. Neither does the Colorado, especially these days when the Colorado doesn't even reach the ocean anymore.

So of the great rivers, that really leaves the Mississippi. MAYBE the Rhine, I suppose, but while the Rhine has the right climate it isn't nearly as long and impressive and doesn't have a badass delta like the Mississippi does.

[Hermes Serpent]

I'm surprised that no-one has mentioned the Danube but then many of the early posters in this thread are in the Western hemisphere and may not be as aware of the nature of the Danube.

It's 2780 km long (Rhine 1320 km, Amazon 6437 km) and has a delta covering 679,000 ha so might well match the Professor's description of the Anduin.

[misterharry]

I think Danube and Anduin being near anagrams, and Tolkien's love of language and its development, are big clues.

[Rieno]

Yukon 1,980

[Laurefindel]

I used to compare it to the St-Laurence river, partly because that's the river I grew with, and because it definitely is worthy of the title of "great river". But in retrospect, I believe the St-Laurence might be too big (although its length is just about right).

The St-Laurence has a wide gulf and a long estuary with tide and salty waters reaching relatively far inland, but no delta (which the map of Gondor shows). This would mean that most of the coasts of Lebennin would be salt water and the river there would be wide enough that you can't see the other shore. That'd be fine in itself but that'd be too wide for Osgilath to be built on both sides of the river that soon upstream. Still, the Rauros fall suggest a high debit and IIRC, the company was feeling safely out of bow shot by sailing on the east side of the river; so it got to be relatively wide between the Rauros and the Gladden Fields. The river is bound to be narrower north of the gladden field, so for me the question rests on "how wide is the river at Osgiliath" and rationalise my way upstream.

[Glorelendil]

Oh the Danube is a great candidate. That's even better than Rhine.

[Heilemann]

Yeah, I'd go for the Danube as well, given that most everything else in Middle-earth is inspired by Europe as well.

Also, this is from the Danube (http://romaniadacia.files.wordpress.com ... -gate.jpg):