Gondorian State

Gondor was the major independent human faction by the time of the War of the Ring. Now, given the fact that clear historical inspiration is derived from England and the Byzantine Empire, we can actually get a pretty solid view of what life would be like in Gondor, its economy and political structure. Lets have some fun here shall we? Before we do, I need to get an important note out of the way. The medieval period covered an entire continent for about 1,000 years. This means that there is a huge amount of variations in both time and space. Plus, feudalism was a surprisingly complex system. Add in the variations over time of the Byzantine Empire. So, what follows is going to be such a simplification that most historians would be enraged. Not to say that gross simplifications are not common in all my other commentaries thus far, but this is going to be more than normal.
Gondor was apparently inspired by the Byzantine Empire. Both were part of larger empires. Both were split into two parts, which the western most part collapsed first. Both had their main enemies to the east. Also similar was the fact that each had a long period of decline followed by a dramatic final siege of their capital. Things differ in that the Byzantine Empire loss in their climatic battle led to its total destruction while Gondor won and saw a revival.
Treadgold, Warren. Byzantium and Its Army: 284 - 1081. Stanford University Press, 1995.
Now, lest get into the basic foreign policy summary here. It seems based on the use of fortifications and the assumptions I make based on the use of Bite and Hold tactics, it seems most likely that Gondor would use a flexible response approach. First, we have the Rangers that would be the first line of defense. There would be no need to mobilize further if the enemy can be defeated by them. Then, both Themes and the local lords of the Southern Fiefs operate on a very flexible response like model. First, the local garrisons would retreat to their bases. Then they would figure out how to respond to the threat at hand. Often this would mean the local troops handling what is most likely simply just raiders. Then there is the slow and costly element of mobilization. Mobilizing for a small threat would carry with it significant economic costs and would likely come too late to deal with minor threats such as a Southron party.
The nature of medieval warfare would also mean a limited war posture. The sort of long running campaign that would be needed for a total war would lead to widespread famine. So the troops would be needed home as soon as possible. The result is that as soon as enough damage to the enemy is done, Gondor will accept peace. No need to wipe out the enemy entirely if that can be avoided. So punitive expeditions, territorial concessions to create buffer areas or some form of reparations would be the main aims. Regime change and major conquests seem unlikely.
Mobilization of the entire army would for similar reasons occur only after the threat has hit a critical point. Otherwise it would be left to the local lords, themes or Rangers. At the national level, for Gondor mobilization means war has already broken out on its territory. It would likely be the last of the powers involved in a conflict to mobilize. But once it does, it would be in a solid position. I see Gondor's mobilization actually occurring similar to how Russia mobilized in World War One. It took weeks to mobilize its entire army, but it began offensive operations pretty quick. So the Battle of Tannenberg functionally wiped out the entire Russian Second Army. But the Russians were able to regain that number of troops with those who had started to mobilize prior to the battle.
The result of this style mobilization and the reliance on heavy fortifications, it seems likely that Gondor would take a second strike posture. The cult of the offensive that Mordor and its allies rely on would mean a stone wall would not scare off their generals. So a no strike posture would simply see them walk all over Gondor. Some form of deterrence is needed. So, the fortifications of Gondor would function as a form of base. The invaders would come in and be defeated. Then, the troops mobilized to deal with this would be used in a strike against the attackers. This would either punish them for their aggression or seek to push them too far back to be a future threat.
In terms of counter force or counter value, this would be a tricky question for Gondor. In medieval war, there would not be much of a clear dividing line between civilians and soldiers. Tactics like the chevauchée essentially were military strikes on soft civilian targets. But those tactics are meant to get supplies and bait the enemy into fighting where and when those conducting the chevauchée want. There is also the punitive logic of vengeance that never seems to be absent from war even in an era where human rights are held as supreme virtues. So I think that there would be a bit of both, but a counter force posture meant to eliminate the military threat to Gondor would be the strategic level focus. But at the tactical level the counter value position would be present enough to make the lives of civilians quite unpleasant.
In terms of secondary priorities, I don't see any real systemic focus on any one of them dominating the minds of policy elites. I think that a degree of focus on external stability will begin to pick up as the War of the Ring approaches. On one hand, you have the Corsairs and Southrons that would be raiding with increased frequency and power. The result would a sense of Mordor needs to be dealt with in order for Gondor to avoid the internal destabilization that will come from these continuing. Meanwhile, Mordor itself is continuing to expand its own military power and take steps to destabilize the entire international order. Gondor would naturally be the first on the chopping block in a major push by Mordor.
International policy being governed by such calculations are not unique. Austria-Hungary was motivated by this same sort of logic in the build up to World War One. Serbia was a state whose recent creation, radical nationalist outlook and the wars it fought with its neighbors made Austria feel that Serbia was a threat. After all, in the wake of major Italian and German pushes for unification under the nation state idea, a multinational empire like Austria Hungary seems to no longer hold much credibility as a government model. Then add in a new player that could attract the Slavs to an external power that appears to be ascending and organized on the "a Serbian land for all Serbs", external stability appears to threaten internal security. So when assassins kill the heir to the throne while backed by rogue elements of the Serbian Government, the Austrian Government felt that it had a choice between crush Serbia once and for all or be destroyed.
I see a similar dynamic developing with Gondor. But there would be major differences. Key among them would be the disillusionment that comes from seeing these raids continue while the government does little to nothing to stop them. The result is rising threats of rebellion by the Southern Fiefs. They will fear for their safety and feel abandoned by the central government under Denethor. This will then put Denethor under pressure to act or face removal from power. Possibly also the fragmentation of Gondor into many smaller states. Either way, the central government will see the external destabilization as putting domestic pressure on them to act.
The other major way this will operate is similar to German fears of Russia in the build up to WW1. After the Russo-Japanese War, Russia was weak. But its population was still growing. As too was its economic power and industrial potential. So Germany saw war as inevitable and thought that every year that passed without said war put Germany more and more at a disadvantage. Similar to Mordor and Gondor. Every year that Mordor is able to rearm, Gondor loses ground. Therefore, hawks in Gondor will push for war sooner rather than later. Without a preemptive strike to put down the growing expansionist pressures coming from Mordor and it growing military, it could spell the end of Gondor.
The combination of the two would see Mordor's international destabilization as a major threat to Gondor. So at least when we come in at the War of the Rings, a concern over external stability would be a concern. But I doubt that they would see this as a long term issue. Just at this particular time. After all, I see Gondor as acting on an offensive realist perspective. Which means they will only see international stability as benefiting them if they are the major hegemon.
But no matter how you slice it, the international order as it is constructed in Middle Earth at the time of the Lord of the Rings makes it a friend to Gondor. The Lonely Mountain, Rohan, Lothlorien, Mirkwood, Rivendell and Moria would all be allied to Gondor. Each provide something that Gondor would need to survive an attack from Mordor. Meanwhile, Isengard can strike Rohan, Lothlorien, Mirkwood and Moria if it wanted to. The Easterlings can hit the Lonely Mountain, Rohan and Mirkwood. Mordor itself can hit Rohan, Lothlorien and Mirkwood directly. So any offensive launched by any of Mordor's coalition will both destabilize the international order and directly harm Gondor. Essentially, Gondor needs to keep its strong position in the coalition of the Free People while making sure the current international order that gives the Free People the majority of the power is preserved.
So, Gondor would most likely feel quite compelled to rely on negotiation over brinkmanship. This is what we would expect from a flexible response posture. Second, the fortifications at the heart of Gondor's defenses means that it does not need to have its army already mobilized in order to ward of threats should the crisis shift to full scale war. Just as important is the political leadership would clearly see the reality of mobilization being slow and costly. The elites would not want to mobilize unless there was a goal that 1) could only be gained via war and 2) would be worth the costs.
But on the flip side, I think the limited war idea would fit Gondor quite well. Once the battle starts, it would commit a small force for a short campaign with limited objectives. The goal, as stated above, would to punish the other side and obtain some form of compensation for losses. Not the total destruction of or reorganization of the targeted society. The limitations placed on Gondor means that this would be quite in line with its capacities and organization structure.
It also means Gondor would rely on the means of coercion to meet its foreign policy objectives. A feudal society certainly would not have the wealth to have much impact on the international economic scene. Well, at least enough to have much power when you have the Lonely Mountain and Moria. In terms of the habit of obedience, the only international power this would likely work to Gondor's advantage would be Rohan. They for centuries defaulted to providing Gondor aid in its times of need. All other powers would have to be manipulated with the threat of military force. The costs of noncompliance would have to be worse than the benefits.
As noted above, Gondor relies on the current international order for its security. which means to me that Gondor would seek to preserve the status quo at least for now. But this is a temporary thing. Should an opportunity arise to destabilize the international order for its own benefit, it would do this. The War of the Ring provides a perfect opening for this. Unlike a lot of the other powers, all the major threats to Gondor form one major coalition. They are all conveniently located to Gondor's east. Which means that a major victory here would cripple all of Gondor's enemies and grant significant territorial expansion. It would be a major reversal of fortune for Gondor, essentially taking Gondor from the status of great power to superpower. The classical offensive realist school of though says that no state would pass up a chance for this. To me, Gondor would seek to preserve the status quo as a tactical move to preserve itself in the face of a growing threat from Mordor. But once the Cold War of the Third Age transitions into the War of the Ring, Gondor will seize the opportunity to overthrow it for its own strategic goals.
Mordor is the main enemy superpower rising that the time of the War of the Ring. Naturally, it threatens Gondor. As one would probably be able to guess at this point, Gondor would seek to balance against it. Hence the alliance of the Free People. Due to Gondor's relative power and location, the other nations of the Coalition of the Free People would want to bandwagon with it. This means Gondor would be getting more military and economic aid from the other powers due to the threat of Mordor. Should Gondor fall, all the other states of the Free People would be at a major disadvantage. Think Domino Theory - if Gondor falls the others will too. So there is an incentive to buck pass in a way that would increase Gondor's ability to survive. So Gondor would be the natural center of balancing/ bandwagon actions aimed at containing the threat of Mordor.
In terms of threats, Gondor is both very lucky and cursed at the same time. Its far west has no states and a very short stretch of land that troops can move through. The south is just coastline that only the Corsairs can hit. To the north are the White Mountains. This means that practically all threats will be coming from the east. These geographic advantages mean that everyone would be having problems attacking Gondor. They would be forced into choke points at the very least. Dwarves especially would have to march a long distance in order to get their armies into place. So even if there were not political reasons protecting Gondor from the rest of the Free People, there is unlikely to be any military threats from them. Isengard is especially cut off due to the proximity of Gondor's allies to Isengard's marching routes.
This leaves two major types of threats. Which is where it is more than a little cursed. To the east are literally all the biggest threats to the Free People. The the rest of Gondor's borders are pretty solidly protected with allies and natural barriers. But that one that isn't has enough military power arrayed against it that any military planner would struggle to see a away around it. Strip the supernatural out of it and the eastern enemies would seem insurmountable. Their not, but certainly would appear that way. I am not surprised that Gondor became known for its fortifications.
The most obvious is Mordor, threatening the very survival as a nation and its territorial integrity. Mordor has the power to also directly attack other powers in a way that destabilizes the international order in way that undermines the pro Gondor status quo. They are also the biggest threat for tow other key reasons. First, Mordor has the largest army and most powerful units out there in the form of trolls and Ring Wraiths. This is still assuming the best case scenario where Modor is unable to get a balrog or dragon. The second is that it is at the center of the enemy coalition. As big of a threat that the Southrons, Corsairs and Easterlings are by themselves, they are significantly worse when attacking together. This united front only occurred because of the influence of Sauron.
Gondor is the main geopolitical rival to Mordor and Sauron's previous defeats have come from Gondor and its allies. Similar to how Mordor is the center of its coalition, Gondor is the center of its. And Gondor is the closest enemy to Mordor. Thus, Mordor can make significant progress by striking Gondor first. So, the biggest threat would be removed. Then the others could be more easily defeated in detail. So Mordor has powerful historical precedents, motives, opportunities, vulnerabilities pushing for an attack. Mordor, due to the whole world conquest objective, represents a global threat. Its army is also constantly expanding and thus so too is its threat level. And a short term one that needs to be crushed as soon as possible. So if I were Gondor, I would clearly be fearing the military developments of Mordor.
This carries over to the rest of the eastern partners of Mordor. The Corsairs, Easterlings and Southrons all have thousands of years of conflict with Gondor. Gondor again sees all three of these as threats and would be naturally interested in actions that might eliminate them as threats once and for all. These will combine to see all three of Mordor's partners would be interested in defeating Gondor first. Then there is the fact that the Southrons and Easterlings have interest in securing farmland. Corsairs can reasonably see Gondor standing in the way of their ability to export slaves to the Dwarves. Like Mordor, they too have motives, precedents and strategic weaknesses that can be addressed through a final defeat of Gondor.
Easterlings are also a threat to the survival of the people and Gondor's territorial integrity. But the threat to the lives of civilians would be less severe. After all, the Easterlings would need someone to work the farmland and only the "useless eaters" would pose a threat to the occupation regime. Similar to Mordor they have the potential to strike not just Gondor but their allies, destabilizing the international order propping up Gondor. The Easterlings have a huge army as well. Not as big as Mordor but on average each soldier is much better than an orc. The Easterling need for ever expanding farmland would be a global threat challenging Gondor. Plus it has the potential to strike 3 other powers reinforces the global threat idea. Their high military power, consistent presence as a threat and proximity means they need to be dealt with as soon as possible. The expansionist logic of Easterling policy makers and the fact its population (thus army too) would be expanding, I suspect that it would be and expanding threat.
Southrons are similar to the Corsairs in the nature of their threat. They were promised land by Mordor as payment for joining the war against Gondor. So there is some territorial integrity issues. But their population does not appear to be big enough for this to be a major threat. The most likely problem is the economic impacts of their raids and the political destabilization that results. Their not so much a threat because their troops are of high quality or quantity. Instead, they are highly mobile.Plus they will be striking from the south, so that Gondor will be spread over a wider front. Then there is the whole elephant thing.
But the Southrons can pretty much just hit Gondor, so I would imagine they would be pretty regional. But the fact that Gondor is suffering militarily due to its decline, the Southrons will be a long term threat. And like the Corsairs they are primarily raiders. Meaning they are a low intensity threat. But they would actually be the victim of internal tribal warfare and Corsair slave raids that would be pretty intense. So their population would be on the decline and with it their threat levels.
The Lonely Mountain would represent the other major type of threat - the economic. Gondor is in a state of economic decline, the sort of thing the dwarves thrive on using for their own purposes. They would throw their financial power at Gondor to force concessions that are useful to the Lonely Mountain. This would result in a likely net drain of wealth out of Gondor and a loss of control over local productive assets. Should a military conflict break out, their skills at siege warfare would mean that they are the only power whose military is geared specifically to counter Gondor's fort-centric doctrine. But distance would make full scale war unlikely. Instead, political subversion would be the main way that the dwarves would escalate. But pretty much only Gondor is both weak enough to be exploited in this way but also has enough wealth for this exploitation to be profitable. So the actions of the Lonely Mountain would only be a threat to Gondor in this manner. But because of this same vulnerability, the Lonely Mountain would be a high intensity and short term threat. It will remain steady until Gondor's economic dependence and vulnerability is reduced.
Corsairs are a sort of blend between the purely economic threat of the Lonely Mountain and purely military military threat that is the rest of Mordor's coalition. They want their plunder, so stealing wealth and people to sell into slavery would represent a clear economic threat. But their means are military and they do lend their men and ships for purely military actions in the Siege of Minas Tirith. As noted above, their raids would also destabilize the internal stability of the Gondorian Government. But their attacks do not represent a full threat to the survival of the people. Nor can they really undermine the territorial integrity of Gondor without a more powerful army. The result is that the Corsairs are more political and economic threats to the internal stability only. Like the Southrons, they would be mainly a threat in terms of mobility and the fact Gondor can't effectively counter. After all, the Corsairs have pretty much the only real naval power in Middle Earth and ships have a lot of benefits for getting troops where you want them.
But because the Corsairs are a naval power, pretty much only Gondor would be in reach. They could hit the region to the west of the Shire, but that is really far away with little benefit to attacking that far. Southrons are their nominal allies. Which means Gondor will be the main target and thus limiting the Corsairs to the status of a regional threat. Due to their naval raiding focus and poor land power, I think they are a low intensity threat. Similarly, they have been a threat that Gondor has struggled to deal effectively with. So while they are not significant, they are a pretty long term threat. But their power does not seem to be going up or down, so I suspect their threat level is remaining steady.
The rest of our concerns here are pretty straight forward. The Lonely Mountain is a national threat but nonlethal and unconventional. Mordor and the Easterlings are both multinational, lethal and conventional threats. The Southrons and Corsairs are more sub-national, lethal and unconventional.

Structure

By the time of the War of the Ring, a hereditary line of stewards ruled as effectively kings but without the official name. Originally they were the closest advisers to the king and ruled when between the death of the old king and the coronation of the next. As such they were chosen based on their wisdom and character. As part of their role in continuity of government plans, they were not allowed to leave Gondor or go into battle. This might have been the foundation for later leadership styles of the stewards, given their insular outlook and lack of interest in military matters. They were authorized by the unwritten constitution of Gondor to rule in the absence of the king or their legitimate heirs. But they did not suspect such an heir would ever come back so their oath to surrender power when one made a claim was not taken seriously. This sort of limbo continued as no heir could be found but no one could prove they did not actually exist.
They originally were very cautious and conservative in their leadership because they did not feel it was their right to change the status quo. But over time, that was because of the stewards lacked the vision and courage to be effective leaders. After the War of the Ring, Aragorn restored his line to power. The steward position was retained in Faramir, basically still the potential regent and as the governor of the area between Minas Tirith and Mordor.
The military formations for the military gives us a solid foundation to establish the political divisions within Gondor. The Theme system basically gave both military and civilian political control to the general. Typically the general’s army army was stationed in an area and recruited from that same region. So, each political subdivision had to be big enough to supply enough recruits to cover turnover and losses, but small enough that the same unit could defend it. This system meant that the army was functionally made of citizens/farmers, native to the region they would be defending. Now, in some cases the Themes had as much as the entire estimate of the professional Gondorian Army. However, there were “minor” Themes that consisted of 1,000 men (or 5 banda), their fort and the territory around that fort. Roman legionary forts had weapons manufacturing plants run by the soldiers themselves. We can expect a similar system for Gondor.
Goldsworthy (2003) 88, 149

Public Agenda

Lastly, I want to briefly get into the foreign policy objectives of Gondor. This is important for us in that the end of the War of the Ring and restoration of the Monarchy would provide it with an opportunity to achieve them. To figure this out, we need to recognize that Mordor was the single greatest threat to Gondor and the main drive in the decline in Gondorian territory. While cultural and political decline came with and helped cause these defeats in the international realm, it was defeats at the hands of Mordor and its allies that actually took most of that land.
I suspect that the main goal would be to reverse these losses at the expense of Mordor, the Southrons and Easterlings. Any land that Gondor feels it lost over time to conquest will be the prime targets. This is especially true for areas whose people share cultural ties. Such positions are part of Revanchism and irredentism. The idea is to reunite all former territories and subjects under their “natural” and “rightful” government and allegedly redeem them. Mythic and historic claims to the territory is used to justify hawkish positions, claiming that those areas outside their appropriate nation state can and should be incorporated through a successful war.

Assets

The White Mountains that form the border between Gondor and Rohan was at least 9,500 feet tall and ran east to west for 600 miles. Evidence suggests that limestone and marble were found in the range. The run off from the mountains produces a river system that runs to the southern coast of Gondor.
A world Bank study estimates that the per capita GDP was $1,304 to $1,477 in today's dollars. Assuming a Byzantine population size of between 12 and 18 million, we can assume that its GDP was somewhere between $16 and $27 billion in today's terms. If we look at my estimate of Gondor's population of 1,351,000, this gives us a GDP of between $1,761,704,000 and $1,995,427,000
Milanovic, Branko (2006): "An Estimate of Average Income and Inequality in Byzantium around Year 1000", Review of Income and Wealth, Vol. 52, No. 3, pp. 449–470
The role of the Catholic Church could not be understated here. The local lord essentially was the government. However, many things we assume the government should do, such as education and welfare, was handled by the Church. Even some law and order elements were handled by the local churches. The Church had its own laws and courts. The village church was run by a priest that was paid between $19,029.40 and $47,573.5 a year. The parish normally got $33,301.45 a year in tithes of 10% of income. The parish had 30 acres of land. 2 acres of that was for the personal use of the priest, who hired people to farm church lands, a personal servant and a bailiff. The education was centered in monasteries and focused on rhetoric, philosophy, literacy, math and history. Monasteries also gave charity to paupers, elderly and the sick in the form of food and housing.
Monasteries were the other major Church institution outside the literal churches in each village. Because there is no Catholic Church in Middle Earth, it would not be providing that role. Yet the role of the monasteries were rather important. As I suspect that the Gondorian government would have to step up to fill in the gaps, monasteries are important to look at.
Lets start with the basics. The first important element is their size. In all, monks were less than 1% of the medieval population. Monasteries did get up to 460 monks at times, but 200 was still considered large. The smallest places still called monasteries appear to have only been 12 monks. But there were some places with as little as 3 or 4 monks. The size was limited by income.
Sustaining the monastery was mainly based on farming. Cistercian lay brothers farmed the land at their monastery with the help of hired hands. Lay patrons would grant rural manors as endowments to monasteries. This granted services in kind from the feudal dues plus cash payments and agricultural produce to feed the monks. Cluny - the monastery that peaked at 460 monks - was a major feudal landlord with hundreds of manors and 30 separate direct landholdings. These were sometimes up to 70 miles away. Urban properties were donated that provided additional cash rents.
As the feudal lords of these lands, they had the same rights and responsibilities of the noble lords. This meant that in times of war, they were called on to provide knights. When churches were donated, the monastery had to hire a priest for it. Granted these churches then provided tithe incomes. They had to administer these manors and lands, on top of defending their claims in court. When they had churches, they were independent of the normal church hierarchy but also subject to some of its oversight. Similarly, they were interwoven with a political and economic structure the monks theoretically were separate from and claim to have left behind. But this conflict of interest is removed the second they become officially part of the government administration - like how I think Gondor would operate.
In terms of the organization, the abbot was the head of the monastery. He was required to consult with senior monks, but was not required to follow that advice. The Pope was often the only official that could countermand orders. For Gondor this would likely be the Steward and later king. The same senior abbots elected the abbot and again only those higher up in the organization could remove him. It was common to elect a young monk - the fact that abbots normally served until death meat this practice ensured years of stable leadership. Normally, he was the one responsible for interacting with lay patrons, managing the landholdings and manors and dealing with the church and secular officials. Internally, he was the main administrator and could order monks to be imprisoned or beaten for misdeeds. Cluny’s abbot could even mint coins. This made the abbot a very important position was treated with a huge amount of respect as a result, by the monks especially. For Gondor, the role of abbot would essentially be that of the local governor.
If the monastery was large enough, priors and deacons were appointed to help with administration. For a society like Gondor, these officials would fill a wide range of essential services needed to administer royal lands. But this was not the only role the monastery filed. They were also responsible for charity and hosting travelers. Its charity involved providing housing the homeless population. There was a place for them to live near the gate. Cluny housed 18 of them at one point. They were supported by the monastery and were required to live semi monastic lives. On top of this, extra food and clothing was given out to paupers and the sick. A monastery official called the almoner would walk around the area to give out these supplies. Some monasteries like Cluny provided long term elderly care - though this was mainly to rich people who had given to the monastery. Others would provide food and care in the person’s house.
Another key role was essentially that of hotels. At the time, inns and regular hotels might be hard to find. Nobles, patrons and pilgrims especially stayed at monasteries. The monasteries even became tourist sites and museums in their own right - housing religious artifacts such as pieces of the cross or the ashes of saints. Due to this, they were important facilities in official business and travel in the areas.
Lastly, the cultural and educational work they did was important. Often, only apprenticeships were the only way outside of monasteries to get an education. Being a monk required knowing Latin and math, plus being literate. Thus, if a person became a monk but was not properly educated, the monastery had to step up. Some larger monasteries like Cluny even had their own dorms in major universities. In the early middle ages especially, the monasteries were the only schools in the area. Literacy outside the priesthood was provided via the monastery. Just as important was the intellectual work of the monks themselves. They were the main body of literate people, who just happened to have no other major economically vital roles. As a result they were responsible for preserving books and writing new ones. Technically manual labor was what the regulations called for, but the aristocratic backgrounds of the monks meant the reading and writing of books became defined as the work called for. Monks were sometimes assigned books to read and copy. These were often history books, medical texts, theology, philosophy, literature and so forth. This meant the preservation and expanding of the documentation from the period. Often the new history books from the period were written by monks describing current events.
Recruits to monasteries were expected to provide donations to help keep the monastery operational. This means that mainly the aristocracy filled the monastery ranks - even with the vows of poverty. The wealth of the monastery as a whole meant that even with poverty at an individual level, the monks still had living standards above normal for the medieval world. This wealth (and the wine) mixed with the dominance of younger children of nobles meant that the ideals of the monastic life suffered. Again, this would not be an inherent problem if these were the sort of secular officials I think they would be in Gondor. Any issues would come from the sort of corruption that would come in any agency in a declining empire.
Beyond the second sons of nobles, it was possible for children to be offered to the monastery by their parents (usually between ages 5 to 7). This appears to be a limited and increasingly outlawed practice. Cluny only had about six in the 11th century. They were constantly monitored, had to stand in meals and were never alone. But they were given an education, more food and more freedom. Because of the banning of inducting these oblates officially into the monastery, they would be housed and educated until they reached 15. This was the age that was often when men were considered adults. Oblates were then made to choose if they wanted to continue on as regular monks.
But I would imagine that Gondor would retain the right to use children to fill in manpower gaps - a likely problem Gondor would face. This would understandably generate some resentment within the ranks of these people (called oblates) or even within the regular population. It might also produce a temptation to create such oblates - whether through kidnappings or forcing into the monastery children of those executed. I would also imagine that regular children would still be given over if the child was an orphan or if the parents were unable to properly care for them.
Once a person became a monk, they nominally left the secular world behind. In fact, they were not allowed to leave for the rest of their lives. Walking out the gate required permission from the abbot. But this permission was regularly given. Officers often needed to leave to conduct their official duties, which involved meeting with secular figures. Also aiding in the practicality of this rule was the lay brothers - unskilled or manual laborers that handled tasks like the laundry, baking or getting wood. They were provided some housing and had some limited participation in the religious affairs. Some of the smaller monasteries used hired labor to fill this role.
Labor from the monks, lay brothers and hired help meant that the monastery was essentially a self contained unit. On top of this the lands given to the monastery provided the economic needs. Buildings in the monastery often provided all the space needed for its many educational, religious, administrative and charity roles. These included wine cellars, work spaces, chapels, dorms, meal halls, kitchens, gardens, libraries, latrines - basically whatever was needed within the budget.
They were often also targets for raids. The vikings were well known for attacking them. As a result, some like Learns Abbey in France were fortified. Their role in providing housing to travelers was also provided to the elites who were often the demographic most often government officials. Their role in education allows them to provide needed education to other officials outside the monastery. As a result, they would provide a lot of solid tools to extend government power to areas and increase the overall effectiveness of local administration. This is on top of all the other services they provide.
We can also expect that these “government monasteries” would represent the main record keepers for the government. Tax records would be kept here, as would likely the main tax officials. Birth, death and marriage records would be maintained here too. Any royal official would likely be sent here for education to get them ready for service. I would suspect that the officials based here would have basic military training and be outfitted as light infantry. This would allow them to carry out police duties and defend the offices from attacks. Heavy infantry arraignments would probably be overkill for essentially civilian government officials.
If we assume that the Gondorian government operates in a similar model to how the Church used monasteries and parishes to provide what we call government services today, we get a foundation for us to look at the size of the Gondorian government. Looking at figures from Medieval England, we see 1% of the population was clergy and the Church handled much of what the government does today. I am going to take that to mean that the Church in medieval England can be a stand in for the government of Gondor. For a population of 1,351,000 – 13,510 would be government officials. Now, if we remember that there would be a normal representative for each 150 person village, that means one third of the officials would be in the “monastery” officials - meaning 4,503 people. If we assume that one of the offices exist for each of the Banda, that would mean 20 of them would exist with an average of 225 people per office – in line with what Chuny was. The government would thus be able to support 360 paupers and 120 orphans. That might not sound like a lot, but at the time the nobles took over a lot of the administration of rural areas and guilds handled a lot more of the urban administration.
Another angle to attack from here is the numbers I got from the Medieval Demography Made Easy essay. It states that there was 1 clergy per 40 people and a priest per 25-30 clergy. Though the author does not define those terms for me. This still leaves with us with 33,775 "clergy" and between 1,126 and the 1,351 number I got above. This is a nice sanity check. The bigger 33,775 figure could be the jurors that aid the local lords, Gondor's version of monastic "lay brothers" and those hired by the local representative of the crown in the Southern Fiefs. Basically all those who are unpaid or not directly paid by the central government.
This means between $9,514.70 to $47,573.50 per each of the 13,510 officials. Civilian payroll would run Gondor $151,860,100.61 and $642,717,985.
This also gives us a starting point to calculate government revenues. The parish Churches would bring in $33,301.45 a year from its tithes. If we assume that 90% of the population is rural farmers, that means that there would be 1,215,900 people. If we keep the average of 150 people per village, that means that there would be 8,106 villages scattered across Gondor, each one generating $33,301.45 in income taxes. The result is $269,941,553.70 total. As the tithes were 10% of income, we can assume then that the income calculated GDP would be $2,699,415,537.00. The King of England’s lands generated between £10,000 and £15,000 a year – or $47,573,500 to $71,360,250 per year. This means that the government would be bringing in at a minimum between $317,515,053.70 and $341,301,803.70. I say minimum because I am not sure how much would be generated from internal tariffs, taxes on slaves and possibly property. Then there are all the fees generated from fairs, imports to cities and vendor stall in the central markets of towns and cities. Still, that gives us a starting point.
Lets approach this from another angle real quick. The latest numbers I could find for the Byzantine revenues was 1 million Hyperpyron in 1321. Granted, this was a while before the Fall of Constantinople, which is my frame of reference for the Battle of Minas Tirith. But it is close to the 1350 date that is use for a lot of other elements of Gondor derived from England. Plus, this is close enough that I think comparisons still work.
But here is the thing. The nomisma currency I have been basing my calculations off of thus far was dropped before this date and replaced with the hyperpyron. Where the older currency was theoretically 24 carats, the replacement was 20.5. Using similar calculations from elsewhere, we get one hyperpyron as worth 180.78 after rounding. Which then means the revenues collected by the Byzantines in my conversion scheme equals $180,780,000. I feel like this gives us a solid range to work with here.
We can now begin to look at the issues surrounding the government budget. For this I will be relying more on the Byzantines as I have better information on its budget. Out of the $317,515,053.70 minimum budget for Gondor, we have payrolls of $10,634,983.59 per year for the army and $26,476,372.50 per year for the Urban Cohorts. This leaves $280,403,697.61 left over. The Byzantines paid between 25,200 and 792,000 nomismata ($5,333,328 to $167,618,880) as tribute to foreign powers to secure peace in times of trouble. Remember, the Corsairs are likely to be demanding protection money out of Gondor, and we can assume that the tribute paid to the Corsairs would be roughly the same. I am going to use the $167,618,880 figure as the combined total for the tribute paid to Corsairs, Southrons and Easterlings, plus compensation to nobles for damage done in raids. This leaves $47,599,697.61 to cover $151,860,100.61 and $642,717,985 in payroll for civilian officials. This is especially when we factor in the donativum that emperors had to pay to the Praetorian Guard a bribe as ranging from 25 to 7,500 denarii. A denarii was 1/10 an ounce of silver, or using the June 6, 2011 price of silver, $3.62. This means the bribes needed to keep the stewards in power could be anywhere between $22,625 to $6,787,500.
This means the acres of land that a priest in Medieval England would normally have for their parish would be an essential model for Gondor to use to cover even the lowest payroll expenses I estimate. We would need to reduce tributes paid by a huge amount (at least $104,260,403) – something I think Gondor would be too weak to do. Or it would have to cut the pay of the military or worse still the Tower Guards. Technically the government of Gondor can survive on this model. But it is certainly not good and leaves no room for emergencies. You know, like an invasion by Mordor that marches into the most economically important region of Gondor.

History

The history of Gondor is one of steady decline in the face of external threats and poor leadership. The external threats came from Mordor and its proxies. Orcs, Easterlings and Southrons attacked constantly over the course of its history. The Great Plague did significant damage to the population and economy. In fact, Gondor was so hard hit that it actively abandoned many of the forts around Mordor, allowing a resurgent Sauron. If any of its enemies were in a position to attack, Gondor would have fallen then, but they were hit just as bad if not worse. These attacks, the plague and a civil war were all responsible for abandoning both Minas Morgul and Osgiliath, leaving Minas Tirith the capital.
Gondor at its height was a staggering 1,203,200 sq. miles. Most of this was very weakly controlled though. Subsequent conquests by the easterlings in particular and abandonment of land resulted in drastic reductions of territory by the time the main series starts. Just like England just before my point of comparison in earlier notes, Gondor also suffered from a devastating plague. Civil wars and rule by less qualified individuals resulted in additional losses.
The plague was specifically important for our analysis here. Apparently over half of the Easterlings were killed. The Barrow Downs suffered total depopulation. Osgiliath suffered the worst within Gondor’s territory both in terms of people killed and those who left to escape and never returned. The result of the plague was the relocation of the capital to Minas Tirith and the abandonment of Cirith Ungol and the Black Gate. Minas Morgul was taken in part due to the retreat of Gondor. Gondor only survived this period due to the fact its enemies were similarly affected or distracted with other conflicts. For example, the Easterlings actually suffered more deaths as a percentage of their population than Gondor.
Worst of all, ineffective leadership was a problem for generations. The stewards were more concerned with preserving the status quo and their own power more than seeking their own glory or inspiring people. The result was the irreversible decline – in the movies Gondor is a mere city state. Basically by the time of Denethor, the stewards rested purely on tradition and past glory without any desire or vision to seek their own legitimacy.
The leadership decline came about partially due to battlefield deaths. The King was expected to lead from the front, so there was increased risk of death in battle. Then the plague killed others. The poor leadership goes back to the days of the kings and conflict with such a less than stellar king caused the Kin Strife to occur. This was the civil war that ultimately caused the navy to break away entirely and become the Corsairs. This civil war was devastating and was responsible for a lot of Osgiliath’s suffering. The Stewards did not do much to solve Gondor’s problems, but they did not start the decline in leadership.
The other cited cause is a little more problematic. Apparently the Numenorians were a superior race and the original kings came from the refugees fleeing Numenor. Yet over time the refugee population began to integrate culturally with the native populations and intermarry. Their height, leadership and longevity declined as this happened, as well as their skin tones beginning to look more like South Europeans. So, pure blood pollution was a major problem. Yeah, no racial issues there at all.

Demography and Population

In terms of its population, it appears to be a lot more urban than Rohan. There appears to be at least 4 urban centers, Minas Tirith and Pelargir being the biggest and most important in terms of the plot. On the maps of the Atlas, Osgiliath is part of the Minas Tirith region. Dol Amroth (estimated population of 120,000 for the entire region) is located about 300 miles away from Minas Tirith along the coast. Unsurprisingly given real world population concentrations, most of Gondor’s population is centered on the coast or along rivers. Two of the major urban centers are on the coast and the other three on the same river. Gondor’s rural population is stretched in a band between these urban areas that sees decreasing densities as you go inland towards the White Mountains.
These are very rough numbers. So I will be attempting to get a little more specific here. Because of course I am. Pelargir we can assume would be roughly 21,616 and Dol Amroth 8,646. These are based on the ratios from the Medieval Demography Made Easy essay.
This gives us 90,706 people out of 1,351,000. Which means that with these numbers just over 6.71% of the Gondorian population lives in cities. Historically, Europe had an at most 5.1% of its people living in cities, so this is a little high. Though we can expect that the growing instability of the region - especially Corsair and Southron attacks, would be causing refugees to move to the cities. For comparison, cities were more in line with 10,000 people up to 12,000. Rare was the behemoths like Paris (50-80 thousand).
Now, I for similar reasons, I suspect that the percent of people living in towns would be the same as medieval Europe. For every person moving into the towns to escape the terror in the villages, I think one would move from the towns to the cities. This means that 4.4% people would be in the towns. The source that gives me that number defines "town" as between 5-10 thousand. But others define towns as populations could be anywhere between 1,000 to 7,000 with "normal" being roughly 2,500. But if we assume that the 4.4% figure holds, we get 59,444 people living in towns. Depending on whether we take the 7,000 or 2,500 average town size, this means that Gondor would have between 9 and 14 towns. Like I said, the section here on Gondor requires a lot of simplification or this would be even longer.
https://medium.com/migration-issues/notes-on-medieval-population-geography-fd062449364f
Towns tended to have more industrial and trade focuses. While nobles tended to dominate the rural areas, the power of merchants grew with population size. Nobles did have a strong presence in cities and towns due to their wealth and homes in the area. However, the higher church offices and royal officials were based in cities. A strata of traders, craftsmen and independent shop owners lived in cities that did not exist in more rural areas. Their wealth and the fact they too relied on hired staff provided a counterbalance to the nobles. Admittedly, the wealth and hired hands were lower than for nobles, but it was significant. In fact, in Paris regulations only allowed for merchants to hire two salespeople. This more urban class is the one that dominated the French Revolution, so they did have power. The main class in the cities and towns though was unskilled labor and servants. The guilds were political as well as economic power centers.
Now, lets look at the demographics we see in feudalism. Around 1% of the total population were nobles. Another 1% were clergy. Around 10% were literate, though only 1% of women were. Roughly 90% were farmers. Around 1/3 of serfs had no land rights at all. Those that were totally landless tended to be the lord’s personal servants, employees for local businesses of the Church or migrant labor. Most had between 10 to 15 acres, which was enough to support a single peasant household. This group’s size varied widely – between 25% to 50% of the peasant population. A fifth of the population had over 20 and only the most extremely rich peasants had between 40-60 acres.
The differences in the numbers were the poor peasants that had 5 or less acres who worked as part time paid labor. Most of the sublets that these poor peasants rented was between 1-5 acres. The free peasantry was slightly better off in that they had fewer obligations to the lord, but had to pay rents of between $237.84 to $713.52 per acre. Often, the rented plots were between 3.75 to 9 acres. It was entirely possible to rent land in one village and thus become free in one area but an unfree serf in another. But these free holdings were key if a peasant was to advance economically. The richer serfs that had more than 20 acres were able to hire workers. They generated much more income than the rest of the serfs due to increased crop sales and the renting of land to the landless peasants. Those that rented their land did so from this gentry.
These peasants could be quite scattered too. Russian peasants prior to emancipation were split into those on private estates and those who were on Royal Lands. These were then organized into peasant housholds. Each one had between 6-10 people in them and were scattered every 6.2 miles. Which means the peasant population was pretty dissuse. We can assume similar scattering for Gondor.

Territories

It was bounded in the north by the White Mountains and Rohan. To the west and south was the ocean. To the southeast was the Southron territory due east was Mordor and the Easterlings. Its latitude is close to that of Venice. Just before the War of the Ring began, Gondor’s climate was defined by a mild winter with hot and dry summers. This is similar to the Mediterranean area or southern California. So, Gondor is England in all cases except for when Tolkien wanted it to be Italy? Okay.

Military

Byzantine doctrine relied on small forces due to limited tax base and a fear of giving generals too much power. The army was costly to train and equip, so was to be used sparingly. Each person was difficult if not impossible to replace, creating caution in generals. Superior discipline, training and communications all were combined to wear down the enemy and drive them out of imperial territory. Ideally, this would be done with minimal cost and no pitched battles. An early intelligence service was even created to help with this. Rare for medieval armies was a logistics system that kept the formations well supplied.
Normally, this meant that attackers were easier to defeat. Raiders and even some invading troops could have their own weak logistics turned against them. The Byzantines would retreat with civilian refugees to a fortified position while avoiding combat. Whether the enemy left the fort alone or laid siege mattered little. The need for supplies would force the enemy to eventually retreat Meanwhile the Byzantines could sit back and remain safe and well fed int their forts. The commander would then emerge and defeat the attackers in detail.
This fits incredibly well with the conservative, risk adverse culture of Gondorian leadership. I would expect some form of blend of the Byzantine cavalry and Western European models. Gondor had a long history of quality forging. They might not be as good as dwarves, but they were superior to all other human civilizations left by the time of the War of the Ring. Thus, we can assume that they would use the full plate armor. However, their enemies would be orcs and Southrons more than anyone using crossbows or the English Longbow regularly. Both of these groups used primitive bows. Easterlings apparently did not use any ranged weaponry, so no threat there. This means some of the weight could be offset through reliance on mail and gambesons. Smaller heater shields or bucklers would probably be the preferred shields to same on weight.
This equipment also works well for dealing with some of Gondor’s more advanced foes as well. The Easterlings were know for dense formations of pikes that mounted troops would have difficulties breaking into. Should a war break out with the Dwarves, Gondor would expect similar issues with them.
Rural areas would be dominated by nobles reliant on knights while the Minas Tirith region would be more professional with greater access to both long-bowmen and crossbowmen. I can see the development of this core professional army in Minas Tirith as a major factor in the continued control of the Southern Fiefs even in the face of growing problems in the central government. The return of a strong leader after Aragorn takes the throne would solidify this. Gunpowder also was a key factor in centralized political power and the end of knights. Cannons made castles obsolete and guns eliminated all usefulness of plate armor. Saruman invented gunpowder in Lord of the Rings and Isengard was located in what became the Reunited Kingdom. Therefore, once it forms, the destruction of feudalism seems like it would follow quickly.
Militarily speaking, Gondor was clearly past its prime. But it was still the single greatest enemy Mordor faced and was the first in line to be attacked due to its location. This meant that military training was still a big deal in Gondor. While the main forces were concentrated in Minas Tirith, Osgiliath and Cair Andros were also big garrisons. But this professional army was primarily used to garrison the core areas run by the central government and strategic points. The lords that ran the local fiefs were responsible for their own defense and raising their own armies when called on. This means the size, training and equipment is going to vary widely outside the core army units.
To me, the role of the Rangers means that the preclusive defense posture would be the foundation of Gondorian doctrine. This is a strategic doctrine discussed in Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire by Edward Luttwak. There is apparently a lot of criticism of this work in that other scholars do not think the Roman Empire actually explicitly set this as policy. But, like Confessions of an Economic Hitman, it provides a model I think applies to Gondor. The idea is to neutralize threats while they are still outside the borders of the nation employing the doctrine. It is a form of preemptive war essentially. This system demands the sort of first-rate intelligence in the borderlands the Rangers provide. In Rome, this was done through a system of watch towers and by continuous cross-border scouting operations of the sort the Rangers can man and employ. When the enemy army is found, forward or preclusive defense requires a strong surprise attack on the forces while they are still coalescing in their staging area.
The Rangers, like Rome, would be too weak and dispersed to deal with abnormally large concentrations of enemy force. The main forward defense line would be breached. Insufficient reserves means that this larger army would be able to penetrate deep into Gondor before reinforcements would arrive. In the later days of the Roman Empire, as Luttwak describes, the Empire recognized this problem and admitted that its territory would become the main battlefield of invasions. In Luttwak’s description Rome had to change its doctrine and remove legions from the border so it could better deploy legions to trouble areas. Instead of repelling invasions at the border, the army would retreat to fortified positions, wait for reinforcements and then attack on friendly terrain.
But Gondor has an advantage here in that its main military force is already in the rear areas be default. The nature of the borderlands near Mordor would also mean that the local villages and noble villas in the area would be more fortified. Rome also fortified granaries and hill forts built or reoccupied in the “defense in depth” period. The result is a territory that can more easily withstand penetration by a force that breaks through the Rangers. We see this a little bit with fortifications and garrisons at Cair Andros and Osgiliath. I suspect that this trend would be applied to the rest of the territory.
The invading force would thus find itself in a region peppered with strongholds in enemy hands and where it could not easily get access to sufficient supplies. If the invaders ignored the strongholds and advanced, they risked sorties and attacks in the rear. If they attempted to besiege the strongholds, they would give the mobile troops valuable time to arrive. Overall, the aim of defense-in-depth was to provide an effective defense system at a sustainable cost, since defense-in-depth required much lower troop deployments than forward defense. To be more precise, the cost was transferred from general taxpayers to the people of the frontier provinces, especially the rural peasantry, who, for all the fortifications, would often see their family members killed or abducted, homes destroyed, livestock seized and crops burnt.
The side effects of the extremely conservative leadership and the cultural affinity for building world class fortifications suggests that offensive actions – when taken – would rely on the bite and hold model. These tactics involve saturating a small area with force then moving in and occupy it. Movements aim to threaten the enemy flanks and salients moving ever closer to core areas. Grand, high level objectives are rejected in favor of more limited and achievable ones taken with surprise and speed. Then the territory taken is to be reinforced so as not to over extend supply lines or exhaust manpower. From this platform, the army can then cut down the enemy counterattack should one come. The surprise lessens the casualties for the attackers that then expect enemy counter attack, aiming to inflict heavy losses on the enemy when they do. Ideally for Gondor, this would mean small local areas that are quickly taken, then fortified and settled by a Banda.
Such a tactic recognizes that sustained offenses against equal or superior foes beyond a few days are likely to end up badly. Pushing attacks too hard in such conditions will see ever increasing losses for ever decreasing gains. Eventually the exhaustion, over extension of supply lines will create a temptation for enemy counter attacks that would be hard if not impossible to resist – thus undoing all the gains.
The Bite and Hold Model appears to be a perfect set up for the use of the Byzantine system of retreat to a strong point then wait to counter-attack. This would mandate the adopting of possibly more mail armor and the addition of bows. Mail would probably be used more on the knight themselves, as the horse would be more exposed and more important to protect. Short bows tend to be the ideal, as long bows are literally too long to effectively move while riding. This is on top of the lance and broadswords.
Thus outfitted, it would be quite easy to see the Gondorian knights following Byzantine doctrine. The result would likely mean the use of archers as the primary infantry support. Like what we see in the movies, the heavy infantry would be held back for garrison duty or pulled out for serious threats. The local actions would be left to light infantry to protect the corps of archers.
Rome used so called resource tactics, which could be useful for our purposes as well. The first objective was to attack resource locations. When a resource rich area or supply cache was captured, as much as possible was taken into secured areas controlled by the Army. This restocked their resources while denying them to the enemy. Then it would attack supplies in transit. Scouts would find the main supply routs and ambushes would be set up. Ideally, supplies would be taken into the Roman stores, but so long as the enemy would lose those supplies, it was a win. Then they would conduct sieges targeting enemy cities. The enemy would lose supplies and thus possibly troops and morale. Meanwhile, Rome was able to sustain its war at enemy expense. Victory comes from attrition – the endless marching, constant sieges and fighting, broken treaties, burning villages and enslaved captives. So long as the government is willing and able to replaces losses, the slow grind will be effective.
Archer Jones. 2001. The art of war in the Western world. University of Illinois Press. pp. 68-89
Robert Asprey, War in the Shadows: The Guerrilla in History, Vol 1, Doubleday, 1975, p 21-30
As I mentioned in the Easterling section, supplies would be a problem for all of Mordor’s allies. Tactics that would make this worse would go a long way to improving Gondor’s position in the War of the Ring. Given the historical inspirations, I suspect Gondor would already be using resource tactics and scorched earth retreats. Then, we can look at the Rangers to see than Gondor already has a formation trained and armed for the sort of ambushes called for.
The goal becomes to win through taking limited tactical objectives though small, local strikes. The enemy is defeated ultimately through death by a thousand cuts. Small victories accumulate and cannot be reversed, while more of the enemy troops are lost in comparison to the allied forces. When the enemy counterattacks are launched, the conquered territory is ready and can be held. Thus, planners aim to strike hard and fast at a point of their choosing, overwhelm the local defenses and begin to fortify the area once more than token resistance emerges. Meanwhile, the enemy would be faced with a hardened target by the time they know what is happening and are able to get reinforcements to the trouble area. Intelligent uses of this tactic would see the attacking army do a follow up strike in an entirely different area on the same model once the counterattack begins. This means that enemy reserves are not available to counter the new assault. The enemy would thus be pounded from many areas, not able to respond to any fast enough. The enemy would be under constant pressure, unable to reorganize, with no time to rest or think. By the time they would be able to act in one area the focus is already in another. Losses mount both in terms of troops and the tactically significant local objectives and territory.
While this element of bite and hold is never mentioned in any of the discussions of it I have read, it leads to a solid position of defense in depth. The idea of bite and hold is that each gain made is reinforced with fieldwork that prevent counter attacks from succeeding. Therefore, should this fail and a retreat is needed, there should actually be a series of defensible lines behind the overrun position to retreat to. Therefore, a good commander could hold a line until it is clear that the position will fall. Then, said commander can call for an orderly withdrawal to already established positions in the rear at the last moment before such a retreat becomes impossible. Thus, bite and hold has solid defensive applications as well.
Each fortified position will cost the enemy time and men to take, even in the case of a success. Given the fact that offensives lose momentum over time, this tactic is described as trading space for time. The enemy loses troops not just from combat but from having to occupy larger areas. Reserves have to be used in mopping up operations and occupation rather than continual attacks. Logistics are stretched as supply lines have to cover more and more territory, causing supply issues. This is a problem even if this length does not lead to losses due to greater exposure to attacks in enemy territory. The dispersal of forces makes it harder to force an enemy into a decisive battle, while leaving attacking forces open to defeat in detail.
Meanwhile, the defenders are able and willing to give up lightly held areas, meaning they can conserve forces. Their flanks, supplies and command-and-control elements are all still protected. The inverse of what happens to the attackers occurs. The attackers become more and more exposed on their flanks and rear. Defenders meanwhile see their forces become increasingly concentrated. As the enemy burns itself out attacking position after position, the defenders actually become stronger. The result is the possibility of encirclement of the attacking force and decisive battle on the defender’s terms. Invaders would need to feed themselves by looting food stores from occupied territories. Gondor would know this and thus take a scorched earth approach. Anything of value will be carried to the rear during retreat or destroyed to prevent it being used by the attackers. Roads and bridges would be destroyed and booby traps laid.
Given the fact that medieval war often relies on living off the land to survive, this policy would have important and devastating consequences for civilians. Such tactics take a horrific toll on civilians as one could imagine. Invaders don’t fare well either though, which is why it is done. When one has no supply lines, this means that starvation can only be prevented by breaking through the defending lines and forcing decisive battle before they can pillage their own territory. At the very least, constant advance is needed. But an increasingly dispersed, tired and starving invader will find it difficult to do this against growing enemy troop concentrations and endless prepared positions.
The Byzantines also used similar ideas when dealing with Saracen raiders. The general in the affected area would gather up their cavalry and shadow the attackers. This force would be too small to handle a large force, but would deter detachments from breaking off to pillage the region alone. Once enough force was collected, a battle would be forced. Infantry would cut off the mountain passes so that the invaders would have nowhere to retreat to or access to supply lines. The scorched earth policy would take its toll, while the Byzantines took their time. Another response taken was an attack on the invader’s homeland, forcing a retreat or the possibility of larger defeat. Should this be combined with the occupying the passes used by the raiders to get into Gondorian territory, this could be devastating. Letting word of an attack on the homeland would induce a retreat right into an area where Gondor could have set up a strong defensive position for an ambush. The result of these tactics working in tandem would create a no win scenario for the attackers. I would imagine that this would be very similar to how Gondor would fight Southron attacks, given how similar the two sides would operate.
Now, there was a special set of instructions for fighting “Franks” - the term used by the Byzantines to mean any Western European group. The textbooks discussing war with them commented that the Franks fought with no real battle order or discipline. Doctrine also assumed no reconnaissance work by the Franks or fortifications for camps. Yet, pitched battles were considered dangerous, in part due to powerful cavalry. This sounds a lot like Mordor if we replace powerful cavalry with huge numbers. The Byzantines advised generals to rely on night battles, attacks on camps and ambushes. Ideally, the invading army would be baited into a desolate area where living off the land was not possible. This was to force the fragmentation of the enemy army into small raiding parties just to get enough supplies. The downside is the invader was now vulnerable to defeat in detail. Advice was also given to exploit the poor discipline of the attackers into ambushes using the feigned retreat tactic. This in turn fits nicely into the strategic model I suspect Gondor would hold to.
Now, medieval and early modern military writers in Europe tended to focus on the study of Ancient Rome. Given the fact that the army of the Roman Empire and the Byzantine army provide a lot of inspiration for how Gondor would fight, I suspect this is worth considering. The book De Re Miliari was quite influential in medieval Europe and the Early Modern Period. It recommended avoiding battle if the odds were not in the commander’s favor. Outmaneuvering the enemy or alternatives to direct battle were advised in those contexts. Strict military discipline and understanding the abilities of formations in the army were seen as valuable for commanders. Officers were expected to accept hardship and go about their duty anyway.

One possibility – especially for a country like Gondor – would be border walls. Hadrian’s Wall was a solid 73 miles long. Depending on where on the wall you measure, it was 10-20 feet wide and 11-20 tall. It also was made with turf in some areas and stone in others. It also had a ditch in front of it. When the stone walls were added in areas, they were whitewashed - making them highly visible. This and the legions in the area made it an effective demonstration of Roman power.
Like the rest of the walls on Rome’s frontiers, Hadrian’s Wall was not meant to actually stop armies coming in. Though even a low level palisade along the border would have stopped some raids. It would not be surprising that a larger and better manned wall would have better impacts against barbarian raids. More likely is that the wall was built to channel trade across it into gates where tariffs and customs could be more easily collected. Raiding parties would be forced to fight its way through one of the well-defended gates and possibly abandon its loot. Or be trapped against the wall by the now alert troops. But a large army would have been able to force a crossing using siege equipment. Value came in the form of simply being in the way and slowing down the enemy. Once this happens, troops are much more likely to be able to respond in time.
The key to the wall was the mile castles and watchtowers. The Mile-castles were nominally placed every Roman mile, though this does not appear to be strictly followed. They were manned by a few dozen men responsible for that section of wall. There appears to be fluctuations in size, but 16 by 20 yards internally appears normal. The stone walls were normally 10 feet thick and 17 to 20 feet high, to match the height of the adjacent wall. There were 80 mile-castles and 158 turrets. This translates to one fort every 4,818 feet and a tower every 2,429 feet. The estimated 20-30 men per fort was the historical range for garrisons. If we look at the Limes Arabicus, there is a legion base every 62 miles.
Now, looking at the Atlas, it appears possible to form such a wall 250 miles long. The path would start at the mountain border with Mordor and run along the River Poros until it meets the Anduin – then from there to the sea. This would have 274 mile castles and thus 5,480 to 8,220 men. 544 towers would be on the wall. Then, 4 forts would have been located on the length of the wall. Along the norther border, one could enclose most of what looks clearly part of Gondor with a 100 mile wall – with its single fort, 110 mile castles and 218 towers.
In Ancient Rome these forts would have been manned by a legion – a formation I don’t think Gondor would have. The question becomes what unit this would be – Tagma or Banda? A full tagma would require the entire Gondorian army, so that seems unlikely. A Banda means that the professional army would have 800 men in the area. It would be possible to have the nobles pick up some of the slack, but only 2,800 were sent to Minas Tirith by the nobles. Aragorn brings another 1,000 with him. This means that between 1,800 and 4,600 men. Rome would have had 27,420 if it fully staffed the same wall on the southern border and 8,100 for the north. This would be within the reach of an Empire with between 33 and 50 legions.
But Gondor is an entirely different ballgame here. We are talking about a government in decline. These numbers would make sense. With the Corsairs able to bypass a wall, it seems likely that they would not be willing to devote huge numbers to manning a wall. Then, there is the fact that such mobilization would hurt harvests at a time when every person was needed to farm. It is possible that mercenaries were used to fill in the gaps, but that would further strain the government. Gondor was hit by plague, attacks from all angles and significant loss of territory. It is entirely possible that at the time of Gondor’s founding, such a wall would have been easy to build and properly garrison. Now, it seems likely that the former anti-invasion wall meant to keep out attacks would be reduced to being an expensive early warning system should invaders approach.
The Tagma are relatively easy to figure out the placement though. The Tagma are primarily from the professional army, which would probably be focused on the core of Gondorian territory and not that under direct noble control. This means near Minas Tirith and between Minas Tirith and Mordor. The northern border is much closer to Minas Tirith and where the Easterlings would approach from. This means that at least one Tagma Theme would be located on that border. Two would probably be placed near Osgiliath – most likely on the far side of the river. You would want to defeat your enemies before they got too close. Plus too many troops too close to the capital makes coups easier. This leaves us with 2,000 troops for the southern border – still leaving us 2,000 men short if we are optimistic with our numbers.
Sheppard Frere (1980). Britannia. Routlege & Kegan Paul. pp. 158–160. ISBN 978-0-7100-8916-8.
So, how would Gondor fill the remainder of the gaps? One possibility would be that those gaps will never get filled. But Rome does provide a basis for how an empire in decline would maintain border security. First, one can replicate the diplomacy I describe in the Easterling section – supporting local leaders, wars and subversion against hostile ones, bribes and so forth. Ideally, this would mean that the Haradrim would not attack.
The other is the barbarization of the Army. This was the process over time where residents from outside the empire were allowed into the Army. At first, the same equipment, training and discipline that made the Legions effective were applied to these barbarian units. This was not maintained closer to the end of the Western Roman Empire. As the traditional strengths of Legions were watered down by these trends, the old units had less motive to retain them either. But, this system obtained short term peace for long term problems – these barbarian troops did not shed their old identities or loyalty. This was a huge problem that led to units switching sides in a crisis.
Ferrill, Fall of the Roman Empire.. 43-190
But given the fact that the Southrons are clearly allied with Mordor, this would probably only work in times of peace. The second Mordor issues the mobilization call, the southern wall would be breached, no questions asked. If Gondor used the second option, it would mean basically hiring haradrim tribes to fill in the army, just to have them jump ship the second the war starts. Like Rome, we can expect Gondor to have seen a decline in the quality of training and weaponry. Now that they would be more likely to fight, they would be less likely to win.
Medieval cities often had walls around them. These were 6-10 feet thick and 30 feet tall. Towers were normally around 200 feet apart. Walls cost 3,706.34 per yard to build and gatehouses ran a full $171,244.80 to build. The gates were closed between sunset and sunrise each day. The gates tended to have 4-12 men running them, responsible for collecting taxes and tariffs on top of their military responsibilities.

Technological Level

Their main feature is their incredible skill at masonry construction. Minas Tirith, Minas Morgul, the Black Gate, Cirith Ungul, Isengard and Helm’s Deep were all built by Gondor and were the most impressive construction in Middle Earth. This masonry work was apparently such a thing that the name Gondor is derived from the elvish for “land of stone”. The other major feature was their shipbuilding carried over from the fact Gondor was founded by refugees from Numenor. In fact some of the earlier kings of Gondor were also called the “ship kings”.

Foreign Relations

Selling public lands and borrowing money to help finance the government are common as well. As banking and the amount of money in the economy are less developed in medieval societies, local sources are not going to be as common within Gondor. Though, the nobles and large merchant families are likely to be the main sources within Gondor as they naturally have the most wealth. Meanwhile the Dwarves have huge piles of money and loans to foreign governments are how they operate internationally. I suspect that the Dwarves would have become an important creditor to Gondor by the time of the War of the Ring.
Now, seizing the land from minorities and foreigners is one way to get around the anger that such seizures would cause if employed against the Church or nobles. Now, I don’t think Gondor has much of a minority community present. But the Dwarves do have a significant diaspora community that could be living in Gondor as craftsmen – a middle class profession that could leave them with a tempting amount of wealth to target. Dwarves are also likely to be the major foreign investors in commerce and industry within Gondor. Then add in the expected dislike of Dwarves and I would not be surprised that Denethor would seize all Dwarven assets. Probably also default on their loans as well. The dislike of a visible minority community seen as hoarding wealth is also a factor that led to pogroms against Jews, the real world group that in part inspired the dwarves.
So, we have a clear understanding by this point on how Gondor would fight its enemies. But what about when it would fight them? Now, I would suggest that Gondor would follow classical offensive realism. That means that the leaders see war as inevitable as there is nobody that can effectively mediate between powers. Rationally, leaders will seek to maximize their own power as a means of self preservation. At best, states are obsessed with security. Expansion is seen as the only thing that can provide a state’s needed security and this is constrained by outside powers. Lastly, there is the security dilemma – actions taken to become more secure within one’s own borders can be taken by other powers as a signal of offensive intentions, thus provoking a counter. Human nature is seen as flawed. The goal of leaders is not security but power. Rulers will not be happy until they have world dominance. Again, I get into why in my other note.
So, in the face of Gondorian weakness and poor leadership, how would this express itself before the War of the Ring? First and obviously, Mordor would not be attacked directly, as this would be downright impossible and provoke a counterattack that Gondor might not be able to survive. The Easterlings are basically the same. While this would be possible, the Easterlings have proven themselves a formidable foe in the past to Gondor and I doubt that unless provoked, the cautious leadership of Gondor would risk it.
This leaves the Southrons and the Corsairs. They are fragmented and are directly on the southern border of Gondor. This means that they are a much easier enemy to face. If we remember, the feudal monarchs are very weak central authorities in real life, not just in Middle Earth. Thus, there would be little to stop local mobilizations. Then it is doubtful that such leadership would not resist too much. So, we can expect each local lord mobilizing limited resources for limited gains on the borders. Some will likely be larger scale attacks, others more like small raids. But the overall pattern would be of specific local objectives to protect local interests with the tacit support of the stewards. Little rebuke would be offered unless they overstep and invite a larger invasion. At that point, the lord would be probably severely punished in the confines of the Gondorian legal system, but full mobilization would result to meet the threat. That mobilization again would be short and limited due to feudal societies being unable to sustain long term war or mass mobilizations. We have to remember in medieval warfare, this was relatively common.
As a result, we can expect the attacks to be essentially raids. They would know they could not pull off a siege. After all, attackers generally have to have larger armies to successfully attack than defenders need to resist. This means that the supply issues that are the defining features of sieges are actually greater for the attackers. But, the attackers are forced to live off the land while the defenders can stockpile in advance. The local nobles would know this and start off on a pure defensive posture. As the attack comes in, the noble affected would mobilize his forces and man his castle. Then, the Southrons and Corsairs would do as much damage to the countryside as they could before retreating. After that, the local knights would sally forth to harass the retreating enemy. If a tempting target presents itself, perhaps the full force would march into enemy territory as a punitive expedition.
One thing that the Byzantine Empire did that seems logical for a weaker power to do would try and buy peace. Basically tribute. I have alluded to this elsewhere. But the numbers for the Byzantines were quite high in some cases. It paid 7,200 pounds of gold each year for 4 years to get peace with the Sasanian Empire. This comes out to $438,860,160. Another tribute sent to the same empire was 45,000 nomismata or 9,523,800. At a time when the government's revenues were between $1,269,840,000 and $1,798,940,000
Norwich, Byzantium: The Early Centuries, 269

Agriculture & Industry

In the Byzantine Empire, there was village and estate models for agriculture. Villages were essentially a collection of small holders. Estates were essentially major land owners with tenant farmers. The tenants as one would expect owed dues to the owner while the smallholders paid essentially property taxes to the state. But this over looks a lot of complexity as one would expect. There was some slave labor. Like in Medieval England there were some landless wage laborers too. Nor were all villagers farmers. Not all tenants even lived on the estates or even had much of a special relationship with the owners.
Farming was the majority of the economic activity in the medieval period and we can expect this to carry over to Gondor. This means the daily lives of peasants would be filled with cycles. Harvest and planting times would be intense work. But the rest of the year would not be. This would leave plenty of time for labor duties to the lord. Or festivals. Or tending to one's own personal animals and gardens. Or relaxing.
Basically, farming was not the constant backbreaking work us modern people think it was back then. This granted a certain degree of freedom to the local peasants. They could take on side projects much more easily than modern day working class people or even those in medieval towns. For example, there were no guilds or regulations preventing people from becoming part time carpenters, cheesemakers or barbers for the village.
Villages often were rather small. They normally had around 24 households that totaled 125 to 150 people. But this could be anywhere between 20 and 500 people per village. I will be using the 150 as an average for calculations from here on out. This is not to say that they were all exactly the same. Remember what I was saying about the complexity of trying to assume standardization across 1,000 years of an entire continent's history?
Another generalization here that could prove useful for us - there were about 2.2 livestock animals per people in medieval society. That means 2,972,200 animals in Gondor. Of this, 68% (meaning 2,021,096) were chickens, geese and ducks. The rest were dairy cows and pigs.
Each was dominated by the lord’s manor house and a church. The lord also controlled the mill, which required a fee paid to the lord to use. Houses were clustered around a main road and surrounded by farmland, divided into 3 fields. Each field had about 125 acres in it. This was divided into 15 parcels of 12 acres, which were further subdivided into 1 acre selions. Each person had on average 3 acres split between the three fields. Land rights often included some pasture, typically in the less fertile and fallow areas. Resources were often pooled to hire a herdsman for the village.
Now, given the fact around 90% of the people were farmers, we would expect most villages to be primarily agricultural. However, a solid 1/3 of serfs had no land of their own. They would work as regular day laborers or as the lord’s personal staff. The millers and blacksmiths were paid well by serf standards. Cloth making, mining and forestry were vital part time jobs for the rural population and supplemented their incomes.
Now, in both the Byzantine Empire and Rome, food supplies were a sensitive issue for political leaders. So I would imagine that like Byzantine leaders, Gondor would take a role in maintaining food supplies to the capital. This meant both securing supplies and working to keep prices acceptable to the public.
At the same time, an economy dominated by subsistence farming would be burdened by any army big enough to be effective. The army found itself in a sort of balancing act. Due to the fact that farming generated some surpluses, however small, there was a percentage that could live without farming. There is a point at which the army then becomes so huge that its burdens destroy the economy because there is literally not enough manpower to produce enough food. A gray area is found in the middle where poverty is generated and there is no protection against scarcity. Meanwhile, the part time troops would cost the government much less (5 versus 9-12 nomismata) and also contributed to the civilian economy. For an economy reliant on farming in a government with limited funds, the fact the government could have three times as many people in reserve that it does not have to pay and can feed themselves would be a huge benefit. It matters not that these troops are going to be substandard when the government cannot pay to rectify the situation. As a result, we can expect that the Army would have imposed more of a financial burden on an inefficient and corrupt government. No general economic hardship would likely be imposed by the army by the time of the War of the Ring due to taxes or manpower being diverted from economic productivity.

Trade & Transport

People needed to travel for practically everything. Couriers were the only means to spread official news and messages. Moving was also common to find jobs and people would go around 20 miles each way to visit market towns or fairs.
The castle and its village would be at the core of the trade at the time. Textiles were in high demand in castles. Some villages would actually produce the plants for dyes as an early cash crop. Blue in particular was both popular and expensive. It took an entire hectare of land to produce enough of the plant needed for 1 or 2 kilograms of blue dye. This dye was symbolic of royalty and thus much demanded even when it cost so much.
The overland trade routes were the only ones available at the time. Instead of one merchant going the entire distance, he would go part of the distance and sell his stock to the next guy. Sometimes this would mean 30 to 40 transfers for spice going to England for example. Each of these transfers saw an increase in price as each made a profit on the deal. Since overland routes were slower and could not handle the same volume as ships, this added to costs as well. Sometimes castles were even located specifically to control access to trade routes. This had the benefit of increasing security against highway robbery, but downside of allowing lords to take their cut in taxes. There really wasn't a way around this - some of these castles I mentioned were literally the bridges the merchant needed to cross.
However, castles and the resulting village had huge costs. Wood was a hugely in demand resource for castle construction. The need for wood was higher than one would expect. Scaffolding for the stone walls was still wood. Things that would normally be metal today were wood then. In fact, nails were extremely expensive by today's standards. Craftsmen only used metal when it was absolutely needed. Clearing forests also made room for crop production. After all, one needs to feed all those workers in the area. Therefore there was a surprising lack of woodland. But at the same time, this wood construction was highly resilient. Some wood doors for example could last hundreds of years.
In towns and cities, there tended to be more support for travelers and trade was much more important. Normally, where one guild dominated, it was normally the merchants guild. The business activity of the cities and towns combined with the poor state of land transit means that rivers were the main location for cities and towns. We see this expressed in Gondor as well. Even the smallest town had some kind of central market, with larger cities having more. Fairs were held in the larger towns, often once a year for between 3-7 days. The greater selection and competition between vendors drew regular shoppers as well as producers into the area.
Now, I noted rivers were the main site of towns and cities due to the needs of travel. Just how did this travel work back then? Well, foot was the main means of transportation. It tended to allow for 2-3 miles per hour and at most 20 miles a day. Should the person be lucky enough to have a horse they can ride, 30-35 was closer to the average and 60-70 was the maximum range. Most horses were just used as pack animals though. Which meant the speed and range was limited to that of walking. When larger cargoes were needed, wagons could be used, able to allow for the transportation of 1,300 pounds of goods at most 25 miles a day. However, the large trains of wagons needed to haul the baggage for noble households or armies on the move was at bet 12 miles a day. Bridges were rare and often fortified with the local lord’s castle, used to collect tolls. Also, there was no authority able and willing to maintain the old Roman roads, which made them of decreasing value. Not to mention the risk of highwaymen in a world with less police and more countryside in which to hide.
This meant that rivers were the quickest, most reliable and cheapest way to get around. Boats at the time averaged 100 tons (the record was 800) and cover 100 miles in a day – a substantial improvement over the land based methods. But it was less that pleasant as messengers only had on average a 25 inch by 63 inch space. The sails were typically square and some had oars.
Besides inflation, governments have a lot of tools to deal with budget issues. Raising taxes and cutting spending being the most obvious and common tools. In the medieval period, there was a network of internal tariffs that sent revenue to the government whenever goods crossed between regions of a nation. The same thing applied to goods entering cities. The rarity and fortification of bridges meant roads were ripe for such tolls. Fees to run stalls in government run markets was common as well. In a crisis, say war, one can expect these to go up rapidly.
Trade was a major source of Byzantine wealth and I would imagine that similar products would be a major source of income for Gondor. Given Gondor's Mediterranean climate and massive coastline, oil, wine, salt and fish products seem somewhat obvious. Though Gondor does have a decent number of trees, it seems unlikely that much timber would be exported. The market for that would be mostly internal unlike for the Byzantines. Ceramics and textiles - especially luxury cloth - would be a huge market for export. It does not appear that other cultures in Middle Earth have much of a role in international trade here.
Generally trade links result in more people in an area. This, like what I said earlier, means coastlines and rivers would be the main locations for cities and towns as a result. The more traffic a river or road can handle the bigger the settlement. This not only comes from the travel related activity like inns or wagon repairs. Manufacturing enterprises naturally will be more profitable the bigger the market. The bigger towns and cities on the trade routes benefit them both in having a larger local market and better access to outside markets. This creates a sort of virtuous cycle of population growth.

Education

Also weirdly for a medieval society, there was a military academy system that trained all residents of Minas Tirith as part of a semi universal education system. England did have a universal education and military college/staff system, but those were after the Napoleonic Wars. But this would have significant impacts for the overall culture. It would instill a greater sense of tradition and respect for hierarchy while also meaning the residents of Minas Tirith were inherently better trained when Mordor’s armies approached. Now, it is unclear whether this education extended to the rest of Gondor, as the Weapons and Warfare book was the source for this and described Gondor as little more than a city state. This means that the education it referred to was just in Minas Tirith. Therefore, I have no information regarding the area of the 7 southern fiefs.
The military academy system would have resulted in all men having basic training even if they chose not to enter the army. These two forces meant that the entire male population of Minas Tirith would be willing and able to become soldiers if needed. Now, given the nature of my sources, it appears that the military forces centered in Minas Tirith and reporting directly to the king/steward are the only ones that are connected to the academies.
The academy system imparted into the army a strict awareness of the military hierarchy and code of honor. It can be assumed a strong militaristic ethos would have infused the whole of society as a result. For the professional soldiers, tactics would be based on the rigid training and drills. We can assume that uniformity, esprit de corps, discipline, obedience to superiors and marching in tight and ordered ranks would be the main focus. It is unlikely that more than basic competence would be demanded in weapons use. This is somewhat confirmed in the Weapons and Warfare book, which states that they do march in controlled ranks, favor close combat and hack and slash combat with swords.
Now, the academy system was only implemented after the end of feudalism, which means that Gondor appears to be unique for a nation of its type. Now, the French appear to have pioneered the use of military academies after the Revolution. It allowed them to promote skilled officers from the middle classes that would not be able to afford a commission. It is important to note that the middle classes were the main beneficiaries of this. Higher class meant better education at the time. Lower classes simply did not have the same literacy rates yet to take advantage. The larger, more educated middle classes of Germany, France and Britain meant they had a better officer corp and thus their armies did better in WW1. The Ottoman Empire, Russia and the Hapsburg armies at the time did not have such middle classes and thus suffered as a result. The technical branches that deal with artillery, map making and logistics require greater engineering, literacy and math skills. Thus, those branches were the early branches to benefit from academies and merit based promotions.
With an urban population whose economy would be based in guilds, I suspect that there would be a bigger middle class than say other human societies of Middle Earth. This means that there would be enough of this demographic to make this work as it did in real life. Now, the Byzantine Empire had primary education even in local villages for both sexes. I would imagine that this would be carried over too. Though I suspect that this would be primarily in the "royal lands" where the government monasteries would be centered. The local representatives in the Southern Fiefs would probably provide some education, but this would likely be more limited and reliant on noble financing.

Infrastructure

Trade was a critical element behind the power of Constantinople in the Medieval world. As a result, the government maintained strict control over internal and international trade.
It must be noted that walls are expensive and cities and towns are civilian areas primarily. Therefore, walls would only be expected in cases of frequent attacks.

Type

Geopolitical, Kingdom

Capital

Minas Tirith

Leader

Aragorn

Head of State

Aragorn

Government System

Monarchy, Absolute

Power Structure

Unitary state

Economic System

Barter system

Currency

Now, the penny in England during the Middle Ages was 1.4 ounces with 92% silver. The French penny was less than one gram and only 38% silver. This plus the British Royal Family’s earlier centralized control over the currency explain why the Pound Sterling became such an importance currency. But it also meant that it was super valuable. Even with the British issuing ½ and ¼ penny coins, most trade was still in barter.
Free Silver was a policy proposal in the US that wanted any mint to take silver and mint coins with it. This was essentially inflationary. As a result, it was a policy popular with debtors and farmers. This was because debtors could pay off their loans for cheaper. Prices also go up, meaning that people can charge more for their products. Farmers, who are traditionally stuck between low crop prices and large mortgages for their land benefit at both ends. Meanwhile, landlords and creditors tend to suffer under this policy for the same reasons. For the same reason that debtors like inflation, governments often respond with inflation to deal with a budget crisis.
Gondor is an agricultural economy, politically weak, still in decline and its center is shifting to urban areas. This means that while the landlords and aristocracy would be still quite powerful, it seems like they would be less well placed to resist inflationary monetary policy. Now, apparently the coins issued in medieval Paris were less than an ounce and were closer to 38% silver. This was at the height of the French feudal order. So it is not too much of a stretch to assume a similar coinage, absent the gold reserve backup like I propose for the Dwarves.
As of 7/20/2019, the price of silver was $16.31. Now, I am not entirely sure exactly what my source meant by "less than" one ounce, so I will assume exactly one ounce for these calculations. For our purposes, this means that Gondor's currency would be a coin worth just short of $6.20.
Russell L. Mahan, "William Jennings Bryan and the Presidential Campaign of 1896". White House Studies (2003). 3 (1): 41. doi:10.2307/1917933. JSTOR 1917933
To give an idea at both living standards and the value of money, lets look at average pay for a second. A day laborer would only earn about one to 2.5 pennies a day ($18.76 to $46.91). Priests only got £2-10 per year (£9,514.70 to £47,573.50 today) and royal officials in England would bring in 35 pennies ($656.69) a year. Soldiers were paid 2-3 pennies ($37.45 to $56.29). Skilled trades got 8-9 pennies ($150.10 to $168.86), servants 1.5 pennies ($28.14), women 1 penny ($18.76), unskilled trades earned 3-4 pennies (56.29 to $75.05). Though this tended to fluctuate. During harvest, the extra demands on labor drove wages up. Farmers needed more labor to bring in the crops, while the craftsmen started to pay more to compete. In the winter, the shorter days meant fewer working hours and thus lower wages. Long term employees were given food and housing in lieu of wages, so the lower pay rates can disguise matters somewhat.
A note on methodology I used to get these numbers. The value of silver was such an important part of the currency and I had pretty exact amounts of silver in each penny – 1.288 ounces per penny. I took that figure and used the price of silver in US dollars on December 15th, 2018 to calculate the modern day values. Well, at least when pennies was how my sources documented the pay of specific occupations. For those that were listed in pounds, I used the ratio of 12 pennies per shilling and 20 shillings per pound to get how many pennies per pound there was – 240. That then allows us to use the value of silver per penny to calculate the value of a pound. And lets be honest here. I am really happy modern money does not use this weird division system that the old pound used to.
Currency was basically a tool for the Government to finance its own needs. Of those financial demands placed on it, the military payroll was the single most vital and the largest single item. Military expenses were likely over half of the budget for the Byzantine Empire. These payroll payments were the main tool through which the distribution of currency to the general population occurred. Thus, a medium of exchange was introduced into the general society in large enough amounts to be useful for most transactions. And through this, trade, paying of taxes and urban life became possible. Thus, the economic impacts were large but also unplanned. It also meant that the monetary policy of the government was an outgrowth of its own spending. Expansion or declines in the size of the army could theoretically cause inflation. Changes in pay structures, centered on the introduction of military land, led to a reduction of coins in circulation by over half under Constans II – but more evenly distributed the coins in circulation. Heraclius halved military pay during his reign, producing similar but less drastic effects.
The effects were uneven though, as troops are not normally stationed for the sake of monetary policy or for the monetary convenience of taxpayers and traders. Yet, payrolls still distributed coinage widely if not equally because even the frontier troops got paid. A poverty wage still needs to be paid, and thus payroll still sends currency everywhere. The public post, civilian bureaucrats, the movement of the navy, couriers and so forth all helped this to a degree. The renting of wagons and horses were a bigger impact than buying of supplies by the government. The supplies could be secured by people using the goods as taxes in kind. Meanwhile those supplies needed to be transported – often through privately owned ships and wagons. The impacts this could have were drastic in some areas like the Balkans. Here, money was so short that taxes had to be paid exclusively in kind. Troop pay introduced monetary economics to this area after Byzantine conquests.
One interesting note about Byzantine monetary policy such as it was comes from the use of both bronze and gold coins. The nomismata was the gold coin defined as 1/72 of a pound of gold. It was the main currency used for payrolls in the later empire. But in the early days, a bronze coin was used called the follis. The nomismata was the main store of value due to the fact that the bronze coin suffered from serious inflation. But it was too good of a store of value – it could only be effectively used if the follis was available for change. Later, the issuance of new follis coins for payrolls stopped, so the only way to get them was to exchange a nomismata for follis. One side effect was the profit generated by the state as people traded in the follis coins for gold ones – which had higher value. Theophilus recognized that more were needed in circulation in order to facilitate trade. During his reign, he began to recirculate the follis by using it to give change when people paid their taxes and as the currency used to pay for the supply allowances of soldiers.
The price of gold at $15,238.20 per pound of gold means that a nomismata is worth $211.64 in today's money.

Major Exports

The Byzantines were famous for their silk, among other things. In fact, this was such a huge deal that the government held a tightly controlled monopoly over it. Only government controlled factories could produce it and it could only be sold to authorized buyers. The result is its export could be used in diplomacy and as a form of payment. After all, it was literally worth its weight in gold.
Silkworms were actually smuggled into Constantinople to help facilitate the production of its silk. It could command some quite high prices. Purple dyes from the city of Tyre was restricted to nobles and thus was often used in international diplomacy. In fact, the Byzantines were able to cement an alliance with the Franks via a gift of silk.

Major Imports

Both imports and exports were taxed at 10% of their value.

Location

Minas Tirith

Related Ranks & Titles

• Gondorian Lord

Related Professions

• Gondorian Archer
• Slaves

Controlled Territories

• Cair Andros
• Castles
• Minas Tirith
• Osgiliath

Neighboring Nations

• Corsairs of Umbar

Related Ethnicities

• Gondorians