Domesticated Animals

The different people of Middle Earth are almost all known to keep certain animals as companions, for labor, transport, war, meat, milk and their other products. Some are domesticated, some tamed and others simply stayed in the vicinity of. Those animals tend to differ from their wilder cousins. Even though most of them are related to native species, some are imported at great cost. Region and climate, traditions, wealth and practicality are deciding factors when it comes to the animals that someone might keep.

Dunlendings, for example, do not keep domesticated animals, but tend to stay near herds of wild goats. The dwarven clans also are known to not keep domesticated animals. Elves maintain that their animal companions, among them horses, birds, dogs and, as rumor has it, even elks, are just that: companions, rather than property. Khandrim and Haradrim value birds of prey, Hobbits their geese and chicken, Easterlings their oxen, Rohirim their horses, Umbari their cats and some Gondorians, who shall not be named and may or may not be writing this, their stubborn, smelly war-hounds.