The Hollin Rift is a transient natural rift that connects the worlds of Eamon and Arda.
Other rifts often have periods on the scale of millennia, so long that they can seem like fixed features of the landscape. The Hollin Rift, however, has a period of only about 750 years, and persists for no more than about two centuries during each appearance. As such, the rift's cultural, political, and trade impacts on Eamon have been less than some other longstanding rifts. No significant structures have ever been built around it, and during its centuries-long closures knowledge of rift gradually fades from living memory.
The first recorded appearance of the rift was around 2600 BA in a forested region of the Empire of Ervuol. It connected to a point on Addar in the Hollin region of the sparsely populated land of Eregion, roughly 20 miles west of the Misty Mountains. The site was close to an ancient stone road that led east to the gates of the dwarf realm of Khazad-dûm. Ervuolian scouts surveyed the area and made contact with the mountain dwarves, but it seemingly led to very little trade or diplomacy before the rift closed around 2400 BA.
It next reopened in the mid-nineteenth century BA during the Troll Wars on Eamon, then again around 1100 BA, and repeatedly thereafter until its sixth and most recent appearance in 1149 YA.
Currently the Hollin Rift is situated in an eastern arm of the royal forest of Cynwood roughly ten miles northeast of the city of Evenhold. The king's foresters and verders monitor the rift and those who pass through it, but access is not tightly controlled.
