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They were given enough room to be able to live a good and peaceful life, and that is a gift enough. One could ask himself why Manwe didn't ask Eru to make them immortal so as to avoid any possible conflict in the future.

Fact is the Valar were hoping the Numenoreans to be thankful with their gift, and not try to conquer every other land as well. 

Isn't there Eastern Lands East of Middle-earth? Couldn't the Numenoreans have been given those instead of a whole island having to be built? And then the Nuemnoreans would have much more room.

The eastern regions of Middle-earth were already populated by the Easterlings (as well as Dwarves, probably) — the Númenóreans sailed to the south of Middle-earth and took tribute (after previously having taught) ... I doubt it would have been morally acceptable to supplant the Easterlings and 'conquer' or take over the lands of Rhûn. Calenardhon being granted to the Éothéod was another story, as it had been overrun by the Balchoth before it was granted after the Riders freed it. But I digress... I agree with mouth of sauron that the location of Westernesse in connection with Aman (and the distance, closer than the other regions of ME) is important in a symbolic sense.

I think the purpose in giving Númenorians their own island was both to give them a land to call their own and also allow them to live in close proximity to Aman, a place that Men would normally never be allowed to go near. The shores of Tol Eressëa could be seen from the summit of Meneltarma, the place where the Númenorians worshipped.  Thus, the Valar gave them a blessed land near a blessed realm rather than granting them a larger but less auspicious portion of already-occupied Middle Earth.

I was curious to see how big Númenor really was, so I took a look at maps that have been drawn.  By my measurements, Númenor is 600+ miles wide at its widest point and over 400 miles long.  Using my extremely rough estimate, and the simplest possible formula for area, which doesn't account for the variance in the "points" of the star, and taking into consideration the inescapable fact that I am calculating based on a fictional map, that would make Númenor around 240,000 square miles in area, about the same size as Japan and larger than Great Britain.  Add in the blessings of the Valar and a triple lifespan and I don't think the Númenoreans had too much to complain about ;)

If someone would like to calculate the size more accurately, feel free, but that's about as much math as I'm willing to do this early in the morning.


-- Edited by The Secret Fire on Thursday 30th of July 2009 12:25:30 PM