Location from The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
A crossroads trading town where Hobbits and Men live side by side — the last outpost of civilization before the wild lands, and where Frodo first met Strider.
Bree is the kind of town that exists because two roads cross and travelers need somewhere to sleep. It has the comfortable grubbiness of a place that has served ale to strangers for centuries without ever aspiring to be anything more. The Prancing Pony is the town's heart, its common room a fog of pipe-smoke and conversation where Rangers sit in dark corners and merchants haggle over prices and nobody asks too many questions about where you came from. The town's unique feature is its mixed population — Big Folk and Little Folk have lived here together for so long that neither finds it remarkable. Hobbits run shops; Men farm the surrounding fields; everyone drinks at the Pony. But Bree is also a listening post, a place where news from all directions converges. Rangers of the North pass through regularly. Travelers from the east bring rumors of war. The locals pretend not to notice, but Butterbur the innkeeper remembers everything he overhears, even if he forgets to pass messages along.
A cluster of stone and timber buildings huddled around a crossroads where the Great East Road meets the Greenway. Bree-hill rising behind the town, with hobbit-holes burrowed into its western slope. A hedge and a ditch forming a rough perimeter. The Prancing Pony inn dominating the main street — three stories for Men, one for Hobbits, with a swinging sign and warm light spilling from its windows.
Also known as: Bree, Bree-land, Bree-town