Orbit of the Moon attraction that the Moon exerts on Earth is the cause of tides in the sea; the Sun has a smaller tidal influence. If Earth had a global ocean of uniform depth, the Moon would act to deform both the solid Earth (by a small amount) and the ocean in the shape of an ellipsoid with the high points roughly beneath the Moon and on the opposite side of Earth. However, because of the presence of the continents, Earth's much faster rotation and varying ocean depths, this simplistic visualisation does not happen. Although the tidal flow period is generally synchronized to
Sun and Moon (Middle-earth) and 'died': the Sun after this for a while left its course, burning a large part of Arda the world (apparently creating the deserts of Far Harad). In writings which are older than the material from which the published "Silmarillion" was drawn, the Moon was described at one point as being created by Morgoth as a mockery of Arda the world, but this notion was abandoned. In the Round World version of the legendarium, the Sun and the Moon were not the fruit of the Two Trees, but actually preceded the creation of the Trees. Instead, the Trees preserved the