The Barrow Hills The World of Greyhawk & The World of Greyhawk Wiki The current year for our World of Greyhawk campaign is set during 579CY. Inspired By Gary Gygax

Just north of Portown rises a bleak chain of weathered hills known throughout Salinmoor as the Barrow Hills. Unlike the gentle, rolling countryside that surrounds them, these ancient mounds are steep-sided and strewn with broken slabs of gray stone that jut from the earth like the ribs of some long-dead giant. Sparse grasses cling stubbornly to the rocky slopes, while twisted hawthorns and blackthorn thickets choke the narrow valleys between the hills.

Even on clear summer days, a cool wind seems to linger among the barrows, carrying an unsettling silence that muffles birdsong and leaves travelers eager to return to the open roads before nightfall. The Barrow Hills predate every kingdom that has ever claimed Salinmoor. Local scholars believe they were once the sacred burial grounds of an ancient Flan people who inhabited the coast thousands of years before the rise of Keoland.

Great cairns of fitted stone once crowned nearly every hill, though most have collapsed into little more than moss-covered rings of weathered rock. Farmers occasionally uncover carved stones or rusted bronze ornaments while plowing nearby fields, but such discoveries are almost always buried again before sunset. The people of Portown consider it foolish to disturb the dead, believing the hills remember every hand that steals from them.

Dark tales have clung to the Barrow Hills for generations. Shepherds speak of ghostly lantern lights drifting silently across the ridgelines during moonless nights, while hunters claim to hear distant horns echoing beneath the earth where no tunnels should exist. Livestock that wander too deeply into the hills are sometimes found days later standing motionless among the ancient stones, refusing food or water until they perish without injury or illness. More than one traveler has sworn they glimpsed armored figures watching from the hilltops at dusk, only for the silent sentinels to vanish when approached. Whether these stories are born from fear or truth, few people are willing to find out. Today, the Barrow Hills remain one of the most avoided places in Salinmoor.

The road from Portown skirts their southern edge, and even the boldest merchants hasten their pace when passing beneath their shadow. Fishermen whisper a quick prayer to Procan whenever the hills come into view from the coast, while children are warned that anyone foolish enough to climb the tallest mound after sunset will hear the whisper of the forgotten king who sleeps beneath the stones. Few believe such stories outright, yet fewer still are willing to spend a night among the ancient barrows. In a land filled with marsh monsters, pirates, and haunted ruins, the Barrow Hills possess a quiet, patient evil that has endured far longer than any living soul can remember.