The Lord Of The Rings: 10 Best Fighters In Middle-Earth Definitively Ranked

If you thought Smaug was formidable think again. The vicious Fire Drake might have terrified the Dwarves of Erebor and the Men of Dale, but the First Age saw the appearance of a dragon that dismayed the gods themselves.

Ancalagon was the most powerful dragon ever to exist in Middle-earth, a winged, fire-breathing terror that when struck down by Eärendil crushed the peaks of Thangorodrom, completely destroying what was then the highest mountain in all of Middle-earth.

Such was the power and dread of Ancalagon, and the dragons who came with him, that during the War of Wrath the Host of Valinor, an army of the Blessed Realm, led by the Valar - which had fought against and swept aside even the Balrogs - was driven back and nearly destroyed.

It is hard to imagine that the Valar would not have rallied and defeated him, but that the most powerful beings in Middle-earth – Tulkas among them – were forced to give ground to a being of a lower order than they, even for a moment, speaks volumes about the strength and might of Ancalagon.