IMAGINE a fantasy world where elves, orcs and trolls exist in the Middle Earth - expect they could be in Berkshire.

A man has created an incredibly detailed Lord of the Rings-style map of the Royal County.

The Middle-earth inspired map was created by artist Chris Birse, after an estimate 70 hours of dedicated work.

The 34-year-old told the Reading Chronicle the project actually started three years ago when he was writing his own fantasy novel and needed a map to illustrate the story’s location and geography.

He said: "Rather than hire someone, I thought I'd give it a go myself. So as a bit of practice I mapped out my home region of Teesside in this style and got a lot of really positive feedback.

Bracknell News: Chris Burse creates Lord of the Rings map of Berkshire

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"After that I mapped out a few countries which was cool, but it lacked the detail I wanted due to their size. So I've now scaled things down to doing counties, since I've found I can get a lot more local suggestions in and I'm able to include places that are often missed out."

Mr Birse said he quit his management job to pursue his passion for map making full-time, calling himself a ‘fantasy cartographer’.

With Berkshire being the latest edition to the collection, Mr Birse has already created fantasy maps for a variety of counties across the UK including Oxford, Hampshire and Kent, as well as countrywide maps for Wales, Scotland and Ireland.

After the map was created, Mr Birse reached out to Berkshire locals on social media by positing on community groups and threads. He received more than 1,000 responses from residents with location suggestions such as ancient burial sites, standing stones and various places in Windsor Park.

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Mr Birse said: "The symbols I use are all fantasy themed. I want the area to look like somewhere straight out of Middle Earth. From towering snowcapped mountains in the Chilterns to dragons depicting airports, I try and adapt everything (even modern locations) to look the part.

The map highlights Reading's history too with the Battle of Reading in 1688 and also gives the Madejski stadium the Tolkien treatment.

Chris aims to make a map of every county in the UK and Ireland in this style and hopefully 'compile them all into some sort of fantasy atlas'.

The Berkshire Lord of the Rings fantasy map is available on Mr Birse’s Etsy account, FantasyWorldMaps, from £16.99.