The Palantíri (sometimes translated as "Seeing Stones") are stones that can be used in communication with one another, and also to see many things across the face of the world. When its master looks in it, he can communicate with other Stones and anyone who might be looking into them; people of great power can manipulate the Stones to see virtually any part of the world.
The Stone of Orthanc is one of the seven Palantíri brought to Middle-earth by Elendil and his sons at the end of the Second Age. The Exiles of Númenor built the Tower of Orthanc on what were then the northern borders of the realm of Gondor, and set the Palantír in the unbreachable fortress called the Tower of Orthanc.
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