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The Sword Coast, also nicknamed the Empty Lands, was the region in western Faerûn that lay along the coast of the Sea of Swords and extended inward into to the vale.
The Sword Coast was an expansive tract of wilderness, dotted with independent cities and overrun by bands of monstrous creatures, that some saw as merely a place through which you had to travel in order to reach an actual meaningful destination. It was much more than that, of course, a rich and vibrant land with a long and storied history that encompassed some of the most important cities in all the Realms.
It was considered one of the rougher locales of Faerûn, both geographically and by virtue of its people. While scholars disagreed as to the exact borders of the Sword Coast, it was generally considered to have been bordered by the merchant nation of Amn in the south, and in the north by Waterdeep and the Delimbiyr Vale. Most cartographers and writers designated the coastal lands north of Waterdeep as the separate Sword Coast North.