### Clue: Where to find hammer in Tolkien's world after principal characters in The Hobbit have vanished (6,3)
### Answer: MIDDLE EAR 
 ### Explanation: Definition: Where to find hammer
 "Middle Earth"(the setting of J.R.R. Tolkien's works, including The Hobbit) **minus**(after … have vanished) **the 1st letters, respectively, of**(principal characters in) "The Hobbit ".
Defn: The cavity in the mammalian ear, between the eardrum and the outer ear, where one finds the malleus, the hammer-shaped bone aka, well, the hammer.