well perhaps Tar Elenion has a head for this sort of thing, but I have already done what I can [ and spent waaay too long at it too [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] ].

I think that the contradictions are way to embedded.

We shall in future posts just have to speak as carefully as possible.

Sorry to nitpick Lalaith (My god, this is beginning to sound repetitive) but:

. The Vanyar, led by Ingwe, are the only elves with golden hair, and they never returned to Middle Earth.

Some returned for 40 odd years in the war of wrath.

However, the Noldo Finarfin, Galadriel's father, married a Vanya which is why she has gold hair.

Finarfin married a Telerin princes-Earwen, daughter of Olwe. It was Finwe who married a Vanyar, Indis, who was close kin of Ingwe, sometimes she was his sister and sometimes his niece. Finarfin and his children, have golden hair. Just a question where is it in the Silmarillion that states that Fingolfin had golden hair? His eldest son, Fingon, is said to have dark, gold-plaited hair (Hence his Quenya name Findekano-hair shout) and Aredhel also had dark hair, and I’m sure that Argon had dark hair as well. I have never, to my knowledge found nay reference to Turgon’s hair, or it’s colour. Anyone know? Also, on the subject of Aegnor’s hair, which was said to be ‘strong and stiff, rising upon his head like fire’. Well it seems that Aegnor ha pretty funky hair. Anyone care to describe it in their own way. I fancy he was rather like some characters form a Japanese anime named Dragonball Z.

So, there’ my nitpicking, though I suppose that someone will be picking my nits soon enough. I would also like to say how much I have enjoyed reading this topic and there have been many great and informative posts.

The Silmarillion states that only Finarfin and his descendents inherited the golden hair of his mother, Indis:

Turgon's daugther Idril is the only exception we see:

A possible explanation of this is that she inherited this hair colour from Elenwë, her mother.

Your generalizations of hair colour are way too broad.

Vanyar were not the only kindred to have golden hair. That is totally, completely false. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

Thranduil and Glorfindel (just off the top of my head) had golden hair.

ALMOST all of the Vanyar had blonde hair. MOST of the Noldor had dark hair. The hair colour of the Teleri is varied (dark, gold, silver).

You must think of it like this: 144 elves awoke in the beginning. They didn't divide themselves up into three/four groups based on hair colour and only reproduce within their own groups. The division of kindreds came later on when the elves were deciding which [eventual] elf-lord they would follow.

Exactly. Well said, Legalos.

The reason the tribes (as they eventually divided) had largely similar features was probably due to most sticking to their close kindred, and thus each tribe being generally -- though definitely not exclusively -- comprised of a particular family or many related families.

Another similar post.

Mea Culpa, Inderjit. Of course it was Finarfin's mother not his wife that had golden hair. I don't know how I came to make such an error. :blush:

Forget hair colour!

Was Gil-Galad [ if he was born in M-E] the High-King of the noldor but not a High-Elf?! [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img]

Of course not. [img]smilies/wink.gif[/img] I'm in full agreement. Whether or not the classification of "Calaquendi" is not inherited, being the label of High Elf is. All Caliquendi are High Elves, but not all High Elves are Calaquendi.

I agree, Gil-Galad was a High Elf by inheritance but he was not a Calaquendi.

Note: The quote on the fact that all Blonde haired elves hair was blonde was a quote from someone else’s post and I was correcting it. My fault, I should have made that clearer.