Do Elves Have Pointy Ears?

[Elenhin]

The Etymologies (in HoME V), written in the end of the thirties, has the following entry:

LAS- *lasse leaf: Q lasse, N lhass; Q lasselanta leaf-fall, autumn, N lhasbelin (*lassekwelene), cf. Q Narqelion. Lhasgalen Greenleaf, Gnome name of Laurelin. (Some think this is related to the next and *lasse 'ear'. The Quendian ears were more pointed and leaf-shaped than [?human].)

(JRRT's handwriting was hard to read, and the last word is only Cristopher's best guess about it; we can't be exactly sure that it's really 'human'.)

This is the only piece of text which gives Tolkien's Elves pointed ears. It should be noted that this was written before the LotR was published, so JRRT's conception of Elven ears may have changed after that. Also, that piece of text says that the Quendian ears were only more pointed than human - not that they were ridiculously dagger-like (like in some artists' pictures...). The Elven ears can't have been a feature which distinguished them from humans, as humans were sometimes mistaken for Elves. It was only through eyes that the difference could be seen. I can easily picture pointy-eared humans, though, so Elven ears were probablyon average more pointed than human ears - but not enough to make a real difference between the two peoples.

[ March 22, 2002: Message edited by: Elenhin ]