Question for the scholars: Dwarf women

[Ferretz]

So, I can' remember reading specifics about this, so I'll give this one to the Tolkien scholars.

One of my players asked if he could play a dwarf woman once, so the question came up: Dwarf women are described as having beards, but in Ruins of the North, it is also described that most non-Dwarves cannot see the difference between males and females. Is this too described in Tolkien's books somewhere, or are they clearly more feminine than Dwarf men?
Looking for a place in the source materials where this is described.

-Eirik

[Rich H]

A couple of similar references here:

http://tolkien.cro.net/dwarves/women.html

Did Dwarf women have beards?

It seems they did. In the note on Dwarf women in Appendix A it was told: It was said by Gimli that there are few dwarf-women, probably no more than a third of the whole people. They seldom walk abroad except at great need. They are in voice and appearance, and in garb if they must go on a journey, so like to the dwarf-men that the eyes and ears of other peoples cannot tell them apart. The Return of the King, 360 (App A)] Since beards were part of the appearance, not the garb, of dwarf-men, we must conclude that dwarf-women did in fact have beards.

The question has been raised as to whether all dwarf men necessarily had beards (the above conclusion depends upon this premise). Insofar as the matter was mentioned at all, it was shown through either direct statements or casual references that at least Thorin, Dwalin, Balin, Fili, Kili, Gloin, Bombur, and Gimli all definitely had beards The Hobbit, 20-22, 159, 186, 198; The Fellowship of the Ring, 240; The Return of the King, 148); it is natural to assume that the others did as well. While no definite statement about the beard status of dwarf-men in general was ever presented as a matter of lore, a thought which reflects the assumed view was given to Bilbo early in the The Hobbit: [as Bilbo rode along wearing Dwalin's hood] "His only comfort was that he couldn't be mistaken for a dwarf, as he had no beard." (The Hobbit, 42) In any event, the notion of bearded dwarves seems an assumption with fairly firm foundations.

References:
• The Hobbit, 20-22 (Ch I), 42 (Ch II), 159 (Ch VIII), 186 (Ch X), 198 (Ch XI);
• The Fellowship of the Ring, 240 (II, 1);
• The Return of the King, 148 (V, 9), 153 (V, 9), 360 (Appendix A, III).

And...

http://tolkien.slimy.com/faq/Creatures.html#DwarfBeards

Yes. The most canonical evidence for this comes in Appendix A, where it is said of Dwarf women that

They are in voice and appearance, and in garb if they must go on a journey, so like to the dwarf-men that the eyes and ears of other peoples cannot tell them apart.

It seems that (male) Dwarves in Middle-earth all have beards: among other evidence, as Bilbo sets out on his adventure in The Hobbit, we read that "His only comfort was that he couldn't be mistaken for a dwarf, as he had no beard." Given that, the quote above must imply that Dwarf women were bearded as well.

However, we do not need to rely on such implications: Tolkien answered this question explicitly in other texts. In The War of the Jewels ("The Later Quenta Silmarillion: Of the Naugrim and the Edain", written ~1951), Tolkien wrote that

no Man nor Elf has ever seen a beardless Dwarf - unless he were shaven in mockery, and would then be more like to die of shame... For the Naugrim have beards from the beginning of their lives, male and female alike...

In The Peoples of Middle-earth, Christopher Tolkien says that a similar statement was present in an earlier draft of Appendix A as well. As these statements are entirely in agreement with the canonical evidence cited above, the conclusion that Dwarf women had beards seems inescapable.

... Should give you what you're after.

[Ferretz]

Nice, thanks.

-Eirik

[Rich H]

No problem at all; finding the stuff saved me from a few minutes of boring work!

[mirkwoodfalcon]

On a similar note, if a player wished to play a dwarf woman, would you allow it in spite of the fact that they 'seldom walk abroad except at great need'? We actually had a dwarf woman in our campaign and our LM allowed it, though she was a most... unconventional character.

[Ferretz]

On a similar note, if a player wished to play a dwarf woman, would you allow it in spite of the fact that they 'seldom walk abroad except at great need'? We actually had a dwarf woman in our campaign and our LM allowed it, though she was a most... unconventional character.

Well, I believe that player characters, in most settings really, should be exceptional and different from the norm.

However, I have a rule (which some players find too restrictive) that only allows players to play characters of their own gender. So no male players playing female characters and vice versa. It's my fault really, seeing too much Monty Python in my youth, and not being able to take males playing females seriously (for an example:

-Eirik

[mirkwoodfalcon]

On a similar note, if a player wished to play a dwarf woman, would you allow it in spite of the fact that they 'seldom walk abroad except at great need'? We actually had a dwarf woman in our campaign and our LM allowed it, though she was a most... unconventional character.

Well, I believe that player characters, in most settings really, should be exceptional and different from the norm.

However, I have a rule (which some players find too restrictive) that only allows players to play characters of their own gender. So no male players playing female characters and vice versa. It's my fault really, seeing too much Monty Python in my youth, and not being able to take males playing females seriously (for an example:

-Eirik

To clarify, the dwarf woman in our group was played by a girl. Thanks for your input!

[Otaku-sempai]

All of this begs the question, what would a Dwarf-woman wear in private or if she was not trying to assume the appearance of a male? I have speculated that Dis might have dressed in robes of mourning for the remainder of her days (assuming she outlived here sons and older brother). What would Dwarves use as the color of mourning? White? Black?

[Valarian]

All of this begs the question, what would a Dwarf-woman wear in private or if she was not trying to assume the appearance of a male? I have speculated that Dis might have dressed in robes of mourning for the remainder of her days (assuming she outlived here sons and older brother). What would Dwarves use as the color of mourning? White? Black?

Grey, perhaps, the colour of stone. Dwarves do not bury their dead but inter them in tombs. It would fit that the mourning colour would be linked to the stone of the tomb (granite or marble).

[Otaku-sempai]

Grey, perhaps, the colour of stone. Dwarves do not bury their dead but inter them in tombs. It would fit that the mourning colour would be linked to the stone of the tomb (granite or marble).

Yes, it could be gray. There's some evidence that the traditional Dwarven color of mourning might be white. We don't get a detailed description of Thorin's tomb in The Hobbit. However, there is, in The Fellowship of the Ring, a description of Balin's tomb in Moria:

The chamber was lit by a wide shaft high in the further eastern wall; it slanted upwards and, far above, a small square patch of blue sky could be seen. The light of the shaft fell directly on a table in the middle of the room: a single, oblong block, about two feet high, upon which was laid a great slab of white stone.

Granted, this isn't much to go on.