XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien   
   From: nospam@nospam.com   
      
   In article ,   
   Steuard Jensen   wrote:   
   >   
   >From "Laws and Customs Among the Eldar", we know that Elves typically   
   >wedded soon after age 50 (except for, well, almost every specific Elf   
   >Tolkien actually described getting married) and had relatively few   
   >children (typically four or less). After that, "In mortal count there   
   >was often a long interval between the wedding and the first   
   >child-birth, and even longer between child and child." Elrond and   
   >Celebrian waited almost 40 years before having Elladan and Elrohir,   
   >and another 135 before having Arwen. And after that, Elven couples   
   >stop having children altogether. But Elvish communities don't seem to   
   >have been that different in size than human ones. So even granting   
   >that Elves matured a little slower than human children (maybe by a   
   >factor of two or three), how many other children under five would   
   >there have been in the entire community when (say) Arwen was born? Was   
   >the sight of groups of laughing, playing children entirely foreign to   
   >the Elves when they first met the newly-awakened Men? And how would   
   >that vastly different experience of childhood affect them, both while   
   >growing up and while interacting with the few children they had?   
      
   Perhaps this was part of the value of Men and Elves living near each   
   other, as appears to have been the original intention of Eru?   
      
   A related question:  Had elven births already tapered off to zero by   
   the time of LotR?  Was that how the Elves knew they were being phased   
   out?  Was part of Arwen's motivation for going mortal perhaps a desire   
   to have children that she could not have as an Elf?   
      
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