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Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't trade have sprung up almost instantly between the Elves and the Dwarves due to mithril? Given that the only source of "truesilver" is smack in the middle of the Dwarven homeland (and not by accident, of course), and given that the Elves were in a life and death struggle with Morgoth it makes sense that they would be highly motivated to trade for something as potentially useful as mithril. The question I come to after this is would the Elves have preferred to trade for ore or completed goods? Would they have wanted to fashion their own mithril weapons and armour or would the work of the Dwarves have been sufficient...or even better....hmmmmm
It occurs to me that this could very well provide a clue as to the reason for the ongoing trade and its necessity. If the Dwarves were really the only people who could mine mithril then it makes sense that they would have a much better understanding of how to refine it and work it. Given that they are such a secretive race, it makes sense, I think, to assume that they would not divulge such important information even to trading partners (and remember how frosty relations were with the Elves even at the best of times) -- so it would make sense to me to say that the mithril armour and weapons made by the Dwarves would be better than that made by the Elves (for the first few thousand years, at least, until the Elves had a chance to become more familiar with it themselves).
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Scribbling scrabbling.
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