[Galin]

Originally Posted by William Cloud Hicklin

The whole thing becomes a mess largely because Tolkien himself futzed around for nearly 20 years after the LR was published and never got the Silmarillion finished. Therefore it's hard to tell what he considered "done" (and even then of course he would still go back and change things).

Agreed, and exactly because of this last thing, in part, there is no "done" until something's been authorized by Tolkien to go to print, at which point he knows it's in the hands of a "present and future" readership.

It's easy, but in my mind misleading, just to draw a bright line distinction between 'published' and 'unpublished'; confusion and uncertainty are part of Tolkien studies, not something to be airbrushed out of the picture. (Was Celeborn a Danian, a Sinda, or a Teler? All three).

It's easy, but I don't agree it's misleading nor that it brushes away complexity (nor is it meant to). The "canonical" answer to your question is Sindarin. But that doesn't erase the complexity found in the posthumously published texts. And when Christopher Tolkien argues that his father surely would have felt bound by previously published text regarding Celebrimbor the Feanorean, anyone can agree or argue with even that... because in the end even Christopher Tolkien can't be certain...

... but what we can be certain about is what Tolkien himself chose to publish (in the case of Celeborn the Sindarin Elf, published twice in two different sources; in the case of Celebrimbor the Feanorean, the revised second edition), versus what JRRT was writing or musing about in private, unfinished papers and notes; and perhaps (or arguably) he was only even musing about something due to forgetting what already had been in print, or maybe because in private texts he was simply free to muse.

There are a couple of cases where it's fairly safe to say the work was "finished" and in Tolkien's mind ready for publication, whenever the rest of the volume was done. These would include the Akallabeth, which T was willing to leave unaltered once done and which CT hardly had to edit (the only significant change was Fionwe > Eonwe); Ak also happens to be fully consonant with the LR appendices.

Upon what do you base "willing to leave unaltered" though, and what other works are you referring to? We might agree that something looks like it's generally "done", yet we don't know if Tolkien might have had an inspirational wrench to toss in, for example, a "last minute" change of a detail... or ten. Tolkien himself might not have plans to revise something... until he sits down, just to fix a few phrases here or there, to polish things up before sending a final version to his publisher.

Did Feanor have seven sons? If so, did all seven live in Middle-earth after the burning of the ships at Losgar? Seemingly simple facts are not always so easy with Tolkien, and I have no problem with things being complicated. Actually I think the web too often simplifies certain "facts" when presenting them, when what we really have is opinions about canon lurking behind them, or just a jumbling-together of popular ideas, despite the complexity of the existing texts.

Things get a lot messier when it comes to the First Age, especially the early (pre-rebellion) and late (post-Turin) portions: the former because Tolkien decided in the late 50s on a massive cosmological upheaval, and the latter because he just never got around to it.

Agreed in general, although I would add that (I think) Tolkien decided to embrace the old concepts as mostly Mannish ideas, and "upheave them" by peppering in Western Elvish contradictions.

But would we be arguing First Age canon if Tolkien had finished and published his Silmarillion?