Galadriel's Family??

[Vanye]

OK! Galadriel's father is Finarfin & her mother is Earwen: am I right so far?? Huh? Now, how many brothers does she have? & (for 5 thousand $ what are their names)?? I have found 2 different family trees for this family in books & on the internet. In the first version she has 4 brothers (Finrod, Orodreth, Angrod & Aegnor) & in the next generation Fiduilas is Orodreth's daughter. Also in this version Fingon (who is Galadriel & her sibs cousin), is Fingolfin's son & Gil Galad is his(Fingon's) son. Are you w/ me so far?
The other version has Galadriel w/only 3 brothers, Orodreth is not listed as her brother but rather as her nephew (Angrod's son). & the in the next generation down the line we have Orodreth's children listed as Finduilas & (you guessed it) Gil Galad!! You didn't guess it ? Anyway, This is called by many an error by CT in HoMe & many have weighed in on it so I thought I'd throw it out there as a topic for the chat room this weekend & I thought I'd give a heads-up so you can round up all of your evidence & polish your arguments! That would make Galadriel, Gil Galad's grandma & Arwen's Cousin. Then, of course I think that all of them are cousin's!! All of you debaters get ready for this one! Vanye
P.S. : In case you haven't guessed--I am also into Genealogy!

[Fredeghar Wayfarer]

According to the Encyclopedia of Arda (http://www.glyphweb.com/arda/default.htm), Galadriel is the daughter of Finarfin and Earwen. Her siblings are Finrod, Oredreth, Angrod, and Aegnor. That site's usually pretty accurate so I'm guessing any other versions out there are just earlier drafts Tolkien went through in the process of fine-tuning his mythology. Maybe they're from The Book of Lost Tales or The History of Middle-earth series and were never corrected.

Anyway, this much I know for sure: Galadriel is Arwen's grandmother, not cousin. Galadriel and Celeborn had Celebrian who married Elrond and had Arwen, Elladan, and Elrohir. And of course, Arwen married Aragorn and had Eldarion, Galadriel's great-grandson....

(I feel like I'm reciting biblical verse. So-and-so begat so-and-so, who begat.... )

[Fanuidhol]

I'm sorry Vanye, but there is nothing to debate.
Vanye wrote:
"This is called by many an error by CT in HoMe".

C. Tolkien admitted that he made an error in The Silmarillion.

tolkien.slimy.com/faq/Creatures.html#Gilgalad

"Who was Gil-galad's father?
The Silmarillion states many times that Gil-galad was the son of Fingon, son of Fingolfin. However, in The Peoples of Middle-earth (in comments on the essay "The Shibboleth of Feanor"), Christopher Tolkien explains that this was an editorial error due to the complexity of the source material: 'Gil-galad as the son of Fingon... was an ephemeral idea.'
Tolkien changed his mind about Gil-galad's ancestry several times, but it seems that his latest decision was to make Gil-galad the son of Orodreth, son of Angrod, son of Finarfin (making him the brother of Finduilas and nephew of Finrod). Christopher says that 'There can be no doubt that this was my father's last word on the subject', but that because the change was never incorporated into other texts,
'it was obviously impossible to introduce it into the published Silmarillion. It would nonetheless have been very much better to have left Gil-galad's parentage obscure.'
Whether one agrees with that assessment or not, it is at least clear that The Silmarillion is not entirely trustworthy here."

When I found out that The Silmarillion wasn't entirely written by JRR Tolkien with only minor editorial changes by Christopher, I was very disappointed. I have since gotten over that and realize that without Christopher ever making the attempt and doing the best he could, The Silmarillion would never have seen the light of day.
Thanks,
Fan