Dwarf Beards???

[Turgon_Turambar]

In the hobbit tolkien describes the dwarfs to have many different coloured beards such as blue and yellow which to me stirps the dwarves of their gritty, manly reputation.
i thought all dwarves either had black or brown beards (accept for the old ones who had white beards)
Does anyone have any ideas?

[Bombadillo]

I don't remember reading that, but I'll take your word for it.

Maybe they were just stained rainbow by some type of sloppy foodand not washed in a very long time. Dennis Rodman dyes his heair with Kool-Aid I think, but he's not the best example of masculinity.

[Lizra]

In Middle Earth, dwarves with yellow and blue beards ARE gritty, and gruff! This is a fantasy world, remember! :) I think it would be boring if everything played out just the way we expected it. Dwarves are unusual beings....not your typical macho MEN. It's the things like that, in The Hobbit, which propell me with delight into Middle Earth. Green smoke rings hovering over a wizard's head, sassy trolls with talking pocket books, and certainly bluebearded dwarves with matching hoods and stockings! I like it! :)

[azalea]

Plus, I think yellow means a yellow shade of blond, and blue is a particular shade of grey (like the term "bluehairs"). Not like electric blue and neon yellow or anything.:)

[Ulmo]

Remember The Hobbit was not originally a part of the legendarium Tolkien had been working on as the Silmarillion. It was a kid's story.

[Wayfarer]

It's not unreasonable to think that dwarves could have had any color of hair that humans do (Brown, Black, Blonde, Red, Grey, Blue, White). It's also not unreasonable to suppose they might have died their beards, since they were very vain about their hair.

[Gwaimir Windgem]

Nor is it unreasonable to think that they might naturally have other hair or eye colours, especially considering that they were not in biologically descended from or related to Men.