Legolas Greenleaf

Legolas (pronounced ) is a character in J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, featured in The Lord of the Rings. He is an Elf from the Woodland Realm and one of nine members of the Fellowship of the Ring.

Legolas was the son of Thranduil, King of the Woodland Realm of Northern Mirkwood, who appears as "the Elvenking" in The Hobbit. Thranduil ruled over the Silvan Elves or "Wood-elves" of Mirkwood.

Although he lived among the Silvan Elves, Legolas was strictly not one himself. His father Thranduil had originally come from Lindon; he and his son were actually Sindar, or "Grey Elves", called in the singular Sinda: "Sindarin" was their language. A small minority of Sindar (headed by Thranduil by the time of The Hobbit) ruled the predominantly Silvan Woodland Realm. Legolas' mother is never mentioned; the Elves of Mirkwood have no Queen at the time of "The Hobbit."

The realm's Sindar minority, who should have been more noble and wise than the Silvan Elves, went "native" at the end of the First Age. After Melkor was defeated and all of the grand Elf-kingdoms of Beleriand were destroyed, the Sindar returned to "a simpler time" in their culture. The realm of Lothlórien was similar to the Woodland Realm in that a community of Silvan Elves was ruled by a non-Silvan minority, namely Galadriel and Celeborn.