Beards, gems, and forces of nature — white things figure predominantly in The Lord of the Rings, perhaps not so densely in The Hobbit. We should go to James Tauber’s Digital Tolkien Project… goodness! Check this out! the Project has done exactly what I was wondering! The word white appears 3.87 times per ten thousand words in The Hobbit but more than doubly that dense in the masterwork! The digital Tolkien Project is free to use, an incredible boon to Tolkien scholars. Thanks to James and his team!

• 1.007 over which his long white beard
• 1.031 on the step with a white beard
• 1.035 said Balin with the white beard.
• 1.046 and a white hood were hanging on the pegs,
• 2.027 when up came Gandalf very splendid on a white horse.
• 3.009 The only path was marked with white stones,
• 3.040 and the white light shone through it.
• 4.024 including a jolly sturdy little white fellow
• 4.035 that scattered piercing white sparks all among the goblins.
• 5.030 Thirty white horses on a red hill,
• 7.025 and wide stretches of short white sweet honey-smelling clover.
• 7.092 and in trotted four beautiful white ponies
• 7.093 One bore a white cloth embroidered at the edges
• 7.106 a splash of white on the floor came from the high moon,
• 7.116 green, blue, red, silver-grey, yellow, white;
• 7.133 There was an autumn-like mist white upon the ground
• 8.033 Suddenly on the path ahead appeared some white deer,
• 8.033 a hind and fawns as snowy white as the hart had been dark.
• 8.035 and the white deer that had appeared upon their path,
• 8.071 green and white gems
• 8.133 and white gems;
• 9.053 Through the mist that riseth white
• 10.045 The white oars dipped
• 12.096 was the great white gem,
• 13.009 there was a pale white glint,
• 13.019 the same white gleam had shone before him
• 13.019 of white radiance
• 13.037 and studded about the brim with white gems,
• 13.044 A white glimmer could be seen
• 14.023 his belly glittered white with sparkling fires of gems
• 14.024 white in the sudden dark under the moon.
• 14.025 It twisted the white fog into bending pillars
• 17.008 and white
• 18.053 and looking backward they saw a white sun
• 19.002 The white water flowing,
• 19.003 The moon is far whiter
• 19.006 to a great council of the white wizards,
• 19.010 in a white bed,