User blog comment:High King Ithilion/New Map of Middle-earth!/@comment-25012056-20160624131630/@comment-26149161-20160624152627

But this cannot be mistaken, as it was written by Tolkien. It seems the base color is black, shadows cause the purple and blue, and snow makes the white. In the book, the White Mountains are referred to as "peaks of jet tipped with white."

Ithilion, Discussions Moderator (Auta i lome) 15:26, June 24, 2016 (UTC)