No problem. I read your objection and got a bit confused before realising that I hadn't clarified that I was talking specifically about dwarves.

I'm rereading The Hobbit at the moment, and every so often I get an 'aha!' moment when I come across a Silmarillion reference, and then I'm just awe-struck for a while that he managed to tie so much of his work together like that. (Though, he refers to Valinor as 'Faerie' in The Hobbit and it makes me giggle. Every. Time.)

I have heard that theory before. The only thing that really bothers me about it is: how the heck did it end up buried under a mountain? Other than that, yeah, there are definitely enough similarities to make it fic-fodder. The bad luck that seems to follow it around, definitely. Thror claims it, enter dragon; dragon lies on top of it, gets a hole in his jewellery-armour; Bilbo steals it, loses his friends and is dangled from a gate; Thorin makes a deal for it, dies. It's amazing nothing happens to Bard while he's holding on to it...