It is often said that Tolkien never finished the Silmarillion. It would perhaps be truer to say that Tolkien finished the Silmarillion several times; leaving a paper trail of mutually contradictory versions in his wake. Christopher Tolkien had to select material: the published Silmarillion can't, by definition, represent Tolkien's final intentions. Christopher didn't automatically regard the last thing his father wrote as authoritative: he went for the versions that were most polished, most finished, most consistent with the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings, or simply "best". And we know that not every word in the Silmarillion is exactly what Tolkien wrote: Christopher made amendments and added bridging passages to create a sense completion and consistency. That's what editors do. At some point between 1980 and 1983 Christopher decided that this had been a mistake and embarked on a thirteen year project to produce a scholarly edition of the exact words his father wrote, false starts and contradictions and crossings out and all.
We could, if we wanted to, say that the only canonical Middle-earth texts were the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings ("including appendices"): since these were the only works that Tolkien approved for publication during his lifetime. We could add -- I think most people implicitly do -- the Silmarillion and the Unfinished Tales, because they contain writings that Christopher Tolkien felt to be broadly consistent with what was already published. You can read the Silmarillion, the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings, in that order, with the Unfinished Tales as a kind of appendix, and feel that you have read a complete history of an imaginary world in various styles and from various points of view.
It would seem odd to say "the island of Tol Eressea is canonically England" (because that was Tolkien's idea in the very early Lost Tales manuscripts), or "Numenor canonically became the continent of America" (because Tolkien explored that idea in a very late "round earth" revision). But it would be equally odd to say that the story of Sam's daughter Eleanor becoming Arwen's hand-maiden was "apocryphal" or "part of my headcanon" because it occurs in an epilogue which Tolkien was persuaded (fairly reluctantly) to take out of Lord of the Rings. And I assume that no-one in their right mind would say that the magnificent ending of Beren and Luthien ("The quest is fulfilled; even now a Silmaril is in my hand!") was "only fan fiction" because it was one of the manuscripts that was published posthumously.
So perhaps, if we are talking about Tolkien, "the canon" had better refer to "what Tolkien actually wrote" (as opposed to what was invented by David Day, Iron Crown Enterprises, Peter Jackson or Amazon TV.)
But "canon" can too easily become a weapon to be wielded in fan disputes. It is not enough to like Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. Unless and until you jump over twelve heavily footnoted hurdles, you are a Dyson Airblade. (*).
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