Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-24.113.168.122-20130520103810/@comment-80.7.156.152-20140722071357

If I may leap in…



Looking at the lore, we can say that the Dragon Cult arrives in Skyrim with the Atmorans, and therefore we can also say that it must have had a profound effect on the development and earliest history of what would become Nordic culture. It seems feasible that for every settlement there would be an attached High Priest or similar, as well as a secular leader, moreover while under the subjugation of the Dragons themselves human settlements would have needed collaboration governments that perhaps were not so clearly aligned with their overlords as the priesthood. Furthermore the equivocation between the Animism of the Atmorans and the Eight Divines makes it feasible that some connection with the Dragon Cult was maintained, in a revisionist way, to supply the right to rule of the Jarls following the Dragon War. For example the Moot to elect the High King does echo the elections to appoint Dragon Preists.



As far as how that could have influenced the current layout of Skyrim’s regions, despite the similarity in numbers, it seems very unlikely. For one thing in the Reach there was a thriving, independent, and religiously distinct culture of Nedic descent, quite unrelated to the dragon-worshipping Nords. While undoubtedly they were themselves at one time or another under the dominion of the Dragons, these cultural differences make it unlikely that following the Dragon War they would retain any Draco-centric political system. Indeed the Reach as a formal part of Skyrim is a comparatively recent event, with the Reachmen being largely independent even during the first Empires.



Other holds also have non-dragon related histories; Winterhold is said to have been built by a mage, and was focussed around the College, sometime during the early first era, given that, any local Nord populations would likely have already done away with their priests by then. Though there would still be a need for governance, so there seems to be two Jarls raised, and presumably holds created, without reference to the Dragon Cult.



<p style="margin:12pt0cm;line-height:16.5pt;"><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"">Building on this, there is the relative sizes of the Holds. The major settlements; Whiterun, Windhelm, Riften, Solitude and Markarth certainly seem more likely to have been settled at or around the time in question. The other three (not including Winterhold, which I’ve covered) are noticeably smaller and lack the same feeling of age that the others have. It seems likely that these smaller settlements arose as a result of a division of lands. For example Dawnstar and the Pale, specifically it’s odd shape; which undercuts Winterhold and meets Eastmarch and Whiterun on the far side of some really very rough and sparsely populated areas. My money would be that the rising of Dawnstar and the creating of the hold would be related to some treaty between neighbouring Jarls; in an effort to limit the power of Winterhold, or to create a buffer between two militaristic Jarls in Whiterun and Windhelm. Similarly Solitude and Morthaal. Solitude sits in a position that commands both holds, despite the bulk of it’s attached land being north and east, around another piece of desolate land, whereas the enfeebled Morthaal sits on the edge of a frozen swamp, overshadowed by dragon haunted mountains and the ruins of Labyrinthian, It seems almost certain that Morthaal was at some point under the control of the Jarl of Solitude, and that some later event lead to its independence. Lastly Falkreath, though larger than Morthaal, and more fertile than the Pale, it never the less seems less fully Nordic than the central and eastern areas. Certainly for more than some of its history it has been counted as a border province of Cyrodil, and it is not clear when exactly it entered Skyrim, though it was definitely long after the downfall of the Dragons and their cult.

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<p style="margin:12pt0cm;line-height:16.5pt;"><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"">It seems therefore almost impossible that the nine Dragon Priests have a connection to the nine holds, although it is more possible that they had influence on the earliest traditions and offices of what would grow into the concept of Jarldom.

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<p style="margin:12pt0cm;line-height:16.5pt;"><span style="font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Helvetica","sans-serif"">Does that make sense?