Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-35390117-20190228155950/@comment-1255618-20190413091058

I'm very impressed with your research OP! You even read the Seven Fights! :o  (I find them to be the most hilarious things ever.  And the Snow Whale and Dirtbird story is so cute. :3 )

I hope I'm able to illuminate some new insights for you!

I don't think Alduin being the "first-born" of Akatosh and also being Akatosh are contradictory, even though lots of fans seem to think it is.

This especially makes sense when one considers that all the dragons are in fact aspects of Akatosh (confirmed when Paarthurnax calls Akatosh "Bormah", which is to say "father"), Alduin being the most powerful aspect among the dragons as the "firstborn".

Personally speaking, I see Auriel as being the opposite of Alduin the "destroyer", Auriel being Akatosh in his "creator" aspect. Imperial vanilla Akatosh is more like a preserver aspect that balances the two. 'Aka-Tusk' seems like an archaic name for Akatosh but appears to be used when referring to him with both his preserver and destroyer functions. When "Aka" is used by itself (for example here), it seems to be the spirit of Time in all its aspects, including Auriel.

From top to bottom, I think the subgradient chain goes something like this:

>Anui-El (or Anuiel)

>>Aka (or "Time")

>>>Auriel (or Auri-El)

>>>Aka-Tusk (or Akatosh)

>>>>Akatosh (as embodied by the Dragonborns and worshiped in the Empire)

>>>>Alduin (or Ald)

>>>>Paarthunax

>>>>Alkosh?

>>>>Other dragons

This is all a bunch of guesswork, but what I'm trying to say is that trying to apply mortal rules of geneology to the god of time itself doesn't necessarily follow. So Alduin can be both Akatosh's son and Akatosh himself at the same time, because to Aka past, present, and future are the same thing.