Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-8248675-20140104003507/@comment-13446185-20140105204942

Octo8 wrote: This is established canon. As per Notes on Racial Phylogeny and Biology, race is inherited through the mother, and only through the mother. In addition, some traits may also be inherited from the father, so for example the son of an Altmer mother and a Bosmer father would be a Bosmer but maybe a bit smaller than Altmer average. That is how the Bretons came to pass: They are in fact human, but with some traits inherited from the Altmer. Same, the other way round, for the Bosmer. So how hybrid races can come to pass is well attested. But there are no classical half-elves as can be found in many other fantasy settings.

As for Jagar Tharn, that was in Arena, before most lore was established. By now this mechanism is in fact established canon, and I'm not sure what there is to argue about. "Khosey, in his 'Tamrilean Tractates,' transcribes a firsthand account of the "discovery" of the Bretons by a Nordic hunting party. The Bretons, in ten generations of Elven intermingling and slavery, had become scarcely recognizable as humans. Indeed, the hunting party attacked them thinking they were some new strain of Aldmeri, halting their slaughter only when one of the oldest began to wail for his life, a shrieking plea that was spoken in broken Nordic."

-Pocket Guide to the Empire, First Edition: High Rock

The first Bretons were barely recognizable as humans. I doubt it was the female elves that "reproduced", with their human slaves.