Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-179.201.236.220-20130721175723/@comment-27913894-20160325153903

As far as I am aware, an individual with pure Elven blood does indeed have the potential to live for centuries, if not a millenium, assuming that said Elf was in good health and had good health practices to prevent an early death. Assuming that said Elf also had a good talent for magic, they could potentially use strong magic to extend their life. As for how long this extension is, I cannot say for sure.

Many people among the Elder Scrolls community debate whether an Elf lives for either a few centuries or over a millenium. While I cannot be certain as to which is really true, I do believe it's fairly safe to assume that an average Mer's lifespan can range anywhere between the two estimated lifespans.

Now, as for which subspecies of Mer has the longest natural lifespan, this is indeed a difficult question. In general, if you hear, read, or discuss any particular Mer which happens to have an unusually long lifespan through any number of means, it is more often than not a Dunmer, and, in general, any member of the Elder Scrolls community would first think of the Dunmer, simply because there have been a very unusually large number of their kind who live for thousands of years.

However, this is not to say that the other subspecies of Mer are short-lived, because this is far from true. Aside from the Dunmer, their Altmer cousins in the Summerset Isles are also well known for their long lifespan, capable of surpassing a thousand years without magical assistance. Even more so, it is not unreasonable to think that the Dunmer would potentially have the longest natural lifespan, given that their race has had, quite arguably, more intervention from the divines, Aedra or Daedra, than any other race of mortals on Nirn.

As a matter of fact, it would also not be unreasonable to think that Daedric intervention would extend their lives. For instance, Molag Bal, the Daedric Lord who gave mortals the so-called 'gift' of Vampirism, gives those infected with the disease potentially infinite life. An excellent example of this is Serana, who, despite being classified as a Nord, who would thus die at a natural age of roughly seventy to ninety years for her race, is alive and well after being sealed away in her 'prison' for thousands of years, even going so far as to genuinely appear and act as though she is barely twenty years old.

To give you an idea of her age, and thus, the life-extending capabilities of Vampirism, Serana was locked away in, according to her wikia page on this site, the mid-late Second Era, in between the rule of the Reman and Septim Empires. Additionally, it's quite possible that she could've been alive for centuries before her sealing, since her exact date of birth is unknown. Due to her Vampirism, Serana has actually managed to live longer than a large majority of Elves on Nirn, which in itself is a feat almost completely unheard of for any race of Men under any circumstances, given a few exceptions which I shall not go into detail here for the sake of time contraints.

As for the near-extinct species of Falmer, more commonly known as Snow Elves, Knight-Paladin Gelebor is confirmed to be at least four thousand years old, according to his wikia page on this site. Whether this extension was from the use of Snow Elf magic, Auri-El's blessing, or some other source, we cannot definitively say for sure until we obtain more information.

Unfortunately, I do not have enough information nor proof to confirm whether or not the other subspecies of Mer, such as the Bosmer, Dwemer, Orsimer, etc have a similar lifespan, or even if they live longer or shorter. However, given they are indeed subspecies of Mer, and thus have pure Elven blood, it can be fairly safe to assume that they, at the very least, have a longer lifespan than any species of Man or Beast, living for at least a couple centuries. That is, of course, also assuming that an individual of these subspecies of Mer was also in good health and had good health practices to keep from meeting an early death.