Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-67.142.181.22-20140102162021/@comment-14027812-20140102163146

Oh, gods. They say "Era" for the same reason that you can use magic; it's a fictional universe. An Era is a period of long lengths of time that started with an epic event and ended with an epic event. For example, the Third Era, the Era in which took place, began when Tiber Septim "united" all of Tamriel, and ended when the Oblivion Crisis was over.