fantasy & cannibalism

the decision to make wood elves in the elderscrolls (for the most part) cannibals who forgo consuming vegetation is an interesting one, but it begs the question:

how are the bosmer (wood elves) surviving?

the worst fact about cannibalism that everyone except biologists forget is that you will starve to death if you consume nothing but other people.

yes. STARVE.

why? because there's not enough nutritional value in human flesh. We're at the top of the food chain and the nutrients we need to fuel the engine of our bodies and keep it operating have to 1) pass through other creature's metabolisms and what they took from it in the chain of eating, and 2) if what little was left over has been already processed and used by the human body, there's not going to be much to gain from it. Forgive my extremely short and simplistic way of saying the higher up on the food chain a creature is, the less bang for your buck you'll get out of it in general: aka why mass meat production doesn't focus on farming apex predators, but instead creatures that consume low on the food chain, like grazing herbivores.

That's real life. You cannot live off of the flesh of other people, you will die of hunger(if the prions and diseases and other stuff don't get you first). Now, apply that to fantasy.

Moving on to elder scrolls

Bosmer are weird... they practice ritual cannibalism and the whole thing seems more spiritual (hence 'ritual') to tie them back to the essence of the plants that shelter them, rather than an essential part of their diet... maybe. It's a blurry mess. The 'green pact', the practice that forbids them from harming plant-matter means their diets are carnivorous. So...

Does this mean bosmer are obligate carnivores, ie: is their biology adapted so that they rely only on meat to give them sustenance (and thus can't derive it from plantlife or non-animals)?

if it doesn't mean their biology is 100% carnivorous and they are instead omnivores like humans, where are they getting their fibre, vitamin c, other stuff needed from plant-eating? Do they import it from outside valenwood where the green pact doesn't apply? That's extremely shaky ground to keep an entire civilization alive...

if the bosmer are obligate carnivores, and the practice of cannibalism came from pragmatism to not waste a resource they depend on to survive (meat), which seems to be what the lore implies, how are bosmer getting nutritional value from eating other people (aka, animals at the top of the food chain)? Not to mention if reliance on this meat is a common thing (again which the lore implies), how do their bodies deal with prion transmission? Do their bodies resist disease- OHMYGOD. THEY DO RESIST DISEASE, it's in morrowind, oblivion, and eso as one of their species stats.

'the green pact' isn't practiced by all bosmer but what does that mean when it comes to diet other than 'haha not all of us eat our enemies'. Are these bosmer also carnivorous?

i mean the boring answer is probably 'tee hee, they're omnivores, just like humans, duh', which opens up all the issues™ with the decision to make them so meat and cannibal oriented.

I don't know. there's so much to do here and everything's so vague and wishy washy.

Mostly I'm just frustrated with creators not knowing the one single most interesting and horrifying fact about cannibalism: it doesn't help anything.

Interesting find regarding the Church of the Deep

While trying to build an argument for Caitha possibly being a wife of Gwyn, I accidentally stumbled upon a little detail that I was not really expecting, but that puts a few things into perspective.

The description of Caitha's Chime claims that the Archbishop concealed its existence because it was considered anathema... however, that didn't seem to make much sense to me, as the one Archbishop mentioned in item descriptions is that of Carim, whom Morne became an apostle of. The thing is, Morne was first a follower of Caitha, and the clergy of Carim (which is part of the Way of White) was taught her miracles from him with little to no problem, so her chime being hidden seemed strange.

So I did something I've grown accustomed to doing because of my time trying to read into the lore of these games: consult the original text and see if there had been an oversight. I used this resource here to do it [x]. It features the Chinese (left), Japanese (middle), and English text from all three games, I recommend checking it out if you are curious about this stuff. Anyways...

In Japanese, the kanji used for the Archbishop of Carim is 大司教 (Daishikyō), which makes sense.

On the other hand, the Archbishop mentioned in the description of Caitha's Chime is 大主教 (Dai shukyō), which is the same kanji used every time the Archdeacons of the Deep are mentioned.

So that explains the apparent discrepancy! The one who concealed Caitha's Chime is one of the three Archdeacons of the Deep, not the Archbishop of Carim. This lines up with stuff we can see in-game as well. The Cathedral of the Deep seems to have been dedicated to Caitha at some point, as it prominently features statues of a weeping woman, with many of the ones found inside the building itself having been covered up by red cloth. One of them, found in the Chapel of Cleansing, was even hidden behind an altar that depicts the Deacons of the Deep, which clearly wasn't there before.

But then, how did the localizers miss this bit? Well, you see, both of those kanjis are extremely similar as you might have noticed... and that's because they both mean Archbishop! And here lies the discovery: 大司教, used for the Archbishop of Carim, refers to an Archbishop of the Catholic Church.

Meanwhile, 大主教, used for the Archdeacons of the Deep, refers to an Archbishop of other denominations, but mainly those of the Orthodox Church.

This revelation explains a few things about the Church of the Deep, like how it's both connected and separate from the Way of White, which according to the way its Archbishop is identified, is inspired by the Catholic Church... and I mean, the fact that Sulyvahn is literally the pope seals the deal for me. It might also help explain Aldrich potentially having a wife in Rosaria, and how he was allowed to have as many children as he did. From what I was told, Orthodox Priests can get married and have children after all.

Archdeacon Royce also genuinely looks the part. The Orthodox clergy is encouraged to grow out their beards, unlike most of the other Christian faiths.

Does this imply Aldrich had a big beard as well? Or perhaps, being the... messy eater that he is, it benefitted him to be shaved clean? I'll leave the pondering to you...

When I first shared this discovery with my friend @katyspersonal, who lives in an Orthodox country, she was quite surprised, but she almost immediately came around to the idea and even told me it fit Aldrich's vibe quite well... so yeah, I'm trusting her judgment on this one lol.

And there it is, a little detail that was understandably lost in translation, but that could shape our understanding of the Church of the Deep a little better.

🔫 chrysie. thursday. syllk.

(In reference to this post)

It's interesting you picked these three because they're some of my most underdeveloped characters XD And for good reason, in each individual case. But you asked, so you shall receive.

Chrysie There's not too much to say about her, unfortunately. She's a blatant self-insert (which I still get embarrassed about occasionally) and sometimes I draw her in place of myself when applicable. I purposefully didn't create her with much lore because I'd rather focus my efforts on developing my actual characters. So the only real lore I can provide is that she lives in a fairy colony in the mountains and helps gather resources for her village, while also exploring the area and interacting with various animals - and sometimes humans. Mountains are my happy place, so it's obvious why I went with that location :>

Thursday Hoo boy, how to explain this seagull child's history...I don't even know how you found him to begin with, since he's so far back on my art blog XD While Thursday's story has been on the back burner for a long time, he was actually my main focus when I created him back in high school. I was obsessed with birds at that age, especially birds that most people disliked or found annoying, so it all started when I thought to myself "What happens if bird + boy?" I eventually ended up piecing together this shred of a story about a journalist named Melissa who lives in a small coastal town and stumbles upon a so-called seagull boy (AKA a boy who both resembles and has the mannerisms of a seagull). It's revealed that the seagull boy has an injured wing, so Melissa helps nurse him back to health over the course of 2 weeks, while simultaneously nursing some of her own wounds and forming a sweet bond with the quirky son she never had. I was very intentional about making Thursday annoying and loud and messy, which explained why most beach-goers didn't enjoy his presence. Thursday purposefully remained underdeveloped because I wanted the story to be simple and focus on the main character's emotions/reactions more than any sort of backstory they arrived with. I also always imagined the story would best be told as a visual short story or comic, and one of my friends had planned to illustrate the script at some point, but plans changed and it didn't happen (which is totally understandable). Thursday's story still means a lot to me, especially since it was the first time I 'finished' planning out an entire story. I hope one day I might be able to see it come to life...but until then, I'll simply hold onto it.

Syllk Syllk (tiefling sorcerer) was my most recent dungeons and dragons character, before I ultimately left the campaign to prioritize mental health and other important stuff. She was a ton of fun to play! But much like Chrysie, she doesn't have too much lore. Syllk's whole gimmick was that she completely lost her memory and washed up on the shores of Candlekeep, where she met the rest of her companions. The only item on her person was a sealed book, which she believed would help restore her memories and locate her parents. My very first legit D&D character had been easy to play because he acted a lot like me - so this time I wanted to challenge myself to play a character on the complete opposite end of the spectrum. Which is exactly why I made Syllk to be sassy, morally gray, quick to anger, and overall just a little gremlin. Near the end of the campaign, Syllk unlocked her book and it led her to a strange laboratory...and there she faced off against a powerful mage, who claimed to have stolen her away from her parents and experimented on her. Syllk was so angry that she aided in killing the mage, but the anger faded once she realized she'd probably never be reunited with her parents. Thankfully, one of her party companions Karliah (tabaxi monk) had been inching closer to Syllk as a surrogate mother, so Syllk decided to stick with her for the time that followed.

I hope these answers are sufficient...I honestly don't know if I described 'lore' rather than just threw random info at you X'D Regardless, enjoy :>