Dwemer - Deep Elf
Known colloquially as "Dwarves" in conflation with old Atmoran myth, the "Deep Elves" were a race of powerful artificers and architects whose language and culture defies understanding to this day. Though they mysteriously disappeared from the world in the early First Era in the events of the Battle at Red Mountain, their ruins continue to taunt explorers and adventurers from within the mountains of modern-day Skyrim, Hammerfell, and Morrowind. Their machines still defend and maintain their ancient fortresses, unburdened by the entropy of millennia, while lingering phantoms protect the secrets of their incredible technologies beyond even the grave.
Sometime in the middle Merethic Era, the Chimer settled the untamed surface of Resdayn. These "Changed Elves" fled religious position in the Summerset Isles for their worship of the Daedric Princes Azura, Mephala, and Boethia. Under the leadership of the prophet Veloth, this new civilization chose the most hostile and volcanic region of the continent in pursuit of their philosophy of betterment through adversity.
The Velothi disaspora was forced to seperate into smaller groups due to the limited resources of the land, founding villages or nomadic tribes. Late Chimer writing contends that the Dwemer first splintered from this group at this time, pursuing ideals of spiritual scientism over worship of any particular deity. With the estimated period of Velothi migration having a thousand-year margin for error, there is little scholars can do to support or disprove this alleged cultural connection. Early Velothi writing on the subject is almost nonexistent.
The fragile peace between the Chimer and the Dwemer was broken when it was discovered that among the Velothi population were bodies reanimated in the crude style of Dwemer slaves, rather than the sanctified and honorable manner in which Chimeri ancestors serve their houses in death. Though they were scattered and maladapted to the land which surrounded them, the Chimer rose at once to war. Little is known about the conflict, but it appears to historians that the Chimer were miraculously victorious. Some evidence suggests that the Chimer allied with one faction of a Dwemer civil war, or that the "First Empire" had already been in decline.
After this conflict, the Dwemer retreated entirely underground. Their surface settlements, believed to have been mainly farming villages and slave baracks, were abandoned, as was the practice of necromancy. The age of the anarchy and mutual aid came to an end as these city-states grew insular, philosopher kings spawning unquestioned dynasties to assure its humiliated peoples of their unshakable walls.
Though the Chimer and Dwemer came into conflict many times throughout the Merethic Era, the Velothi were able to claim absolute dominion over the surface world, entering into a golden age of power and prosperity.
Resdayn's golden age came to a brutal end in 1E 240, when the Nordic King Vrage led an invasion of the country. The warchiefs of neighboring Skyrim had grown in power and influence in the centuries after their triumph over the Dragons. Their territory stretched from the Bjoulsae River at the mouth of the Iliac Bay in the West, in their conquest of Resdayn, they reached the Eastern edge of the continent. Though never contemporarily regarded as such, this powerful civilization is remembered as the Empire of the Nords.
While the Chimer on the surface were subjugated, the Dwemer endured the incursion as a seige. In the centuries since the Velothi conflict, they had learned to create powerful war machines. The Dwemer filled their halls with these machines to keep the barbarian armies occupied while their populations retreated through teleportation to the island stronghold of Vvardenfell. Meanwhile, the heads of the more powerful Houses of the Chimer fled to the island as well, a government in exile while their countrymen languished under foreign occupation. Because of this strategy, the island became a fortress against Nordic aggression. However, Nord Tongues were powerful users of the Thu'um. Armed with this dragon magic, they shouted down any counter-offensive the dwarves could muster. The occupation lasted nearly two-hundred years with neither Chimer nor Dwemer able to break the hold the foreign humans had on their territory.
Not all were in favor of the alliance with the Chimer. Rourken, head of a wealthy and powerful clan of the Dwemer, refused to participate in the battle and did not recognize the authority of the low-born King. Soon after their victory, the Rourken Clan left Resdayn. Legend contends that Rourken swung his warhammer Volendrung and threw it over the horizon, vowing to start his kingdom where it landed. In the year 420, his people arrived in the arid land they called Volenfell, known today as Hammerfell, quickly establishing their dominance over the indigeonous peoples of the land.
Though their numbers were few, the Rourken Dwarves were ambitious and adaptable. They spread out throughout the region in small groups, founding strongholds of ostentatious scale and industrial purpose, intending to profit off the untapped resources deep below the sparsely populated desert landscape. Although born into the volcanic world of Resdayn, they found the supernatural heat of the Alik'r deleterious to their machines. To compensate, they incorporated desert glass into the chassis of their animunculi, lowering their weight and providing insulation. As a result, Rourken animunculi came in a striking variety of colors and designs.
Rourken strongholds were comparatively less decorated. Rather than the chaotic ad-hoc machinery of the old cities, Rourken architecture utilizes dark stone, vast, open chambers, and simple, mathematically precise adornments. Hidden behind their walls were simple but reliable heatsinks which cooled their above-ground structures during the hot days, and passively radiated heat throughout the freezing nights. These hidden systems were maintained by durable mechanical Scarabs.
Compared to the twisting haunted corridors of Dwemer ruins in Morrowind, or the meticulously deadly fortresses in Skyrim, the ruins of the Rourken Clan are relatively safe for adventurers. As a result, many have been thoroughly looted, studied, or repurposed in the eras since the Dwarves' disappearance. Rourken science and technology have been studied for centuries, leading to the adapoption of technologies far beyond the scope of contemporary science, such as Airships which were in use by the Empires of Man as early as the Reman Dynasty. Though early and careless looters have largely depleted this valuable resource, still-functioning Dwemer automata and devices can be found in the private collections of the wealthy throughout Tamriel.
The prosperity of the First Council did little to dissuade the discontentment of more traditionalist Dwemer, particularly those whose holdings had been abandoned during the two hundred year occupation. A new movement was led by the patriarch of Clan Kagren, who felt a burning need to avenge their humiliation. Rather than rely on the fickle friendships of lesser races, Kagren sought to seize the opportunity of their victory to assert dominance over the surface world. His movement grew rapidly despite King Dumac's steadfast commitment to the alliance.
The Chimer had fought alone for the bulk of the war and were weak, while the Dwemer were at the strongest they've been in over a millennium. Attempting to force a conflict, Kagren's faction attacked the Chimer. However, this move was anticipated by the Dwarf-King, who led his own forces to defend their allies.
Lord Kagren was slain in the battle. His clan holdings were dissolved and those loyal to him were banished from Resdayn. The fallen clan followed in the footsteps of the Rourken, staying together and founding the city of Arkngthamz deep in the Reach in western Skyrim. The city-state thrived in this new land. The Kagren elves expertly played the feuding surface-folk off of eachother, trading ingots and gemstones to all sides of multiple conflicts in exchange for necessary goods to jumpstart a new civilization. The Reachfolk, the Orcs, the feuding Nord Kingdoms, and the desperate Falmer were all eager to make a deal.
In time, Clan Kagren's holdings spread across the west, while three other Dwemer states were founded across Skyrim's numerous mountains by other clans who came to see the wisdom of Lord Kagren's sacrifice. Once established in the region, the Dwarves proved to be intractable to the Nords, who quickly recognized the threat of their ancient enemy colonizing their lands. Numerous wars and skirmashes were fought over the following centuries, never quite able to oust the invading dwarves.
The architecture of Kagrenite cities stand in contrast to both the unplanned assemblies of the east as well as the spartan and practical palace-factories of the west. Skyrim's dwarves planned their cities from the ground up to reflect their station, with statues and busts adorning every corner with the idealized self-image of its people. Their surface structures are made of thick stone, each a defensible fortress guarding the true cities below the ground. Each subterranian complex is a labarynth of traps and quickly deployable automata ready to defend their masters in the event of a seige.
The most valuable discovery of the Kagrenite city-states was Blackreach, a vast subterranean realm far beneath Skyrim. This incredible hidden world had already been used by the fel creatures of the land for millennia, with numerous vampire clans staking out territory already. It hosted plants and fungi with powerful alchemical properties, the only known natural sources of soul gems, hidden artifacts from the beginning of time. Its immeasurable value inspired the four Kingdoms to unite in their efforts to colonize its depths, driving out or enslaving the monsters, undead, and dragons who called it home.
Dwarven machines proved to be vulnerable to the glowing spores which suffused the caverns of Blackreach.
The First Ones
The origin of the Dwemer remains unknown, with many scholars even doubting the dwarves themselves knew definitively where they come from. While their written language strongly resembles Aldmeri, their spoken language appears to have been created with little or no influences of existing structures. Very little Dwemer writings have been successfully translated. The few that have are late-Dwemer writings which were translated for the benefit of other elves. Early Dwemeri writing remains entirely untranslatable. It is known that the later Dwemer acknowledged the Aldmeri races as inferior cousins, and participated in the elven trade-network which excluded non-merish races. The Altmer assert that the Dwemer were another offshoot of their ancestors, assigning them as descendents of the ancestor-god Xarxes. This would make them cousins of the caste of Altmer who serve as beaurocrats and librarians in Summerset. To the ancient Chimer, ancestors of the Dark Elves, they were Great House Dwemer, considered as much a part of their own Velothi culture as the independent Telvanni mages or the tribal Ashlanders. This would make them an offshoot of the Chimer, or perhaps a seperate religious group that joined the Velothi in their exodus out of convenience. Divayth Fyr of House Telvanni, a living contemporary of the ancient dwarves, may have inferred one possible origin. In an intercepted letter to the Psyjic monks of Arteaum, Fyr alluded to the "First Ones", who supposedly awoke inside a cave in mythic times with no memory of their life before, save the image of a mighty Brass Titan burning in each of their minds. This letter spontaneously combusted before the Imperial spy who intercepted it could read further. A century after the fact, a recently dismissed palace archivist sold the report on this incident to a traveling historian. Numerous papers have been published ever since on the subject. Lord Fyr has refused to offer any further glimpses of his insights on the Dwemer, citing "professional respect" of his absent colleagues. To the knowledge of contemporary scholars, no further writings of Fyr's have ever since been intercepted.Resdayn and the Noocracy of Vvardenfell
Often referred to as the "First Empire Period", the early Dwemer appear to history to have been birthed from the pyroducts of Red Mountain itself, forming an anarchic civilization of ad-hoc city-states which spread throughout the land of Resdayn, known today as Morrowind. These cities appear to have been largely unplanned assemblies of workshops, wizards' towers, and communal housing. Over time, natural leaders arose in each city who settled disputes and allocated resources equitably. These Philosopher Kings guided their people in pursuit of unearthing the secrets of reality, incentivizing automation and slavery so that more time could be devoted to science. By the end of the Merethic Era, Dwemer Automata had grown sophisticated enough to supplant any need for physical laborors. Rather than freeing their workforce, however, the souls of captured people and animals were harvested to power these grusome machines at an industrial scale. Their bodies were raised using necromancy to serve instead as footsoldiers, or secreted back into tribal lands as spies and slavecatchers. This culture grew to its most powerful in the central isle of Vvardenfell, roughly translating from Dwemeri to "Place of Strong-Shield". Owing to some great discovery, these central Dwemer formed a confederation of mutual defense and pursuit of a unified mystery kept secret from outsiders.The Velothi War
Dumac and the First Council
The Hortator
In 1E 410, a young Dwemer warrior of low status and modest skill ventured beyond his island fortress. Against the wishes of his people, he activated a long-dormant teleport to the mainland. When he emerged, he found only a vestigial encampment beyond the walls of the abandoned city. After dispatching the soldiers, he traveled for a time, discovering that the Nords had been embroiled in a decades-long War of Succession in their homeland. Their grip over the outlying territories was slipping. The warrior returned home, but could not persuade his people to attempt taking back their home. Enraged, he returned to the mainland to begin a private crusade against the occupational force. In Dunmeri writings, this warrior is called Dumac, sometimes with the epithet Dwarf-Orc. Whether this alludes to his ancestry, or perhaps his caste is uncertain. However, he was considered for a time a hero of Resdayn for his actions in the coming years. In his travels, Dumac met a Chimer priest by the name of Indoril Nerevar who had encountered the same obstacles he had. While the Nords were at their weakest in two-hundred years, his people's spirit was also broken. The Houses of the Chimer had consolidated into six Great Houses, who were happy to maintain their holdings in Vvardenfell rather than risk going back to war. The mainlanders had largely accepted foreign rule, led by traitor Houses who enforced the will of the Warchief. Together, Dumac and Nerevar set out to find allies who could see the opportunity at hand. In time, the duo grew into a party of rebels. They were joined by:- Almalexia, a fierce warrior and granddaughter of an Ashlander Wise Woman who later took Nerevar as her husband.
- Vivec, an urchin who grew in the coming years as both a warrior and a renowned poet.
- Sil, a noble of the minor House Sotha who returned to Dwemereth after the war to become an apprentice of a tonal architect.
- Alandro Sul, an Ashlander tribesman whose sense of honor guided the party.
- Voryn, a minor councilmember of Great House Dagoth who served as the party's ambassador.
Volenfell
by Eugeny Kazantsev
Northern Conquest
War of the Crag
Naming Traditions
Feminine names
Bluthanch, Kamdida, Uurthehnchenthyalft
Masculine names
Anchard, Brazzefk, Bthuand, Cuuolec, Dalen-Zanchu, Dhark, Dumac, Duramac, Gharen, Ihlendam, Jnaggo, Kagrenac, Klathzgar, Klorgiic, Mhuvnak, Mithas, Mzulchond, Mzunchend, Nbthld, Nchylbar, Nchunak, Nevith, Radac, Razak, Rkungthunch, Sthovin
Family names
Bagarn, Kragen, Mezalf, Mzahnch, Rourken, Stungnthumz
Culture
Funerary and Memorial customs
Dwemer see the cosmos in cold, logical terms. Through their studies of the Dreamsleave, they have came to understand death as a mere recycling of souls, rejecting any idea of a true afterlife as more than the collective hallucinations of fading spectral egos.
Intent on improving upon the cosmic model, the souls of fallen Dwemer across Tamriel were captured in specialized containers by Mzualrazak, or "Mercy Technitians/Modulators". These death-priests are believed to have interred the dead in hidden catacombs within their ancestral city-states in Resdayn. Their souls were linked together in Dwemer Cantore, computational machines, where their fading minds were put to use pursuing the mysteries of their ancestors.
After their disappearance, these cantore fell into disrepair, causing dwarven spectres to manifest in the ruins. These spectres are typically insane, with every trace of their identity scrambled by their time in the machine and attacking intruders without provocation. Only a few intelligent ghosts have ever manifested this way. The last vestiges of a civilization persisting in undeath. They may occationally offer insight to a friendly adventurer, but never appear before scholars or anyone over-eager to learn their secrets.
Appearance
Dwemer had pale gray or blue skin with eyes in cool hues of blue, violet, green, or black. Like the later Dunmer, their sclera were often the same color as their pupils. They have naturally curly dark hair and stockier bodies than their more waifish cousins. Despite being referred to as "dwarves", they were often quite tall, typically ranging from 5 to 7 feet in height.Fashion
Dwemer men typically wore beards. Their hair was often elaborately braided or kept in lochs. Though it was just as often covered entirely by elaborate headgear. Both men and women adorned themselves in bronze, silver, and gold accessories including piercings, hair beads, and jewelry. Aesthetic sensibilities were often secondary to practical applications, or vociferous symbols of status. Even the poorest Dwemer wore at least some metal, a traditional symbol of their dominion over stone.Age
Dwemer had similar lifespans to other elves. They reached adulthood between 18 and 20 years old, and were considered young until their middle 100s. A typical Dwemer could expect to live up to 300 years old, with a lucky few reaching 500. Like the Telvanni, many Dwemer mages discovered the secret of prolonging their lives indefinitely, which did not spare them from the disappearance of their race.Language
Dwemeri is a dense and complex language. Their alphabet parallels other Aldmeri writing, but each symbol represents a nigh-unpronouncable combination of consonates. Centuries after their disappearance, few people understand how any given word is meant to be pronounced.Cultural Groups
Dwemerethi
The Dwarves of the homeland known today as Morrowind. Their cities were largely unplanned, built in an age of creative freedom in pursuit of their sacred quest for knowledge. Their machines and architecture were more primitive than their later offshoots. These elves were concerned first and foremost with uncovering the secrets of reality. A quest which appears to have destroyed their entire race.Rourken
Descended from a wealthy clan of Vvardenfel which profited immensely from housing the other Dwemer clans who fled the mainland during the 200-year Nord Occupation. Seeing little advantage to be had in the alliance of the First Council, Clan Rourken left for the western desert region known today as Hammerfell in search of wealth and power. They developed a fierce rivalry with the Aldmeri Direnni Hegemony to their north which seems to mirror the competitive culture of the Illiac Bay kingdoms today.Kagrenite
Followers of the teachings of the martyred Lord Kagren, who was forced to flee his ancestral holdings during the Nordic Occupation. After a failed attempt to incite war with the Chimer, Clan Kagren was banished from Dwemereth, settling instead in the mountains of Skyrim. While continuing to pursue the mysteries of the universe, the Kagrenite states were bastions of Dwemer supremacy, inflicting cruelty on the surface-dwellers. The Kagrenite Kingdoms enslaved the desperate Falmer using alchemy and tonal magics to transform them into deformed husks to serve their whims. With the discovery of a means to harness the rare substance Aetherium to create incredibly powerful artifacts, the four Kingdoms fell into civil war over this precious resource. Weakened by their greed, their Falmer slaves rose against them while the Nords laid seige to their complexes from the surface. Just as their collapse was imminent, the Kagrenite Dwarves disappeared alongside the rest of their race.Astronomy
Dwemer rejected the notion of "faith" altogether very early in their history. They came to understand all spiritual forces, from the Daedra to the afterlife, as quantifiable aspects of reality, with no more or less philisophical significance than the laws of gravity. They do not have a pantheon. However, Dwemer astronomers catalogued eight planets in the sky to which they ascribed motifs which may be recognizable to other belief systems:- NIRN - The "Gray Maybe". The planet on which the Dwemer were born. NIRN represents space and the sacred laws of reality. The Dwemer sought to escape from NIRN by reading its bones. NIRN is symbolized by the Scarab Beatle, a symbol which appears to have particular meaning to the Dwemer.
- AKHAT - Represents causality, and therefore is the cosmic font of all logic. It orbits alone. AKHAT is symbolized by intertwining Clockwork Gears.
- RKHET - Represents either knowledge or death. It is possible this is commentary on the certainty of death, but most scholars believe there is deeper meaning here. RKHET is symbolized by a Tablet marked with Interlocking Squares
- A Planet whose name is not recorded. It may indicate the ever-incomplete work of discovery.
- - MHARA - Orbits the unnamed planet. Represents geometry, which may connect it to the process of creation through tonal architecture. Its symbol is a Hypercube.
- JHUNAL - Represents discovery. If RKHET is to have knowledge, JHUNAL is the process by which knowledge is gained. Its symbol is a Tower.
- - THENDR - Orbits JHUNAL. Represents adaptation, or overcoming obstacles. Its symbol is a Waterwheel.
- KYNRT - Represents room, as in usable space to work, to grow, to breathe. Its symbol is a Cave Within a Mountain.
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