On the Aedra, Their Origins, and Forms

The Aedra are spirits, a subset of the et’Ada. They are those spirits that gave themselves to Mundus.1 I want to give an overview of the subdivisions of this group of spirits. To do so, I will first examine their origin.

The et’Ada originated in the Beginning Place, they sprung up from the Interplay of two opposing forces, most often called Anu and Padomay. The “first” spirit was the Dragon also-known-as Aka, Time, and his existence allowed other spirits to come into being. He is said to be the soul of Anuiel, which is the soul of Anu2,3. Whether this is literally the case or just a title of rulership among the early spirits is unknown. However, the original Dragon was the most Anuic of spirits and his opposite, Lorkhan, was the most Padomaic4.

The spirits were, at this point, not yet divided into Aedra, Daedra and Magne Ge. They could, however, be categorized:

• Some spirits were anuic, others Padomaic5
• Some of the et’Ada were aetherial, others dwelled in Oblivion6
• Some of the et’Ada were “strong”, others less so7

This last distinction is the most important. We have almost no reports from the time before Mundus was created. This means that we know almost nothing about the society of the Aedra and Magna Ge before they became Aedra and Magna Ge. I assume that the organization of the spirits of Oblivion is not crucially different from the organization of spirits in general before Mundus was created. This may be a wrong assumption, since many of the spirits that would become the Aedra were aetherial spirits. I will elaborate on this later. If we apply the organization of Daedric society to all the Ada, we have several categories of spirits:

• A ruling class of the Strong, part of which are the Princes of Oblivion. Other strong spirits are Arkay, Y’ffre and Magnus. As the first spirit, the Dragon was probably also part of this “class”8.

• Weaker, yet independent spirits. The only known example would be the Demiprince Fa-Nuit-Hen mentioned in the first Sermon of the 36 Lessons of Vivec9.

• The countless Lesser Ada organized in Clans10. These are the Dremora, Matzken, Scamps, but also the Dragons11 and Jills, the Aurorans and Mnemoli. This category consists of numerous Ada given form and purpose by a shared collective identity, the Clan. They either bond with a Strong spirit in an Oath, or live independently.

• Special cases, spirits that are not independent, but do not belong to a Clan, i.e spirits that are still unique. Haskill12 is an example for this.

Just to reiterate, the subdivisions so far are Strong-Lesser; and among the Lesser: Clanbound-Unique and Oathbound-Independent.

Let’s talk about spirit physiology for a bit. We know for sure that spirits13 do14 not15 have16 one specific form17, but can rather take whatever form they please. Talking about their bodily functions would be pointless, except for the functions of the plane(t)s of the Strong. More on that later18. Let’s examine the components of the et’Ada, specifically the Strong Spirits:

• A Sphere; Each Strong Spirit is the God of something, be it Time, Sex, Love, or Death. The equivalent for the Lesser spirits are

  1. the Oath, granting them part of a Strong Spirit’s sphere19, among other things7; and
  2. the Clan, giving them purpose10.

• A Personality; The personalities of spirits are informed by their spheres, but distinct from them. Depending on their level of sentience, the Lesser Daedra may receive all of theirs from the Clan identity or have thoughts of their own. This is the Animus.

• A Body; A physical manifestation. Its form is arbitrary, but very likely to conform to the spirit’s sphere and character, or personal taste; Lesser Ada receive their form from their Clan.

• A Plane(t); This is what separates the Strong from the Lesser spirits.

The Strong spirits have these “special bodies”, manifestations of their power. Realms, entire worlds unto themselves. According to the Monomyth, these realms are “within” the respective Strong spirit. The Aurbis consists of nothing but these realms, some of which were built to resemble the Void without the Aurbis. This is the reason the Strong are important, they have plane(t)s for the weak to dwell in; and spheres the Lesser Ada can align with.

The et’Ada lived divided into Strong and Weak, Clans and others for most of the Untime of the Dawn. Then Lorkhan came along. He had an idea. He wanted to build something new. Many spirits followed him, Strong spirits, their hosts of servants and perhaps independent Clans, too. To find out what happened to all these et’Ada, let us examine the structure of Mundus and then try to find out which parts of which group of spirits went where.

Superficially, Mundus consists of Nirn, the Moons and the Eight. Now a little more detailed:

• There are living Ada on Nirn. Morihaus is an example, Dragons are another.

• Most inhabitants of the Mundus, however, are mortal. This includes animals, plant-life and the sentient races.

• There is also inanimate matter on Nirn, e.g dirt, mud, water, stone and ebony.

• Mortal beings have souls. These had to come from somewhere.

• Nirn is governed by laws of nature. These are called Earthbones. One of them is the Heartbone.

• Nirn has a beating Heart. It deserves special mention.

Let’s find out which part of which Aedroth went where; there are four groups of Aedra:

• Eight Aedra Eat the Dreamer withheld enough power to still remain plane(t)s independent from Nirn. They are the strongest of the Aedra, although they are not necessarily the strongest of the Strong spirits that followed Lorkhan. The Eight are “dead”, they asleep or comatose or whatever else you want to call spirits that once were active and powerful but are no longer. Of all the (regular) Aedra, the Eight are the most alive.

• Other et’Ada became the progenitors of the mortal races. They had children and died, because they had children. Or they noticed that they were dying and made offspring to “survive” in some way, if impersonally. Their divine souls split and became the souls of mortals. Species and races of mortals are the equivalent of the Clans of the Ada. The souls of mortals are pieces of the Animi of their spirit ancestors. This is creation, the splitting of the divine into the mortal. The Dwemeri practice of anti-creation is the reverse, building the divine by killing the mortal. Numidium is the racial God of the Dwemer, its Animus the sum of their souls; it is their Clan identity given physical form.

• Some of the Ada died even more completely. They became the Eartbones, the laws of nature. Y’ffre is called the “First Earthbone”, he is the strongest spirit to suffer this fate. Y’ffre’s sphere became, among other things, the forms of the Bosmer and the laws of the Green Pact. The Green Pact itself is an Oath bond – the Strong spirit Y’ffre grants the Bosmer a part of his sphere in exchange for servitude. All the inanimate matter of Nirn was once part of the bodies of Ada. Nirn is made of corpses.

• The last category is special. There is only one example. Lorkhan, who died even more thoroughly than the Earthbones. His heart was ripped out, his body became the dead Moons and he was torn asunder. This does not refer to him being split into the Moons. The Moons were once white, alive. Lorkhan had two plane(t)s when he lived. His body was torn asunder, his Heart became an Earthbone, his planes the moons, who knows where other parts went and his Animus, too, was torn apart. This is what makes him especially special. As outlined above, the souls of mortals are the Animi of their divine ancestors. The Animi of the Earthbones are defunct. Their fates are various. The Eight retain their Animi. They still have their own souls and personalities. Although these are warped by mortal belief and “asleep”, they are still whole. Except Aka. Aka’s Animus/mind is all over the place. And we all know Lorkhan’s Animus. We get to as it. Lorkhan’s Animus was torn into pieces. When these pieces are born into mortal men we call the resulting person Shezzarine.

Now, some remaining questions:

What are avatars?

An avatar is a physical manifestation of a Strong spirit. What we see of Sheogorath and Jygallag in the Shivering Isles storyline are avatars. The Sheogorath we meet in Skyrim is an avatar. So are these guys.

What are dragons?

Lesser Ada that survived on Nirn. They share thoughts and form, both given by their Clan and their allegiance to the Dragon.

What is Morihaus?

A lesser Ada, surviving trough much of history. He was Oathbound to Kyne. It is unknown wether he was unique or the last surviving member of his Clan.

You got sources for all of that?

Yep, here:

[Work in progress]