Timeline of Tamriel - pt. 2 Late Merethic

Timeline of Tamriel - Merethica Finum

By Morillius Agoricci, 4E 204 Written for the Imperial Council of Emperor Motierre

Just as Falmeri and Dovah culture rose, so did High Velothi culture fall with the great Prophet’s death. The people of Resdayn retreated to their pointed bamboo houses amongst the ash, where they practiced High Magicks of death and magma.

But it was in the frozen lands to the west that held the more interesting events of the Late Merethic. For the Falmeri people and the Dovah had learned to co-existed, and the arrival of a new people on these frigid shores heralded the dawn of a new Era.

It was around the time of Veloth’s death that the cities of Farrun and Sutch were founded (then known as Fjavkvujn and Sjuvkutch.) They were founded as tiny villages on the edge of their respective Merish Empires.

The Chimer reported sightings of ‘strange, bearded Mer, with ears flat and eyes round. They are clearly as stupid as they appear and should be treated as the vermin they are.’

These weren’t the only colonization attempts of the men however. It wasn’t long before Jehanna, Kynesgrove, Cormaris and Anvil had all been founded, (known respectively as Jehkjarnra, Kjynsgorov Kjaldmaris and Andvjild.)

As fair Atmora to the north froze in its own river of time, the people of the Northern Continent ventured in droves to Skyrim (known then as ‘Mereth,’ not five-hundred years after the founding of the first great cities.

One of these first settlers was Ysgramor, this short children’s story from around the same time sheds light on the situation:

> When Ysgamor arrived at Hsaarik’s head, he met a Mer called Vorial, who taught the principals of Merish learning and language. Ysgramor was thankful for the Mer, who betrayed Ysgramor and readied his snowy sharp-ears for battle. Ysgramor was unknowing of this, so he built the great city Saarthal, but Vorial’s army struck with such ferocity that Saarthal was buried under a flood of blood and tears. This, children, is why all Mer must be killed as soon as you taste their pointy ears with your noses.

For now, Saarthal is eternally showered by fire through time, and every time the wheel turns, the spokes that point to this lonely ruin burn again.

This text is interesting, as it sheds insight into the culture of the Proto-Nords, and of course is mildly entertaining in that Nedes had no word for the verb ‘smell,’ using instead, perhaps rather peculiarly; ‘Taste with your Noses.’

It was during the Night of Tears that the eternal war between Stasis and Chaos restarted between Man and Mer. It was but ten years later that Ysgramor left the frozen Kings of Vjiknigorrd and Vkildjiskr with his five-hundred great Companions under the many heads of Shor.

They returned ‘pon Hsaarik with their Battle-Axes held wide and their Swords of Great virtue, and they shouted the Falmer off the cliffs, before descending into the green canyons of Saarthal.

And as the snow-berry blood of the Falmeri spilled across the ground, the canyons did freeze, before all of the Snow-Elves were gone, and the Nedes had been victorious. It was after this that Ysgramor ventured deep into the land of Mereth, and carried their largest Galleon on their hoary shoulders, before dropping it by the Skyforge, a forge built by the Gods themselves. The Companions constructed a great Meadhouse out of this Galleon, and then Ysgramor sent out his finest to the furthest corners of the land. The Companions founded four great cities in this new land; Haafingar (City of Stuhn,) Hjonrich (City of Mara,) Yorrgreim (city of Tsun,) and Hsaarikhjhuld (City of Jhunal.) Ysgramor’s Grandson was named Prophet of Jhunal, and was made Jarl of Winterhold. This Prophet set about mapping Mereth and noting the locations he found. He named Hjaalmarch after Hjaal the Unfortunate, his strange, clumsy brother. He named the Reach for its great distance from Winterhold.

He named Haafingar after Haafin the Flawless, his sister, with whom it is rumoured he partook in an incestuous relationship with.

The final place that he named was called Dawnstar, for it was this plain of pale green grass that was the site of the rising star of Pelin-Al, and in this pale bay he built his home, named Heljaarken after his young child. This location has been the site of many manor houses over the next 5,000 years.

All of these cities, save Dawnstar, had their names changed by the coming of the Reman Empire to more Imperial sounding names, respectively; Solitude, Riften, Windhelm and Winterhold.

A number of other cities and settlements sprung up in this time, such as Jorrvaskr (Whiterun,) Fjalk’s Wreath (Falkreath,) Mjorra’s Thrall (Morthal) and Ivar’s Steading (Ivarstead.)

Hundreds of tiny hamlets also sprung up across Mereth’s central green plains, like Rorik’s Steading, Halt’s Stream, Ygraldjol, Dust-Man’s Steading, the Grey Moor, Hamvir’s Steading, and many more. Most of these villages’ only legacies are the tombs made for their warrior-leaders.

It was the eastern stretches of these plains that Jorrvaskr grew. Whiterun grew around the Meadhall like a flowering orchid, the Longhouse of Shor constructed from the wood of the Bone-Trees, colossal white pines now long extinct in Tamriel.

Whiterun’s main focus back then was the White Bridge, a large stone bridge that crossed the White River on which Whiterun lay. Jorrvaskr and her Longhouse lay on the bluff, overlooking the river to the east. According to historians, a great flood destroyed most of the town, which was instead rebuilt upon the bluff.

It was on this bluff, beneath the Longhouse and next to Jorvaskr, a tree was planted. The tree was dubbed ‘Gildr’s Green,’ and became a symbol of Kyne. By the last century of the Merethic, the central plains of Whiterun Hold were packed with villages, hamlets and towns, but only in the east. In the west were the vast Bone-Pine woodlands, from which the great Nordic infrastructure was founded.

The next decade saw the complete and utter removal of the Bone-Pines, and all of Mereth became a paradise with wood to spare. It was truly an Empire founded on raw rock and wood. However, this prosperity did not last. Soon enough, every last tree was laid down, and Fjalk’s Wreath became a new trading capital based on the strong Bone-Wood.

A close cousin of the Bone-Pine is the Iron-Pine, one of the most common trees in Mereth. The Iron-Pine is almost as strong as the Bone-Pine, but it doesn’t last indefinitely like its cousin. If you go to Whiterun today, most wood is recycled Bone-Pine, torn from ancient ruins and crumbling farmsteads, with their frames still very much intact.

Fjalk’s Wreath was a different story however, and was more a sad tale. Fjalk’s Wreath was founded by Gridgeir the Untimely, who named his eldest son Brodgeir, who named his son Gjildgeir, and so on, using the suffix of ‘Geir.’

Gridgeir Fjalk-Wulf founded his town on the hopes of a successful trading post, but that idea died with him when the Shriek-Wind clan came and took the then budding village. It wasn’t long before his son; Brodgeir overthrew them, but the casualties were so great, that the cemetery constructed was twice as large as the town itself.

Hjonrich was built by a crazed old woman called Drabbi Witch-Lake, who enchanted the thick, subtropical trees of the Rift to break into pieces, and build bridges across the lake. The exertion killed her of cause, but her hundred followers built their fish-huts from stone by these bridges, and they named their town ‘Hjornrich,’ which means ‘Lake witch.’
Haafingar was built, probably rather stupidly, by Folgunthr the Unwieldy on top of a great stone archway. He built it there to show ‘the power of the Nedic people,’ and how he could build a city with only ten men in ‘Great Solitude and Isolation.’

They… miraculously succeeded, and built a quite successful kingdom, named Haafin’s Helm, after Haafin the Flawless.

Whispers of a wandering knight, in armour made of metal (an unbelievable sight in those times,) began circling around this time. For he was Pelin-Al, bane of Mer and chosen of Lorkhan.

He founded many Kingdoms, that were inevitably abandoned after mere decades. Examples of these Kingdoms include Rhabajis, a bizarre Nedic city, founded on principals of Insect worship and slaughter of the ‘imitators,’ strange insect-like Mer who lived in their sodden mountains.

Rhabajis was abandoned within the next fifty years, and Pelin-Al moved on to the lands of the Ayleid, his nemesis. In the far north-east of these Heartlands, he met Cheydin of Velothi, a Nedic Prophet of Kyne, who helped him found his next Kingdom. This new kingdom was Cheydin’s Halls, founded on a city of beauty and prosperity, which was soon abandoned by Pelin-Al, but not by Cheydin, who kept the Kingdom prosperous as Cheydinhal, hidden by Kyne’s Magicks from the curses of the Ayleid.

To the south east, the people of the Hist lands stayed quiet ‘mongst their fetid swamps, till the Chimeri people, in their rage for the death of their Prophet, began capturing the lizard people, and chained and bound them, and the Argonian people were to forever lust for revenge.

Elsewhere in Tamriel, however things were different, for during the Early Merethic, the Bosmeri people were founded from the Ooze and Chaos of the Dawn Era, and they had made a vow to Y’ffre, to ne’er harm the forest.

Their great leader was Camoran, and he rooted the Elden cities, and connected them by root. Camoran taught his people to Dance with the music of Reality, to bend it to their will, and taught them to live by the Tone of the forest.

Camoran was born in the last two-hundred years of the Merethic Era, when the second Inventive Revolution began in Elsweyr.

It was Khiraja Blackened-Blood, a Khajiiti mage, who invented the first magickal staves to be used for the common mage. It was this revolutionary invention that led to wars between the Bosmeri and the Khajiti.

Khiraja also invented the modern day Alchemical processes, as well as the founding of the first Magickal schools, respectively; Chaos Magic, Stasis Magic and Shadow Magic. Destruction and Alteration falls under Chaos, Restoration falls under Stasis, and Mysticism, Illusion and Conjuration fall under Shadow.

But the most notable event took place over the last two centuries of the Merethic Era, three hundred years after the settling of Mereth. At this time, the Nedes continued their worship of Dragons, which culminated in a colossal war over the next few years. Towards the end, the corrupted version of Akatosh – Al-Du-In, was banished from time. Two years after the end of the War, King Camoran declared the first year of the First Era, and the toddler years of Tamriel were over.

In the next volume we’ll cover the slow rise of High Nordic culture in northern Tamriel, as well as the Alessian slave rebellion, that laid the foundations for modern day Tamriel.