The Illumination of Underground Cities of the Dwemer

"From fire, life; from light, magic." Raelys Anine, Ayleid Reference Text

I posted a thread about the illumination of the Dwemer cities, it was something small and I got the necessary input. Had a lot of time to think about it since then and here I am.

So the "world" is created by the "gods". They used their powers to do it, which means everything in the "universe" is magical. To start with, magicka, or creatia as some name it, is the very essence of creation, and takes place in literally everything, even in a wooden spoon. This process can be reversed to obtain magicka, which means destroying the spoon to obtain it. So, people can regenerate magicka from just about anything, but it would never be as effective as directly obtaining the magicka left behind by the creators. Magnus, when he decided to leave the creation, left behind some of his magicka (intentionally or not), and a hole/portal to Aetherius, from which magicka seeps into the creation. These two are the main source of magicka for mortals. They absorb the magicka and fill their reserves, a process known as regeneration. Combining these two with some common sense, we can say that the easiest way to regenerate magicka is, simply, exposure to sunlight.

Living underground in giant cities that were built by digging into mountains, illumination should have been a real problem for the Dwemer, not to mention regeneration of magicka. They couldn't have used only fire to lit the whole cities like they are. Soul gems wouldn't be cost effective. They can't have used their own magicka reserves for that either.

The answer is simple: they used sunlight. What other source to use than the sun that illuminates Nirn? They could have added some mirrors and lenses, and their cities would get lit with the sunrise. But with the intelligence of the Dwemer, why limit yourself day and night? Why not collect sunlight, and then send it to the city to illuminate wherever you want, whenever you want?

So the Dwemer, as expected, built Oculories (lets say orb mechanisms for now) which collected sunlight & starlight. They sent this light into their cities, illuminating their halls and corridors from the ceiling, and their small rooms via chandeliers. There are also the "Oculories", of which there are only 3, two in Skyrim, one in Stros M'kai. These three had other uses than just illumination as seen in Skyrim.

Now to game references. In Skyrim, you can see that the Dwemer ruins are lit too well to be done with fire. Strong light coming in from the ceilings, and at certain points, from chandeliers and wall lamps that dont use fire, but some powerful source of light. At this point, we can safely assume that all Dwemer cities had some sort of "orb mechanism" to collect sunlight, and by connecting it to a "grid", illuminate their cities. At least for the clans in Skyrim.

The Dwemer of Vvardenfell however, used a different method by storing the sunlight in specific gemstones that were placed in desired locations. These gems would also be connected into a grid, from which the collected light was pumped in, constantly recharging the gems. This method, is propably an older one since Dwemer cities in Skyrim are lit better than Vvardenfell ones. We don't see these yellow gems in the Skyrim cities, except for Blackreach, where a giant ball of the said gem or stone is turned into a chandelier. It doesn't provide too much illumination like the other light sources in Skyrim ruins, further supporting that it's an old method.

We also see similar light sources in Ayleid ruins, which seems pretty much the same with Vvardenfell cities, but with a blue glow instead of yellow. I haven't played Oblivion, so I'm not familiar with Ayleid ruins, so I'll need your inputs on this one.

Here are some in game images of the said light sources: http://imgur.com/a/Kz5q3