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Lore'd to Death
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Lore'd to Death
The Falmer and the Dwemer [The Elder Scrolls]
Today we dive into the world of Elder Scrolls to answer the question of what happened to the Falmer and Dwemer, and how were they related? The history of the Elves in the Elder Scrolls is always a roller coaster, so join me on this journey while I read every book from Skyrim to try to figure it out.
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Hey there, welcome to the Lore’d to Death podcast– a deep dive into the lore of your favourite games, movies, shows, and more! My name is Brett, and today I feel like reminiscing over one of my favourite games, Skyrim. More specifically, I want to talk about something that I don’t think a lot of people know about, despite having played the game. That is the history of the Falmer, known also as the snow elves, and the Dwemer, or the deep elves and the bloody history between the two.
There’s a reason I haven’t touched the Elder Scrolls IP up until this point, and that’s because it’s a very daunting prospect. There’s so much lore that Bethesda puts into their games that it’s almost overwhelming. Granted, at this point, I’ve talked about Fallout numerous times, but the Elder Scrolls is an entirely different beast. One that’s not really rooted in our world, and therefore is a bit more of a challenge to tackle. That being said, I’m going to do my best as always. And just one more thing before I start, there are going to be no spoilers for the games in this episode. As far as I’m concerned, all of the information that I’m getting on the Falmer and Dwemer comes from various books across the series, mostly in Skyrim, and has nothing to do with the story whatsoever. That might feel like a bit of a moot point to make, but I always do appreciate a spoiler warning, even if it’s just to make sure that I’m safe to listen to certain episodes. So without further rambling, let’s start by talking about the Falmer.
I mentioned this at the top of the episode, but the Falmer are also known as the snow elves or ice elves. You’ll notice that all elves in the Elder Scrolls have “Mer” at the end of their names, and that’s because Mer is the collective term that describes all elves in Tamriel. The prefix to Mer is a descriptor of a specific group of Elves. So in this case, Fal would mean snow or frost, and Mer would mean Elf. And the Falmer were a group of proud Elves with a strong, wealthy and prosperous culture that would rival the Altmer, or high elves.
Evidence of their prosperity was the Chantry of Auri-El that the Falmer created, which was a vast series of temples located across the Forgotten Vale– a deep glacial valley. The chantry was massive and lavish, as you would expect of a shrine to Auri-El, the chief in the Elven pantheon, and was the epicentre of Falmer religion. There were other temples that the Flamer created to other deities, but none were as grand as this one. Within the chantry were many Wayshrines, which were built and infused with Falmer magic to act as teleportation devices. From Knight-Paladin Gelebor, we learn that the Falmer were capable of great magic. It’s said that the Snow Prince was able to make ice and snow churn around himself as if it came from within him which extended to the other Falmer, who had an affinity for ice magic.
Many Falmer would make a pilgrimage to the Chantry of Auri-El, and many would not survive that pilgrimage as it was not only soul crushing, but physically demanding as the elements of the Forgotten Vale were harsh. Many would die on these pilgrimages, but that stood as a testament to their loyalty and faith to Auri-El. However there were also plenty who would start the path and turn around shortly thereafter, realising the danger that it posed, causing them great shame.
But we didn’t come here to talk about one temple, we came to talk about the history of the Falmer. I just thought it was worthwhile to mention the temple, as it was a testament to who they were as a race, which is going to make a sad story of their history. And speaking of their history, just like many elves, we don’t know exactly when or where they first settled, just that they were there one day. The first records of the Falmer come from the Nords who came from Atmora, the aptly named Atmorans, who wrote about the Falmer when they settled in Skyrim. The two races were said to have lived alongside one another in peace for a period of time which was beneficial to both races.
Becoming more prosperous as a result of this connection, the Atmorans built the city of Saarthal which served as their capital under their leader and founder, Ysgramor. This made the Falmer fearful, understandably, as the Nords began to settle in Skyrim and get closer and closer to their land, which the Nords claimed was theirs by birthright. This is a pretty common theme for the Nords, to immigrate and then start staking their claim to various lands under false pretences. And so, this weakened their relationship with the Falmer who, eventually, began to fear that the Nords would declare a colonial war on them. So, they did what they thought was best and decided to make a preemptive strike against Saarthal, and razed the city to the ground in what would be known as the Night of Tears. The only Atmorans who were known to have escaped were Ysgramor and his two sons.
It seems like a bit much to raze a city to the ground over the fear of being driven out of your own lands when nothing had happened to that effect yet, no? Correct. There was some speculation that the Night of Tears was not only about territory, but about power. The Nords were said to have found an item, the Eye of Magnus, and were trying to keep it hidden from the Falmer. As soon as they caught wind of the object, they desired it for themselves. It’s said by some that this was the sole reason for the attack, and that territory had nothing to do with it, but it’s hard to say because those accounts are from Nords. We don’t really have anything from the Falmer on the matter, so it’s hard to say what their thoughts were about it. I, personally, think that the colonial expansion of the Nords was a factor, and possibly the initial reason. But once they had unearthed the artifact, the Falmer had an inkling that if they were able to harness its power then the Nords would drive them out for good. After all, the Eye of Magnus was basically a super battery of magic power, so whoever controlled it might as well have controlled the land. But, again, it’s hard to say who the bad guys are here.
Anyways, Ysgramor escaped with his two sons and they went back to Atmora to gather an army with which they could strike back at the Falmer for destroying their capital. I can't really blame them for that. And so legend has it that they gathered the five hundred companions and the help of a famed enchanter, Ahzidal, who enchanted their weapons to give them an extra edge in battle. With this, they went back to the remains of Saarthal where they would find the Falmer and begin a long war where they were ordered to show no kindness and no mercy. The companions would hunt down any and all Falmer across Skyrim, killing them wherever they found them. The companions would eventually found the city of Whiterun around an ancient statue of an Eagle which would become the city’s Skyforge because of the importance that Falmer prisoners gave it, stating that it was far older than even the elves. And that kind of sets the tone for how the Nords ran things. They seemed to find places of import to other races, then decimate their population and promptly build cities around their relics.
The Falmer were eventually pushed to a point where they had to mount an all-or-nothing offensive against the Atmorans in which they would end up losing their Snow Price and the battle altogether. Having lost so much of their population, coupled with the failure of their last offensive, the Falmer were forced to retreat with the small population that was still alive. They knew that they had elven kin in Blackreach, so they went deep underground to beg for some kindness from the Dwemer.
The Dwemer were an advanced civilization of Elves who were, in many respects, further ahead in terms of technology, engineering, mathematics, and magic (among other things) than other races were at the time. The Dwemer, as mentioned before, are also known as the Deep Elves or more commonly referred to as Dwarves. Being associated with Dwarves, you might assume that they are all short, stout, and 60% beard by volume, but that’s not quite the case. Contrary to popular belief, the Dwemer were just as tall as the average man, typically had the slim, lean build of an Elf, although they admittedly did tend to sport a lavish beard, unlike most Elves and they did have a penchant for mining. The myth that they were as short as children seemingly comes from the giants, as they referred to the Dwemer as their “little friends”. And, well, everyone's a little friend compared to a giant, so I think it’s safe to say that this is just a miscommunication. However, it’s hard to say exactly what they looked like, since most information about their race was seemingly lost to time, as we will get into later.
And just like the Falmer, we don’t know when the Dwarves came to Tamriel, nor do we know anything of their history before that point. Recorded Dwemer history starts in the Merethic Era, just like the Falmer. By this time, the Dwemer had established themselves in the Velothi Mountains which was situated between Morrowind and Skyrim.
Some time in the first era around 1E 221, while they were mining, they discovered a new mineral which they called Aetherium. This was a blue luminescent crystal that possessed magical qualities, but was unusable without the right tools. The Dwemer, being a people that were heavily invested in mining and engineering, were the only ones that were able to make use of it because of its finicky nature, from what I can tell. They were able to fashion it into artifacts, which were inherently powerful because of the magic imbued into them with Aetherium. Four major dwarven cities–Arkngthamz, Raldbthar, Mzulft, and Bthar-zel– came together in an alliance to maintain control over Aetherium and each city had its own part in that process. Arkngthamz served as the main command centre and the primary research facility, while Raldbthar, which was the primary source of Aetherium, was given the role of dealing with mining operations. Mzulft was used for storing materials and supplies, and we aren’t quite sure what role Bthar-zel was assigned. The Aetherium Forge was constructed deep beneath the city of Bthalft, where the Aetherium artifacts would be constructed under precisely controlled conditions.
This was a very prosperous endeavour, and even the Nords couldn’t get their greasy hands on the united Dwemer cities, but it couldn’t last forever. Eventually, each city and its folks started to get greedy and wanted to control Aetherium for themselves. They all tried to take control of the forge, which led to a civil war known as the Aetherium wars. Over time, this weakened the Dwemer city-states and basically crippled their empire from the inside-out. Seeing this discourse as an opportunity to strike, the Nord High King Gellir of Skyrim advanced on the weakened Dwemer. His armies swept through the Dwemer like they were nothing, and took over many of their cities in a matter of three years. It’s said that about a century later, the Dwemer came back for their cities and managed to gain a foothold in Skyrim once again, but for some reason it was abandoned. I would assume that they were going back to take over the Aetherium forge, but perhaps the cost of doing so was too great and it had to be abandoned. Perhaps they feared that the discourse that led to them being driven out in the first place was doomed to repeat itself. Alas, we will never know.
What we do know is that the Dwemer retreated underground into Blackreach after their defeat by the hands of the Nords. And, as far as we know, this is where they would stay, deep underground away from the prying eyes of the other races. It’s down here in Blackreach that the Dwemer would encounter some Falmer who were looking for refuge after they, too, had been ransacked by the Nords up above. You would think that since all Elves were cut from the same cloth, or at least that cloth was bought at the same store, that they would like each other, and want to help each other. But you would be wrong. Elves have problems getting along with anyone in their own race of elves (hence the Dwemer having a huge hand in their near extinction) let alone tolerate other elves and don’t get me started on their attitude towards non-elves.
And thus, the Dwemer decided to take the Falmer in under their wing. But Brett, you just said that the elves hate other elves! Yes, I did say that, and yes the Dwemer took in the Falmer regardless because they were a different breed– one that could see past the petty differences of their kind, and see that the Falmer were indeed brethren in need of help! They were the paragons of kindness, the barons of charity, the icons of niceties… and that’s why the Dwemer took them in and made sure that the food that was given to the Falmer was poisoned with a toxic fungi that wouldn’t kill them, but maim them over time.
Did I get you with that one? I sure hope so.
The fungi that the Falmer were fed unknowingly, in conjunction with the darkness of Blackreach, eventually rendered them blind. Or, at least I think they were fed it unknowingly. It’s hard to say because the source The Falmer: A Study only says that they were forced to eat the fungi. I don’t see why they would knowingly eat something that they knew would cause them to go blind. If they knew, why wouldn’t they have just left and tried to find somewhere else, potentially in Blackreach, to settle for a while? And, there were others who did leave the group to find shelter elsewhere, but most of them either ended up dying or coming back to the Dwemer to be under their care. I just don’t see a reason why they would be consciously forced to eat a toxic fungi, and I think it makes far more sense that they were fed it and became blind over time.
Either way, the Dwemer are just awful, terrible beings.
The once majestic and powerful Falmer were rendered powerless, and they went from being a culturally rich group, to being hunted, to being in servitude to the Dwemer, to being straight up slaves for the Dwemer. The fungi that they ate was a part of their regular meals, and they had no way out of this hell that they found themselves in. The fact that they were continually forced to eat the fungi made sure that any of their offspring would be blind as well, which the Dwemer knew full and well, which makes them even worse in this scenario.
I’m not trying to excuse what the Falmer did up on the surface that caused the Nords to come down on them with their armies. They, just like the Dwemer, got too greedy and they sought too much power. They made the mistake of razing the Nord’s capital city, and that’s terrible for anyone to do. Especially for a mere artifact, no matter how powerful it was. Would the Nords have eventually fought against them had they not attacked first? Almost certainly, but mayhaps it would have gone differently if they were on the wrong side first. Who knows?
Regardless, much like any other story involving slavery, the Falmer ended up rebelling against their masters. A group of Falmer ended up overthrowing the Dwemer, and were able to retreat deeper into Blackreach, where the two factions would end up warring for decades. This part of the history isn’t dated, like most of this information, unfortunately. So we don’t know exactly how long they were fighting for. It seems like the Elves didn’t care much for chronicling their escapades, while no one up on the surface knew that they were even fighting.
Then things start to get… weird. As they tend to in the Elder Scrolls universe. And this gets a bit confusing, since the account is seemingly written by someone who just assumed that everyone reading knew who all of the people involved were, so it’s pretty shallow. I’m sure that’s intentional, but it;s a bit frustrating regardless. So, here we go.
At some point, we had what was known as the Battle of Red Mountain. And we have a couple different accounts on the matter, but the most thorough was a transcript of a conversation with Lord Vivec, who is one of the three immortal god-kings of Morrowind.
He talks about how his people, the Chimer (or the beings who the modern Dunmer or Dark Elves descended from) worshipped the Daedra as Gods while the Dwemer mocked them and preferred to follow logic and reason instead of what he describes as “foolish rituals”. It was because of this that the Chimer and Dwemer were at constant war with one another. That was until the Nords showed up, back to their usual antics, to invade Morrowind. Then, and only then, did the Chimer and Dwemer team up to cast out the invaders. After they succeeded, the two leaders– General Nerevar of the Chimer and General Dumac of the Dwemer– had come to, and I quote, “love and respect one another” and attempted to make peace between their peoples. This was a fragile peace, as described by Vivec, but a peace nonetheless. Everyone can bond through stopping a Nord invasion.
And being a fragile peace, it didn’t take much to break it. Lord of the Chimer house Dagoth, Dagoth Ur, a friend to both General Nerevar and General Dumac, brought proof to the Chimer that the Dwemer had discovered the Heart of Lorkhan. They were allegedly planning to use the heart, which contained a divine spark, to build a new god as a weapon and a further mockery to the Chimer faith.
See, the Dwemer were always innovating and creating things, like we saw with the Aetherium forge and creating powerful artifacts. And they were probably best known for their military creations. They created constructs that were basically giant, metal automatons whose sole purpose was to wreak havoc on battlefields. They had many different kinds of automatons from human-sized constructs on rolling spheres, to smaller mechanical spiders, and up to the giant centurions who wielded a battle axe and warhammer simultaneously and had nigh impenetrable armoured plates. These were all powered by soul gems, and were exceedingly dangerous and made the Dwemer fearsome enemies, because they had a disposable mechanical army alongside the one made of their people.
This is all to say that when someone catches wind of the Dwemer creating a giant mechanical god, that is definitely not out of the question and it’s something that you might want to look into rather than shrugging it off. And so the Chimer were urged to surprise the Dwemer with a war– to catch them off guard and take them out for their mockery of the Chimer faith. However, General Nerevar was troubled and didn’t want to shatter the trust that they had built with General Dumac. So Nerevar seeked out a Dwemer engineer by the name of Kagrenac and asked with the rumours were true, and was met with great offence. Kagrenac asked who Nerevar thought he was to meddle in the affairs of the Dwemer, and that was the end of that conversation.
One might have taken this to mean that Dagoth Ur was correct, and that the Dwemer were using the Heart of Lorkhan to create a god, but Nerevar was still troubled and, props to him, still didn’t want to take this as a means to start a war. So he made a pilgrimage to Holamayan, to the temple of Azura, and had Azura confirm that what Dagoth Ur said was indeed true. Having the confirmation of a god to say that the Dwemer were up to no good, he wanted to confront Dumac one last time in hopes that they could avoid a war. And, third time’s a charm, Dumac was bitterly disappointed in his friend, and the only way they could settle this dispute was through war.
This war was the battle of Red Mountain that I mentioned before. It was named after the stronghold that the Dwemer held up in, Red Mountain, where they intended to hunker down and stay in. Unfortunately for them, the cunning plans of Nerevar drew them out into the plains where their armies were pinned. Meanwhile Nerevar, Dagoth Ur, and a small group of soldiers were able to take advantage of the Dwemer armies being elsewhere and they made their way into the heart chamber. It was there that they met Dumac and the Dwarf King who were on their knees, collapsed by grievous wounds and draining magic. Nerevar and Dagoth Ur were threatening to kill the two when suddenly, Kagrenac turned his tools upon the Heart of Lorkhan and in a flash, Nerevar said that he witnessed the three Dwemer in the chamber, along with all of the other Dwemer everywhere, disappear without a trace.
Nerevar told his people that the Dwemer had used the heart to turn their people immortal, and that the heart held wondrous powers. Dagoth Ur, on the other hand, told others in secret that he believed that they had destroyed themselves rather than turned themselves immortal. But I’m not sure that anyone really knows what happened here, and they were all trying to come up with an explanation for seeing the Dwemer suddenly blip out of existence.
And… that’s the unfortunate end of the Dwemer. We really don’t know what happened to them, just that they tried to create a god for themselves, and ended up wiping themselves from existence. I would have to imagine that they’re just on another plane, somewhere, trying to find their way back home. But they could have all died for all I know. And we will probably never see them again.
So what does that mean for the Falmer, the slaves of the Dwemer?
Well, that meant that they were finally free from servitude. Their masters had all vanished out of thin air, and they could do what they wanted to. Except that they were still blind, and their offspring would still be blind… so they weren’t exactly free from the shackles of the constraints that the Dwemer forced upon them. But, they were able to spread throughout Blackreach, at the very least, and make their own homes there. They devolved into goblin-like creatures who were feral from years of being mistreated. They were also at war when the Dwemer disappeared, so they had an unsatiated bloodlust which made their feral behaviour even worse. They would begin to raid the surface, allegedly stealing babies from cribs, attacking travellers on the road, and becoming the thing of nightmares and monsters of bedtime stories. People started blaming any misfortune that happened to them like crop failure, or getting lost, on the Falmer.
In the fourth era, people started seeing them more often, and they weren’t just the things of myth. They were actually raiding the surface in brutal attacks. One scholar theorised that the Falmer could be using these attacks to gauge the threat levels of those on the surface so that they could one day launch an all-out attack to reclaim their lands and their long-lost glory. To this end, they ended up taming beasts in Blackreach to do their bidding, like the Chaurus– a large, insect-like creature with a hard carapace and sharp, piercing appendages. To this day, both Falmer and Chaurus can be found on the surface in Dwemer ruins and small caves.
Over time, there were a few Falmer who managed to evade the Dwemer and maintain their original form, not blinded or malformed. One of these was Knight-Paladin Gelebor, who I mentioned before. He seems to think that their intelligence has increased over time, and while it’s unlikely at this point that the Falmer of Blackreach will ever return to their original forms, he thinks that one day they might be able to establish some sort of communication with them in an attempt to make peace. Whether or not that’s true, or that would do anything to help them, who knows. But it’s nice to know that there’s one of their kind out there, looking out for them and hoping that their people might one day be able to live amongst other creatures again. They will never reach their former glory, but they might be able to have a life worth living.
As for the Dwemer, they are nothing more than a boogeyman at this point. People know they exist from the ruins that are dotted around the lands, but their language is indecipherable and since their technology was so far beyond what others were capable of understanding, no one really knew how to make use of it. There had been advancements made, and some of their technology was able to be repurposed in a more modern society, but it was largely just broken down and used for the materials.
In the years past, people had tried to tinker with the Heart of Lorkhan. One of those was a scholar from Winterhold who hired the Dragonborn to help them attempt to kickstart the heart with a warped soul gem. However, while they were working on keening the soul gem, they disappeared immediately, just like the Dwemer did, further strengthening that it was the tampering of the heart that caused them to disappear.
And that’s really all that I have to say about the Falmer and the Dwemer. Sure there are some more subtle aspects of each culture that I could have gone over, but none of it really fit within the story that I wanted to tell. I think that, overall, this is a relatively complete story of the Falmer, the Dwemer, and what happened between them and that’s all that I really wanted to tell.
And so that brings us to the part of the episode where I ask the only question I reliably never get an answer to– what did you think? Do you think that if the Falmer didn’t attack the Nords first that maybe they wouldn’t have ended up in the hands of the Dwemer in Blackreach? Or how about, do you think that the Falmer were knowingly forced to ingest the toxic fungi, or do you think (like I do) that it was just snuck into their diet? I think I’ve said all that I can say in that respect already, but I’m genuinely curious to hear what someone maybe more well versed in the lore of the Elder Scrolls has to say.
You can find us online @loredtodeath on your favourite social media apps, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you have any questions or suggestions for topics, please send me a message wherever you can find me or at loredtodeath@gmail.com. If you’re using the Spotify app, there’s a Q&A function attached to the episode where you can submit any questions or topics. I would love to hear from you! If you haven’t already, please leave a 5 star review and subscribe to the Youtube channel!
And until next time, remember: nothing good comes from going underground and consuming toxic fungi that your friend tells you is delicious. Don’t eat the funky mushrooms, they’ll turn you blind. And I’ll lore you to death in the next one. C’ya.
