Whether or not this topic has been brought up, I can't say, but I'm interested in learning more.

Since the Argonians have immigrated outside of the Black Marsh, through capture and slavery in Morrowind or immigration to Cyrodiil, there are high chances of reproduction and childbirth occuring outside of their homeland. The Argonian race, as hinted by Wormgod, are shaped by how many times they lick the Hist. And, so, this brings me to the question: Do the Argonian travel back to the Black Marsh after one is born? Is there an Argonian born and raised outside of the Black Marsh?

I doubt that would be the case. I see licking the Hist Tree as one of these two things:

A. Its just tradition. Nothing special happens. Or......

B. Those saps might act as growth hormones. In that case, it is not be needed to begin with. It might make Argonians mature a bit faster, but I do not think it is require to be an advlt.

A: The hist are Trees that grow thousands of feet in the air, and a single Hist tree can support an entire cities weight. The only in-game Hist tree was very small, making me think it was extremely young. But the Sap does whatever the tree wants it to do, and the possibilities range from turning Aldmer into lizards to making people go F***ing crazy and kill everyone.

B. Without the sap, Argonians would simply be giant lizards. It is possible that skooma and moon sugar dealers traffic Hist sap in small quantities; and that is given to young argonians.

Again, going back to my tradition theory, I can see that these Hist Tree might as well be treated as a god, but I would suspect that as far as it goes ( doubt that the Hist tree would process that much power ya mention anyways ). The Argonian might think that licking such a tree might do something to their body, but I would doubt that it is require as a way of growing up.


And how would one know that? If its true, I would hear many account to suspect that it would be a case where there is no next generation just because Argonians did not lick some tree bark. I would also doubt there would be a need to traffic tree sap just for "growing" up.

It seems that Argonians can be born outside of Black Marsh. Argonians born outside the province, are "hatched" from an egg that incubates within the mother. While Argonians inside the province are laid as eggs in nests. It would make sense that if they are born differently, not all Argonians need to lick a Hist.



Now, it seems that there are in fact tree dwelling lizards in Black Marsh. Perhaps Non-Argonians are laying eggs, in trees, in nests. And whatever comes out of those eggs are the Argonians we know (or not until they lick a Hist?). And the unhatched eggs in BM can be used as soul gems, an interesting characteristic... Does this imply these unborn "Argonians" are without a soul? By licking a Hist, an Argonian also gets named, receives an identity. By licking the Hist, the argonian gets a soul.

I'm still studying the Argonian Compendium, so bear with me lol.

Argonians could be like sea turtles, who return to the spot they were born in order to lay their eggs.
Every Argonian might be expected (or it could be instinctual) to return to the place of their birth/tree-licking in order to give birth and allow their own children to lick the Hist's sap.

Maybe they can't procreate outside of their ancestral swamp (but they can still lay eggs wherever they please)... or in the case of Argonian slaves and others who can't travel to Black Marsh... they might just flat-out refuse.

There isn't that much data to support any claims of how Argonians are born. Pretty much alot speculation going on in that article. These Unhatched eggs could have been from a different creatures for all it worth.

And I would consider Argonian Compendium a combination of cited from many books to NPC conversation to even speculation among the Devs and the Forumites. Kind of wish I was there at the time to discuss these things.


I would doubt that would travel form where they live all the way to Black Marches. In many cases, the travel would long and dangers, not to mention Black Marches have the tendency to make people disappear. And we have to consider that maybe the couple will birth another child and have to go back and forth just to do this again.

Slave wise, I would not be surprise if there were mating going around. I would doubt that they cannot procreate just because they are in a different location.

I would say that a much easier solution for procreation for the Argonians is that they simply just does not need the Hist Tree in their lifetime.

I wish I understood more biology concerning plants. I think the fact that they keep referring to the Hist as a "type of spore tree" has some significance. But I tried reading up on spores (something to do with how a plant reproduces) and I got lost lol. Maybe its not important, but from what I've read, the biggest connection between Argonians and Hist are reproduction.

I don't think the Hist are proven to be the same as the walking city of Falinesti. That's a speculation that I've never heard on these forums until this past week or so.

I heard once a speculation that the Argonians have a life cycle similar to a novel by (I think) Orson Scott Card, where some of the wisest among the Argonians are chosen to become rooted and turn into Hist trees. Maybe Nalion or other forum veterans could confirm this. At the time I heard it, it wasn't definite lore, but the devs had supposedly read Card's novels and were influenced by them.

What I'm starting to think is that the Hist essentially makes the argonian fertile. Without it, they are unable to impregnate each other. This would also lead me to believe that, if required, a pregnant argonian could secrete hist during the incubation period and pass the traits of the mother to child.

Plants go through something called alternation of generations and in those which spread by spores (plants without seeds) you can find two distinct and independent (sometimes) stages of life cycle (sporophyte and gametophyte) and these stages can be morphologically very different. So it could be like syronj said that Argonians and Hist are two different stages in life cycle of the same organism.

Could it be that the Hist are a third gender of Argonian? And that only offspring of this 3rd gender (and either of the other two) are laid as eggs?

After looking into Falinesti, there are some interesting connections...

1) Bosmers are the "tree sap people" and Argonians are "people of the root" and lick Hist sap
2) It seems like a huge coincidence if Falinesti was not a Hist, and just coincidentally another type of moving tree
3) Y'ffre (Bosmer deity of the forest) turned into the first Elnofey, the Hist coincidentally were also around at the beginning
4) supports the idea that Argoinians and Hists are the same organism experiencing a different stage in their life cycle\

Animals licking trees is also something that goes on in the real world. A quick google search came up with lemurs licking trees because the coevolved with the plants and act as pollinators. Animals also spread seeds, which may or may not be what Argonians are doing outside of Black Marsh... Animals can also digest the seed and deposit it in the soil when they go #2. Are argonians doing this when they lick the Hist? Doesn't seem likely but its not impossible.

According to Pete Hines in the Argonian Compendium, argoinians are ovoviviparous. And the young of ovoviviparous amphibians are sometimes born as larvae, and undergo metamorphosis outside the body of the mother. So Argonians may experience some sort of metamorphosis in their life. BlueDev also mentions in the article that whether an Argonian lays eggs or not depends on their climate. In a wikipedia article on vivipary, its says





In the argonian compendium it says you are more likely to find eggs in well established communities in warmer climates. This could mean that there are more females being born in warmer climates that are also laying eggs... This sort of environmental effect on Argonian phenotypes might also include some sort of hormone released in Hist sap.

PS = apparently http://www.imperial-library.info/mwbooks/corpse_preparation.shtml

From what the Argonian account says the Argonians come in a hell of alot of variations, including flying Argonians, in my opinion the Hist has somthing to do with this, perhaps the Hist, if it is in fact intelligent, can choose to turn the Argonians who drank the sap to turn into various types of Argonians. Maybe it should be investigated if variations of hist trees exist in locations specific to where certain tribes of Argonians live, this could explain where the various forms come from.

I hate to bump this, but I feel as though my question has gone unanswered or has been too vaguely answered.

Do the Argonians reproduce outside of the Black Marsh? If so, do they take the form of their parent? or do they grow as common reptilians?

New Hist can be planted, it seems, as the one in Lilmoth was grown from a sapling of a previous corrupted one...I'm not sure if they can survive outside of Black Marsh or too far from the Root system however, as the one in Cyrodill was...tainted and kept alive by profane sorceries and machines.

They can be born anywhere, they're just lizards. Sentient Argonians are only created by contact with the Hist. See Larry Niven's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pak_Protector, only the Hist are intelligent and have an agenda

You'll have to forgive the lack of reasons, I'm mostly touching and feeling my way through on this here.

Could they? I'd say yes. There has been the possibility of inter-species relationships and offspring with Argonians raised. Whether truly possible is hearsay, unfortunately, but if so then would indicate that they could. Would they? In order to answer that, I'd ask to what degree do the Hist control the Argonian's thoughts and consciousness across the entire species. If only a little, then I'd say you couldn't generalize for an entire race who on an individual basis have been sent out of the swamp for whatever reason you might think. That some Argonians would indeed reproduce. If more, then I'd say, in general, no.

My impression is that the 'licking of the hist' is not necessary to Argonian development, but can affect how they grow and develop. Presumably those born away from the presence of hist would have a different physical appearance (and maybe even characteristics) to those born within Black Marsh, though this is all guesswork. Given that the definition of the hist is so uncertain (at one point they've been referred to as as a seperate breed of Argonians), there's not much to go on here. Reference to Black Marsh (the hist in particular) is very rare ingame, and I wouldn't trust the word of developers 100% until there's a collective decision on the facts, ie, they put it in the game. I won't go on about this, it's hard to get the words right in my head at this time of night and it's kinda besides the point anyways.

Point being, I have no doubt that Argonians are able to reproduce and grow normally outside of Black Marsh - the abundance of long-term Argonian slaves in Morrowind would suggest some sort of steady supply there, for a start, I'd imagine the Dunmer would hesitate to enslave Argonians from their homeland given the history of conflict between the two provinces and Argonians themselves would probably shy away from immigrating into the province for similar reasons. As for whether they take the form of their parents, I honestly have no evidence to suggest either way, but I would like to imagine that inter-provincial Argonians would have unique appearances based on a lack of genetic mingling with hist sap... but again, I'm just guessing.

I highly recommend http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Black_Marsh if you want some good evidence.

EDIT: BTW, just like to say this is the nerdiest post I've ever made and I only know all this because I've been making a plugin based on Argonia recently. Not a good excuse, but... :wave:

The Hist made Argonians smart, and now can talk to them no matter how far away from the source they are. All Hist are connected at the root and share a brain, although apparently when influenced by Deadric power an individual tree can separate from the others. They have the power to basicly mind-control argonians. Most non-argonian dwellers of Black Marsh call the Hist, collectivly, "The Organism"

What are the sources for that information? Very interesting if true, I have speculated about the Hist being a hive-mind, but don't know where you found that information.
According to your source (or lack of source) are the Argonians more or less a "worker bee" organism to the Queen/Hist-Hivemind?

minor spoiler alert (the Elder Scrolls Novel)

About the worker bee thing, whatabout when the Llimoth tree

good theory.