Concerning the Dreamsleeve : The Elder Scrolls Series Discussion

» Sat May 28, 2011 8:33 pm

During my studies and browsings of the Elder Scrolls' plethora of lore and information, one subject has always eluded me: the Dreamsleeve. From what little I could turn up on it, I have uncovered that it is a rapid means of communication, possibly a Magickal telegraph, so to speak. I feel this only scratches the surface of what it really is (hence why I ask the devotees here). So I beseech you, what is the Dreamsleeve?

» Sat May 28, 2011 12:21 pm

It is essentially a recycling system for mortal souls. Dead soul goes in, comes out like new, headed for a new vessel. Or something similar, I don't know any details.

» Sat May 28, 2011 10:38 pm

The Nords call it http://www.imperial-library.info/mwbooks/bm_sovngarde.shtml apparently, which according to the linked text, can be entered by dying valiantly (obvious Valhalla reference). I recall proweler (I think) offering a translation that meant something similar to "dream sleeve" as well; I may be wrong though.

And all souls go there, mortal http://www.imperial-library.info/tsobs/part04.shtml.

» Sat May 28, 2011 6:29 pm

And all souls go there, mortal http://www.imperial-library.info/tsobs/part04.shtml.

I think they're just describing what it's like to swim the black waters of Oblivion. The Mazken and Auriels of Shivering Ilse also give a similar description of what it's like. I think one of the Oblivion books had some interview with a dremora, who also mention that they don't like death either, and would rather be out as soon as possible.

» Sat May 28, 2011 10:36 pm

During my studies and browsings of the Elder Scrolls' plethora of lore and information, one subject has always eluded me: the Dreamsleeve. From what little I could turn up on it, I have uncovered that it is a rapid means of communication, possibly a Magickal telegraph, so to speak. I feel this only scratches the surface of what it really is (hence why I ask the devotees here). So I beseech you, what is the Dreamsleeve?

Just gonna be lazy and dump in an old post. I should probably turn it into an article someday.

Arkay is the God of the cycle of life and death. We're born from the dreamsleeve and return to it on death in an endless cycle that is always new.

Birth:

We mortals leave the dreaming-sleeve of birth the same, unmantled save for the symbiosis with our mothers, thus to practice and thus to rapprochement, until finally we might through new eyes leave our hearths without need or fear that she remains behind. In this moment we destroy her forever and enter the demesne of Lord Dagon. - http://til.gamingsource.net/obbooks/mythic_dawn_commentaries.shtml

Mortals leave the dreaming-sleeve of birth, without any divinity (unmantled) safe for the symbiosis with the special divinity of Nirn (our mother, Mankar wan't to destroy Nirn).

The powers also created Red Tower and the First Stone. This allowed the Mundus to exist without the full presence of the divine. In this way, the powers of Ada-mantia granted the Mundus a special kind of divinity, which is called NIRN, the consequence of variable fate. - http://til.gamingsource.net/obscure_text/nu-hatta_nu-mantia.shtml

This special divinity comes back in the intercept, Red Mountain (tower) holds Lorkhan's Heart (stone). Lorkhan's heart is also called the divine spark, our shared divinity. As such, we already much like the Daedra, we're separate parts of a larger divinity.

Death:

When people from different cultures all believe in an afterlife and all seem to get exactly what they expect, it is reasonable to assume that their experiences are influenced by their expectations. The Nords believe they go to a place called Sovngarde which can be translated as to a meaning that means as much as the Dreamsleeve, the sleep-enclosure. So we're already back the start.

"The echo of the Void is Oblivion. The echo of Oblivion is now mortal death. Death results in reappropriation of spirit towards its aligned AE?"either to the god-planet Aedra or the Principalities of Oblivion. Vehk’s name for this transaction, mentioned above, is “lunar currency”." - http://til.gamingsource.net/obscure_text/5th_era_loveletter.shtml

This shouldn't be read as some Heaven and Hell afterlife were people who've done enough bad things end up in Oblivion. The AE literally is a connector and in the sermons it is often used as: "AYEM AE VEHK AE SETH", Almelexia and Vivec and Sotha Sil, Almsivi.

This connection is the soul. Normally, when a person is killed he experiences afterlife, when a Daedra is slain he experiences the void. A soul trap can force the soul to remain connected to a soulgem and a Necromancer can call back souls and force them to animate a body again.
Ghosts can return out of their free will if they have something that binds them, but often you'll see that they've already started to disintegrate and are starting to lose their memories and thoughts while they're being mangled and stripped from their identity in the dreamsleeve.

As I've already shown above, mortals are born from the dreamsleeve, it's their to their divinity so their allinged AE goes to Mundus and while the God planets of the Aedra are often interpreted as Aetherius, they are part of Mundus, they are the gift limbs.

It's also what allows Mankar Camoran to pick up his followers in his Paradise, they've given up Mundus ("destroy her forever") and become part of Mehrunes Dagon ("enter the demesne of Lord Dagon")

In addition what I didn't touch on here was the connection to aligned AE that the Loveletter mentions.

The Dreamsleeve is part of Mundus, but the lesser Daedra are bound to their Prince or to their own plane(t) orbiting the plane(t) of their Prince. This connection seems to be without the soft forgetfulness of the Dreamsleeve as each Daedra fears the experience (see: Spirit of the Daedra).

Now it's possible for someone to change this connection. In one of the dead-endings in Battlespire you could sell your soul to one of Mehrunes Captains, Umaril bartered his away with Meridia. Mankar suggests doing the same for Dagon.

» Sat May 28, 2011 3:10 pm

These answers explain an incredible amount of things that I've read but not understood recently. Thank you all very much.

» Sat May 28, 2011 8:46 pm

*Resurrects thread*

Alright so the Dreamsleeve is the definitive collective afterlife where everyone goes and experiences their expected afterlife as a sort of dream. Would it therefore be possible for the Dreamsleeve to be hijacked? - souls going into the sleeve being forced into an unexpected afterlife at the whim of a God?

» Sat May 28, 2011 11:19 am

The Sovngarde part doesn't add up; it was previously believed to be a real place somewhere on Nirn, its existence as an afterlife has only recently been accepted, as the result of the account of a ghost who, during his mortal life, believed it to be an actual place rather than an afterlife.

» Sat May 28, 2011 2:51 pm

Proweler, don't you think the ideas of "experiencing afterlife" and "loosing identity in the dreamsleeve" are opposed? In everyday speech, when you say afterlife, you mean a place or state in which you can continue individual if disembodied existence after corporeal death. The dreamsleeve is, on the contrary, exactly about giving up memories and identity, and for all intents and purposes - ceasing to exist.

Or should we take the dreamsleeve rather in the sense of some intermediate step in the way of reincarnation? I don't think it was meant that way, but then I only have the most superficial understanding of the texts you quote.

» Sat May 28, 2011 11:10 am

Proweler, don't you think the ideas of "experiencing afterlife" and "loosing identity in the dreamsleeve" are opposed? In everyday speech, when you say afterlife, you mean a place or state in which you can continue individual if disembodied existence after corporeal death. The dreamsleeve is, on the contrary, exactly about giving up memories and identity, and for all intents and purposes - ceasing to exist.

Or should we take the dreamsleeve rather in the sense of some intermediate step in the way of reincarnation? I don't think it was meant that way, but then I only have the most superficial understanding of the texts you quote.

Sounds more like a "Dreamgut", your soul is digested and molded into something new.

» Sat May 28, 2011 8:49 pm

Proweler, don't you think the ideas of "experiencing afterlife" and "loosing identity in the dreamsleeve" are opposed? In everyday speech, when you say afterlife, you mean a place or state in which you can continue individual if disembodied existence after corporeal death. The dreamsleeve is, on the contrary, exactly about giving up memories and identity, and for all intents and purposes - ceasing to exist.

Or should we take the dreamsleeve rather in the sense of some intermediate step in the way of reincarnation? I don't think it was meant that way, but then I only have the most superficial understanding of the texts you quote.

I see it like this; the soul is taken into the dreamsleeve, stripped of identity, but leaving soul-creatia, raw sentient-magical material to be molded into another mortal. What that identity does is open. As proweler said, the experience is what they expect. A sort of interdimensional hallucination I'd like to think.

» Sat May 28, 2011 6:26 pm

As proweler said, the experience is what they expect. A sort of interdimensional hallucination I'd like to think.

But is it what they expect, or what they desire?

» Sat May 28, 2011 10:20 am

To have an experience, you need a consciousness, and to be conscious, first you have to be. Once reabsorbed into the Dreamsleeve, the former mortal's identity is lost, it's no longer a he nor a she nor a Nord nor an Altmer, it has no expectations and it can't experience. That's why the idea that the experience of afterlife depends on what the dying mortal expected is contrary to what the Dreamsleeve is.

Certainly a mortal's expectations about afterlife are modeled by her myth-environment in life, we differ in that I don't think she'd find them fulfilled in death.

» Sat May 28, 2011 11:49 pm

But is it what they expect, or what they desire?

Same thing

» Sat May 28, 2011 2:58 pm

To have an experience, you need a consciousness, and to be conscious, first you have to be. Once reabsorbed into the Dreamsleeve, the former mortal's identity is lost, it's no longer a he nor a she nor a Nord nor an Altmer, it has no expectations and it can't experience. That's why the idea that the experience of afterlife depends on what the dying mortal expected is contrary to what the Dreamsleeve is.

Certainly a mortal's expectations about afterlife are modeled by her myth-environment in life, we differ in that I don't think she'd find them fulfilled in death.

Although the Dreamsleeve exists in the TES cosmology, I still find it depressing because the mortal's self -- all the memories and consciousness -- is destroyed in the process of recycling it. It's no better than just destroying the soul upon death.

» Sun May 29, 2011 1:48 am

Then achieve apotheosis.

» Sat May 28, 2011 1:43 pm

Although the Dreamsleeve exists in the TES cosmology, I still find it depressing because the mortal's self -- all the memories and consciousness -- is destroyed in the process of recycling it. It's no better than just destroying the soul upon death.

Even so, departed spirits prefer it over being trapped on Mundus against their will.

Edit: And there remains the question; were the failed incarnates actually Nerevar reborn, because if they were, why would they leave ghosts behind?

» Sat May 28, 2011 6:12 pm

Even so, departed spirits prefer it over being trapped on Mundus against their will.

Edit: And there remains the question; were the failed incarnates actually Nerevar reborn, because if they were, why would they leave ghosts behind?

That seems like a good point. It could be there are two possibilities: the Failed Incarnates had at least some of Nerevar's soul, but not enough to constitute a full reincarnation; or they didn't have his soul and were only charismatic people.

Some were spiritual leaders, but didn't know enough of war to succeed; others were warriors but not spiritual enough, or not experienced enough with intrigue. The player character is the first one to put it all together -- both warrior and politician.

That was one of my favorite moments in "Morrowind", seeing the spirits of the Failed Incarnates standing proudly next to their mummified corpses, and passing the torch to you.

» Sat May 28, 2011 8:26 pm

MK once mentioned that Tedders originally made it up in Battlespire as a mage Internet/email network -- a concept that survives in the Loveletter from the Fifth Era.

» Sat May 28, 2011 10:58 am

It seems that the only way to escape the Dreamsleeve's oblivion is to go Oblivion. (bad pun intended

)

The only way to preserve one's self is to accepted into one of the Daedra's realms, preferably one of the nice ones like Azura's. Or to become a god.

And that brings the question: why do people worship the Aedra if they can't even offer a decent afterlife to their followers?

» Sat May 28, 2011 9:22 pm

Go search the concept of lunar currency. You can go to Aedra's realms too.

Plus, there's always apotheosis.

» Sat May 28, 2011 5:45 pm

This lunar currency is new to me, I will give it a look. Isn't apotheosis becoming a god? If not them it is research time for me.

» Sat May 28, 2011 12:42 pm

Yes, it's becoming a god. Different people did different things to achieve godhood. There are 6 recorded incidents of this happening. Talos and Vehk are examples of two of them.

» Sat May 28, 2011 9:56 am

And that brings the question: why do people worship the Aedra if they can't even offer a decent afterlife to their followers?

They worship their gods and believe in their respective afterlife myths because they don't know the truth, just like in real life. Not many mortals in TES would be aware of the nature, or even of the existence of the Dreamsleeve.

» Sat May 28, 2011 9:18 pm

They worship their gods and believe in their respective afterlife myths because they don't know the truth,

truth and myth aren't mutually exclusive