Reposted from the Skyrim forum -

OK, I know that the Dunmer have some very interesting cultural ties to religion. Between ancestor worship and the Nine Divines, there is a lot of lore out there. And I don't understand most of it.

I could really use a "cliff notes" version.

I am planning a Dunmer mage in the game, and I want to get the culture right. If I am raising the dead or summoning Daedra with Conjuration magic, I want to do it with a full understanding of the social implications of his homeland.

(For those about to say, "Who cares about RP, just do whatever," thanks in advance for your brilliant insight and thread bump )

So: is necromancy a horrible crime to the Dunmer? Perhaps only when raising other Dunmer? Is it OK to raise another Dunmer's ancestors as long as your own are protected? How about if you kill a bandit? Is it OK to raise his corpse right there? Or is it blasphemy to reanimate the dead in any way? What about a Dunmer bandit?

And how about the Daedra? As counterparts to the Aedra, is summoning them into combat servitude weird? Even blasphemous? Or are they just powerful guys who are fair game since they had no part in the world's creation? How about the Daedric Shrines and cultists? Would it be awkward to go talk to a group of cultists with a Flame Atronach following you around?

What about the Tribunal Temple? Is it still around? Does it have any implications on any of this?

Thanks in advance to all the beautiful lore hounds out there - you know who you are. :wub:

Dunmer do worship the Daedra, in fact Daedra worship was the catalyst for them to split from the Aldmer back in the day (when the Dunmer were the Chimer).

Dunmer worshipped or at least held in good esteem; Azura, Mephala and Boethiah whilst they dislike Malacath, Sheogorath, Molag Bal and Mehrunes Dagon, whom the Dunmer collectively call the House of Troubles, each of the four evil Daedra being a corner of it.

However this distinction was instituted by the Tribunal Temple so depending on your Dunmer's views towards that as in whether they supported the Tribunal or just continued the tradition of the House of Troubles; if positive I suppose the following would apply:

Therefore, you should be alright summoning most Daedra like Winged Twilights (Azura), Spider Daedra (Mephala, but they were on 'loan' to Mehrunes Dagon in Oblivion) and Hunger (who technically belong to Boethiah even though they were found in the Shivering Isles). Atronaches are aligned so they should be fine. However you probably want to avoid*, and I'm a bit shaky on this because Dunmer did this in Morrowind anyway, but you'll probably want to avoid summoning things like Scamps, Dremora, Golden Saints, Dark Seducers, Ogrim, Daedroth and Xilivai.

* Unless controlling the servants of the 'evil' daedra is viewed by your character as 'sticking it to the man', or your Dunmer is evil or something - in which case do the opposite.

Or your Dunmer might not consider the old Tribunal beliefs at all, in which case, every Daedra is fair game.

Great post! Thank you Claw.

What do you mean when you say "atronachs are aligned"?

Yeah, I guess I hadn't really thought through what it means to summon a servant Daedra. If I summon a Winged Twilight to fight for me at 3:00 in the morning, is Azura cool with it, or would she be piqued? I imagined that summoning a servant Daedra would not be something their masters would want. But maybe it would be seen as a friendly act if I am committing these acts of violence in the name of the Daedra in question. Then again this is sounding more like Daedric cultists, who are definitely on the fringes of society. But there are plain old summoners and even bandits just walking around summoning these things.

It's all very confusing

Reanimating the dead is seen strangely by the Dunmer. It's strongly suggested that their ancestor rituals are a form of necromancy, as in things like the Ghostfence and summoning of ancestor spirits and skeletons to defend tombs, but these rituals are done according to ancient customs and rites, and only upon one's family members. Long ago, it was considered mostly acceptable to practice on animals and "lesser" races(read: everyone), though what constituted as lesser gradually became only Argonians and Khajiit. Even then it is frowned upon heavily as making the Dunmer as a whole look bad.

As for Daedra, the Tribunal looked upon Daedra worship sketchily, but had general respect for Boethiah(associated with Almalexia and her glory), Mephala(associated with Vivec and his weavings), and Azura(associated with Sotha Sil and his mysteries). The other four were outlawed. Keep in mind, though, that most Dunmer now know what happened at Red Mountain, and there may be a lot of spite for the failed gods of the Tribunal -their feelings on Daedra weigh less heavily than their feelings on Necromancy, because every Dark Elf has at least some respect for his ancestors(hence Ancestor Guardian).

It depends on your character's decisions on the Tribunal and what Great House he lived under. If he was Telvanni, it could be forgiven to exploit Daedra openly, and even to reanimate lesser races with impunity. Indoril or Dres... not so much, without guilt. This also assumes, of course, that Tribunal culture survived the Red Year and the 200 following years at all. It's possible that it was forgotten with time and the Dunmer became a people lost to their once rich culture with the destruction of most ancestor tombs and the loss of the three living gods.

Recommended reading:

http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:The_Anticipations
http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Pocket_Guide_to_the_Empire/Morrowind
http://www.imperial-library.info/content/pocket-guide-empire-first-edition-morrowind

Atronachs don't belong to any one Daedric Prince, they align to whatever takes their fancy.
As for servant daedra

1. There aren't any offerings or rules for summoning servant Daedra gameplay-wise, so by extension lore-wise, let's just say no.
2. Taking a Winged Twilight for a walk on Nirn to kill some enemies of Azura I think would be alright by Azura. But at that point, one Winged Twilight is inconsequential, I wouldn't worry too much about repercussions with the Prince for summoning the Daedra they created, unless your character is superstitious and has imposed RP rules concerning summoning.

EDIT: I see what I did in the first post now. I meant that atronachs are NOT aligned to any particular prince.

Got it, Claw! And thank you HorvathSaigyou. I also got some great info privately from Deven Velni. Having done some reading, I have arrived (so far) at the following conclusions:

My character (let's just call him by name: Stadrin Sendu) is a very cranky, old-school traditionalist. By traditionalist, I mean he would have been pegged as an opinionated arch-conservative even before the time of the Tribunal. This is reflected in his attitudes both towards the races of Tamriel and the Daedric Princes.

Firstly, Stadrin regards mer as the only true citizens of Nirn. Although he despises and dreads the Altmer and Bosmer, he respects them as "real people". Even the Orsimer, although debased, are the children of Malacath and have a place in the world (see below). The men and beast races, however, are no better than animals, regardless of what works they may have performed or whatever intellect they may possess. And Stadrin is not overfond of animals. He would as soon kick a puppy as look at it ... better yet, if he had the time, he would happily perform experiments upon it.

Therefore, as far as necromancy is concerned, my practical rules are these: do whatever you want with corpses, unless they are orcish or elvish. Leave orcish corpses where they lie. If you discover a dead elf, or are forced to kill one, respectfully arrange its corpse to be as "comfortable" as possible; then tell someone about it in town, who you trust to make arrangements to recover the body and dispose of it properly in accordance with their racial tradition. Even your enemies deserve this courtesy.

In addition, never use the Soul Trap effect on mer or orcs, unless it is your deliberate intention to perform an overt act of evil upon them and their family. Let the souls of Nirn's true children pass on to the otherworld in death. Do whatever you want with the souls of men, beasts, animals, monsters, etc.

Secondly, Stadrin can be considered a die-hard Daedra worshiper. He recognizes not only the blessings of the "good" Daedra, but also the tests of the House of Troubles. Although he recognizes the wisdom in the teachings of the Tribunal, he regards its vilification of the "bad Daedra" as short-sighted liberalism. According to his philosophy, the purpose of life is to perservere in the face of hardship, both individually and as a society. (And, man, the Dunmer have had plenty of hardship to perservere through!) Comfort and peace are perhaps to be desired and striven for, but it is the striving that defines a mer, not the attaining. Therefore the Daedra that cause all kinds of problems for the Dunmer are as glorious and deserving of devotion as those who are more obviously benign. (This is why he respects the Orcs. They are here as a test from Malacath to keep the "true mer" physically strong.)

None of this has any direct bearing on practical gameplay rules, but it does inform my interpretation of the subject. Since Daedra, even lesser ones, do not actually die on Nirn, but simply return to Oblivion to coalesce new bodies, and since Conjuration effects are so temporary, and since the lesser servants of the Princes are so numerous and expendable, it is perfectly OK to summon them whenever you want and force them to whatever duties you are capable of imposing. In a sense, the service of Daedra to those who can wrest it is a kind of just reward for the ruthlessness with which the Daedra institutionally inflict difficulties upon mer. Stadrin will probably tend to be "nicer" to the servants of the "good Daedra", saving unpleasant tasks such as "go set off that trap" for the "bad" ones.

Not sure yet how I feel about taking Daedric souls for enchanting purposes. Traditionally in TES, these are the most valuable and are required for top-tier enchantments. Will Stadrin see Daedra as deserving as the same respect and "rights of citizenship" that he applies to elves? After all, Daedra are certainly "true citizens" of Oblivion, the flip side of Nirn. A Golden Saint for example is certainly as "real" as an elf, and trapping its soul would undoubtedly be a greater crime than trapping the soul of a rabbit or a human. But do lesser Daedra care what happens to their souls? Do they also go to an "otherworld" when they die, or do they just fizzle out? Maybe, rather than ceasing to exist, they would prefer to be trapped and made into magic shoes. Doesn't seem very likely, though.

So what do you think about Soul Trap and Daedra?

...hrmm...I'd take less inspiration from Indoril, and The Temple when it comes to outsider attitudes, and drop the mer love. The dunmer/chimer are the exception for a reason, and they did commit one of the largest heresies towards the altmer, which was also why they left Summerset to begin with. You also completely bastardize the message of Veloth and sound more like an altmer than anything.

Also, necromancy is a giant NO NO, and to practice it would be sacrilegious. The only time necomancy is okay, is when a member of the temple does it, and even then, it's done for specific reasons and done towards lazy and problematic members of a family that died.

As for soul trapping, I'd say only towards the daedra from the House of Troubles

I think Hellmouth pretty much hit the nail on the head with his post. However I think that the attitudes towards men and mer that your character has are rather good, although they're not traditional by any means and you shouldn't fall into the trap of thinking that they are. I feel that Hellmouth is trying to give tips on making your character more of a traditionalist, which is fine but the right direction will probably depend on whether you're more attached to the concept of traditionalism or the traits that you've already described. I think the general ideas that you have already mentioned could (with some tweaking) make a great character.

But yes, when I picture the character as described I see an Altmer.

Hm.

I took necromancy on "animals" as traditionally acceptable based this passage from http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Ancestors_and_the_Dunmer:


The same book also describes Telvanni practices:


Bear in mind that this was written shortly after the Armistice, over 3000 years after the time of the High Velothi Culture. How do we interpret this? We could say that the author just made it up, or that he met a few criminal wackos and applied his observations of them to the race as a whole, but in the absence of hard evidence to the contrary, I choose to take it at face value and accept that Dunmer really did think of mer as the only "real people" throughout their early history, and therefore, no taboo against necromancy applied to non-mer. Bottom line, my opinions on old school necromancy haven't changed at all. It's only during the Third Era that the Dunmer, "corrupted" by Imperial influence, start to see humans as real people.

I'm absolutely open to reading other sources that contradict this conclusion - I'll check them out side by side and rethink then. Nothing I've found so far contradicts this.

As for Veloth's message and the Daedra, all I found was http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Veloth:

Now, while I have no doubt that this teaching was largely responsible for the perception of the Bad Daedra as "evil", really all it says is that you need to watch out when dealing with them. This is totally consistent with the teachings in http://uesp.net/wiki/Lore:The_House_of_Troubles, which is what I based my upthread interpretation on.

Based on that summary of Veloth's teachings (which date from earliest Dunmer history) and the House of Troubles interpretation, it looks to me like the Good and Bad are two sides of a coin, and equally worthy of respect in the earliest records, implying that the vilification of the Bad as evil beings to be fought was an evolution of the distinction imposed by the Tribunal, probably to focus more support on themselves. (We all know how powerful institutions love to have visible enemies.) Again, I would love to look over any source that says otherwise.

It's true that the Temple has been around as long as the Dunmer themselves, and therefore Temple tradition, since it was also popular, can be considered the "most traditional" viewpoint. However I am going to claim that the "cultist interpretation" predates that of the Temple and is therefore technically more conservative. (Veloth himself was apparently not a Temple supporter at all, but a proponent of ancestor-worship.) In any case, it doesn't matter whether my character is as traditional or conservative as possible; that's not the point. Whatever the exact chronology of the varying viewpoints, the "Troubles" viewpoint looks like it will be the most fun to subscribe to. Though I do enjoy the idea of blowing off the Temple teachers as a bunch of Johnny-come-latelies.

Anyway, this will mean that I still view all the Daedra as being important and praiseworthy, so my upthread conclusions have again not changed. Probably will avoid using Soul Trap on any aligned Daedra, but will be OK with Trapping Atronachs, since they are unaligned and therefore kind of second class citizens.

Hellmouth, you mentioned something about not taking so much inspiration from Indoril. I looked around some but couldn't find any relationship between Indoril, necromancy, or Daedra. Some Indoril guys worked in the Temple; that's it. So I have no idea what you meant.

If I am mixed up on any of this, please set me straight, preferably with source material. Thanks!

:facepalm: Yeah for some reason I thought that by traditional you meant Velothi.

You seem to have done your homework :thumbsup:

You've already quoted most of what I know about that time period in dunmer history so I defer to others on matters I know little about.

That's what I thought too, not pre-armistice dunmer traditional.

Well, there you go. Seems like you got it down then.

Awesome! Thanks for the support guys!

Well, it helps you did do your research, just didn't understand what you meant by traditionalist.

Good work, I hate looking stuff up for people.