this has been on my mind from time to time, and I doubt there is anyway to properly confirm it but I would like others ideas on the subject..



so, in the Dragonborn expansion, everyone was happy to see Neloth again, as he was previously featured in Morrowind..

but, is that actually Neloth?


people often say that in most cases, the majority of quests in TES are canon, but the person who did them is not..

if this is true, the Neloth in Dragonborn can't be the Neloth from Morrowind, because you had to kill him for that one Mages Guild quest.

so, could it be that, the Neloth we meet in Dragonborn is not truly the Neloth from Morrowind? that perhaps after the death of the Original Neloth, another skilled mage came in and assumed hes Identity to gain power and influence within House Telvanni?
this may also add reason to why he referred to the Nerevarine as a "he", even though many players played the Nerevarine as a She, because if this is a different Neloth, they would likely have never actually met the Nerevarine..




like I said, its a theory more than anything else, but I would like others opinions on the concept

The quest to kill neloth was removed from vanilla morrowind.

umm, no, it wasn't

It's possible.

How many clones of himself did he ask Fyr to make, exactly? Could be anywhere between 3 and 200. The Red Year probably hopefully got most of them.

The clone that you meet in Dragonborn was the one version of himself smart enough to magically compel the rest to link arms before paralyzing them. He rode a raft of his own drowning doubles to the north, where he grew his mushroom tower out of a patch of earth made fertile by freshly buried bodies.

"For I have crushed a world with my left hand," he will say, "but below my basemant is how it could have won against me. Love is under my tower only."

The ending of the words is CANISROOT

That made me chuckle

Anyway, there is indeed a quest to kill all the Telvanni councilors but I believe you can ascend the ranks and become Archmage without having to do that at all. After all, the records could show that the Nereverine (or whoever became the Archmage at that period) fought Trebonius at the Arena after being promoted several times/ challenged Trebonius after being asked to perform illegal murders.

More likely is that nobody noticed a rather casual change of Guild leadership/ internal squabble

I'd love for it to be a whole "Manshoon" scenario. Dozens of Neloth clones running around and warring with each other thinking that they are the original.

Telvanni mage lords tend to be cunning, aloof and at least a little crazy. I'd say it's plausible that he faked his death. As for the pronoun, he may remember that he met the Nerevarine without remembering the Nerevarine himself or herself as the case may be. This doesn't sound plausible in that case but then he's lived for hundreds of years and he more or less named the Nerevarine Hortator to shut him up and get him out of his tower.

But then nobody discusses any personal details about the Nerevarine anyway. Even Neloth is an imposter, most people in Morrowind should know the Nerevarine's gender even if the education system's collapsed since the fall/reform of the New Temple. But all anyone's said since is that he's gone, possibly to Akavir and the may as much truth in that as the Eternal Champion having been Shathra the Ohmes assassin.

That being said, Dragonborn's continuity is a bit iffy in a few areas:

• Both Neloth and Varona Nelas look younger and more importantly, have different personalities.
• Milore Ienth says that she learnt alchemy from Lami in Morthal before hearing about a Dunmer settlement forming on Solstheim. Either that news travelled really slowly or Lami is over 200 years old. Not bad for a Nord with no apparent spell casting ability.
• Raven Rock is said have been home exclusively to Imperials and some Nord in 3E432, all dependent on the mine for their livelihood. So what happened to the roughly 50% Dunmer population in Bloodmoon?
• In Oblivion, the legions stayed in the provinces. In Dragonborn, it was recalled.
• Since when did Skyrim have the authority to give Solstheim to Morrowind?
• What happened to the Nordic invasion of Solstheim?
• What happened to Nords outside the Skaal and Thirsk? The reavers, berserkers and fryse hags?
• What happened to the grahls?
• When did the barrows turn into enormous fancy dragon cult style ruins?
• Did the Ulen family buy the Morag Tong or something? Fighting to last man for a client isn't old MO and neither is letting them join in.
• Why does a priest who claims to be an Ashlander have a house Dunmer name, when the Velothi working class of the old Redoran towns didn't and now being an Ashlander only enhances his status in the Temple?
• Was Captain Carius definitely not killed under Mortrag Glacier as he likely was in the werewolf Bloodmoon quest line?

A quest to kill Neloth was removed, but not both. Or perhaps all. Although if ones says that all observable quest outcomes are canon, it could be argued that Neloth should be dead following the Nerevarine claiming the title of Telvanni Hortator, because killing councillors, even all of them, was a legitimate way to do that in that case.

I generally agree, but I do have a few comments.

1. The MAJORITY of quests are canon also means that THAT PARTICULAR quest to kill Neloth, can be among the ones NOT canon

2. The use of "he" is based on the previous mention of the Nerevarine - "he" is here used in general terms, not necessarily as proof that the Nerevarine actually was male.