I started my search after I decided to study the Imperial Empire's religious history and views. While reading through various books about the differing religious viewpoints of the races I stumbled across a name that intrigued me; the Temple Zero Society. I've searched for more information about who or what this society is, but found no trace of evidence to their existence. Although, surprisingly, I found a lore-master going by the alias "Temple-Zero" who's information was being questioned by other well-versed lore-masters. In Temple-Zero's defense came another lore-master with the alias "Sload", whom referred to Temple-Zero as Paw-prints and stated that he was an expert in lore. Additionally "Apophis", another lore-master came and validated Sload's claim and stated he was probably the second most leading expert in lore. To me, this validates Paw-prints credentials in lore.

Now to get on point, what I found curious was that Sload immediately demanded that Paw-prints no longer go by his alias:

"Also, we are going to have to ask that he change his name. Temple-Zero is not his name to use, and some respect for our organization would have been appreciated. Its my understanding that this can be fixed, and I hope vehemently that it shall." - Sload

After this I hit a dead-end. Later, I picked up on another trail of Paw-print's that led me to a place where a group of people calling themselves The Temple Zero Society use to write books of fictional lore. Unfortunately, it seems they abandoned this place long ago leaving only their false books and very little information on who the true Temple Zero Society was. This is the only piece of information on the Temple Zero Society they left behind:

"Temple Zero takes its name from a secretive organization that appears in ancient lore. Little is known about Temple Zero, but it consists primarily of conspiracy theorists, revolutionaries, intellectuals, and heterodox thinkers, who are highly critical of the Cyrodilic Empire and generally entertain Marukhati philosophies. Furthermore, they appear to have access to information not generally available to the public, and have a history of spreading that information against the will of the Empire. For this reason, they are often portrayed as frauds, charlatans, or heretics." - The Temple Zero Society

Since I have no sources to validate even this claim I cannot take the information as fact and since my trail has hit a dead-end again, I am stuck where I started at. So I ask all of you to help me gather the information i'm searching for. If you have any information on the Temple Zero Society even if you can't validate a source, please let me know, thank you. - Sage Montalius

http://www.monkeytruth.net/

My first though upon reading this thread was something along the lines of "aha, Temple Zero is trying to draw us into a meta-game-role-play-lore-writing-session about itself. Would self-referential jokes be appropriate here?"

Thats Temple Zero.

In all seriousness, are you interested in Temple Zero the heretical Tamrielic faction, or Temple Zero the website and forum account?

You know, I'm pretty sure he's already been there.

As for the Temple Zero organization in TES, as far as I am aware it has only appeared in the context of some of MK's writings, wher it has served as an in-universe source for the writing. (Like, Nu-hatta, only it's an organization rather than a single moth priest) Namely, they serve as authors for the Monomyth and Cosmology.

Personally, I'm inclined to wonder if they have any relation to the Cult of Emperor Zero.

Haha, well yeah, even though everything I wrote is about website's and fan discussions which is an honest representation of my real-life search for information on the Temple Zero Society, I wrote in a way not to specifically break the 4th wall (in a way).

But in all seriousness i'm interested in the Tamrielic faction. I've been to the monkey truth website and the last three paragraphs of my post are ABOUT that website in particular.

We don't really have much on them. They are referenced in the http://imperial-library.info/content/redguard-forum-madness and as authors of a few texts, but other than that we've got nothing. The websites description of itself (which you quoted) is as good a description as any.

I was looking for information on this too in my thread looking for information regarding Cyrodiil. But I'm pretty sure now that all we know about them has already been stated in this thread. :shrug:

We'll have to wait for more information lore-side.

Besides the Monomyth and Cosmology are they credited as the author of any other books? The Monomyth is what started my study when I went to UESP and found a discrepancy in who the author was:

"Michael Kirkbride originally posted this book and listed the author as an enigmatic "Temple Zero Society" [1]. However, no author is listed in the version of the book that appeared in-game."

After looking around on the big name ES lore websites and finding nothing I just got more intrigued. Especially after I found and read the discussion between Paw-prints and Sload. Paw-prints being praised as one of the top lore-masters by other expert lore-masters and the fact that of all names he choose Temple Zero as his alias just set me off on my search. I figured he must know something the rest of us don't, so I tracked him to Tamriel Rebuild, Imperial Library, and Monkey Truth. And when I got to the Monkey Truth website I thought I found what I was looking for, but it was more about making lore than who the TZ was. At this point, now i'm looking for where the Monkey Truth website got their basic description of who the TZ is.

Does anyone know the connection between the Temple Zero Society, The Psijic Order, and Marukh the Seer?

They seem to tie into on another in some manner.

Especially their link with Mysticism (which isn't going to be in Skryim!). We know Mysticism is the school of magic that delves into seeing the past and future. Temple Zero seem to have information that otherwise shouldn't be available to them leading me to think they were practicers of ancient Mysticism. While the Psijic Order are known to get their power from ancient Mysticism, and Marukh the Seer (Prophet) is obviously an alude to Mysticism as well.

This is atleast something to think about...very interesting.

Paws and Sload are both members of the Temple Zero Society (as is Adanorcil, HoonDing, and a bunch of other people, kinda-sorta including myself). The society's description of itself is a fancy summary of what is stated or implied in Redguard Forum Madness and the Monomyth. There really is nothing more that that.

I doubt that t0 has any connection to the Psijics or their version of mysticism. The Psijic mysticism is as much a religion and a culture as it is a magic school, and its limited to Artaeum, while t0 appears to be an Imperial (or at least mannish) cult. As for Marukh, it might help to view him as the Cyrodiil version of Vivec (sans divinity-stealing and spear-dongs). He is essentially the figure that revealed various metaphysical truths to man, truths which often went against the status quo. Temple Zero appears to follow his ideas and be a pursuit of truth (with or without quotation marks), which makes them unpopular and an easy target for ridicule in the eyes of more mainstream scholars.

I'm not well-versed in ES lore. I've played Morrowind and I played Oblivion when it came out, but I never really read the books or got into the lore because there was so much to read and the books just didn't make much sense to me. Now that Skyrim's coming out I kinda got back into the Elder Scrolls and i'm studying the lore (I never knew there was so much more to this game than meets the eye). I decided i'd start at the beginning with how the world was created. I thought that would be the easy part...haha...so I read the Monomyth and that's kinda been my reference guide to studying lore. I have a basic understanding (or misunderstanding) of Anu and Padomy, the beginning of time, the et'Ada, the creation of Mundus, etc.

But to understand even the most simple of lore you need to study alot more than just that one side. Everthing seems to revolve around one another and intersect, sometimes creating conflicts in the lore, plus the prospect that maybe what you read has an agenda behind it or is just flat out misleading on purpose. It's pretty interesting stuff!

So now that I know as much as I can about TZ, and I have Redguard Madness and their written works as a source. I guess i'll be moving on to research marukh and his teachings and learn for myself their connections! Could you or someone else provide source material for me? I'd hate to overlooks a book or a developers post and not get the full truth (I never would have found Redguard Madness without the help provided above), and i'd be most appreciative.

Heh, you've got a talent for picking topics we know next to nothing about.

Anyways, check http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1112211-how-to-become-a-lore-buff/ out. If you're intent on studying a particular topic (like Marukh), I recommend using TIL's search function.

The more obscure and mysterious; the harder it is to find the truth. And that's the fun part about it.

Right now I use UESP as a reference point (I find it easier to use, but maybe that's just cause i'm not use to TIL yet), but then I cross reference what I read with TIL, and then come to the forums here or any places where the lore might reside (like I found Monkey Truth). Forums are a good place to find info, but I always prefer to find a source from a book or developer input over word of mouth.

Do you think i'd have an easier time using TIL as my reference point, as UESP just like any wiki could be slandered by anyone, or do you think it matters? Also, besides UESP and TIL are their any other major lore sites I should be aware of? I checked out Tamriel Rebuilt but it doesn't seem to much like a lore site as it is a reconstruction site.

If you`re using UESP to read books, and find it more comfortable, theres no reason to switch. However, avoid the articles in the Lore section, since they can be (and are) edited by anyone, and therefore can be (and are) wrong or incomplete. Books, games, and developers should always be your first sources of information. TIL has a bunch of info that UESP doesn`t, though, so you`ll have to use it for some things.

TIL, UESP, and this board are the major ones. t0 has some intersting stuff, but its not really active, and its not much use if you`re just beginning.