Alright, so it's clear that we don't know a whole lot about Ogres, other than the fact that they're big, dumb, and seem to have some sort of ties to Malacath. I've been thinking about this bond, and I have to wonder if Ogres couldn't have a similar origin to Orcs.

The Orcs were originally Aldmer worshippers of Trinimac who were changed into their current form at the same time Trinimac was changed into Malacath (or so the story goes). But the Aldmer may not have been the only worshippers of Trinimac. Recall the Imga, intelligent apes that are native to Valenwood and emulate the Altmer, whom they see as the pinacle of civilized culture. Assuming Imga already had a similar relationship to the Aldmer at the time of Trinimac's fall, it seems likely that a number of Imga would have taken up worship of Trinimac as well. When Trinimac became Malacath, his Aldmer worshippers lost much of their grace and intellect but increased tremendously in strength and toughness, becoming the brutish Orcs. If the same transformation were to occur to an intelligent ape–an already brutish creature–what do you think the end result would look like? I would imagine it would look a lot like an Ogre.

Of course, there is not real proof to this theory, but I think it makes sense. It would certainly explain the bond that Ogres have to Malacath. What do you all think? Does this seem reasonable to you?

Imga becoming Ogres?

I love it!

I thought it was a pretty good theory. It's too bad we'll probably never get an offical explanation, but I guess that's just the way TES is. People in universe don't magically know everything about everything, so there's no one to communicate all of that information to us.

Well there was a man living in Chorrol in Oblivion by the name of Jironlin Doran who thought he was related to some Ogres, it was supposed to be a quest but was never put into the final game. But if you go to his house you can still see the Doran family tree, ogres and all.

I wish they would have left that in; Ogres just seemed underutilized in Oblivion to me. Maybe they just decided that it was unrealistic, either for someone to mate with an Ogre without being killed or for such a child to actually be born and grow up to have a family. I would imagine that half-ogres wouldn't exactly be the most attractive.

I like this theory.