What if Lord Harkon is really the son of the Jarl who was turned into a vampire, and his vampire cronies are really the original Dawnguard?

The original Dawnguard existed in the Second Era, and was sworn to protect/hide the son of the Jarl of Riften who had turned into a vampire, guarding him until the group was disbanded for some reason, several are given in-game, but none are ever confirmed as to why the group was disbanded.

When you awake Serana as part of the Dawnguard MQ, you tell her about the existence of The Empire, and she seems to not know that an Empire existed at all. Which Empire she means is actually hinted at in the game dialog, which labels Serana's response as "empireseptim", meaning, she came around sometime in the second Era, after the fall of Reman, but before the rise of Tiber.

According to Sorine Jurard, one of the rumors surrounding the end of the original Dawnguard, was that they were so awed by the power of Vamprism that the Jarl's son had, that they chose to become Vampires themselves.

Just crazy theory here, what if Harkon was the Jarls son, some his Vampire cronies are the original danwguard?

In which line of dialog does she imply the septim empire? I was under the impression that she was hidden pre-Alessian Empire.

I realize I wasn't clear, the game's label for serana's dialog, if viewed in the CK, says Septim on it.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim_talk:Serana/Archive_1#Her_age

It sounds like she doesn't immediately know that the Dwemer are gone. Or, if we are going with your theory, she might be expressing some 2nd Era fascination with the Dwemer.

I don't have access to the CK, but I am curious about the name of that specific line.

She is unaware there is an Empire based out of Cyrodiil. Cyrodiil has been the seat of the Empire since the First Empire under Alessia. That would date her back to the First Era. I don't think the Creation Kit labeling is sufficient. If you spend enough time in it, you'll find sometimes things are given all kinds of silly labels that don't fit.

At the same time she is familiar with the College of Winterhold, which the oldest records of it being around, according to the Arch-Mage when Skyrim begins, is in the 2nd Era.

She is unaware an Empire is based out of Cyrodiil, yes, but she doesn't say she in unaware of there having been a Cyrodiilic Empire in the past, just that the idea of a current empire out of Cyrodiil is unknown to her.

And Cyrodiil wasn't the seat of the Empire when there was no Empire to be the seat of, such as the long periods of time between Alessia and Reman, and Reman and Tiber.

Its called DLC1VQ02BackgroundTimeSeptims

and the lines in question are

Dovhakiin: "The... Empire. From Cyrodiil."

Serana: "Cyrodiil is the seat of an empire? I must have been gone longer than I thought. Definitely longer than we planned. Please, let's hurry. I need to get home so I can figure out what's happened."

What's interesting to note is that being in he Second Era makes Harkon's transformation into a Vampire Lord around the same time as Molag Bal's, the creator of the Vampires, invasion of Tamirel.

Nice idea.

Write a story about it.

Well thats pretty damn cool. I wonder if its coincidence

considering that the MMO's plot was probably set in stone before Dawnguard came out, its possible it was meant to be like that, that is, if Harkon being second Era theory is legit.

If I recall correctly ESO had supposedly been in development for about 5 years before they announced it in 2012. So I suppose it's very likely Harkon is meant to be from that time period.

On UESP it says that Harkon said he sacrificed a thousand innocents in Molag Bal's name before being turned. What if he was with the Tharns when they made the deal with Mannimarco/Bal? What if all the player characters were Harkon's sacrifces (assuming a thousand is just a random number meant to represent a general large amount of people)?

This is crazy stuff, man.

I was referring to the "Is this a dwarven city? I'm surprised that they'd let it get this way" line.

That would be probable, I frankly find it hard to believe him being able to kill thousands of people, and not getting caught, in anything but a war time scenario.