Some of you guys/gals might recall the 'Trinimalarkay' theory posted at the official forums awhile back. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, it was my attempt to equate Trinimac with Arkay through Orkey. The theory was primarily based upon the lack of an obvious Arkay equivalent within the Altmeri pantheon, as well as a bunch of word-play and death symbolism associated with Malacath. Since then, we have seen the release of ESO, which has added a significant amount of lore to this series. Of particular note is the lore added regarding the god Xarxes, who apparently is the Altmeri Arkay. I don't think any of us expected it to be him, what with his connection to history and writing and all. I honestly believed him to be the Altmeri Julianos. This revelation, of course, throws the 'Trinimalarkay' theory out the window, but not entirely. There still remains the connection between Trinimac and Arkay through Orkey, which is something even the developers of ESO acknowledge. After all, they decided to connect the two through a newly added line in the Nordic edition of "Varieties of Faith". So, I am once again bringing this subject back up to see if we can all come to a conclusion, especially now that we know Mithras is the inspiration for Trinimac. Let's begin.

Not much is known about Trinimac before his unmaking. What we do know is that it was he who killed Lorkhan and took his Heart. We also know that, according to some sources, he was considered the most powerful et'Ada to ever walk upon Nirn, and that some sects of Aldmer held him in higher regard than even Auri-El. He was also a guardian of the Aldmer, protecting them and their way of life from threats both foreign and domestic. But what is his sphere, exactly? We must look to Malacath for answers. Like Mithras, Malacath is a god associated with oaths, hence his moniker 'Keeper of the Sworn Oath and the Bloody Curse'. Malacath, like Mithras, takes deception very seriously, and it is quite apparent in his affiliated quest in Skyrim. He's willing to curse an entire family of his people, all because of the actions of one dishonest chieftain. Reminds me of a passage from the "Hymn to Mithra", which says "The ruffian who lies unto Mithra brings death unto the whole country, injuring as much the faithful world as a hundred evil-doers could do." This extreme attitude and behavior towards lying certainly makes it understandable why it was Trinimac who killed Lorkhan. That being said, Trinimac was undoubtedly a god of truth, even before he became Malacath. But there might be more to his sphere than that. Let's refer to a passage or two about Mithras and see if we can connect some of his roles with Trinimac.


And another...


Here we see Mithras variously referred to as a god of oaths, justice, light, the sun, and war. He also appears to be affiliated with agriculture through cattle-herding, and it just so happens that he is a patron of kings and the Roman legions. Those all sound awfully familiar, but look closely at the last two roles I mentioned. Many people believe Trinimac to be the equivalent of Zenithar within the Altmeri pantheon. This idea came about with the release of "Shor son of Shor", which equates Trinimac with Tsun to the point where both gods switch places. I've often challenged this belief with the mentioning of Xen within the Altmeri "The Heart of the World". He is named seperately from Trinimac within the text, so how could Trinimac be his equivalent within the pantheon? And then there is the issue of Orkey. My belief was that Arkay and Zenithar shared a similar relationship to one another as the one between the Time God and Space God, due to the overlap between them. For example, both gods are considered agricultural deities among the Redguards, and Tsun serves a similar purpose to Tu'whacca as a psychopomp, a conductor of souls into the afterlife. That's why I believe Trinimac and Tsun switched places, because their fathers, Ald and Shor, had switched places.

But there's another problem: Stuhn.

In "Shor son of Shor", he and Tsun are constantly shifting about throughout the text, possibly due to all the overlap between their spheres. They're twins for [censored]'s sake! So does this mean that Trinimac is Stuhn by extension? Let's refer back to one of the roles of Mithras. He is a god of justice, as well as a patron of rulers and the Roman legions. Is Stendarr not a god of justice? Is he not a patron of magistrates and rulers, AND the Imperial Legion? And thanks to the introduction of the Vigilants of Stendarr, he is also a god of light, just like Mithras. ESO heavily expands upon Stendarr's light through multiple texts, such as "Prayer of the Resolute", "Rituals of the Harmonious Masters", and "Aura of the Righteous". I think it also bears mentioning that, according to ESO, the Redguard gallants (knights) are patroned solely by Stendarr. Let's not forget that Trinimac was THE god of knights in his time, so there is a lot in common between he and Stendarr.

At last, we come to Arkay. But before we begin with him, let's go over a few more things concerning Mithras, particularly his role as a sun god. As mentioned above, Mithras is famed for slaying the cosmic bull that gave birth to all life. This act was necessary so that man could successfully inhabit the earth. In doing so, the bull's body and blood gave rise to all plant life and useful animals within the world, and ushered forth the Good Rains. I don't know about you, but this sounds a lot like Lorkhan's sacrifice, followed by Kyne's tears. Not only did Mithras set in motion the fertility of the planet in slaying the bull, but he also displayed his superiority over Ahura Mazda, thus earning him the titles of Sol Invictus, or 'invicible sun', and kosmokrator, or 'cosmic ruler'. Here's a few passages going over his duties as sun god and kosmokrator.


Not finished...


One more...


Now we can finally go over Arkay. As many of you know, Arkay is known as the 'Lord of Seasons' due to his association with time, and he is also referred to as the 'Lord of the Wheel of Life', according to "The Consecrations of Arkay". This puts him in control of the cosmic order of the Aurbis, which is easily identified with Mithras and his roles. You're probably thinking, "But Arkay isn't a sun god!" Well, let me ask you this: what is the sun, if not a massive soul-gate from which all souls pour forth from Aetherius? If Arkay is the one in charge of maintaining this soul-gate, then that makes him a sun god. Just not THE sun god. I think you guys/gals should take a look at an Amulet of Arkay, too. The symbol used looks VERY reminescent of a sun. But anyway, Arkay's power over souls is reflected in Orkey, who uses his power to shorten the lifespans of the Nords via curse. And then there is the story of Arkay's rise to godhood. Some sources claim he was but a man born of the earth, who ascended to godhood via Mara after learning the secrets of the cycle of life, death, and rebirth. Other sources state that he was present at the beginning, but he only found purpose after the creation of the world. I can't help but think of the rock-birth of Mithras in this case, with the 'maternal rock' being Nirn. After all, Mithras was a god AND a man. So there's that...


To bring this long-ass post to its conclusion (which isn't going to be short), I postulate that Trinimac's name is the key to the mystery: He is, as his name suggests, the "threefold son". He is the amalgamation of Arkay, Zenithar, and Stendarr into one being. This explains why he was considered to be the most powerful god ever to roam the world, and why he is connected to all three gods. We learn in ESO through a questline entitled "Mauloch and Z'en" that he has the power to overtake Z'en. As Mauloch's influence grows stronger in the world, Z'en's influence disappears. I believe the same case can be said of Orkey, with Mauloch overtaking Arkay's sphere and inverting it into a malevolent force. We've yet to see a similar instance with Stendarr, but it's well-known that Malacath abhors the weak and looks down upon mercy. That alone is an inversion of Stendarr's sphere. But that's not to say Malacath doesn't employ the influences of both Zenithar and Stendarr within his code the stronghold Orcs follow. Orcs are excellent craftsmen, and each weapon forged is done so in honor of Malacath. The code also employs 'righteous rule by might' through the chieftains of each stronghold. As for Arkay, well, I haven't figured out what his influence would be within the strongholds. Perhaps the Orcish views of old age and seeking glorious death could be connected to him. Oh, and here's a crazy thought: the weapon Scourge, Malacath's hammer, is said to be able to banish any of the Dark Kin, or Daedra, back into Oblivion. Not only that, but it has the ability to summon the souls of those banished enemies to aid the wielder in combat. What if this weapon employs the power of all three gods? Firstly, it's a hammer, and Zenithar's symbol is both a hammer and anvil. Secondly, it is potent against those who abhor the light, and Stendarr's light is used against those the Vigilants deem as abominations. Thirdly, it has power over souls, which is something Arkay is known for. Food for thought. But back to the main subject. How Trinimac managed to become a threefold god is a mystery. I suspect his removal of the Heart of Lorkhan had a part in it, since it played a crucial role in the formation and apotheosis of the threefold Talos. Perhaps the Heart's removal triggered a Dragon Break, assuming it wasn't already broken in the Dawn, and the Enantiomorph between Arkay, Zenithar, and Stendarr (the three cosmic order deities) resulted in the formation of a new god known as Trinimac, the ever-victorious warrior. But, unlike Talos, Trinimac did not have CHIM, and so his spirit was blackened and poisoned. I can't help but wonder if Mephala, Boethiah, and Azura attempted to become a threefold deity in murdering him. Put Arkay in place of Mephala (Thief), Zenithar in place of Boethiah (Warrior), and Stendarr in place of Azura (Mage) as the only who can tell them apart.

And there you have it, boys and girls. Oh, my brain hurts...

Thank you for bringing this issue back.

Not long ago I asked in a post about the eso Altmeri pantheon, and some feedback I gained was intriguing to my taste. It brought the issue of Kyne into the existence of Trinimac.

At first I have to mention that the link between Trinimac and Tsun/Zenithar does exist. However, let's consider the role of Trinimac in the Aldmeri myth. He was the Shield-Thane to Auriel, same as Tsun the Shield-Thane to Shor. But was Trinimac or Tsun the only Shield-Thane? If we consider the King-Rebel-Witness model true, can we say anyone who is not Rebel should be a Shield-Thane to King? And this is the reason why all other Aedra lost thought on whom they were fighting against in Shor son of Shor. The Shield-Thanes only follow the King, no matter whom the King is.

By this it means all other six Aedra-planet or Ada (in order to minimize confusion) could be considered same role as Trinimac/Zenithar/Tsun, or they could be mixed up into one being or replace one the other.

And let's go back to Kyne. As a Y'ffre-Kyne similarity supporter, I had never considered the link between Kyne and Trinimac. But as Umpteen mentioned in my old post, both are god/goddess of war, which is a feature of the Shield-Thane. So I reconsidered the possibilities, and I think the key is the state of Y'ffre. Y'ffre is an Earthbone, much Deader than other Aedra-aspects like Kyne. And beside the core feature of Space-Nature (The provider of Mundane Space and all within) and Song (Poetry and Shout, all Music, the basic nature of Earthbone), Y'ffre and Kyne are almost totally opposite. Earth-Sky, Solid-Floating, Dead-Alive.

It would mean a proto-Kynareth (Ada or planet) got split in the Aldmeri myth. The "corpse" that became the very First Earthbone is Y'ffre, and the "spirit" of nature should be some equivalent to Kyne or Khenathi or Tarva, which means "sky", or "bird", which, in the Aldmeri culture, more referring to the passage escaping Mundus (the reason why both Altmeri and Ayleidoon culture worships or uses bird or eagle or hawk as emblem, the very animal of Kyne-Khenathi-Tarva, though we see no Aldmeri worship to the very goddess).

It is easy to think the reason why Auriel could escape Mundus is that he obtained this very pair of wings from the proto-Kynareth, thus also explained the Aldmeri bird emblem. However, Auriel is the King, and the spirit equicalent to Kyne-Khenathi-Tarva is Shield-Thane fighting for him. I don't think the King would stripe the fighting nature from his Shield-Thane, as Shor himself also fight yet still obtaining his Shield-Thanes. This means the "spirit of wind/flying" in Aldmeri culture should not be Auriel. And then enters Trinimac, the very aspect of Ada who fought with Auriel and actually killed Lorkhan and striped his heart out, as all Auriel had done was to shoot the heart to the east. And thus Trinimac was and is worshipped by the Altmer in quite a positive way, or not as negative as we used to think him to be.

Also we could look into the Chimeri myth on the death of Trinimac. I always believe that without the Auriel-centered religion replacing the Old Way, Velothi would never begin his exodus and there would be no Chimer. So the death of Trinimac could be considered as "the result" of Auriel's ascending, especially if what Mannimarco said about the very first dragonbreak by the High king of Alinor is true. Auriel "lives" in Aetherius, but the status of Trinimac is ambiguous. He should be considered dead, which is proven by the existence of Malacath, but he is still worshipped by the Altmer as if alive. I think maybe after the Chimeri Exodus Trinimac (not Malacath) had entered a similar state of Y'ffre, dead as Earthbone, but still worshipped. Maybe he is exactly acting as the passage between Earth and Aetherius, the Sky-Wind, only the Altmeri culture solified him as they did Y'ffre, thus "the sky Earthbone through whom Auriel got ascended, a loyal Shield-Thane who acted as the fist general". And this Trinimac also embodies the concept of Mundane Death by his own death.

So if Trinimac, now Malacath, is those three divines, are they a part of him or is he a part of them? Did they all merge to form him or does his sphere just overlap with theirs? Sorry for the silly questions but the whole concept of spheres and stuff confuses me.

Good read. I have an interesting theory to add to this.

It has been brought to my attention that King Gortwog of Orsinium banned the worship of Malacath in an effort to bring back worship to what he claimed was their true god "Trinimac."

The orcs have been a pariah race for millennium, and seems that they are mythically inclined to remain so. Malacath, the eternal underdog, will never win. We see this time and time again.

Say, don't you think it's an odd coincidence that the orcish ruler that turned from Malacath helped gain his people a new status?

My theory is that Malacath is not just inverted against those three divines you mentioned, but that he is an inversion of Trinimac completely. If this was Legend of Zelda, he'd be "Dark World" Trinimac. He's Dung Trinimac, a facsimile brought together by Boethiah in dishonoring the merrish champion. Some mer, believing the lie, became orcs.

So the orcs remaining as pariahs, is all just another plot, by the Prince of Plots.

Think of him like Talos, only without CHIM. I believe Trinimac is a result of the Enantiomorph between Arkay, Zenithar, and Stendarr, yet he retains a singular identity. However, in times of conflict, he can overtake any one of the three gods. He's a hero-god of war, just like Talos.

You could also compare him to Pelinal Whitestrake. Pelinal was supposedly a fusion of Aka and Lorkhan into one being, yet he still remained seperate from them.

Oh, and one more thing, the idea of him being a triplicate deity also comes from a characteristic of Mithras. If you research him, you'll sometimes see references made to a Triplasian Mithras, or Triform Mithras. In every depiction of the tauroctony, Mithras is accompanied by two characters on his left and right flank. The one on the left, Cautes, represents dawn/life, and the one on the right, Cautopates, represents dusk/death. Together, they all three make up the Triform Mithras.

BTW, does anyone know how to edit tags? Somehow or another, the 'Trinimac' and 'Arkay' tags aren't seperate.

You should be able to click on them when you have opened the edit window. A "x" should appear to delete the respective tag.

Maybe I didn't get the whole theory... but are you saying Malacath becomes Trinimac when he is reabsorbing his three "aspects"?

Thanks. I just fixed them. I'm used to running the mobile version of this site, since the majority of my posting is done from phone.

What I'm saying is that Trinimac/Malacath, being a triune being of Arkay, Zenithar, and Stendarr, can manifest himself into any one of them and take over in times of great conflict, just he like he does with Z'en and Orkey. That's why aspects of all three gods can be found within him.

However doesn't Talos exist because Lorkhan or his other aspects in a state of "missing"? Thus Talos became Lorkhan 2.0. In every myths Lorkhan or his other aspects are dead, thus the enantiomorph succeeded. Yet at least two of the aspect of Zenithar is still "alive" with Stendarr. How can an enantiomorph exist when neither the King had conqured the Rebel or the Rebel had usurped the King?

I think if the mixing exists, it is more like the case of Almalexia. Almalexia is Kyne plus Mara plus Dibella, according to Nu-Hatta. What we know about the Aedra pantheon are mostly based on manish view, so I think the Merish pantheon could be more flexible. I still hold my guess that Trinimac acts as the spoke section of one or several Aedra together, below him is the earthbone section in the hub, and above him is the Aetherius section on the rim. The similar pattern as Sotha Sil with the earthbones, Almalexia above the stars while Vivec floating in between.

Tsun is dead, Xen is missing, and Zeht rebelled. I'd say he fits the role of Lorkhan in this instance very well. Trinimac, or rather Orkey, would fill the role of Aka in this case. I say Orkey because he fulfills the role of Trinimac in the battle between Shor and Alduin in The Five Songs of King Wulfharth, but I'll use the name Trinimac for convenience. In Shor son of Shor, Trinimac and Tsun switch places, yet only Stuhn notices this and observes. However, Tsun and Stuhn constantly switch places, too. Trinimac serves as the accuser of man (King), Tsun the defender (Rebel), and Stuhn is the apologist-mediator between the two (Observer). You could flip-flop the roles of Tsun and Trinimac in regards to the Aldmer, but the fact of the matter is that Tsun died alongside Shor in the Mannish pantheon, and Xen went missing in the Merrish pantheon.

I wonder, if Stuhn constantly switches place with Tsun, how can he be an Observer to Tsun? An Observer is the one who records with his own eye that the King is/becomes the King. If the Observer could switch with the King / the Rebel, who could take the Observer from the King / the Rebel apart? One could not observe himself, thus the necessity of an Observer.

Or we have to accept the infinite cycle of the Observer of the Observer of the Observer and so on.

To my understanding, in Shor son of Shor Tsun switched with Trinimac because Shor switched with Ald, as Tsun could only be the follower of Shor while Trinimac of Ald. This means both pairs should share the same Observer, as the two events are in fact the same one. Or we should see the possibility of Tsun Shield-Thane of Ald, or Trinimac Champion of Shor, or at least it should be mentioned. But all we see is Tsun "constantly" switching with Stuhn.

So I think it is still a little difficult to say Trinimac-Tsun-Stuhn follow the enantiomorph. It could be sure unless the Observer being the same Observer of the dragon-serpent. However I do think it possible that Stuhn and Tsun being merged into a single being, thus Trinimac being merged with other Aedra, only it is not due to enantiomorph, but due to mortal perspective.

Believe me, it would have been much easier to just stick with the idea that Trinimac is equivalent to Arkay. But ESO's inclusion of Xarxes as Arkay, and the presence of Zenithar and Stendarr's influence within Malacath, screws all of that up. This character is either a big mess, or he combines all three gods. Whether or not that is due to an Enantimorph doesn't matter. What matters is Trinimac's equation with Mithras, which comes from MK's own words. It's our biggest clue yet as to who he is. With all the research regarding Mithras in mind, and all the clues connecting Trinimac to these three deities, I can only come to one conclusion.

Well, my head-canon is when Auriel dragonbroke to ascend and to do so killed the proto-mother-kyne in the Old Way Aldmeri ancestors, he arranged the Altmeri pantheon to his like, thus it became so different from the manish or the planet pantheon. To now it is still impossible for me to insert Phynaster or Syrabane into their rightful place in the planet pantheon.

And regarding Mithra, his Vedic equivalent Mitra charging bond of friendship while the counterpart Varuna charging truth and contract, and in Persian religion Mithra takes place of both Mitra and Varuna. So if we use the same logic on Trinimac as Mithra, Mitra and Varuna as Stuhn and Tsun, I don't think there is any problem. Trinimac stood in Tsun's space, leaving the loving feature to Altmeri Stendarr, and took all other Stuhn-charging feature for himself.

I once read about that character when studying Mithras. That thought had crossed my mind, as well. But as I researched more and more into Varuna, I learned that he is the predecessor of Ahura Mazda, who would be equivalent to Auri-El in the case of Mithra/Mithras, with the Persian Mithra adopting some characteristics of both Varuna and Indra. Mitra and Varuna, sometimes invoked as Mitra-Varuna, uphold the cosmic order together. The same relationship was later developed with the Persian Mithra and Ahura Mazda, and then, finally, the Roman Mithras came to be the one who solely upheld the cosmic order.

BTW, in regards to your point about Tsun and Stuhn forming into Trinimac, it's worth noting that, according to The 500 Companions, Tsunaltir and Stuhnalmir are said to become the ashen amalgam Grit-Prince Tstunal. I just now remembered this.

And I think in Shor son of Shor, the constant switching between Stuhn and Tsun suggests these two Aedra share a common concept. IIRC in RW mythologies the duality of Mitra-Varuna could be seen as pan-Indo-Aryan, some researches suggest the similarity between Mitra-Varuna and Tyr-Ordin. The basic idea of such dualism is different aspects of a single abstract concept, mainly mundane vs magic or mystic. I'd like to think Stuhn and Tsun also follow this pattern. By this it is easy to draw from them a more ideal concept like the one of Trinimac. Also we should see the Divine Stendarr and Zenithar. In Cyrodiil system it is Stendarr who is the fighting knight of mercy, while Zenithar only cares about making money. This means features like "guarding knight" "mercy" "work" all belong to the duality of Stendarr-Zenithar, and it is cultural differences that may choose different features from the group for their Stendarr, and the left ones are for their Zenithar. We are yet to mention the influence from other Aedra or Daedra, but I think the basic pattern is like this.

This is an idea I've started to get interested in too.

There's some other points in it's favour. Kyne/Kynareth is sometimes depicted as male through her associations with Khenarthi and Y'ffre. Kyne, like Trinimac, is a warrior god - the shield wife of Shor to Trin's shield thane of Auriel. Both sides of the philosophical conflict therefore depict this entity as the shield-bearer of their pantheon head.

Both entities can be considered manifestations of "The Spirit of Sundering" that ended the dawn - Trinimac who reaches in with "more than hands" ("Talons?" quips Din) to hollow Lorkhan's heart from his chest and Kyne who "provides the space" for creation to exist. They both create a sacred void. Indeed, Kyne is further related to the concept of sundering in The Song of Pelinal, where a Alessia invokes the dawntime sundering and prays for Kyne to likewise sunder her enemies. We can also see this theme reflected in Y'ffre, a deity clearly related to Kynareth, who likewise ends the dawntime for the Bosmer by solidifying their forms.

The bird imagery of the Altmer could easily be a symbol of Trinimac, who we are told in Varieties of Faith is a very popular god among the Altmer, sometimes eclipsing the worship of Auriel. If this is so, then he shares bird imagery with Kyne.

That's not even touching on the idea that when Boethiah spoke with Trinimac's voice it might have been thu'um...

Xarxes, Kyne and a whole lot of gods. And it makes sense... enough, at least.

What kind of god is Trinimac? He's a convoluted mess more than Serpent/Dragon ever was. I think he beats Akatosh in that if this theory of him is true.

It is really very interesting that the Altmer worship Y'ffre and Trinimac at the same time, if we do acknowledge the relation between Trinimac and Kyne. Bird means air means the passage between Earth and Heaven, or Aetherius to Altmer. So I don't see it some coincidence on the parallelof Earthbone-Middle Air to Sotha Sil-Vivec to Y'ffre-Trinimac. If Almalexia could be the merge of Kyne-Mara-Dibella, then Trinimac could also contain several character from different Aedra, with Kyne-equivalent being one of them and Tsun-equivalent being another. Also it would be interesting to mention that it seems Auriel could not return to Aetherius without the help of Trinimac, as it is Trinimac who actually killed Lorkhan. To Auriel, Trinimac acted as the way to becoming the King and to reach heaven, similar to Vivec leading Nerevar(ine) to his role of the Master and to Amaranth. By this Trinimac could be considered floating in mid air, acting like the passage, the spoke between the hub and the rim, and the master of air is his Kynic character.

Yet it would leave a question that with Y'ffre as earthbone and Trinimac in between, who related to Kyne would act as Almalexia with Splendid of Stars. Auriel maybe as he is the King and he is in Aetherius, but I'm not very sure about it. It seems the Altmer are so longing for escaping that the bird is in everywhere within their metaphor.

However I think a main feature of Kyne is to give birth, or should we say, she is the mother who gives birth, contrast to Mara the mother who feeds. It is based on her "providing the space" nature. When MK said the Stone of Snow-Throat is a cave, finally I think he means the Gildergreen, and the key to the Gildergreen quest is to respect the nature of life cycle and the reproduction, that the children would inherit the parents to live on. This feature is both Y'ffre and Trinimac lack, maybe due to the Merish long lifespan and their distaste on such "degeneration". Perhaps this is the reason why both Y'ffre and Trinimac are generally portraited as male.

(And maybe that's the cultural reason for Mankar Camoran to use "until finally we might through new eyes leave our hearths without need or fear that she (mother) remains behind". Mother Kyne is abandoned, while Other-Character-Kyne are kept.)

Hmm... Y'ffre as Trinimac is a very interesting idea. For one, there is the Green Pact, which is a contract between he and the Bosmer. Those Bosmer who violate this contract are subject to a terrible fate known as the 'Ooze', which I believe is connected to Namira. One of the texts added by ESO regarding the Forsworn associates Namira with something called the 'Ever-Oozing Altar'. My guess is that the 'Ooze' is a hell of sorts. And when we consider the beliefs of the Bosmer's close cousins, the Khajiit, they too view Namira's domain as a hell for condemned souls. What's interesting about Namira is that her name is an anagram of Ariman, the god of darkness, evil, and death, and the eternal enemy of Mithras, Trinimac's equivalent. I think it's also worth mentioning that, according to Words of Clan-Mother Ahnissi, Y'ffre is described as not having an appreciation for secrets. Secrets imply deception, which is something Trinimac despises.

I'm still curious as to how Arkay fits in all of this. We can't leave him out, as he is connected to Trinimac through Orkey. God, this guy's a mess...

I bet it would intrigue you that Khenarthi flies the souls of deceased Khajiit to their afterlife!

The cycle maybe? Arkay runs the cycle of both life-death and the seasons.

Also in eso there is a quest in Black Marsh related to Namira, where Namira claims herself as the Mistress or some title similar of the Spirits. Spirits are those who dropped out of the normal life-death cycle, so perhaps it would mean Namira being against the concept of Arkay? And Namira seems to be against the normal food chain, which is Kyne's nature.

If Arkay is the absolute concept of cycle of Mundus, with Kyne representing the natural side of him (could the food chain also have some influence from Arkay?), then Namira might be the opposite to both.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that. I suppose there's little difference between the roles of a war god and death god. Plus, there is overlap between Kynareth and Arkay through their association with the natural world. Unsurprisingly, the Redguards view Arkay, Kynareth, and Zenithar all as agricultural deities.


Namira is most definitely antagonistic towards Arkay. We've seen how her followers handle priests of Arkay. I'd say she's an enemy to any god associated with the natural world. Though it's interesting that she is considered by the Khajiit to be the corruption residing in Lorkhan's Heart, which has now become the Heart of the World. Nirn is a ball of decaying god-flesh, after all, and decay is right up Namira's alley.

I've personally given up on trying to make sense which divinity corresponds to another in different deities. The fact that Zenimax made their own interpretation of the Tamrielic Pantheons makes it even more messy. And the Lore devs haven't been reading their source material for a while anyways. But apparently the Imperial God of Knowledge and Scholarship is not equivalent to the Aldmeri God of Knowledge (Xarxes). Instead the Aldmeri God of Knowledge is the "same" as Arkay of the Imperial Pantheon. And Orkey is apparently Malacath + Arkay according to ESO. So in a convoluted way Trinimac + Xarxes = Orkey. It's a contradictory mess and no one can convince me otherwise at this point.

No mentions of Morihaus? Or, hell, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyne?

Well, yeah, the bull depicted in the tauroctony symbolizes man's birth and salvation. The bull is also a lunar symbol, as well as a symbol of chaos and disorder. I'd say Lorkhan fits the bill, seeing as he was the one sacrificed. Kyne, on the otherhand, I see her as Anahita, the water goddess who supposedly gave birth to the Persian Mithra. It's said that, when Mithras slayed the cosmic bull, it's death ushered forth the Good Rains. This is very reminescent of Lorkhan's death bringing Kyne to cry. I think one source claims that rain was a phenomenon that didn't exist until Lorkhan's death. So yeah, I like to equate Kyne with Anahita in this case.

The problem here, however, is that Anahita was not the one who gave birth to the bull-slaying Roman Mithras. He emerged fully-formed from a 'maternal rock', surrounded by the zodiac, or Wheel of Life, and with a sword and torch in hand. I like to compare his birth to Arkay's, with the 'maternal rock' being Nirn. Arkay was either born from it as a man, or his godly purpose was born from its creation. Could be both. That's why I believe Arkay is involved here, because his position as a solar deity, his rivalry with Namira (Ariman), and his control of the cosmic order strongly links him to the Roman Mithras.

Here's something cool I read:


What's interesting about the constellation is that it is sometimes referred to as the 'Bull's Shank'. This, of course, relates to the slaying of the primal bull. To go into more detail, Mithras was tasked by Sol to capture the great bull. Mithras manages to overpower the bull, throws it over his shoulder, and drags it back to his cave. But the bull escapes. Sol then sends a raven, his messenger, to aid Mithras in tracking the bull, and then asks him to kill it. The raven is seen perched on Mithras' shoulder in the tauroctony, or within the folds of his cape. The mentioning of the bear and raven reminds me of the bear totem mural, which depicts a raven, too. Many of us speculated that the bear totem represented Orkey. The bear is sometimes a solar symbol related to the cycle of life, death, and rebirth, and the Triform Mithras depicts that cycle. Cautes (dawn/birth), Mithras (noon/life), and Cautopates (dusk/death).

I'm in agreement with viltuska_rebooted about the lore of ESO, and that's mostly because when I had brought up the issue of Xarxes as Arkay to MK, he seemed a bit surprised by it. Xarxes is either a usurper of Trinimac's position, or Trinimac is a conglomeration of multiple deities. Or, the devs are wrong.

I posted the following two passages over at Reddit. Let me know what you guys/gals think.

This one was in response to Orcberserker's post:

This one was in response to taxusbaccata's post:

Feel free to add anything.