Everyone,

As I was thinking about the map of Tamriel the other day, some peculiar observations started presenting themselves.

When you look at it quickly, you could sorta say that the north is dominated by mountains and snow, the middle is temperate, and the south is junglelike, with a western desert and some small desert in the mid south.

But upon closer examination, there are some real oddities.

For instance: High Rock seems to consist of temperate green valleys nestled between very impressive and glaciated mountain ranges. This suggests an environment less like Scandinavia and a bit more like the area of Switzerland and just south of it into northern Italy. Considering that High Rock is a northern province, that's a bit of surprise - you'd think the valleys were more like what you'd see in Sweden, Finland and Norway, with lots of evergreens and truly intimidating winters.

Now let's move over to Skyrim. You see your first oddity at Solitude. Even though it's right on the northern sea, it's sheltered by the mountains to the east, and it sort of tucks itself partially into that mountain range. Yet you would expect the city to still be somewhat northern in character, but instead it seems very temperate. In fact, it seems almost TOO temperate. Contrast Solitude with Dawnstar and Winterhold and you'll immediately see the jarring disparity.

As we keep moving east, we come upon the area south of Windhelm and we see lots of geysers and hot springs. Keep going east and you get to Red Mountain.

And that's where things get truly strange. In areas of high geological activity, there isn't just one volcano. For instance, look at the west coast of North America. Starting from Rainier in Washington State and going down to Panama, you'll run into a good half dozen active volcanoes. Not just one.

Now let's work our way south. Cyrodiil was supposed to be jungle but is deciduous forest instead. That suggests it's still pretty far south. As soon as you get into Valenwood, Elsweyr and Black marsh, you run into LOTS of jungle.

All of this tells me that Tamriel is not a large continent. It also tells me that If one were to position Tamriel on Earth, its northern border would start right on the edge of Canada and it would extend down to, say, the middle of mexico.

Looking at the surrounding continents, I would guess Pyangonea would start somewhere in Guatemala, with a relatively small sea between it and southern Tamriel. In the north, Atmora (which used to be temperate forest) would basically be Canada from Edmonton up to the level of Alaska's north slope, with another small sea between its southern border and the northern shore of Tamriel.

What do you think, folks? Do I have this right, or is there a flaw in my reasoning?