» Sat Apr 06, 2013 7:25 am The Sow and the Snake
by Dura gra-Lorbul
A Brief Introduction: Among the Orcish strongholds that pepper the northern provinces—largely found in Skyrim and High Rock, but extending into Hammerfell and Morrowind as well—there is a children’s tale known as ‘the Sow and the Snake.’ The tale essentially serves as a simplified version of the myth of the creation of the Orcs and the mythic Change of Trinimac into Malacath. Such a simplification is clearly necessary, considering the complexity and uncertainty of the base myth. I have heard this tale many times throughout my childhood as a Stronghold Orc, and I shall recollect it as well as I can. Note that I do not necessarily hold the perspectives within.
The tale begins with the Sow and its litter of little piglets. It was raising its piglets, feeding them its milk, nourishing them with its love, and teaching them to avoid dangerous predators, such as Snakes. The piglets loved the Sow, and the Sow loved its piglets, and they were happy.
So of course a Snake came along. There is usually a Snake listening to your conversations, no matter where you are, and this specific Snake was hiding nearby, hiding beneath the corpse of the god that the Nords call Shor. It took issue with the Sow’s lessons, its lessons of love and its lessons of avoiding Snakes. It took issue with the Sow’s words and with the Sow’s care for its litter.
The Snake rose up from beneath Shor’s corpse and said, “What lies do you teach your children, Sow who killed Shor? You teach them to hide from Snakes, but Snakes, such as I and Shor and others, teach the truth of the world. The world is harsh. You soften your children, teaching them to hide in your shadow and weep at the hardships of Nirn. You steer Aldmeris the way of stasis. And though you teach them of love, you teach them of the wrong kind of love. You must teach them of the Love that brings about ascendency, the Love of self and of all others that is I ARE ALL WE, not this simpering, tearful sack of—”
And before the Snake had finished speaking, the Sow and its little litter were laughing, laughing, tearful at the hilarity of the words of the Snake.
So the Snake ate the Sow amidst much spilled milk and panicked squealing.
And the Snake turned to the piglets, which were hurriedly gathering up the spilt milk of the Sow, and the Snake said, “See? The Sow was weak to the ways of the world. The Sow felled Shor, a Snake much greater than me, through trickery, but the Sow failed to survive a fair battle with me, Shor’s shadow. The Walking Ways are the Ways to ascendency, the Ways to I ARE ALL WE. But we Snakes do not have legs, and thus we cannot Walk the Ways ourselves; instead, we must teach others to Walk the Ways, we must be the wise elders that lead the world.”
The piglets squealed in terror at the prospect. The world was a thing to be sundered, not embraced. The world was a thing to weep at, not adapt to. The piglets refused to follow the Snake (as they well should).
So the Snake ate the piglets.
And the Sow, still trapped within the Snake’s belly, was angered by the sight of its litter as distressed as they were within the Snake. The piglets squealed and squealed, helpless, and the Sow Changed. The Sow Changed into the Boar, and the Boar gored the Snake from within. The Boar and its litter spilled out of the Snake’s belly, and the Snake fled, leaking black blood like the blood of Shor.
The piglets turned to the Boar, expecting milk and love and wise teachings. But the Boar was not quite the same as the Sow. The Boar had no milk, and the Boar gave a different kind of love: a fierce love marked with the loyalty of warriors, rather than the motherly love of the Sow. And instead of teaching wise lessons of avoiding Snakes and the like, taught the knowledge that vengeance must always be carried out when called for, and that blood is the true currency of the world. The Sow had been weak to the ways of the world, but the Boar embraced the world, the Boar adapted to the world. The world had been a thing to be sundered, to weep at, but it was no longer.
The piglets returned to the pool of the Sow’s spilt milk, hoping for one last taste of the Sow’s brand of love, but they found that the milk had spoiled. Because they could no longer drink it, they took it as a material to forge their weapons and armors of, so that the Sow may protect them even after its replacement by the Boar. Today, that material is called Orichalcum.
And so the little litter of piglets donned the milk of the Sow and pledged themselves to the Boar.
And that is where the Orcs are from, and where Orichalcum is from, and where Malacath is from. And that is why you should always avoid Snakes.
