#but they're *Thalmor*

[pastasuccubus]

Idk, but I do know that they're having fun terrorizing the local Nord population with their antics.

Taliesin and Nebarra dancing together (spontaneously) in a rather suggestive manner in the middle of the Ivarstead's Inn at 5am: is this a form of courtship?

[bougainvillea-and-saltwater]

Headcanon Alert: the Thalmor are all wearing full and extra makeup when Elenwen throws out parties. Maybe the wings of an eagle painted over their eyes or golden glittering eye shadow or black lipstick...👀

Some Pinterest references for your consideration:

[barvin0k]

hello hai

escano content for fans of f@cked up pairings 🤌 enjoy

[elenwen-and-ondolemar]

This one would like to make a formal complaint against his superior officer. Khajiit is alfiq, and so it is difficult to travel outside of Elsweyr, yet he did so anyways so as to put his excellent magical skills to good use. Khajiit expected men who are unfamiliar with different furstocks to make remarks about his shape, but not mer that have worked with and aided Elsweyr for so long! Superior officer tried to pet khajiit like a common house cat when he should know better!

Elenwen: Master wizard, I am sorry to hear that. You know how greatly we value our alliance with the Khajiit people. Your work is crucial to the Cause. I will have a word with the officer in question.

Ondolemar: To be clear, I meant no disrespect. Perhaps I was a little tipsy that evening, we were all drinking to the Ambassador's escape from that damned dragon, remember? But it was meant as a gesture of congratulation. If you hadn't spent all those months playing housecat in the Legion's courier office, Tullius would have wrapped up his business in Skyrim quickly. I accept that I was mistaken in trying to pet you, but you look a lot like a cat I owned when I was a boy and -

Elenwen : hastily It will not happen again. It's a pity Tullius caught wind of you. How would you feel about a mission to Windhelm? We could do with a pair of eyes in the Palace of the Kings.

[unsettlingcreature]

also the urge to make my next skyrim character be completely normal with no angst backstory or struggles like. that would be so new for me.

[tiredela]

Devotion for TES summerfest! @tes-summer-fest

Aurelion isn't exactly sure of what he's devoted to. on one hand, he's given a specific role to play (thalmor robes), but on the other hand, specific events in his life (the death of his twin, meeting and befriending the dragonborn) put everything he's ever known, everything he's ever believed in, into question (shrine of talos).

he questions his devotion

id in alt

[feykrorovaan]

Gore:"The next Thalmor dog I see is dead."

LDB at Caryalind and Taliesin:

[demilypyro]

In a way it's crazy how the opening of Skyrim immediately posits the Stormcloaks as the obvious good guys vs the oppressive empire lady who executes people for no reason. so yeah of course you help the Stormcloaks. and then later you go see Ulfric in Windhelm and he basically doesn't really give you the time of day and you find out they're all just really into racism. like. man. what was that opening then. and then you do some digging and find out the entire conflict was orchestrated by the Thalmor to destabilize the empire so they can kill all the humans

[blockedragon]

They're all vile people that'd probably be terrible company but Ondolemar seems like the lesser evil. Elenwyn is not only his boss but also a cruel torturer who's probably responsible for more deaths than anyone else on this list. Ancanno can't even utter a single sentence without being a twat, I still don't know how he got a job keeping Winterhold under control for the Thalmor when he can't even hold a conversation properly - let alone influence anyone. The rest we only really know from their attempts to murder TLD. He MIGHT be able to hold a conversation without being completely insufferable and isn't Elenwyn or a non-entity like the other options.

Hopefully he'll ignore me if I ignore him.

I thought it would be funny to make this poll because I have a feeling I know who's getting the top spot - but who knows, I could be surprised!

I added extra agents, I don't know if they're popular characters or not, but I figured to throw them in there for variety. Personally, I'd rather choose everyone but Ancano. Personal grudges and all that. ^^

[obi-troll-kenobi]

Daily reminder that being a rude annoying ass character in videogame is more of a crime than being a videogame elf supremacist. Fictional crimes are fictional, my annoyance is real.

[elderscrollsconceptart]

Elder Scrolls Sitcom Idea:

An Thalmor and a Stormcloak..ARE ROOMATES

But wait it gets even better..they're the legal guardians of...A Breton!!!

We can call it: "Two and a Half Men/Mer"

🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪

[the-drunken-huntsman]

Guilds ranked by how much internal fucking is going on

10. Dawnguard: none of these people are fucking each other because Isran is weirdly up in everyone's business.

9. Dark Brotherhood: The only ones getting any action are Astrid and Arnbjorn and only because they're married

8. Theives Guild: surprisingly not a lot of sex going on in the sewers of Riften. The members DO fuck, just not each other

7. Companions: I debated where to put them but I feel like the younger ones (Athis, Torvar, Ria, Njada) are definitely all over each other

6. Imperial Legion: analog to the roman legion so you KNOW there's a ton of gay shit going on in there

5. Bards College: like the thieves guild they mostly fuck people outside the college but there is a lot of shit going down in the dorms

4. Stormcloaks: I feel like there's some weird eugenics shit going on with them

3. Volkihar clan: duh

2. Thalmor: definitely some weird eugenics shit going on with them

1. College of Winterhold: these wizards are fucking each other like you wouldn't believe

Purposely left off the blades and the greybeards because ew

[barvin0k]

hehe my OC, Varonur 🥰

(third pic is him with rulindil lol)

[firefly-factory]

They're living rent free in my head at this point

Ondolemar and Revyn Sadri would never meet, but I love them both and this pose popped into my head so I had to draw it.

Thalmor clothes are actually so neat?? Revyn might be too purple but let's say it was for ✨️contrast✨️

[thana-topsy]

So wait, are you implying that Falmer babies are born like normal, but since they're raised by other Falmer, that's why they become animalistic?? But they can be raised by people, and develop normally?? I'm assuming they're born blind tho?? Genuinely, I am curious, not trying to sound accusatory :')

Ahhh my friend, it is safe to say at this point that I have dedicated nearly two years of my life to exploring this question lol. Apologies in advance. You've activated my trap card special interest.

Sarel comes from my fanfic "Halfway to the Sky", in which a mage kidnaps a Falmer child and raises him as an experiment to see if he can be taught to live as a "civilized" person. The short answer to that initial question is: yes, Sarel is just a normal elf child, though still blind.

As to the other part of your question, (if Sarel had been raised among the Falmer, would he become "animalistic"?), I'm going to answer charitably by pointing out that we are dealing with Fictional Races of People, in which our interpretations of these races are going to vary, and that's okay. First off, my interpretation is not "the correct" one. So any answer I give is just my personal take. Second, the way we are told to play the game (by the mechanics of the game) also informs our perception of these races. And lastly, there is no one-to-one allegory at play here in terms of "The Falmer represent [x] race in our world." I just wanna get that out of the way.

So, all that being said, the question always comes back to "what does it mean to be civilized"?

In the game, we are told that the Falmer are hostile and violent, so we must kill them, and that they are 'devolved', even though evolution cannot move backwards. So, to correct that second misunderstanding, the Falmer are actually evolved to better suit their current living environment, and as to the first, we (the player) are intruding on their settlements. I can only imagine anyone with a sense of self-preservation would react with some amount of hostility to the loud, shouty person carrying weapons.

To continue to use game-logic, we are shown that the Falmer construct buildings, create weapons and armor, craft potions, lay traps, enchant objects, and use magic. Already, these are things that animals, by definition, cannot do. To be a magic user, a character must have a relatively high Intelligence stat, (we see this in the older games more than in Skyrim). In order to construct settlements, people must also have the ability to work in groups and communicate. We never hear the Falmer speak to each other in-game, but the implication that they have language and a social structure is right there in what we're shown.

So, in this long-winded, roundabout answer to your original question: I do not think that the Falmer are animalistic at all. I think they are culturally different, but made of the same stuff as Joe Thalmor over there. They have a different way of living in the world, and they adapted to their environment as best they could. This does not mean that they are perfect or better. But I think that referring to them as animalistic plays into what the game tells you to think, all while giving you a lot of evidence to the contrary. They're very much a complex, functioning society of people. We just never see their side of the story.