#unfortuantly for you I have minimal art talent so you are stuck with a bunch of words

[minty-mumbles]

Hylian Ears

Remember that post I made about Hylian evolution? Well, I'm back to talk more about ears.

In the original post, I said that perhaps ears have less to do survival needs, and a little more to do with aesthetics. I still think this is true, but there's more to it

The rest under the cut because I've thought about this for a long time, so this is gonna be a longer post

General Ear Headcanons: A Hylian's ears never truly stop growing, much like a rodents teeth. The older someone is, the longer their ears get, this generally means that means ear length is equated with wisdom and respect. However, this still has limits. An elder from Four's era, for example, where the ears are genrally smaller, would still have shorter ears than a young person from Wild's era, where the ears are stupidly long.

I think Hylian ears are mobile. They can move voluntarily and involuntarily. It’s used to express emotions as well as to be able to hear things better. Hylian children have trouble controlling their ear's movements until they hit puberty. (I think I might have seen this hc in a fic somewhere and just adopted it, but can't for the life of me remember) Not for any specific reason. They twitch in the direction of any interesting noise they hear. It's easy to tell when a kid is eavesdropping because their ears point in any direction they are listening too. Because of this, involuntarily movement of the ears is seen as childish.

Anyways, on to specifics

Sky - I have no idea how this would work exactly, but I think Hylians in Sky’s time have an inner ear flap that they can close while they fly. It help keep the noise from the wind down.

Four - Ears in Four's era are small, and small ears are considered beautiful here. This does not help when he's trying to be perceived as an adult in other eras. He walks up to a weapon vendor in Warrior's era, and the vendor takes one look at his ears and goes "Who's sassy lost child is this?" It pisses Four (Read: Blue) off the first couple times, but it just happens so often that at this point Four kind of gives up and goes to get one of the others. This isn't to say that in his time his ears are considered to look like a child's. His ears are proportionate to his body, which looks like a sixteen year old's body except for the fact he is so short. So in his era people can usually use that to tell that he is indeed as old as he says he is. So in his Hyrule, his ears get him treated like an adult, in the other Links' Hyrules, they get him treated as a child.

Four's ears in particular are a little strange. They look suspiciously Minish-like. Also, he reason Four only wears one earring is because the other piercing got ripped out at some point, and he never bothered to get it healed correctly, so he has a split lobe.

Time - Sorry, I honestly have no thoughts about this one ajshgsfjhgs 😅

Wild - Hylian’s ears have evolved to be long as heck by the time Wild’s era rolls around. However, ears as long as that will cause problems- namely the tips of the ears get cold and freeze way too quickly. So I propose that the tips of Hylian’s ears in Wild’s era are fluffy. They’ve got fur. Not big tuffs, just a thin layer to keep them from getting frostbitten. Ear fur comes in at the same time as hair on their head, not during puberty, since you don’t want a kid's ears to freeze off either. Some people who live in warmer environments find it fashionable to shave their ears. Also, because their ears are so long, it's pretty easy to get them accidentally caught on something, meaning that a lot of people walk around with the tips of their ears cut off. Wild is like this. One of his ears was blown off by a guardian shot and the other was cut off in a training accident before the calamity, so he's missing the tips of both his ears.

Twilight - Twilight also has tufts of fur on his ears, which make the rest of the chain think that he's closer to Wild's time than he actually is. However, he doesn't have his ear fur because that's what is standard for Hylians of his time. He has ear fur because of his little wolfie problem.

Warriors - He also has very long ears, as well as them being slightly fuzzy. However, unlike Twilight, this actually is because he is close to Wild's era. I like to think that he was the hero before the hero who was 10,000 years before Wild. (I have no idea if that’s popular fanon or not, but that's where I place him)

Wind - Much like in Sky's time, Hylians in Wind's time also have an ear flap, but this time, it's for swimming, not flying. It helps keep sounds clear underwater, as their ear canals are not clogged with water, and it keeps them from getting anything like a Swimmer's Ear infection.

Wind's ears are still recognizably short in his era, marking him as a kid. It's not noticed so much by the other members of the chain, as their ear lengths vary so much. But put him next to someone from the Great Sea, and you can tell easily. He also has a hard time controlling his ears’ involuntarily movement still.

Legend and Hyrule - I think they are the closest together on the timeline (disregarding Time and Twilight, because that's a whole other can of worms), like a hundred, maybe two hundred years between them, max. So their ears are very similar. In such a difficult environment, I think that Hylains adapted the way they wear wedding rings- to make it easier to do hard manual labor and such. They wear wedding earrings now, basically small matching hoops on one ear, traditionally left for women and right for men (or visa versa, doesn't matter.) Hyrule is the only one who knows Legend is married to Ravio, because he’s the only one who understands what their matching earrings mean.