Reasons why Lore is not an accurate authority on History.

President_PUG

First of all its open to interpretation, and bias.In example: Lets say 400 years ago a group Orcs decided to send trade delegation to High Elves next door. They took army to protect them from bandits.Arriving mid way to High Elven capital they decide to build camp and resupply, negotiating with local Wood elves who did not have the authority they bought land and cut down all the trees. The Highelves alarmed send an army to remove them. A huge battle happens, everyone dies and all the merchant cargo is appropriated by the local Wood elves.The lore thus set down by each side is this. Orcs:Friendly trade delegation wiped out by High Elven aggressors.High Elf Lore: Invading Orc army defeated after attempts to build fort in Out land. Local Wood Elf Lore:Great Year for Prosperity, Orcs and High elfs always at war.
The only pure way to make sure a story is not corrupted or changed by others is to set in down as Celestial events.Here best example The Bible was written long before ant man was ever made.
It was declared in The Heavens by God. God Named each star and constellation and assigned them Their path. 7bc-3bc astronomers saw King planet Jupiter appear in the Constellation of Virgo, The Virgin, and exit into the constellation of Leo, representing Judah. This is fact and could not ever be changed by man before or even after the event. Neat Huh?

VaranisArano

I think there are plenty of examples where the in-game lore books are written by biased authors with conflicting information without needing to draw conclusions about real-world religions.

Part of the charm of Elder Scrolls lore is that its deliberately written to be conflicting. The entire Main Quest of TES III: Morrowind rests on contradictions in the historical accounts about what actually happened with the Tools of Kagrenac and Nerevar's death.

Things we know for sure are true are things we've done in game. Alduin was defeated by the Dragonborn. Mehrunes Dagon's attempt to take over Tamriel is defeated by the efforts of Martin Septim and the Hero of Kvatxh, etc.

notimetocare

President_PUG wrote: »

First of all its open to interpretation, and bias.In example: Lets say 400 years ago a group Orcs decided to send trade delegation to High Elves next door. They took army to protect them from bandits.Arriving mid way to High Elven capital they decide to build camp and resupply, negotiating with local Wood elves who did not have the authority they bought land and cut down all the trees. The Highelves alarmed send an army to remove them. A huge battle happens, everyone dies and all the merchant cargo is appropriated by the local Wood elves.The lore thus set down by each side is this. Orcs:Friendly trade delegation wiped out by High Elven aggressors.High Elf Lore: Invading Orc army defeated after attempts to build fort in Out land. Local Wood Elf Lore:Great Year for Prosperity, Orcs and High elfs always at war.
The only pure way to make sure a story is not corrupted or changed by others is to set in down as Celestial events.Here best example The Bible was written long before ant man was ever made.
It was declared in The Heavens by God. God Named each star and constellation and assigned them Their path. 7bc-3bc astronomers saw King planet Jupiter appear in the Constellation of Virgo, The Virgin, and exit into the constellation of Leo, representing Judah. This is fact and could not ever be changed by man before or even after the event. Neat Huh?

Some ingame lore. Yes, bot all is written in conflict. All about reading into context. And even your elf example is not false. Just part of the elephant

ghastley

There's also the argument that documents written as fictional/allegorical stories have since become accepted as factual accounts of real events.

ArchMikem

You brought the Bible, which is the single most propagated and rewritten fairy tale in Human History into this.

So now im just all "...wut".

Adernath

President_PUG wrote: »

First of all its open to interpretation, and bias.In example: Lets say 400 years ago a group Orcs decided to send trade delegation to High Elves next door. They took army to protect them from bandits.Arriving mid way to High Elven capital they decide to build camp and resupply, negotiating with local Wood elves who did not have the authority they bought land and cut down all the trees. The Highelves alarmed send an army to remove them. A huge battle happens, everyone dies and all the merchant cargo is appropriated by the local Wood elves.The lore thus set down by each side is this. Orcs:Friendly trade delegation wiped out by High Elven aggressors.High Elf Lore: Invading Orc army defeated after attempts to build fort in Out land. Local Wood Elf Lore:Great Year for Prosperity, Orcs and High elfs always at war.
The only pure way to make sure a story is not corrupted or changed by others is to set in down as Celestial events.Here best example The Bible was written long before ant man was ever made.
It was declared in The Heavens by God. God Named each star and constellation and assigned them Their path. 7bc-3bc astronomers saw King planet Jupiter appear in the Constellation of Virgo, The Virgin, and exit into the constellation of Leo, representing Judah. This is fact and could not ever be changed by man before or even after the event. Neat Huh?

... you realize that there is a small difference between an army and a trade delegation?

Bruccius

When looking at lore gathered from books, there is always a couple of things to keep the mind focused on. Much like in real life when gathering information:
1. When was the book written?
2. By who?
3. For what reason?

The first one is most often unkown in the games, the second as well, as most books appear to be ''anonymous'', and even the third one can quite often be a big question mark.

So what do we do instead? We look for other accounts describing the same event, and based on all accounts combined, we try to make a judgement of what is the most reasonable explanation.

Don't get this mixed up with thinking that just because some books reaffirm one another, that means it must be true. In The Monomyth it was said that the Heart of Lorkhan couldn't be destroyed without destroying the world, but the Nerevarine did just that during the events of TES III, effectively disproving that part of the Monomyth.

ghastley wrote: »

There's also the argument that documents written as fictional/allegorical stories have since become accepted as factual accounts of real events.

You're trying to tell me that Lifts-Her-Tail isn't canon? I refuse to accept such heresy! /s

themaddaedra

Conflict is part of the lore. Nerevar was a good example above. This is a common fiction thing where you can see some things that are clear but some also blurry, sided, incomplete etc.

That's why we are here discussing in lore section. People coming up with theories, inferences etc. Otherwise we would have a boring strict book where there'd be nothing to talk about.

DeadlyRecluse

President_PUG wrote: »

s.Here best example The Bible was written long before ant man was ever made.
It was declared in The Heavens by God. God Named each star and constellation and assigned them Their path. 7bc-3bc astronomers saw King planet Jupiter appear in the Constellation of Virgo, The Virgin, and exit into the constellation of Leo, representing Judah. This is fact and could not ever be changed by man before or even after the event. Neat Huh?

....not even the Bible claims the Bible was written prior to man.

PrayingSeraph

ArchMikem wrote: »

You brought the Bible, which is the single most propagated and rewritten fairy tale in Human History into this.

So now im just all "...wut".

I was waiting for an atheist comment like this to appear. Anyways its inappropriate for this forum and is most certainly bait, but you knew this when you typed it out.

ZOS_MattL

This discussion is related to real world religion and as such we have decided to close it. We do not allow discussion of real world religion or politics. Not only are these types of posts unrelated to our game, they also tend to go bad quickly. In the future when making a thread to avoid these topics.
Cheers,
Matt