[blockquote][b][url=/profile/VelothTheProphet]Veloth the Prophet[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

With the Hearth Gods, Dibella is the Maiden, Mara is the Mother, and Kyne is Crone, not Mara being the Crone.

To further explain this you can these links found here: Mara / Kyne / Dibella

Also, about Shor being a Fox, there is debate that Shor is actually the Snake and not Orkey because of this

"Shor took on the form of his Totem then, which he used to better shape his displeasure, rather than to shout it aloud and risk more storm-death. [...] Shor shook his scaled mane." -Shor, Son of Shor

These can hold some weight because in Redguard and Elven Pantheons Lorkahn and Sep, I think, is almost always depicted as a Serpent/Snake

Also, Jhunal was quite popular among the Atromans because they were respectful and careful of Magic. There were mages that came with Ysgamor and the Five Hundred Companions, that would place Runes, cast protective spells, and heal them. The reason he fell out of favor is that the Imperials bastardized the Nords religion, and only added two of the Nordic Gods in their Pantheon, those being Shor and Kyne.

[/blockquote]

Why would Kyne be the Crone? She birthed the Nords on Snow Throat. She is literally the Mother.

Well, the design document as provided my MK states that Shor is the fox.

Lore from ESO states that Jhunal was never actually a popular god. He's also not really a magic god either so the amount of Clever Men with the Atmorans doesn't really mean much. 

[/blockquote]

She is considered the Matriarch of the Nords, just because you are the Matriarch of a Clan or group of people doesn't mean you are their "mother". Plus, Mara is always seen as a concubine to Shor/Lorkhan and Auri-El/Akatosh, and guess what war chiefs, kings, and such would have a wife, in this instance Kyne, who couldn't have children and so they would take a concubine, in this case, Mara, as a "second" wife, handmaiden, or someone to give birth to a child for their wife couldn't. There are examples in the real life and in several religious texts. So yes Mara is the technical mother, but Kyne is the "mother" because she raised them.

Shor, Son of Shor was also written by MK, so again which is true is up for debate, and I said it was a debate and not a fact.

There are other sources that have stated different, and I don't play ESO. Again, you can't tell if he actually was popular because of different sources say different things. Also, the Nords who never cared for Jhunal could have been ones who one hated magic, or two fell in favor of the Imperial Pantheon. Even the Vikings, who the Nords are based on, had a god of Magic, so why wouldn't the Nords.

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/VelothTheProphet]Veloth the Prophet[/url] said:[/b]

Why would Kyne be the Crone? She birthed the Nords on Snow Throat. She is literally the Mother. 

[/blockquote]

To me it's like she was the mother but has passed that stage. When the world was young and the Nords born, the last cycle even, Kyne was the Mother and Dibella the crone. But the cycle turns and even the gods age through mythopoeia and are reborn at the end.

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/PaulEngland]Paul England[/url] said:[/b]

The idea of Mara as Mother could come, in part, from a resemblance to Christian imagery that seems to link her to Mary.  The statues of Mara show her in a 'pietas' position (check Renaissance sculpture for that term - the only thing missing is the body of the dead Christ in her arms).  And then, I suppose, there's the similarity of the name.  These aren't super strong links, of course, but I'm sure they have an impact on some players - I know they did on my interpretation.  

Kyne/crone similarly sound alike, and while (again) you can't just go on sound-echoes, I prefer to think that such things aren't entirely an accident. :)  

I guess for me, also, Mara is *embodied*, while Kyne isn't.  There are no images of a physical Kyne/Kynareth.  She's an abstraction.  Mara is at least given physical (human) representation.  That moves her a bit closer to the "Mother" role, to me anyway.  To know a mother is to know a *body* (note that the same is not true for fathers!).  

And I'm a bit miffed at that design doc, myself; Stuhn and the Bear, Tsun and the Whale, and Shor and the Snake seemed like such good fits! ;)

[/blockquote]

I think there is that link, Paul, good call. Unless I'm mistaken, Catholics deliver prayers to Mary which is reminiscent of how Alessia delivers prayers to Kyne by addressing her Handmaiden as she does in Song of Pelinal:

[And then] Perrif spoke to the Handmaiden again, eyes to the Heavens which had not known kindness since the beginning of elven rule, and she spoke as a mortal, whose kindle is beloved by the Gods for its strength-in-weakness, a humility that can burn with metaphor and yet break [easily and] always, always doomed to end in death (and this is why those who let their souls burn anyway are beloved of the Dragon and His Kin), and she said: "And this thing I have thought of, I have named it, and I call it freedom. Which I think is just another word for Shezarr Who Goes Missing... [You] made the first rain at his sundering [and that] is what I ask now for our alien masters... [that] we might sunder them fully and repay their cruelty [by] dispersing them to drown in the Topal. Morihaus, your son, mighty and snorting, gore-horned, winged, when next he flies down, let him bring us anger." ... [And then] Kyne granted Perrif another symbol, a diamond soaked red with the blood of elves...

So it's like Alessia is addressing Kyne through proxy. The image of the weeping Mara is also very Mary, that's so true!

And I'm a bit miffed at that design doc, myself; Stuhn and the Bear, Tsun and the Whale, and Shor and the Snake seemed like such good fits! ;)

I quite like that little switcheroo to be honest, as if we consider how Stuhn and Tsun switch places in Shor, Son of Shor, they are like flip sides of a coin. So one guards the corpse of his brother in Sovngarde - a perspective that is quite cool, no? :D

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

With the Hearth Gods, Dibella is the Maiden, Mara is the Mother, and Kyne is Crone, not Mara being the Crone.

To further explain this you can these links found here: Mara / Kyne / Dibella

Also, about Shor being a Fox, there is debate that Shor is actually the Snake and not Orkey because of this

"Shor took on the form of his Totem then, which he used to better shape his displeasure, rather than to shout it aloud and risk more storm-death. [...] Shor shook his scaled mane." -Shor, Son of Shor

These can hold some weight because in Redguard and Elven Pantheons Lorkahn and Sep, I think, is almost always depicted as a Serpent/Snake

Also, Jhunal was quite popular among the Atromans because they were respectful and careful of Magic. There were mages that came with Ysgamor and the Five Hundred Companions, that would place Runes, cast protective spells, and heal them. The reason he fell out of favor is that the Imperials bastardized the Nords religion, and only added two of the Nordic Gods in their Pantheon, those being Shor and Kyne.

[/blockquote]

Shor, Son of Shor is a very complicated book. My interpretation of that passage is that the book is highlighting the identical nature of the two pantheons. On the side of the enemy, they have Ald, son of Ald. The book draws comparison to what is going on in the House of We from both sides, and each side mirrors the other.

Ald's Shield-Thane is Trinimac, Shor's is Tsun. That makes Ald = Auriel. Shor is the other half of Akatosh, the time dragon, or Auriel's twin. They are both dragons in the context presented, but most importantly to help your argument, they are time dragons:

He had taken the first with pride, roaring a chieftain's gobletman into dust to underscore his willingness to leave, knowing we would follow. He had taken the second by drawing a circle on the House's adamantine floor with his tailmouth-tusk which broke with a keening sound, showing the other chieftains that it would all come around again. And he took the third by vomiting his own heart into the circle like a hammerclap, guarding his wraith in the manner of his father and roaring at the other tribes, "Again we fight for our petty placements in this House, in the Around Us, and all it will amount to is a helix of ghosts like mine now spit into the world below where we fight again! I can already feel the war below us starting, and yet you have not yet thrown your first spears even here!" We took our leave of the House and would never reconvene again in this age.

Tailmouth-tusk. If we think tail, mouth, and tusk in the context of dragons/serpents/time, we get this image:

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/Zonnonn]Zonnonn[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote]

tricked by the Hare(ma) Mora in to becoming an elf

[/blockquote]

Wait, does this happen? There's so much craziness in ES lore, but race and gender seem to be one of the only things that gods don't change... But it would be awesome if they do, imagine a Dunmer slave owner being turned into an Argonian.

[/blockquote]

So here's the quote and link for that, dude:

And the Fox spake, saying, "Know thou, mortal, that I am Shor, and this was nary Hare, but indeed, Herma Mora, who did nearly trick thee into becoming of Elvenkind. Rely you hereafter, mortal, upon the forthright methods of Man, and eschew the tricks of the Elves, lest ye become one. Fragmentae Abyssum Hermaeus Morus

I know Shor, Son of Shor is complicated from what I have read a lot of things written by MK is quite complicated. I was just saying that there is some debate on who Shor actually is on the Nordic Pantheon. Also, I have heard that theory of Auri-El and Akatosh are one of the same and Lorkhan and Shor/Shezzar/Alduin are the same way, I only stumbled across Shor, Son of Shor because I have been doing a lot of research for my upcoming Lore project.

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

I know Shor, Son of Shor is complicated from what I have read a lot of things written by MK is quite complicated. I was just saying that there is some debate on who Shor actually is on the Nordic Pantheon. Also, I have heard that theory of Auri-El and Akatosh are one of the same and Lorkhan and Shor/Shezzar/Alduin are the same way, I only stumbled across Shor, Son of Shor because I have been doing a lot of research for my upcoming Lore project.

[/blockquote]

I totally get it, an am glad you're doing a lore project :)

To be clear, I was attempting to help your case be showing that Shor shaking his "scaled mane" along with the other imagery we're given does indicate he is either a serpent or a dragon. Because the book is about the circular nature of Nordic myth, the image of an uroboros or Jormungandr is quite an apt one for the book. In context, a fox makes less sense than a serpent.

"Yes, and always they will be ignored. As for the counsel you crave, bold son, and in spite of all your other fathers here with me, that you create every time you spit out your doom, do not worry. You have again beat the drum of war, and perhaps this time you will win." Shor son of Shor returned then to us on the mountaintop.

And the awful fighting began again.

The cycle, the wheel, and infinity, you know?

Thank you, but it may not be that fascinating to a whole lot of people.

Ahh, that is my fault. I thought you weren't helping me, so that why I said what I did. XD Also, Lorkhan means Doom Drum in Aldmeri, and in Shor, Son of Shor it says "that you create every time you spit out your doom, do not worry. You have again beat the drum of war" I found that quite odd that those pairings of words were that close. And if you read the Monomyth of the Imperials and Altmer, you see two sides of Shor/Lorkhan. I do believe Shor was actually a Serpent or even a Dragon of some kind, and the twin/necessary evil of Auri-El/Akatosh.

I am new to ES Lore, but Davey has been a great help. He has explained the Wheel and the Tower, by using sources and drawing it out, but I am not quite sure I know the cycle and infinity.

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

Thank you, but it may not be that fascinating to a whole lot of people.

Ahh, that is my fault. I thought you weren't helping me, so that why I said what I did. XD Also, Lorkhan means Doom Drum in Aldmeri, and in Shor, Son of Shor it says "that you create every time you spit out your doom, do not worry. You have again beat the drum of war" I found that quite odd that those pairings of words were that close. And if you read the Monomyth of the Imperials and Altmer, you see two sides of Shor/Lorkhan. I do believe Shor was actually a Serpent or even a Dragon of some kind, and the twin/necessary evil of Auri-El/Akatosh.

I am new to ES Lore, but Davey has been a great help. He has explained the Wheel and the Tower, by using sources and drawing it out, but I am not quite sure I know the cycle and infinity.

[/blockquote]

I'm sure it will be fascinating :)

It's interesting that you mention the Doom Drum. It's said like a curse for the elves. What do you make of Paarthurnax's dialouge at the Throat of the World in relation to the Dragonborn and possible Shezarrine?

There is no question. You are doom-driven. Kogaan Akatosh.

Good to hear you've been chatting Tower lore and the Wheel with Davey, the whole Psijic Endeavour stuff. That's some deep lore there, good to get a handle on :)

So the cycle is referenced as Kalpas, I think the word first came to my attention in the Song of Pelinal:

"[Presently] the half-Elf [showed himself] bathed in [Meridian light] ... and he listed his bloodline in the Ayleidoon and spoke of his father, a god of the [previous kalpa's] World-River and taking great delight in the heavy-breathing of Pelinal who had finally bled..." "[Let us] now take you Up. We will [show] our true faces... [which eat] one another in amnesia each Age."

Varieties of Faith mentions the circular nature of Nordic myth and has Aduin as the herald of their Ragnarok - the end of the world and start of the new, which is Convention, but it wasn't until TES Skyrim that the word Kalpa was spoken aloud and we got to learn more. You and Davey share an interest in the pagan concept of the triple goddess, and like the discussion as to which goddess fills which role, we can see in the cycle the possibility of that progression. Imagine, two kalpas ago we may have seen Kyne as the Maiden and her sphere being the one Dibella occupies now. Faces which eat one another in amnesia each age.

The concept of the cycle is further muddied by the Anuad. Where the Monomyth differs from the Anuad is possibly due to the latter being the memories of a previous cycle or even entirely different universe. It gets complicated real quick, but briefly the whole Interplay between Anu, Nir and Padomay could be the memories of the Godhead: Anu is overcome with grief, flees into the sun and dreams this new universe. The simlarities between the Anuad and Monomyth account for the memories of the previous Tamriel, the differences account for the myths.

We can see that play out in the Nord vs Nede debate, as the common belief is that Kyne breathed men into the world. Yet if that were true, what of the Anuad's assertion that...

Over many years, the Ehlnofey of Tamriel became the Mer (Elves)

• The Dwemer (the Deep Ones, sometimes called Dwarves)

• The Chimer (the Changed Ones, who later became the Dunmer)

• The Dunmer (the Dark or Cursed Ones, the Dark Elves)

• The Bosmer (the Green or Forest Ones, the Wood Elves)

• The Altmer (The Elder or High Ones, the High Elves).

On the other continents, the Wandering Ehlnofey became the Men: the Nords of Atmora, the Redguards of Yokuda, and the Tsaesci of Akavir.

So in terms of the cycle, factoring in the myths and trying to find out what the truth is becomes part of the fun. Did the Ehlnofey become mortal? The Monomyth hints that. But Kyne breathed Men into the world.... Ha! :D

Another example being Arkay the ascended mortal. The Monomyth destroys the possibility of that happening, but it doesn't mean it didn't happen or will happen again in a past or future kalpa.

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/VelothTheProphet]Veloth the Prophet[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

With the Hearth Gods, Dibella is the Maiden, Mara is the Mother, and Kyne is Crone, not Mara being the Crone.

To further explain this you can these links found here: Mara / Kyne / Dibella

Also, about Shor being a Fox, there is debate that Shor is actually the Snake and not Orkey because of this

"Shor took on the form of his Totem then, which he used to better shape his displeasure, rather than to shout it aloud and risk more storm-death. [...] Shor shook his scaled mane." -Shor, Son of Shor

These can hold some weight because in Redguard and Elven Pantheons Lorkahn and Sep, I think, is almost always depicted as a Serpent/Snake

Also, Jhunal was quite popular among the Atromans because they were respectful and careful of Magic. There were mages that came with Ysgamor and the Five Hundred Companions, that would place Runes, cast protective spells, and heal them. The reason he fell out of favor is that the Imperials bastardized the Nords religion, and only added two of the Nordic Gods in their Pantheon, those being Shor and Kyne.

[/blockquote]

Why would Kyne be the Crone? She birthed the Nords on Snow Throat. She is literally the Mother.

Well, the design document as provided my MK states that Shor is the fox.

Lore from ESO states that Jhunal was never actually a popular god. He's also not really a magic god either so the amount of Clever Men with the Atmorans doesn't really mean much. 

[/blockquote]

She is considered the Matriarch of the Nords, just because you are the Matriarch of a Clan or group of people doesn't mean you are their "mother". Plus, Mara is always seen as a concubine to Shor/Lorkhan and Auri-El/Akatosh, and guess what war chiefs, kings, and such would have a wife, in this instance Kyne, who couldn't have children and so they would take a concubine, in this case, Mara, as a "second" wife, handmaiden, or someone to give birth to a child for their wife couldn't. There are examples in the real life and in several religious texts. So yes Mara is the technical mother, but Kyne is the "mother" because she raised them.

Shor, Son of Shor was also written by MK, so again which is true is up for debate, and I said it was a debate and not a fact.

There are other sources that have stated different, and I don't play ESO. Again, you can't tell if he actually was popular because of different sources say different things. Also, the Nords who never cared for Jhunal could have been ones who one hated magic, or two fell in favor of the Imperial Pantheon. Even the Vikings, who the Nords are based on, had a god of Magic, so why wouldn't the Nords.

[/blockquote]

Yeah, but in Nord myth, Kyne literally birthed the Nords. She literally brought them into being on the slopes of Snow Throat. You don't get more mother than that. Mara is also the patron of witches. That screams Crone to me. 

What sources have stated that Jhunal was ever popular? 

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/VelothTheProphet]Veloth the Prophet[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/VelothTheProphet]Veloth the Prophet[/url] said:[/b]

[blockquote][b][url=/profile/GwenUlfblod]The Last Blade[/url] said:[/b]

With the Hearth Gods, Dibella is the Maiden, Mara is the Mother, and Kyne is Crone, not Mara being the Crone.

To further explain this you can these links found here: Mara / Kyne / Dibella

Also, about Shor being a Fox, there is debate that Shor is actually the Snake and not Orkey because of this

"Shor took on the form of his Totem then, which he used to better shape his displeasure, rather than to shout it aloud and risk more storm-death. [...] Shor shook his scaled mane." -Shor, Son of Shor

These can hold some weight because in Redguard and Elven Pantheons Lorkahn and Sep, I think, is almost always depicted as a Serpent/Snake

Also, Jhunal was quite popular among the Atromans because they were respectful and careful of Magic. There were mages that came with Ysgamor and the Five Hundred Companions, that would place Runes, cast protective spells, and heal them. The reason he fell out of favor is that the Imperials bastardized the Nords religion, and only added two of the Nordic Gods in their Pantheon, those being Shor and Kyne.

[/blockquote]

Why would Kyne be the Crone? She birthed the Nords on Snow Throat. She is literally the Mother.

Well, the design document as provided my MK states that Shor is the fox.

Lore from ESO states that Jhunal was never actually a popular god. He's also not really a magic god either so the amount of Clever Men with the Atmorans doesn't really mean much. 

[/blockquote]

She is considered the Matriarch of the Nords, just because you are the Matriarch of a Clan or group of people doesn't mean you are their "mother". Plus, Mara is always seen as a concubine to Shor/Lorkhan and Auri-El/Akatosh, and guess what war chiefs, kings, and such would have a wife, in this instance Kyne, who couldn't have children and so they would take a concubine, in this case, Mara, as a "second" wife, handmaiden, or someone to give birth to a child for their wife couldn't. There are examples in the real life and in several religious texts. So yes Mara is the technical mother, but Kyne is the "mother" because she raised them.

Shor, Son of Shor was also written by MK, so again which is true is up for debate, and I said it was a debate and not a fact.

There are other sources that have stated different, and I don't play ESO. Again, you can't tell if he actually was popular because of different sources say different things. Also, the Nords who never cared for Jhunal could have been ones who one hated magic, or two fell in favor of the Imperial Pantheon. Even the Vikings, who the Nords are based on, had a god of Magic, so why wouldn't the Nords.

[/blockquote]

Yeah, but in Nord myth, Kyne literally birthed the Nords. She literally brought them into being on the slopes of Snow Throat. You don't get more mother than that. Mara is also the patron of witches. That screams Crone to me. 

What sources have stated that Jhunal was ever popular? 

[/blockquote]

How does Mara scream Crone? Because of she the patron of witches? You do realize witches before Christianity weren't seen as evil, and were instead seen as medicine women and caretakers, in a way, right? And they were represented as these old ugly women, right? A good amount of the time they were young women in their 20s and 30s. Crone is the representation of an older woman which seems to fit Kyne more than Mara. Plus, Mara in the Nordic Pantheon is the handmaiden to Kyne, which a hand maiden is a female servant, and in ancient times like Viking and even during the Roman Empire and onward, the Matriarch wasn't able to have a lot of children, maybe one or two and three if they were lucky. So many men of power, whether it be chiefs, war lords, or else would have sex with their female servants or even their wives servants to have more children in which his wife would raise. That is basically Mara and Kyne, I know that has been repeated, but those links I provided you explain its very well.

I honestly can't cite them. I have been digging through Imperial Libary, TES Lore, Bethesda's Lore Forums, and USEP so much for other Lore items; I can't remember the sources.

So, Ç'est ce que ç'est.

Laurelanthalasa's Femininity in Tamrielic Faith is a series I am a huge fan of. This one about Kyne is close to how I see her:

Kyne, Queen of the Nords, Kiss at the End, War-Wife to Shor, Mother of Tears

One of the first things that stood out to me was, why Mother of Tears? If Mara is the Tear-Wife, why does she not bear the title of Mother of Tears?

The Nords assign Kyne that title because legend has it that when Shor died, Kyne wept, and her tears became the first rain to fall on Tamriel. Kyne also referred to herself as such in C0DA. In the chaos of the Grey Maybe, it was Kyne/Kynareth that made room for creation, sheltering it so it would not come apart, tearing apart the weak so the strong could have room. The Tears belong to Mara, but without Kyne there would be no Creation and Mara would have no reason to cry. This is why Mara is the handmaiden; she may be the Mother, but Kyne is the Matriarch.

A matriarch. What comes to mind when we picture a matriarch? A dignified older woman; children grown, or maybe a childless woman who became head of a business, clan or noble house, sometimes she is a queen. She is a woman who transcends the feminine dichotomy of sensuality and fecundity, or simply ages past them. Unencumbered by the stereotypes of youth, she can assume more traditionally masculine roles and exert her power outside the traditionally feminine sphere. Kyne is all these things; all the while maintaining a distinctly and almost universally female identity.

The matriarch also shoulders the burden of a great melancholy. If childless, sometimes there is regret, envy or jealousy about it. If she did have children (spiritual or literal, doesn't matter), sometimes those children must be sent to fight and die for her cause. The Queen sometimes has to stand by and watch her dominion crumble away, everything she worked for, fought for, made room for. I dare say her sadness is deeper than Mara’s because Kyne does not have the distraction of always making something new. Often Kyne only sees the battle and the end.

For this is why she is the War-Wife, and why she is so sad. She was the first to agree to Shor’s plan, his greatest ally, defender, enabler and it is she who picked up his cause and continued the fight after he died. Kyne fought to give shape and strength to the Nords, she helped Paarthurnax gain mastery over his nature, and she helped give shape to countless beasts and nature spirits, all through her simultaneously destructive and sheltering qualities. Kyne not only engages in conflict, she embodies it.

Consider her Dovah name, Kaan, Kiss at the End. The End of what? To a more-or-less immortal Aka-Shard of a dragon, what is the End? Not the End of their life cycle because they have not one, but of all cycles. Consider the Thu’um, Kyne’s Peace. The Peace of the Kiss at the End, where the animals do not flee, instead they accept their deaths with calm aplomb. Peace for Kyne means death.

In Shor son of Shor, Kyne is confused and irritated that she does not get her kiss, but is wise enough to know that she will understand when the dawn breaks and the twilight is lifted. When the Dawn comes, the fighting begins again, and she returns to the battlefield, clear in her intention and purpose once again.

Apparently to the Nords, when the spirit of the Void embraces the War-Wind spirit, that is the End of All. That is a very interesting and powerful image to me, like the negatively charged cumulonimbus cloud towering over the positively charged earth, and then their energies clashing in an explosion of plasma and electricity, wreaking absolute havoc before completely dissipating in a shower of light. And we thought Dibella was the Goddess of sexual energy! Actually all three of the Nordic Goddesses represent certain aspects of female sexuality/sensuality, but that is a discussion I want to save until I have had a chance to give Dibella her due in this series.

I would like to conclude this post with a confession about how these posts have changed my perception. I had always imagined Kyne as a rather ageless woman, but if I had to draw her, she would have probably looked like Artemis, a slender young huntress, a forest spirit, maybe with a big sword. This was wrong, and simply a reflection of my own personal ageist bias. I realise now that to depict Kyne as a young woman does not do her the justice she deserves. She is a seasoned warrior, who has fought countless battles through countless cycles, and who has wept countless times over the deaths of her husband and her children (spiritual and/or literal, whatever you prefer). She would have rough hands, grey in her hair, and if drawn as a mortal, maybe a few lines around the eyes and mouth, marks of the strain of being the embodiment of change and conflict. For once she finally gets her kiss, that will be the End of the fighting, which is to say the end of the Arena. Peace at last, but the end of Nirn.

Let it be noted that even in C0DA, despite attending the bachelor party and wedding with her husband, she still had not gotten her kiss. The battle continues, somewhen and somewhere, and as long as Kyne is fighting, she is making room for creation.

The next essay will be about the Nordic Dibella.

On the subject of Mara being a Handmaiden, this little quote from Laurana is succint:

A handmaiden in a polygynous science-fiction context calls to mind Margaret Atwoods The Handmaid's Tale. It is a dystopian world (America) where powerful Commanders and their powerful but infertile Wives employ fertile handmaids to produce babies for them. Despite being in charge of creation, the handmaids were always subordinate to the powerful Wives, and the Commanders. Their sexuality is rigidly controlled and monitored. Intercourse and childbirth is highly ritualised and the Wife is always present at every stage, because the Handmaid is simply an extension of herself.

And Jhunal... well it is said in Varieties of Faith that "After falling out of favor with the rest of that pantheon.." This implies he was once in favour. We see that faling out of favour happen in Shor son of Shor, but the implication is that he was once as popular as aany other of the gods.