Elder Scrolls Lore » Discussions


Witchmen of the Reach

Tags: #Races  #Reachmen 
  • Member
    January 29, 2018

    Sarah Lannister said:

    Karver the Lorc said:

    What is arrogant about it? I feel like my article mislead you so I´m only providing you with all the possible sources on Reachmen I could find and used to do this article so that you could make your own opinion without the subjective influence that is someone else´s article. What is arrogant about that?



    Your tone tbh.  

    And btw, the in game books and lore help understanding their beliefs and their culture, but they are just stories, hearsay, legends, mythology... without Archaeology and Anthropology to back them up, you can't blindly take them as facts. Also, reading these books don't solve the problem I'm proposing here, which is of an anthropological nature: what about the Reachmen who don't abide to that lifestyle? Those who prefer to adapt to a more 'modern' lifestyle if you will, but still preserve their religion, and some of their values and tradition and, most importantly, are still proud to call themselves Reachmen? If you consider Reachfolk a race, then these people would still be Reachmen despite not being Forsworn. That's my point. XD

    So, as the lore host, I thought it would be good to throw my old hat into this discussion. What you are presenting here is a bit of an odd question and boils into a Ship of Theseus dilemma.

    The Reachmen aren't just a race, they are a culture, a religion, and a history. While I despise the use of the word race in our world (I also happen to think it's stupid in fantasy but that's a whole other dilemma), a very comparable situation would be the Jewish ethnic groups (not in beliefs but in how closely those beliefs are often linked to their ancestry). A Reachmen without their religion and culture can't really be called a Reachmen anymore. Depending on the culture they would integrate into they would be seen as either a Breton or a Nord (mostly Breton though) just like any hybrid.

    You mention preserving the religion and beliefs but a religion is not just the faith of the individual; it's also the practices and the rituals that come with it. A Catholic Christian won't be seen as such if they were never baptised. Hell, there's a handful more conditions and rites to go through if you want to be a proper Catholic to begin with. In a similar fashion, a Reachmen is not a Reachmen if they don't revere the old gods and offer them appropriate sacrifices which tend to be of the humanoid variety (Also goats, lots of goats).

    While I do agree that Karver's tone in the other message could quite easily be interpreted as arrogance, (we lore idiots occasionally have that problem) I think he was really just trying to help. Take it from the guy who has had to work with the green fuck in the past. Besides that, the sources he mentions are mostly from a pre-Forsworn era and describe the Reachmen not as a race, but as a culture. Some of them were even written by the Reachmen, and later by the Forsworn themselves. Giving them a quick read yourself if you want to RP any variation of Reachmen is a good idea.

  • January 29, 2018

    Thanks for dropping by Teineeva xD

    I honestly don't think this a Theseus' paradox at all, because we are talking about people here, not objects. And the thing about people and their culture, beliefs, rituals, etc. is that they're not static, they're constantly changing and transforming. What you consider a 'proper Christian' nowadays is definitely not the same that a 14th century priest in Scandinavia would. Rituals change, traditions are left behind and sometimes even core values are replaced by other values in order for religions and cultures to adapt and survive as technology, philosophy and cultural interchange pose threats to the identity of a people. I mean, Jewish people stopped sacrificing animals at some point, Catholics started (then stopped) executing left-handed people for being in cohort with the Devil, Mesoamerindians stopped decapitating people during solar eclipses, and so on. I totally agree that it is very hard to make a fundamental distinction between culture and race (unless you take genetics into account, but then miscegenation will impose another problem), and one thing cannot exist without the other (good ole Constructivism, can't escape from it).

    But with so many factors in place, cultural exchange and all, how can you say that a person who, let's say: was born in the Reach and has Reachmen blood; believes in the old gods, worships Hircine and practices some of the traditional rituals but: do not believe in blood sacrificies, kidnapping children and other 'barbaric' stuff; is okay with the Empire rule over the Reach and other races living there; believes in trade and working for a living; dresses in Imperial fashion (with maybe one tribal tattoo here and a hawk amulet there); and, most important of all, identify himself as a Reachman, is not a Reachman? A 'modern' Reachman maybe, but still a bloody Reachman imo! lol And if I was this guy, I would not like to be a called a 'Forsworn' and I would not aid their cause, but that wouldn't mean we are not members of the same race/cultural group. I think that after the Forsworn got their arses kicked by Ulfric and became outlawed and weakened, many Reachfolk who just want to live in peace among the Bretons/Nords/Imperials would 'water down' their practices and adapt more and more Imperial values in order to have their culture being accepted by the estabilishment (kinda like the 'modernisation' Islam has been going through in the last couple of centuries).

     

    ps.: I have indeed read many articles and in game text about the Reachmen, including of course this topic and the one about Nocturnal written by Phil. And yeah, they have given me a lot of useful info to help me create a compelling story for my character, good stuff xD

  • January 29, 2018

    Teineeva said:

    Take it from the guy who has had to work with the green fuck in the past.

    My man! :D

    Sarah Lannister said:

     And the thing about people and their culture, beliefs, rituals, etc. is that they're not static, they're constantly changing and transforming. 

    Normally I would agree, but not always when it comes to TES, especially when the Reachmen of Second Era are pretty much exactly the same as Forsworn of Fourth Era, and that is roughly 800 years. I'm not sure they can really change in a peaceful manner, not as a nation and race. There can be individuals who run from this because they don't agree with the traditions, but changing overally as a whole race... Hm. I think they don't have much choice but to change by conquer. 

    Just take Longhouse Emperors for example. Durcorah the Black Drake grabbed the Empire by the balls during Interregnum in Second Era and seized the Ruby Throne. A barbaric Reachmen taking a throne for himself. This could have been a possible direction for change, but overally Durcorah didn't change much actually, as the Vice-Troll Tharn says:

    For nearly thirty years I advised the savage men of the Reach, from Durcorach to Leovic, as their long, brutish dynasty ravaged the Empire. They lasted longer than many of the would-be conquerors that came before them, but their alien nature and low heritage made them unfit to stand in the presence of the true-blooded sons of Colovia or Nibenay. Their most grave insult came when Leovic, youngest of their line, sought the hand of my sixteenth daughter, Clivia, in marriage, that she might rule with him as Empress. Like his grandfather before him, who married Veraxia Tharn, Leovic hoped that our family's connections and pure Nibenese bloodline would somehow legitimize his claim to the Ruby Throne. It was an exercise in futility, and it exasperated me to no end. - Chronicles of the Five Companions, Part 4

    Durcorah himself was slain when he tried to invade High Rock. Old habbits die hard it seems. 

    Next thing that might have brought change for Reachmen, and could have been even better than sitting their arses on Ruby Throne, was Markarth. 

    But the truth is far more revealing. Yes, from -176, the Forsworn did in fact rule over the Reach as an independent kingdom from Skyrim. Yes, this was accomplished while the Empire was beset by Aldmeri Dominion forces and could not send the Legion to re-establish order. And yes, Ulfric Stormcloak did quell the rebellion without Imperial assistance. That much is true, but what the bards often fail to tell in their stories is that the Forsworn Kingdom was quite peaceful for those 2 years they were in power.

    True, some crimes were committed against former Nord landowners (often those accused of being the harshest towards their native workers), but on the whole the Forsworn ruled their lands fairly, and were making overtures to be recognized by the Empire as a legitimate kingdom.Bear of Markarth

    This could have been the next big thing right after Red Eagle for Reachmen, but then Ulfric showed up and shouted the whole dream back into Oblivion's backside. And Reachmen had to scatter into the wilderness again, forced to go all guerilla on Nords and Empire - and Thalmor too, after the Concordate. 

    It's not like Reachmen are going to swallow their pride and just crawl to these foreigners who took their land - which they believe was theirs in the first place. Those who do are weak and traitors to true Reachmen. 

    But alright, let's give this thought a shot. What would it take for Reachmen to integrate into the society as a nation, through trade and exchange, peacefully? Ok, so first they would have to stop raiding and raping, that's a good start. Next they would have to get rid of Hagravens and Briar Hearts connected to them. Then the blood sacrifices and dark magic. Then the worship of Daedric Princes such as Namira, Dagon, Molag Bal, Hircine, probably even Malacath - because those are all either outrightly outlawed or in Malacath's case frowned upon. So with all this we essentially cut out everything that's bad about Reachmen (and what¨s making them Reachmen, but not important now). So they - let's call them Neo-Reachmen from now on - do all this and now what? Building a city sounds good to me. 

    But that isn't that easy right? Because we already have a precedent for this kind of thing, when "barbaric" people try to raise from the bones of their traditions. Orcs. 

    They are not so different from Reachmen, even though they are sort of more accepted than Reachmen, because Orc's don't have traditions that involve rapings, blood sacrifices, but they still raid settlements and such. And Orcs divide mainly into three categories. 

    • Stronghold Orcs - Traditionalists, believing in Malacath and his Code, one chief many wives type of stuff
    • City Orcs - those leaving the strongholds trying to integrate into society of Tamriel as individuals, scratching lot of stuff from Code of Malacath
    • Orsinium Orcs/Trinimac Followers - Those who want to become part of Tamriel society, that want to be accepted. They want trade and all that.

    So what if we compare that to Reachmen? We have the most populated part and that are the tribes in the wilderness around Druadach mountains, the traditionalists.

    Then we have city Reachmen, those who have pretty much abandoded their culture and belief to integrate themselves into society. They got civilized.

    And then we have these peaceful Neo-Reachmen (who pretty much don't exist, either because no one has seen them or because they didn't get the chance to pop yet in the last few thousand years) who change their culture, who start working on better future and start building a settlement. 

    Guess what happens? *wink wink* at Orsinium. Not only Orsinium gets leveled by Bretons and Redguards every now and then - even though the Orcs there just want to trade and integrate themselves into the current civilization - but they are also always on knives with the traditionalists, the Stronghold Orcs who say that Malacath doesn't want Orcs to live that way. 

    So I'm not saying that a Reachmen can't be individualists who dislike certain points about their own culture, but in order to become part of the rest of the Tamrielic society they would be forced to throw away pretty much all that makes them Reachmen and this is more of a philosophical topic in my opinion. If you remove everything that makes you a Reachman - except the looks and blood - are you still a Reachman? Or are you "assimiliated"? These individuals would have as rough as the city Orcs in the late Third Era. Being spat at by Tamriel's races and also being spat at by their own traditionalist kind. If I were one of those Orcs I certainly wouldn't be proud Orc. Beast/barbarian to one side, assimilated weakling to the other side. That sucks ass.

  • January 30, 2018

    Karver the Lorc said:

    Normally I would agree, but not always when it comes to TES, especially when the Reachmen of Second Era are pretty much exactly the same as Forsworn of Fourth Era, and that is roughly 800 years. I'm not sure they can really change in a peaceful manner, not as a nation and race. There can be individuals who run from this because they don't agree with the traditions, but changing overally as a whole race... Hm. I think they don't have much choice but to change by conquer. 

    Definitely on the same page with you on that one, Lorc, but that is just really bad writing on Bethesda's part tbh. History taught us many times that culture doesn't work like that, humanity works on constant conflict and resolution, constant change. That is not only a problem with the Reachmen, but with Tamrielic history overall; things are pretty static, mostly technology. It advances way too slow, especially when you have so many different peoples from completely different backgrounds sharing the same land (and all the Dwemer stuff, come on... they should be flying spaceships by the 4th Era lol). Tamrielic history is very interesting and really well written when it comes to politics, but almost everything else about it falls a bit flat imo. But anyway, that is another topic entirely. 

     

    Karver the Lorc said:

    Not only Orsinium gets leveled by Bretons and Redguards every now and then - even though the Orcs there just want to trade and integrate themselves into the current civilization - but they are also always on knives with the traditionalists, the Stronghold Orcs who say that Malacath doesn't want Orcs to live that way. 

    So I'm not saying that a Reachmen can't be individualists who dislike certain points about their own culture, but in order to become part of the rest of the Tamrielic society they would be forced to throw away pretty much all that makes them Reachmen and this is more of a philosophical topic in my opinion. If you remove everything that makes you a Reachman - except the looks and blood - are you still a Reachman? Or are you "assimiliated"? These individuals would have as rough as the city Orcs in the late Third Era. Being spat at by Tamriel's races and also being spat at by their own traditionalist kind. If I were one of those Orcs I certainly wouldn't be proud Orc. Beast/barbarian to one side, assimilated weakling to the other side. That sucks ass.



    It definitely does suck arse, but you can't change who you are. I mean, these Orcs (very good example btw) who get shit from all sides can't change the fact they are Orcs and I don't think they are necessarily embarrassed of their heritage, they could very well be proud of it actually (even if they don't get any respect from their peers). By being assimilated you definitely lose a lot of your identity, but people always find ways to keep some traditions alive in order to keep some of this identity left (even simple stuff like clothing, food, music, folklore can save a culture from being obliterated). And of course, there are several examples on Earth's history of that (notably, African Americans).


    Going back to my character, her background story has a lot to do with her parents being this 'assimilated' type and trying to be as neutral as possible, but then getting shit from both the Nords and the Forsworn. She then grows up in Cyrodill, and that of course totally changes her perspective of things entirely, but at the same time she also feels proud of her heritage, and even admires a lot of the Reachmen's values. She just thinks that dumb politics, pride and stubbornness made them lose the plot entirely... Initially I was gonna write her as someone who wanted to go full on Nazi an wipe out all the Forsworn, but after this convo I think it makes more sense for her to go on a 'Maoistic' quest actually: stir some shit up and make her people move forward, put themselves in the 4th Era. They had their chance in Markarth and f***ed it all up because they are clueless about how the real world works, it needs to change.