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Shezarr and the Eight Divines
Note: this document was posted on the official Elder Scrolls forum by Michael Kirkbride
as an answer to my question as to why is not Shezarr (Shor, Lorkhan) officially worshipped in the Empire,
as a part of Eight Divines pantheon.
Currently this book superceded by Shezarr and the Divines.
You (understandably) misconstrue the position Shezarr enjoys in Cyrodilic
worship. He, and a thousand other deities, have sizeable cults in the
Imperial City. Shezarr is especially venerated in the Colovian West, though
he is called Shor there, as the West Kings are resolutely, and religiously,
Nordic.
The haziness of Shezarr’s relationship to the Eight Divines (he is often
called their ‘Missing Sibling’) begins with St. Alessia, the so-called
‘Slave Queen of Cyrodiil’, the founder figure of the modern Empire. In the
earliest Cyro-Nordic stories of the Heartland, Shezarr fought against the
Ayleids (the ‘Heartland Highelves’) on mankind’s behalf. Then, for some
unknown reason, he vanishes from the stage (presumably to help other humans
elsewhere), and, without his leadership, the Ayleids conquer the humans and
enslave them.
This slavery lasts for generations. The isolated humans eventually begin to
venerate the pantheon of their masters, or at least assimilate so much of
High Elven religious practices into their native traditions that the two
become indistinguishable.
In 1E242, the Cyrodilic humans, under the leadership of Alessia and her
demigod lover, Morihaus-Breath-of-Kyne, revolt. When Skyrim lends its armies
to the Slave-Queen of the South, the revolution succeeds. The Ayleid
Hegemonies are quickly overthrown. Shortly thereafter, White Gold Tower is
captured by Alessia’s forces, and she promptly declares herself the first
Empress of Cyrodiil. Part of the package meant that she had to become the
High Priestess of Akatosh, as well.
Akatosh was an Aldmeri god, and Alessia’s subjects were as-yet unwilling to
renounce their worship of the Elven pantheon. She found herself in a very
sensitive political situation. She needed to keep the Nords as her allies,
but they were (at that time) fiercely opposed to any adoration of Elven
deities. On the other hand, she could not force her subjects to revert back
to the Nordic pantheon, for fear of another revolution. Therefore,
concessions were made and Empress Alessia instituted a new religion: the
Eight Divines, an elegant, well-researched synthesis of both pantheons,
Nordic and Aldmeri.
Shezarr, as a result, had to change. He could no longer be the bloodthirsty
anti-Aldmer warlord of old. He could not disappear altogether either, or the
Nords would have withdrawn their support of her rule. In the end, he had
become “the spirit behind all human undertaking.” Even though this was
merely a thinly-disguised, water-downed version of Shor, it was good enough
for the Nords.
As for why Tiber Septim did not somehow ‘revitalize’ Shezarr during his wars
against the Aldmeri Dominion, we can only speculate that, by his time,
memories of the Alessian Order’s follies (the Dragon Break, the War of
Righteousness, the defeat at Gelnumbria Moors) would have only damaged his
campaign for the Imperial Crown.
Michael Kirkbride,
Officer of Paleonumerology,
Hla Oad, Vvardenfell
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