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Comments on 2920, The Last Year of the First Era

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Comments on "2920, The Last Year of the First Era"

This is a work of historical fiction, set in the eponymous year 1E 2920, by Carlovac Townway. While generally regarded as an accurate account, there are some oddities that might cast doubt on Townway's scholarship.

 

The Human Argonian

In Second Seed, an Orma tribeswoman is described as an Argonian, which is generally used as the name for the reptilian people of Black Marsh. We know from PGE 3rd Ed that the Orma were one of the human tribes indigenous to Black Marsh, along with the Kothringi and others.

There are several potential resolutions to this:

1. Argonian was once, or still rarely is, used for all people indigenous to Black Marsh, also known as Argonia.

2. Townway, or more generously, the character who describes the Orma as an Argonian, did not realize that Orma Tribespeople were human.

3. PGE 3ed is mistaken in its description of the Orma as being humans, and they are instead a tribe of reptilian Argonians.

(4. Retcon. PGE 1ed states that the Kothringi are the only humans of Black Marsh to have “persisted in the area for long”. As far as I can tell, 2920 is the first reference we have to the Orma at all, and they may originally have been intended to be reptilian, before PGE 3ed changed them to human, for some reason.)

 

Arcturian Heresies

A scene in Frostfall is described as looking "like a punishment tapestry inspired by the Arcturian Heresies". It is not entirely clear what this actually means, but the The Arcturian Heresy that we know of deals with the events at the end of the second era, long after 2920.

There are several possible resolutions to this:

1. This comparison is not intended as one made by the character, but rather by the author. This would be stylistically odd, like describing something in your historical novel set in ancient Rome as looking like a Jackson Pollock painting.

2. Townway was thinking of The Five Songs of Wulfharth, which could certainly have been around at the end of the first era, and contain some scenes that would befit a “punishment tapestry”, whatever that is. To exonerate Townway, it is possible that this was “corrected” by an editor who was unaware of the Five Songs, but did know another text about Wulfharth.

3. There is something else called the Arcturian Heresies that we don't know about that does date from the late 1st Era. This would be odd, since presumably the name is from Zurin Arctus, who is best known as a contemporary of Tiber Septim, though Mannimarco is quoted in "Where were you when the Dragon Broke" as claiming that he was around during the Middle Dawn.

4. Which brings us to time bullshit. Somehow a copy a copy of The Arcturian Heresy fell back in time, and, without the context needed to understand it, it became known for its odd imagery.

 

Weird Geography

Some of the geography described in 2920 is off, even by the loose standards of The Elder Scrolls series. The difficulty with Wroth Naga is already covered on the Imperial Library page for this book, so I will focus on a different example. Vivec, having heard about the battle in Mournhold, starts on a journey, presumably headed to Mournhold. He starts in Bodrum, which is described as being on the Cyrodiil-Morrowind border, implied to be north of Mournhold, as “to the south, during all the course of the voyage, he could see the whirling red clouds and knew that the battle was continuing, day after day.” His travel somehow takes him over the terrain of Dagoth Ur (perhaps here used to mean the entirety of Vvardenfell), and to Gnisis, which seems really far out of the way. There he meets a messenger from Sotha Sil, telling him to get to Balmora.

Possible explanations:

1. Townway made some very odd mistakes in his geography.

2. What is considered Cyrodiil at the end of the First Era extends all the way north through Skyrim to the Sea of Ghosts. If Bodrum were on the very northern border of Morrowind and what is generally called Skyrim, then Gnisis could be a reasonable stop on the way to Mournhold. If Cyrodiil also extended west to the Wrothgarian mountains, that would also explain the description of Wroth Naga.

3. This isn’t the same Gnisis, but rather another settlement on the mainland with the same name.

(4. Things changed in development, and 2920 was written based on an earlier map that had Gnisis on the mainland, at a reasonable spot between the border and Mournhold.)

 

Conclusions

If we are to take our other, non-fiction, sources as reliable (and we discount out of world factors like retcons and shifting development), then these apparent errors must lead us to doubt the quality of Townway’s scholarship in other details. In the “Interview with Three Writers”, Townway describes himself as a scholar foremost, and an author only out of necessity. Unless these apparent errors can be reconciled, this scholar must suggest that Townway not quit his day job as an author popular fiction.

(No slight is intended to the actual author of this story – Ted Peterson. 2920 is one of the best books in Morrowind, and explores an interesting period in the history of Tamriel. I think retcons and changes during development are the most likely explanation for the inaccuracies, apart from Wroth Naga and the Arcturian Heresies, which I think are genuine errors.)