Who actually is the Empire ?

[THE SKULL MERCHANT]

I keep hearing the term "Empire" a lot in Skyrim. But who does the Empire actually consist of ? And where do they reside ? All I see in Skyrim is, the major holds and their jarls, the stormcloaks and the Imperial Legion. Where is this Empire everyone keeps talking about ? In Solitude ? I have just seen Elisif (the jarl) and the Imperial Legion in Solitude, but not anybody related to the Empire. Can someone please explain in easy language.

[Docsprock]

Google up a map of Tamriel. Tamriel is the continent that the Elder Scrolls take place on. In the center of the continent is a province called Cyrodiil. Cyrodiil is the seat of the Empire. Other provinces include: Morrowind, Black Marsh, Valenwood, Summerset Isles, Hammerfell, and High Rock, along with Skyrim.

[THE SKULL MERCHANT]

Okay. So then why is the Empire from Cyrodill trying to control the province of Skyrim ? Why aren't they minding their own business ?

[Turtleswatter]

Originalmente postado por Hella_Rowdy:

Okay. So then why is the Empire from Cyrodill trying to control the province of Skyrim ? Why aren't they minding their own business ?

Oh boy. In order to answer that you'd have to cover a thousand years of lore. Can I suggest this website:

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page

On it is the history of every elder scrolls game. Chronologically you'd have to start with Elder Scrolls Online, and lore books will help.

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:History

But basically where there's a continent there's always someone trying to be in charge of it.

[Rez Elwin]

The Empire used to be every provice in Tamriel under one ruler. Each area sort of governed themselves under it's own King or in Skyrim the Jarls, But an Emperor is like a king to other Kings. He sets laws and governs certain actions that every province must follow. The only exception was Morrowind.

The Empire is a shell of what it was, only 3 procinces are part of the empire from the original 9. Cyrodiil, High Rock and Skyrim, which is being disputed by the Stomcloaks but it is still an Empire territory.

The Thalmor took the Summerset isles, Valenwood and Elsweyr away from them, Black Marsh secceded as well as Morrowind. They still had Hammerfell but "let them go" before they signed the treaty.

[258789553873]

The empire is, well, an empire ruled by Cyrodiil, a nation to the south of Skyrim. It used to hold claim to the entire continent, but has since lost that.

Originally, they essentially ruled by divine right; the existence of the emperor was necessary to keep the daedra (evil gods, basically) from invading Nirn (the world where the games take place). In the game oblivion, the last emperor was assassinated by a cult called The Mythic Dawn (they get mentioned in the quest 'pieces of the past'), which was a cult that worshipped the daedric prince Mehrunes Dagon, the god of destruction basically. It was all a ploy by him to remove the emperor so that he could invade Nirn. Though the player character finds the last emperor's only surviving heir, its too late. When a new emperor enters office, he has to relight these 'dragonfires' that act as the barrier that keeps the daedra out. By the time they find him, the fires have extinguished, allowing the daedra to freely enter Nirn. The heir, Martin Septim, solved this by smashing the Amulet of Kings; a sacred badge of office for the emperor that also gave them their powers. He transformed into an avatar of Akatosh, and defeated Mehrunes Dagon in combat, thus banishing him from nirn. He then turned to stone, which the resulting statue now acting as a permanent barrier to the daedra, making sure they could never invade nirn again.

Though the day was saved, this created a problem for the empire; there was no longer an emperor, and he was no longer needed to keep the daedra out, so the empire now held no divine right to rule. Also, many nations were unhappy with the 'oblivion crisis'. The existence of the empire was supposed to prevent such an invasion from happening, but it happened anyway. Plus, cyrodiil pulled troops out of the neighboring provinces to defend itself, which obviously displeased the other provinces quite a bit. Morrowind, which had only recently joined the Empire, succeeded. In the 200 years since the oblivion crisis, the Thalmor, an ancient cult that wants to destroy the world because they think it will give all elves immortality (seriously) re-conquered the Summerset Isles for the third time, which is the homeland of the Altmer, aka High Elves. Valenwood and Elsweyr, the homelands of the bosmer (wood elves) and Khajiit joined them, forming a new empire called the Aldmeri Dominion. This new empire then invaded Cyrodiil, and won. Among their many demands, they ordered Cyrodiil to outlaw the worship of Talos, a god that was once a mortal called Tiber Septim (the emperors were all descended from him). They were also forced to give up Hammerfell (the nation of the redguards) to the Aldmeri dominion. The redguards didn't like this and succeeded from the Empire, and even defeated the Aldmeri Dominion when they tried to invade the province in response.

The events of the game occur 20 years after the 'great war', when the Aldmeri Dominion conquered cyrodiil. By that time, only Skyrim and High Rock (home of the Bretons) are still a part of the former empire. Ulfric has started a war of succession, claiming its so the Nords can worship Talos again despite the ban on it, even though its obvious he's just trying to seek power (he started his war after another Jarl was voted to be High King, which Ulfric murdered shortly after even though by all accounts the man quite liked Ulfric, and in fact thought that Ulfric was going to invite him to join his rebellion when he entered his city).

So, what is the empire now? Not much, really. It used to rule the entire continent by divine right. Now, it no longer holds the right to rule all of Tamriel (the continent the game takes place on). Its still more than one nation, but only two others remain under Cyrodiil's control. The empire thus still exists, even if its obliviously declining. That's what the empire is; general Tulius is from Cyrodiil, and came to try and quash the rebellion against it. Also, in one questline, the current 'emperor' visits Skyrim and you can even meet him. Of course, he's not a descendant of Tiber Septim, so many claim his rule is illegitimate. Besides, unlike the previous emperors there's no need for him to exist; the daedra can't invade Nirn regardless of whether he exists or not. Its more accurate to say the 'empire' is a declining empire based on Cyrodiil that used to rule by divine right, but no longer does. Now, the dominant 'empire' on the continent is the evil Aldmeri Dominion. Before them, there was no other empire on the continent, and so it didn't really have a unique name. That's why its simply called the 'empire'.

And yes, there's a rather large world outside of Skyrim you can't access; every game takes place in a different province. The previous game, for instance, took place in Cyrodiil, while the one before that took place in Morrowind. There's a project that's ongoing called Beyond Skyrim, which aims to add most of the other provinces to the game. So far, the only thing they've released is Beyond Skyrim: Bruma, which is one of the 'counties' of Cyrodiil which appeared in the previous game Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. It appears Bravil, another county of Cyrodiil will be the next release, though its obviously not coming soon. They also announced another small release called the 'Iliac Bay', which I believe is part of Highrock and Hammerfell, but that was years ago and its still not out. Again, they intend to do the entirity of each of these nations, plus Morrowind, and Atmora (an ancient continent to the north, where all the white humans and giants originated), plus Roscrea which is an obscure island that appears in the lore. I think Elsweyr and Blackmarsh are also being done too, though the Blackmarsh project was cancelled for a while due it still being stuck in the concept stage. That appears to have changed though. There was also a brief project for the Summerset Isles, but that died quickly. There's been no mention of Valenwood being done either, sadly.

[Valden21]

There's a lot to it, so I'll make it short. The Empire you hear everyone talking about is the Empire of Tamriel, also known as the Tamrielic Empire. It was founded by a military leader named Tiber Septim, who was made a god after he died and became a member of the Divines, where he's referred to as Talos. It was his military/political efforts that unified the continent of Tamriel under one banner, until every formerly-independent country in Tamriel existed as a province of the Empire. His descendants, the Septim family, ruled the Empire as the Imperial Family up until the events of the fourth game, when a cult of Mehrunes Dagon-worshippers assassinated almost every Septim and the last remaining Septim sacrificed himself to stop the cult and its leader.

In the 200 years since that happened, the Empire's lost a LOT. Natural disasters, political fallout because of those disasters, power plays from within the Empire, a bad choice for a new Imperial family, and a REALLY bad war have all coincided to hit the Empire hard. The Empire's much smaller now than it used to be, with all but three of the provinces seceding for different reasons. The civil war being fought in Skyrim is about whether or not Skyrim should secede as well, because of the treaty forbidding the worship of Talos. A lot of Nords hate that part of the treaty, as Tiber Septim/Talos grew up in Skyrim, so they regard the guy as a hometown hero.

[ralphtobybob]

Originalmente postado por Hella_Rowdy:

Okay. So then why is the Empire from Cyrodill trying to control the province of Skyrim ? Why aren't they minding their own business ?

Skyrim is a part of the Empire, and has been since the Nords turned on the Bretons during the Battle of Sancre Tor. They then allied themselves with the Empire.
Ulfric Stormcloak decided he wanted to be High King of Skyrim and killed the reigning king.
He formed the Stormcloaks and began a civil war against the government of Skyrim, in an attempt to leave the Empire.

It's like if a state like Texas, led by nutjobs who believe the state has a right to secede, were to try and breakaway from the U.S. Obviously the Federal government would object.

[THE SKULL MERCHANT]

Thanks everyone, the explanations cleared out a lot of my doubts. Really appreciate it @Docsprock @Turtleswatter @Rez Elwin @IXBlackWolfXI @Valden21 @ralphtobybob