lifespans of the TES universe*minor spoilers*

[oriphur]

About a week ago a thought came into my mind. What are the lifespans of the races of tamriel? This never dawned on me until i found sinderions journal and it said he met this sarethi dark elf lady who lives in the rift whom i conveniently met before hand. This meeting happened in 4E 58 i think so that gave me the thought of just how long elves live. I know the men races live the same lifespan as their realworld counterparts but what about the elves and beast races? do elves live for about 150 years or what. Please enlighten me because i am curious

[neilbert1]

I'm not sure at all about Orcs, Khajiit, or Argonians, but Elves all seem to have very long lifespans compared to Humans. Some lore indicates that some High Elves and Dark Elves can live hundreds of even over a thousand years, and even Wood Elves are said to have long life spans. Knight-Paladin Gelebor, who is the Snow-Elf Paladin you meet in Darkfall Cave (in the Dawnguard DLC) claims to be thousands of years old, and there seems to be no reason to doubt him (and there's more than a little evidence to support his claim).

[Big Boom Boom]

Orcs are Elves.
Elves are Elves.
Dwarves are Elves.
Falmers are Elves.
All Elves live for centuries easily. They are not immortal however the Tribunal and Dagoth Ur used to be, thanks to Lorkhan Heart.

Khajiit and Argonian are roughly the same as Nord, Imperial and Redguard, which is human standard.

Breton are actually half Human half Elves, so they do live longer than normal Human I guess. The Forsworn/Reach people are Bretons.

[Sai'Raks]

By speculations, Argonians live for around 150 years or so, thanks nonethreless to their immunity for diseases.
However, in the end of 1st era, an Akaviri potentante lived for hundreds of years. Of course, Akaviri =/= Argonian, but somehow I have a feeling that Argonians' roots originate from Akavir.

[Grinch]

Originally posted by Cyrax:

By speculations, Argonians live for around 150 years or so, thanks nonethreless to their immunity for diseases.
However, in the end of 1st era, an Akaviri potentante lived for hundreds of years. Of course, Akaviri =/= Argonian, but somehow I have a feeling that Argonians' roots originate from Akavir.

Didn't the Argonians evolve from the Hist trees? or am I totally wrong?

[apple.snowsong-voice actress]

Yes, in Morrowind Elves could live for thousands of years before being considered old. There was an elven Telvanni Wizard they mentioned was very old and powerful and when i met him, he still looked pretty young. There was one Telvanni Wizard that was finally going crazy from old age, but was at least 1000 years older than him. The Elves are not immortal but their life-spans are so long, that they are pretty close to immortal compared to the human lifespan. Elves would frequently comment on how pitiful and sad man was because he was here today and gone tomorrow, referring to his short life-span. However they sometimes also pondered this with envy because they thought it made man more vital and bold, knowing his life was like a hot flame that would burn brighter, but extinguish sooner. Whereas the elven have so long...but eventually after thousands of years their flame just dims gradually until they fade away. This is similar to Irish Faery Lore, that the Fey were close to immortal, but not quite, because their lives were so very very unphathomably long. They were considered like unto to gods, but not gods. Their magick was great, growing stronger throughout their lives until they finally began to fade from this world, into the Otherworld. That’s the best i can explain it. I don't think we have been given an exact age for the lifespan of ES Elves, but just that it can be a few thousand years. Even in Skyrim, an Elf will occasionally comment on how their life is different in one way or another from other from man, because of their slower aging and longer life-span. In Skyrim, the blonde female High Elf Steward of the first young Jarl of Falkreath, (during the Imperial Occupation) mentions something of this too, although she does not pin down the exact length of her expected lifespan, for us. She had served the young Jarls uncle who was now quite elderly, when the job was taken from him and given to the younger nephew (his age was used as an excuse, because it was really because the elder one, would not betray the Nords for the Imperials as the young greedy nephew would). However the High Elf Steward who had served the now elderly and replaced Jarl, also was to serve the whole life of the young Jarl, and she still looked in her prime and would when the young Jarl also grew elderly and grey. She explains this is because she is from the longer lived High Elf race..So she could see generations of men come and go..unless she is murdered or killed in some other way, than a natural death of course.

[「Heart of Ice」]

In my opinion, the fact that elves are both skilled in magic AND live a long time support the same factor. Magic is about learning, discovering. So their long living supports their time to learn more about the arcane.

[oriphur]

i know orcs have the shortest lifespan because once they hit forty or fifty they look for a fight they can die honorably in. I'm not sure if the applies to the females but i know this doesn't apply to cheiftains

[neilbert1]

I think Oriphur is right - from what little I can gleen from lore, it seems that even though Orcs are technically Elves, they have the shortest lifespan of any race (I wouldn't be surprised if the same was true for Falmer). With Argonians, what little I've read about their lifespans is that they live slightly longer than humans (Cyrax mentions 150 years, which seems to match what information I've come across). As far as their origins are concerned, although they seem like Akaviri in form, they seem to have somehow evolved from Hist trees (lore mentions that in early Argonian hierglyphs, the Argonians depict themselves as looking more treelike than lizardlike). Khajiit lifespans aren't specifically mentioned anywhere that I could find, but I would imagine that they live about as long as humans.

[neilbert1]

I've read in lore that supposedly Bretons, who have a lot of Elven Blood in them, live twice as long as Imperials, Redguards, or Nords. I've also read that the Bosmer might have lesser lifespans than other Elves since they supposedly interbred with humans after they left the Summerset Isles thousands of years ago (that also might explain why they appear more human-looking (to me, at least) than other Elves). Of course, as mentioned above, Dark Elves and High Elves have the longest lifespans.

[Sai'Raks]

Orc might have long lifespans, but they would rather die young then live to get old.

[neilbert1]

Well, maybe. Most things I've heard about TES Orcs is that they have short lifespans, but when you talk to Urag gro-Shub (the College of Winterhold librarian), one of his answers to one of the Dragonborn's questions is that if it weren't for his care, the books of the librarary would have "burned to ashes, or dissolved to nothing before the third era". This seems to indicate that he is hundreds of years old, which means that at least some Orcs could have Elven lifespans. Maybe most Orcs get themselves killed off before they get old, or maybe instead of staying young for centuries before getting old at the very end of their lives like Elves, Orcs get old early like humans, and then can live for centuries after they get old (which most Orcs would find intolerable).

[Willow]

I remember reading in one of the (auto?)biographies of Barenziah (possibly Daggerfall edition) something about how elves viewed time differently-- how she had lived to see many emperors rise and fall although she was still considered young, and how she had grown tired of human politics. Also, the snow elf we meet has apparently been alive for centuries. I seem to remember in Oblivion a conversation between a human and Orc where the Orc said something along the lines of "Ha, you think he's old? I was alive before his mother was born," or something, which seems to suggest that Orcsimer are included in the long lifespans. They are elves, after all.

[neilbert1]

Hmm. I guess Orcs have long lifespans after all, it would appear.

[Oberon]

Originally posted by Willow:

I remember reading in one of the (auto?)biographies of Barenziah (possibly Daggerfall edition) something about how elves viewed time differently-- how she had lived to see many emperors rise and fall although she was still considered young, and how she had grown tired of human politics.

Barry herself was born late into the Second Era, (She was a child when Tiber Septim united Tamriel; she later had sex with him) and lived through the entire Third Era, and there were a lot of emperor's in the Third Era. That said, she died sometime in the Fourth, at around 400 years old. Elves, or Dunmer, at least, only live to be about that long.

[Doctor_Wiki]

Originally posted by oriphur:

i know orcs have the shortest lifespan because once they hit forty or fifty they look for a fight they can die honorably in. I'm not sure if the applies to the females but i know this doesn't apply to cheiftains

I agree with you. I believe they live around the same time as human based races. You run into the ones who want to die all the time in Skyrim.

Good point man!