Fertility of Men and Mer: Assorted Lore Collation
[[ This list is by no means complete. I just felt a resource like this would be very useful, both for myself and for those looking to create new roleplay muses. While I have linked canon lore to each statement, I am happy to discuss potential corrections or contradictions if it is felt that such lore has since been retconned. Please feel free to chip in! ]]
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All races of men and mer are fertile with each other.
Men and men, mer and mer, or man and mer — All unions can produce fertile children. However, the lore book expresses doubt that this fact also extends to men/mer and the beast races. While one could infer this to be due to the bias of the source or potentially due to societal stigma, there is further evidence to support this statement — Argonians are assumed to lay eggs in a further Imperial account, and thus, it’s probably not a far stretch to assume that they are too different biologically to bear fertile children with men and mer. Furthermore, the moon cycles and complexity of Khajiit births make it questionable if a fertile coupling between them and another race could occur, even if the Khajiit was one of the more human forms such as the Ohmes.
At least in the case of a human-mer birth, Racial Phylogeny is proven right in both physicality and genetics by the Gray Prince, whom has a Orsimer mother and a vampire Imperial father.
The child of a mixed race couple will physically take after the mother, with aspects of the father.
Again, the Gray Prince provides a canon example of this lore. He’s got a human father, but appears almost entirely Orsimer.
Vampire males are fertile and capable of siring children.
Lore sources: [ x ] [ x ]
Once more, the Gray Prince is a canon example of this lore. Furthermore, it’s also canon that that vampiric blood heightens his combat abilities, suggesting that the power of the blood is at least somewhat transferred even if full vampirism is not present. That said, the Gray Prince never knew of his dubious heritage, which further suggests that the negative aspects of vampirism barely apply, if at all, to a half-vampire.
Mer are conditionally fertile.
This is an interesting piece of lore, gleamed from an in-game Morrowind quote:
”Elves are conditionally fertile — that is, they only conceive when population pressure is low — so expanding populations do not force them to explore or war with neighbors.”
This could explain why the Snow Elves never managed to stage a population comeback once they had lost the Battle of the Moesring — The invading Atmorans essentially “boxed” the remaining elves that did not go underground within the relatively small expanse of the Chantry of Auri-El, providing population pressure despite the overall critically low numbers of uncorrupted elves.
Mer can only conceive a maximum of four times over the course of their life.
While it’s widely accepted that mer generally do not have many children, the infamous Barenziah books suggest that a female mer may only conceive a maximum of four times over their entire life.
"Sire. It is her child. Children are few among the Elves. No Elven woman conceives more than four times, and that is very rare. Two is the usual number. Some bear none, even, and some only one. If I take this one from her, Sire, she may not conceive again."
The source in the book is quoted from a High Elf healer, and thus, seems reliable in context. This does not necessarily mean a hard limit of four children, however — A conception event does not take into account the number of blastocysts that may form thereafter, and thus, a multiple pregnancy could see a mer have a number of children beyond the limit of four conceptions in a lifetime.
Half elves age like Bretons.
This lore relates to Emperor Cassynder, whom had a human father and Dunmer mother. Unfortunately, as he was sickly, we have little idea of what that lifespan might be. However, as Bretons have a great affinity for magic, and magic is linked to the longest lifespans of Altmer, it’s probably not a far stretch to assume that a Breton (and thus, a half elf) would have a lifespan somewhere between that of human and elf.
baratheonpilled
romaincrisis
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