Hello everybody, it's another episode of the Elder Lore Podcast, and in this particular episode, we're going to continue this thread that we've been unraveling in our previous few episodes, where we pick a province in Tamriel and talk about it in depth. And today we will be focusing on Hyrock, which is the home of the Brettons, and also intrinsically involved in this conversation is also the province of Orcineum, which is not technically a province. It's the homeland of the Orcs, the Orzamer, and it is really a small part of Greater Hyrock. So the Orcs don't have their own province, but they do call this little corner of Hyrock their home.
So, according to myth in the Marathic Era when the Aodra met to discuss the creation of Mundus, the mortal plane, they built a tower on Nern where they could all meet. It is also the place where they later debated and decided on what Lorcan's punishment would be for his treachery in convincing them to create the mortal plane. They decided at the end that he was to be torn apart, his heart was removed and thrown from the top of the tower where it flew across Tamriel and into the east. The tower would go by many names over the millennia, including the Derenny tower, the Ur tower, Atimansha, or sometimes the Atimantine tower.
It still stands in the place it stood on the Isle of Belferia in the Iliac Bay, part of the province of Hyrock. The next documented visitors or dwellers within Hyrock were the Nadek people and then after them the Aldimer, although it is sometimes said that, you know, it's possible that there were some beast races living in the province before this. At any rate, the Aldimer were the first to develop a real civilization in Hyrock. An aristocratic family of Aldimer merchants would set up the trappings of government using the Atimansha as their political seat and they would become a very powerful dynasty within Hyrock.
These were the Derenny clan. They lent their name into one of the many names of the Atimansha, the Derenny tower. They called their government the Derenny hegemony and some sources put the height of their power as kind of contemporaneous with another Aldimerny dynasty in Tamriel, the first Aldimerny dominion. Sources kind of diverge from each other as to how contemporaneous they are, but it gives you kind of a general idea of what the political climate was in Tamriel when the Derennys are taking power in Hyrock.
Soon, the Nords arrive out of Skyrim and the Nords would play a very important role in driving the Derenny out of Hyrock, but we'll get into that in just a second. One of preface it by quoting a section from the pocket guide, which states quote, As an economic and military power, they were formidable enough to pose a threat to the battle hardened to Nords and the nascent Alesian Empire of Cyrogel. Taking advantage of the internal strife in Skyrim, the hegemony began taking land north and south of Hyrock claiming portions of Skyrim and present day Hammerfell. At the peak of their power, they controlled nearly a quarter of Tamriel, but they had overextended their reach and slowly, nearby year, they lost all that they had gained, falling back to their fortress in Belferia, the Adomantine Tower, now called the Derenny Tower, end quote.
This was the beginning of the end for the elves in Hyrock. Soon the province would be in hands in the hands of the Brettons. We talked about the Brettons themselves in depth in an episode in our first season, but suffice it to say, During the reign of the Derenys in Hyrock and possibly for a little while before, we know that the Aldmer and the Native people were in fact reproducing with each other. The resulting children exhibiting characteristics of both parents became the half-man half-maire hybrids that we would call the Brettons.
There were many aspects of the Bretton appearance and temperance which evidence this connection may have sharper ears than your average man, longer fingers, fairer skin, they have a strong affinity for magic and so on and so forth. So over time, the Derenny had made some questionable allies, including the aliens in Cyrogel. So these Aldmer who are living in and controlling Hyrock are aiding the aliens in Cyrogel in their battle against the Alesian Empire and the uprising of the Native people that lived there. These Aldmer helped the aliens fight the Cyrogels at the Battle of Clenum Remorz at great cost to themselves.
In the wake of this battle and the subsequent weeking of Derenny military strength, the Nords and the Brettons were able to push them out of Hyrock once it for all. And after this has happened, we can see obviously that even the greatest warrior among the Brettons may not come closely to physical strength of any one of the Nords that had helped them push out the Ales. They were much less capable when it came to brute force and violence. However, over time, the Native inhabitants, the Brettons slowly overcame the Nords in Hyrock through trading and political maneuvering without using Bibles.
The Brettons remained in charge of the province until the end of the first era, but we'll get into that a little bit later on. And here, I want to take a break from Hyrock proper for a moment to discuss or cine him. In legend, the orcs came about when their patron deity Trinamak was, in one way or another, transformed into the Daedric Prince known as Malakath. All of his followers changed with him.
These were the orcs. Feared and ostracized by the other races of Tamriel, the orcs fled into the North where they thought they could be left alone. Over time, they would migrate westward into the Rothgaria Mountains within Hyrock, following their herds. This all is taking place during the reign of the Derenius before the Nords come and help the Brettons push the Derenis out.
And the elves took to calling their settlement in the mountains, or cine him, which translates to Ork Tal. If you look on a map, it's north of, at the time, the relatively new city of Wayrest, kind of near the border of Hammerfell. Everything changes for the orcs at the coming of the Yokudids. The so-called Warrior Wave of the Yokudids, the Ragh-g-dah, which landed on the shores of what was then known as Volenfell in the year 808 of the first era, had a tremendous impact on life in Hyrock.
Fleeing refugees, running from the infamous swordsmanship of the Yokudids, would cause overpopulation and conflict in many settlements along the coasts of the Iliac Bay. In addition, the orcs that were fleeing from the Yokudids would travel en masse into southern Hyrock and come to settle with their brothers and sisters in Orcineum. The orcish population kept growing and growing and getting more and more restless, as more and more orcs sought to escape from Hammerfell. Eventually, they became a threat.
In 948 of the first era, the King Indagrval, King Joy-lea, sent the letter to Gaiden Shindi, proposing a temporary alliance against the orcs. Gaiden Shindi was a great hero and swordsman even among the Yokudids, and is also this kind of mythic creature who's also responsible for the building of the arena in Cyrodiil in the Imperial City. Shindi accepts the alliance, even though eventually it would be his death, and the following campaign, which was called the Siege of Orcineum, lasted 30 years. Now, considering that the orcs were up against the Bretons, who will remember to have a great skill with magic, the Red Guards, aka the Yokudids, who are fearsome swordsmen, considering that the orcs lasted a surprisingly long time, are 30 years.
Of course, eventually, they could only hold out so long, and the gates were broken, and the invading forces entered and burned the settlement of Orcineum in the year 908. This would be the end of the settlement of Orcineum for quite a while, until it would be reformed later on, and we'll talk about that later. So, things will be relatively peaceful in Hyrock, until Haman Cameron takes the throne inbound. Haman is also known as the Cameron Yussiber, with a heart-king.
Haman started a conquest of western Tamriel in 249 of the Third Era. He destroyed almost everything west of Kavash in Siridil. Eventually, he turned his attention on Hyrock. In 266, seeing that the disconnected city-states in Hyrock had no united ruler to lead them against his armies, Haman begins as much.
Resistance was kind of light in the beginning, because, at the time, anti-imperial sentiment within Hyrock was relatively common, and there were some breads that viewed the incoming Cameron Yussiber as a kind of liberator. All of that changes over time, however, when word begins to spread of how the Cameron's were treating the bread. An alliance is formed between these kind of petty baronies of Ithalan, Frigius, Cambria, and Dwinen, and an army led by the Baron of Dwinen himself, Othraak. In the Battle of Firewaves, the usurpers navy, which is the biggest in Tamriel at the time, and his army, met these combined forces of Hyrock, and miraculously, the elves are soundly defeated, Yussiber himself falling in battle.
It is said that the weather played a part in destroying the usurpers navy, and the breads believed that this was divine intervention on their behalf. The breads would remain disunited in the years to come. They became easy targets in these kind of relatively numerous conflicts that would kind of fall in their lap. The War of the Bendermock brought death and devastation to the Brettons and the Red Guards in 396 of the Third Era at the hands of the Nords.
The War of Brettany in 402, when the Red Guards in Sentinel, the newly formed capital of Hammerfell, Declare War on Hyrock. The Red Guards believed that the Barony of Brettany was actually a territory of Hammerfell, and when King Mogref of Brettany asked King Lysandis of Dagrapal for help, those two forces came to blows. So now, over 3,000 years after Orcinium burns, the territory was claimed by Lord Bowie, who is in Bretton, and who is eventually challenged by the Orchiro, Gorgog, Gorgog, Nagor, in, I believe this is $399 of the Third Era, $399. The Orchichiro defeats Lord Bowen in a duel, and rightfully wins the claim to the land, and reforms Orcinium.
The Brettons were wary at first, but over time, Gorgog proved himself a savvy and educated ruler, and so things were looking good. Orcinium files for provincial status in Tiber Septim's Empire. It was in fact being reviewed by Uriel Septim VII, but the review of their application is kind of put on hold, of course, when he is assassinated by the Mythic Dawn. It would continue to be on hold in a political turmoil that followed, and would not be reviewed before the Fourth Era, when unfortunately for the Orch's, Orcinium was once again sieged and sacked by the combined forces of High Rock and Hammerfell.
The exact circumstances of this second siege is unknown to me, but it comes in the midst of great turmoil within the region. Of course, we know that in the Fourth Era, things have really started to deteriorate between the Thalmor and the Empire. Soon, Hammerfell will leave the Empire, Black Marsh is already out of the Empire, and things are really beginning to fall apart. However, I really don't know how this second invasion came about, and I don't really think about it.
So if you do, miss the blog and let us know about it. Now, I'm only going to briefly touch on this next piece, because I believe we have an episode coming down the pipeline, where we are going to focus on the... ...the phenomenon of the Dragon Break. But suffice to say that, only a few years after Orcinium is sacked for the second time, so we're back in the Third Era now.
A very strange thing happens at Samuel. There is a time-shattering event known as the Warp in the West, sometimes referred to as the Miracle of Peace. Through the intervention of Akatash and Standar and Mara and possibly a few other divines. The timeline is fractured into multiple simultaneous existences, and then eventually collapses back on itself.
In the wake of the Warp, High Rock emerges as a united province with all of its disconnected baronies becoming five well-governed and well-groomed Imperial Counties. So, again, I'm only briefly touching on that. I know it seems like it's kind of torture to just say that like it's just magic. But we do have a Dragon Break episode coming up, and I'll do my best to explain the Warp in the West in as much detail as I can when that time comes.
So, here it's not a definitive history, but it's a history of High Rock. It's also as much of a history of Orcinium. So, I hope you enjoyed the episode. I hope I didn't leave too much out, but if there's something that you thought I left out or got wrong again, because I often say, visit the blog and let me know about it.
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