Lore:Battle of Red Mountain

The UESPWiki – Your source for The Elder Scrolls since 1995

To meet our site's higher standard of quality, this article or section may require cleanup. The user who placed this here had the following concern:
refs, better breakdown
To leave a message about the cleanup for this article, please add it to this article's talk page.

The Battle of Red Mountain is also known as Lorkhan War. This famous battle, paving the way for the formation of "modern" Morrowind, took place around 1E 700 towards the end of the War of the First Council between the Chimeri (led by Nerevar) and the Dwemeri.

It is during this battle in Dumac Dwarfking's citadel (soon to become the headquarters of Dagoth Ur) that Kagrenac is supposed to (according to some sources) have used his tools upon the Heart of Lorkhan in order to strengthen the Dwemer and win the battle. However, his actions somehow caused the entire Dwemer race to disappear from Tamriel.

What happened during the battle is rather obscure since there are many sources that clash with each other. Some sources imply that during the battle, Nerevar and Dagoth Ur led a small platoon of troops into red mountain while the battle outside acted as a diversion. It is then said that Nerevar and Dagoth Ur encountered Dumac and Kagrenac within the mountain and a bloody duel broke out with Nerevar slaying Dumac and Dagoth Ur killing Kagrenac. It is implied that after the duel, Nerevar and Dagoth Ur used the Heart of Lorkhan to destroy the Dwemer race; this explains why the Dwemer disappeared. Afterwards Nerevar is supposed to have left Dagoth Ur to guard the heart while he discussed with the Tribunal what he would do next. After coming to the conclusion that they would destroy the heart, Nerevar and his Tribunal returned to the heart chamber only to find that Dagoth Ur had been corrupted by the heart. It is then said that the Tribunal changed their mind on destroying the heart (after they were corrupted by it themselves) and poisoned Nerevar so that they could use the heart's power.

Other sources imply that House Dagoth betrayed the Chimer and fought with the Dwemer (possibly because they disliked the other Chimer houses and tribes), and that Nerevar was slain during the battle. These sources state that Kagrenac accidentally wiped out the Dwemer in a vain attempt to power them up using the heart.

A Nordic source has yet another account ^[1]: Nerevar carried Keening, a dagger made of the sound of the shadow of the moons. His champions were Dumac Dwarfking, who carried a hammer of divine mass, and Alandro Sul, who was the immortal son of Azura and wore the Wraith Mail. They met Lorkhan at the last battle of Red Mountain. Lorkhan had his Heart again, but he had long been from it, and he needed time. Wulfharth met Sul but could not strike him, and he fell from grievous wounds, but not before shouting Sul blind. Dagoth-Ur met Dumac and slew him, but not before Sunder struck his lord's Heart. Nerevar turned away from Lorkhan and struck down Dagoth-Ur in rage, but he took a mortal wound from Lorkhan in turn. But Nerevar feigned the death that was coming early and so struck Lorkhan with surprise on his side. The Heart had been made solid by Sunder's tuning blow and Keening could now cut it out. And it was cut out and Lorkhan was defeated and the whole ordeal was thought over.

It is said that Azura punished the Chimeri for allowing Nerevar to die by turning their skin gray and their eyes a fiery red. The Chimeri thus became the Dunmeri.