Female Greybeards

[Kerr]

Are there any? I know there weren't any in Skyrim but have there been female Greybeards the past? They're called Greybeards and all of them are old men (which would result in having a grey beard) but I assumed that wasn't an actual requirement for entry.

Gender rarely seems to matter in TES, their leader is a genderless Dragon and nobody raises an eyebrow to training a female Dragonborn. So is it safe to assume the Greybeards aren't a no girls allowed club? It says no girls, we're allowed to have one. That women can be Greybeards but in 4E201 they all just happen to be men.

[likelolwhat]

That always bothered me. Though TES has done a lot of things right in the gender department, there are still some glaring errors (for example... why are there no female generic Legionnaires or Imperial guards? Why are all the higher-ups in Stormcloak command dudes? Why are there no female field officers on either side [Rikke doesn't count]?) in practice.

As usual, I blithely ignore any gaps in the canon that don't suit me. If I fancy headcanon-ing/writing a female Greybeard, I will.

[IcarusBen]

The lack of female guards is peculiar, but that's probably because... they forgot. The lack of female commanders/field officers is probably because of actual gender prejudices in the real life era of history that Tamriel seems to be stuck in.

Seriously. I see little difference in technology between ESO and Skyrim, which is totally ridiculous.

[legoless]

That always bothered me. Though TES has done a lot of things right in the gender department, there are still some glaring errors (for example... why are there no female generic Legionnaires or Imperial guards? Why are all the higher-ups in Stormcloak command dudes? Why are there no female field officers on either side [Rikke doesn't count]?) in practice.

TES isn't supposed to be high fantasy; I'm all for strong female characters, but medieval soldiers for the most part aren't women. Also, pretty sure one of these generic legionnaires was female.

[Trelares]

Also what one should take into account, there are dozen of western countries where women can literally become everything they want but still even then you have only a very small number of them in military positions. Furthermore there is a really nice study published from Norway that shows that in western countries women tend to go more heavily into women jobs (social, teaching...) than they do in developing countries. The conclusion more or less was, if women have the economical and political freedom to do whatever they want, they likely will end up more often than not in "women jobs".

So either "free" societies have some really backwards ways to constrict women or one has to accept that Evolution likely imprinted a genetic preference into women/men that leads the majority of each group towards different things.

[Dark Spark]

That always bothered me. Though TES has done a lot of things right in the gender department, there are still some glaring errors (for example... why are there no female generic Legionnaires or Imperial guards? Why are all the higher-ups in Stormcloak command dudes? Why are there no female field officers on either side [Rikke doesn't count]?) in practice.

The only female Legionary I've seen in a Light Armor outfit was a battlemage at Helgen.

I chalk it up to chance that few, if none, female soldiers in the regular legion were assigned to Tullius' force. And given that much of the Legion in Skyrim consists of auxiliaries recruited from the local populace, the likelihood of a local woman in Skyrim seeking a job in the Legion seems remote.

Female Stormcloaks, on the other hand, have nationalism ogoing for them. The desire to fight alongside (or in vengeance of) a loved one factors in as well.

[MetaCthulhu]

To paraphrase Barbas: "Skyrim is now host to giant, flying lizards and two-legged cat-men... and you're surprised by this?"

But yeah, I think the grey beards don't care if you're a man, woman, elf, lizard, cat, flying lizard, etc.

(Even the grey beard women have beards! This gave rise to the myth that there were no grey beard women! That grey beards just sprang out of holes in the sky!)

[BetaB17]

I think a lot of ppl are overlooking the fact that we only ever hear about or see very greybeards. Even if they are predominately male, we can't base the whole faction off of a small sample... Also recall that even the Tongues had a major female character, so why assume they fall in strict gender roles when very clearly Nordic women are just as warrior like as the men?

[Pilaf The Defiler]

That always bothered me. Though TES has done a lot of things right in the gender department, there are still some glaring errors (for example... why are there no female generic Legionnaires or Imperial guards? Why are all the higher-ups in Stormcloak command dudes? Why are there no female field officers on either side [Rikke doesn't count]?) in practice.

As usual, I blithely ignore any gaps in the canon that don't suit me. If I fancy headcanon-ing/writing a female Greybeard, I will.

There were plenty of female soldiers in Morrowind. Of course, as graphics progress and gameplay is more streamlined, most of the variety of NPCs in a game like that gets reduced, for better or worse.

[all_freed]

Yea maybe there were female greybeards in the past but it doesn't look like their order records names or anything like that (with the exception of Jurgen).

[Pilaf The Defiler]

One of the three original Tongues was female, as are some of the random NPCs in Sovngarde who claim to be Dragonborn. I'm pretty sure "Greybeard" is just a figure of speech and no actual beard is required. I wouldn't assume in this case that the absence of evidence is evidence of absence, as Skyrim history is filled with legendary female Shouters, including one from the Lessons of Vivec. If even the Dunmer have tales of them, they surely existed. It logically follows, then, that if there were militant female Tongues, some of them would have became Jurgen's students and then became Greybeards. Thus, female Greybeards.