Of Emperors and Dragons

[MidbossVyers]

You know, I've been noting a parallel between this game's concept of Imperial and heroic dragons and China's. Both hold that the Emperor is a dragon in human form, and dragons are symbols of the Emperor. In both cases, emperors and dragons (emperor or otherwise) have powerful Voices. For example, the Voice of the Sleeping Dragon can be used to kill: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sk-W06fiwlo and the Voice of the Emperor can even control people and convince them to commit suicide, such as in the Emperor and the Assassin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Empero ... e_Assassin Back story is the Emperor might not be the legitimate son of the previous king, but rather a [&@%!] conceived by the previous queen and a merchant. The Emperor convinces the merchant to commit suicide before wiping out the merchant's family, as to prove that he is not the merchant's son because no one is so evil as to wipe out his own family. During times of national war and chaos, ambitious and talented people (those with the highest chance of being emperor after the dust settles) are oftentimes called dragons. If there are too many dragons, there is chaos, and the chaos can only be quelled by a dragon who can "devour" the others (much like the Dragonborn devouring the souls of other dragons).

[Pilaf The Defiler]

Cyrodiil has had heavy Asian influence since the First Pocket Guide, which mentions strong Akaviri influence on the Empire, post-Reman. I believe the whole Dragon God/Emperor imagery is supposed to purposely resemble Asian mythology and customs for this reason.

[Raptor_X2000]

Pilaf is right, Akavir is based pretty heavily on East Asian mythology and culture, and while the designs of Cyrodiil and the Empire are in general based more on Rome than China, the Akaviri influence on the Empire brings a real East Asian influence to the Empire's design.

But I am unconvinced about the connection between Voice of the Emperor/Thu'um and Chinese folklore and history. If I had to guess I would say Thu'um comes more from the Kalevala, where the heroes summon magic by literally singing it. For example, the hero Vainamoinen defeats his adversary Joukohainen by *singing* a swamp into existence around Joukohainen, trapping him. Vainamoinen only then agrees to free Joukohainen after Joukohainen offers his sister to Vainamoinen in marriage, at which point Vainamoinen sings the swamp back into thin air.

This, I think, is very similar to the Thu'um. In the same way that Vainamoinen sings of a swamp to generate one, Dragons (or Dragonborns) shout about fire (FIRE-INFERNO-SUN!) to summon fire, or shout about storms (STORM-WRATH-LIGHTNING!) to summon storms, etc.

[MidbossVyers]

Also, having dragons be gods and demigods, instead of just devil beasts, is more eastern than western.