Corpus Tamrielicum - The Imperial Library

[26] Holidays of the Iliac Bay
[26] HOLIDAYS OF THE ILIAC BAY
Holidays of the Iliac Bay
by Theth-i
The region of the Iliac Bay has a rich history, and not surprisingly, a number of holidays
unique to it because of this history. The Breton and the Redguard cultures have many
similarities, but just as many distinctions. An analysis of the holidays is one way to study the
people.
As any schoolchild could tell you, the Redguards are a relatively new culture to Tamriel.
Their arrival from their homeland is actually well recorded, though it occured several
thousand years ago, in the 808th year of the 1st Era. Hammerfell was a great desert
encompassed by almost impassable mountains -- unclaimed and unwanted. Many of the
holidays extant in modern Hammerfell seem to be direct translations of older Redguard
festivals before their migration to Tamriel.
The orgiastic seasonal celebrations seem unusual in a province with few changes in the
weather from month to month. Yet on the 28th of Suns Dawn, the Redguards of the Banthan
jungle celebrate Aduros Nau to relieve the wintertide lethargy; on the 1st of Mid Year, the
people of Abibon-Gora celebrate Drigh R'Zimb in honor of the sun, which no normal
Redguard worships in this day; similarly, on the 29th of Suns Height, the festival in the Desert
called Fiery Night, seems almost perverse in such an environment; the Koomu Alezer'i on the
11th of Last Seed in Sentinel has been translated as a harvest thanksgiving, though many
scholars have suggested that it was once a springtide holiday; similarly, the Feast of the Tiger
in the Bantha on the 14th of Last Seed was probably once a religious holiday to a Tiger God,
instead of a thanksgiving.
Other old Redguard holidays have either been acknowledged as part of the old culture or
adjusted to fit with the climate of Hammerfell. The Serpent's Dance, for example, of
Satakalaam is patently an old festival honoring a Serpent God of the homeland who evidently
did not survive the journey to Hammerfell. The significance of the date, the 3rd of Suns Dusk,
has been lost with the Serpent Priests. Baranth Do, on the 18th of Evening Star, and Chil'a, on
the 24th of the same month, are both New Years festivals. Most likely, they have been moved
from their original dates to correspond with the notion of the year defined in Tamriel.
The Bretons have been in Tamriel since before recorded history. Their holidays have
remained almost unchanged since primitive times, though new holidays have been created to
replace those which have lost popularity.
The oldest holidays still observed in High Rock must include Waking Day, on the 18th of
Morning Star, when the people of the Yeorth Burrowland wake the spirits of nature after the
winter, very nearly in the tradition of their more reverential ancestors. Flower Day, held on
the 25th of First Seed in the smaller villages of High Rock is most likely just as older or older.
The old cult of the flower is also remembered as Gardtide in Tamarilyn Point on the 1st of
Rains Hand. Daggerfall's Day of the Dead, on the 13th of Rains Hand, suggests the ancestor
worship that marked the Breton religion of antiquity. Finally, the ancient goddess of the
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