The Untold Truth Of Skyrim's Falmer

Players of The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim who like to venture into the underground caverns have seen the Falmer, an underground race. The Falmer are secretive, and there's not much known about them until you start digging through lore and books.

Skyrim is no stranger to mysteries, but the Falmer-filled Dwemer ruins are one of its detailed histories. With a little bit of speculation and digging around in the books you can find, players can learn about the species and the rise of Nords in Skyrim. Some of the secrets are as dark as the caves the Falmer live in, and the species surprisingly connects to other races in Skyrim and surrounding lands.

The Falmer aren't discussed much by other NPCs in Skyrim, so it's safe to say that not many know they exist. The Falmer don't live aboveground, so there's not really a reason for anyone to know they exist, either. However, books in Skyrim discuss the increasing raids of creatures similar to goblins, which might be a hint at the state of the land in the future.

The Falmer are actually snow elves, the original rulers of Skyrim. While there are rumors that the snow elves might exist somewhere, most NPCs believe that they were wiped from existence. The snow elves went to the Dwemer undergound for solitude after a war with the Nords. The Dwemer sought to make them weaker, resulting in the near-extinction of snow elves and the existence of the Falmer. 

Fall of the Snow Prince details from a Nord's perspective how the snow elves were defeated by the Nords and how brutal the war was. There's an idea within another book in Skyrim about the future: "Are the snow elves of ages past ready to reclaim their long-forgotten glory? Are they ready to surge to the surface, and make war upon the 'light dwellers'? If that happens — if the Falmer are indeed planning on reconquering Skyrim — I fear a horror neither man nor gods could possibly stand against."

Considering that Skyrim is known as the land of the Nords, the idea that Skyrim could belong to the Falmer could impact the state of the land in future games or even Elder Scrolls Online updates.

Players will never hear the Falmer speaking, even though there's a talk option with some of them. Instead, players might hear hissing noises when the Falmer are around, but they never actually communicate with the player despite being descendants of a race that can speak and write. They also can't see.

The Dwemer tricked the Snow Elves into eating a dangerous fungus back when the snow elves were seeking solitude from the Nords. One side effect caused the snow elves to become blind and extremely weak. Even the descendants of the original snow elves were blinded, and now all Falmer are completely blind.

Players can see this while exploring the ruins. You can sneak right by Falmer without them seeing you, and you can get much closer to them than you can to the other races, even if your sneak level is extremely low. This is a great way to boost that sneak stat if you haven't already. 

With Dwarven machinery around but the entire Dwemer areas in ruins, players might wonder about the fate of the dwarves.

Well, the Falmer eventually rebelled against their slavers, completely wiping out the Dwemer population. Players find Falmer in Dwemer ruins since the Falmer made them their home, and they actually began taking slaves as well in raids throughout the land (according to The Falmer: A Study). While exploring the ruins, players can find slaves to the Falmer. You can also encounter NPCs that talk about "goblins" who take people underground in certain areas throughout Skyrim. These aren't goblins though — they're Falmer.

Despite their weaknesses, the Falmer were strong enough to wipe out an entire race. Players experience this when fighting them underground. They're not all easy to kill, and unless you're a great archer, getting through areas with Falmer running rampant is a struggle.