Cyrodil is Rome. Should be obvious to all. Rome was founded by Romulus and Remus. Cyrodil by "Reman" Cyrodil. The names of the Imperial npc's, architechture and arms.

Rome was beaten, and seemed defeated and dead many times, from 700 BC to 1453 AD ( ending finally with the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople). But it always came back, and destroyed the enemy, or subjugated them culturally (making them Romans).

The Etruscans, the Samnites, the Gauls, Carthage, Parthia (several times) and the Huns. The Visigoths, Ostrogoths and Franks never really seemed like they could defeat Rome but did seem to be undefeatable by Rome. But eventually the Romans simply made them Romans. And they integrated into the Empire, as citizens.

The Vandals weren't really trying to defeat Rome, they wanted a homeland, after being chased out by the Huns, and (after sacking Rome) Rome gave them (the Vandals) a land in North Africa, west of Carthage, to call home. Diplomacy IS warfare! And Rome won. Again.

And the key here is that every time one of those cultures had the chance, it didn't wipe out Rome! It balked, and gave Rome a chance to re-group and re-oganize.

The Altmeri Dominion should have wiped out Cyrodil when it had the chance. The Dominion seems to be over-powering and arrogant (big mistake), and the clear winner. Cyrodil seems to be crying "please sir! don't kill me! I'll give you anything you want!" But like the Etruscans, Samnites, Gauls, Carthagenians, Parthians and Huns, the Dominion didn't execute the coup de gras. Cyrodil has the chance to regroup, and re-organize, the way Rome did many, many times. Allowing Cyrodil to sign the White Gold Concordat was a bad mistake.

Or, at least that's how I'd write it Large parts of the concept of the Elder Scrolls are based in historical fact, why wouldn't this also be?

Note that the Blades are already making a come-back.

...good for the empire, good for all.

Cyrodiil has Roman influences but is not Rome.
The Thalmor are trying to end the world, its in everyone's best interest they are defeated, but you can only get so far in TES using historical comparisons.
An understanding of the mythic nature of Tamriel is also helpful.

If Empre is TES equivalent of Rome, the Thalmor is Imperial Japan. Very similar goals. Fake racial unity against foreign imperialists, goal to unite the world under a single banner, military police patrolling the streets, lots and lots of war crimes and torture...


But, besides that, I don't think it's necessary to apply real life into TES, especially history.

According to The Great War, the Thalmor didn't have any attack forces left to wipe Cyrodiil out with. You can bet that if they had been able to, the empire would've been gone.

History is myth, myth is history. Whether or not something actually occurred is kind of beyond the point of history. Historians write about what is already written, and then add their own theories and how those conclusions were drawn from what is written.

Knowing history can be used, often very accurately, to determine what will occurr next, in any given context and situation. "Those who know not history, are doomed to repeat it".

And besdies, it's freaking cool! A great many of us history nerds love fantasy fiction. The fact that it DID occurr in history, makes it likely that it WILL occurr in fiction

Especially given how obvious it is that Cyrodil is based on Rome.

THe Thalmor signed the White-Gold Concordat because they came to the conclusion that it would be too expensive to continue the war. They wanted to regroup and reorganize as well, the Empire just bought the peace to be sure it could regroup itself.

An ancient General once quipped "if we have another victory like this, we will lose the war." When he ultimately won a battle, but with HUGE losses. The General and the battle are all confused in my head. Can't remember who said it about what.

I know that when Hannible defeated Rome, his losses were so great, that he couldn't take his men into the city to secure it. He couldn't convince them, or he didn't believe that the Romans were completely helpless after their defeat. Turns out they were completely helpless, and there was no one left who could fight Hannibal. But Hannibal left, Rome recovered and within 20 years completely destroyed the civilization of Carthage, razing the city to the ground.

There was a documentary about "the worst military mistakes in history", near the top of the list. Hannibal doesn't march into Rome. Hannibal should have marched into Rome, and destroyed it.

The Altermi Dominion is Carthage in this metaphor.

I once read the Book "The Great War" in Skyrim, and there was written, that the entire Thalmor Force in Cyrodiil was defeated by the Imperial Legion after the Thalmor conquered the Imperial City which later get conquered back by the Legion.

I'd just like to point out that the dominion lacks the benefit of knowing what happened to ancient Rome. The fools should read up on their history!

Well the Parthians were never integrated into the Persian Empire. Eventually the Sassanid Persians displaced them and the Sassanids were later conquered by the Arabs.
Nor were the Franks, Goths etc. By that period the western Roman Empire was giving away land to buy peace and they paid lip service at best to Roman suzerainty.
The Vandals in North Africa and the Ostrogoths in Italy were eventually defeated by the eastern Roman Empire but the reconquest left devestated territories and was shortlived.
Lesson I'd draw from it is no empire lives for ever.

As bigger the Empire grows, you will need a large Army to defend it. And the Soldiers want also be payed, so you will need a lot of money, which you get by trading. But if you only have Enemies around you, you can't trade with other and so you won't get money to pay Soldiers or recruit new. But if many small Nations force up against the one big enemy they will will defeat him.

Lol, the Dominion doesn't know, but the dev who wrote it did

I think it was not necessary to agree to ban talos. The thalmor could not have sustained the war if cyrodiil had crossed that line out. Therefore the empire must have had another motive for so easily agreeing to it. One imperial scholar wrote that Talos really isnt a god. While I disagree with that notion, if the emperor thought that was true that might be why he agreed to ban it. Not to appease but for his own purposes.

Well i think both Sides, Thalmor and Legion made the contract the gather strengh again.

Yeah no Empire lives forever, like the downfall of the US right now... But besides that, the Empire's time hasn't come yet. There is still hope for it, stupid Stormcloaks are fighting the only chance of survival they have.

Well, Rome was eventually destroyed. Also, just because Cyrodiil is based off of the Romans, doesn't mean they have the same fate/ and the Thalmor were at sort of a stalemate with the whole sacking imperail city thing. You don't understand how politics work, the Altmer faced a dilima, the didn't think they could take the entirety of Imperial lands, but backing out of their conquest was not an option, so they sowed the seeds of discontent to make a future conquest easier.

The Medes have been terrible Emperors so why not try to erase the "good" Emperors from history so they don't seem so bad? It seems more like a jealousy issue to me, Medes vs Septims, bad Emperors vs the good Emperors.

Perhaps the Thalmor have ulterior motives when the signed the concordant, maybe they knew the terms would incite rebellion and could just stand back and watch the empire destroy itself (Ulfric, could after all, be their puppet). Divide and rule. Also even though the Empire won their pyrrhic victory the Thalmor were still in a better position to regroup and try again. Which is why I believe the Thlamor have ulterior motives.

Look at the map. The empire used to have 8 provinces and now they are down to one and a half. Calling it an empire at this point is like calling Britain an empire. They used to be, but not anymore.

True, but damn looking back in time at Britain! They were a tiny Island that colonized alot of countries and practically ruled most of the world back then! But look at them now.......

Since the Thalmor wiped out all the Blades in the Aldmeri Dominion the Empire was fighting blind with regard to intelligence about the enemy. They did not know that the Thalmor would probably have settled on better terms.

Nothing lasts forever, no. It could be the end of Cyrodil. But, it's up to the writers, and fantasy writers love history. So I'm betting the development of the story continues to follow it.

The Franks and the Visigoths had been citizens of the Roman Empire for around 100 years maybe more, before Odoacer and the Franks forced the abdication of the Emporer. Really is was more like the Romans, just didn't want to be Romans anymore. A little more than half of the city of Rome were christians. And the majority of the western empire were christians. But the pagans had employed extremely cruel persecution on the christians before christianity was the official religion. So there was a social divide there. The Goths and the Franks were christians. So it was more like the whole thing just kind of fell apart. But the Goths and the Franks had indeed been Romans. They made up the bulk of the Roman army. Along with the Ostrogoths and Celtic mercenaries from Anatolia (Galatians)

I think the answer to the signing of the White Concordat simply lies in a few truths.

Take the mysterious nature of the Altmer. For centuries before the Great War, the Thalmor had been building up to that great moment, all under the nose of the Empire.

Every account of what took place in the Great War, so far, has been from the perspective of the Empire, not the Altmer.

Do we know, for fact, that the Altmer did not have more armies poised to destroy the Empire? No. So that leaves room for speculation.

I, however, believe that if the Altmer did in fact have remaining armies to crush the Empire with, they would have done it.

Taking into account the Altmer were fighting a two front war and when they finally had peace with the Empire, they could turn their focus to Hammerfell, which they STILL lost to.

So perhaps it was a mutually beneficial agreement?

The point I was making is that many times Rome had looked doomed, no way to win, the Empire was dead. And then it came back. It had been "counted out" several times before it actually ceased to exist. I'm saying don't count out Cyrodil just because it looks so weak now. It ain't over until it's over. The fat lady might be warming up her vocal chords, but she ain't singing yet. Espcially since Cyrodil is so obviously based on Rome. I'm thinking the writers, will continue to write it that way.