im always wondered where are the ruins of the once great city?

They don't exsist. Along with many skills, all your atttributes, the paper doll etc...

It was buried under the tremendous amount of crying that the sea boiled over due to attributes being lost.

I'm sure that they destroyed it and then they builded the actual Winterhold.Nord people don't like old artifacts like the humans in real life.

I think they mean the ruins of the city itself where it fell into the sea. Winterhold was one of the largest cities in Skyrim in earlier eras... now it's a few wooden longhouses clining to a cliff with only the mages college left of the original city.

You'd expect some evidence of the city; broken stonework and stuff

well it snows there like very day...I thought it all just fell into the sea buried over multiple decades of snow. That's why there's a giant cliff fall in Winterhold.

Its mentioned time and time again, but it seems that very few of you know it. Winterhold fell to the sea in the Great collapse, I assume the area around the college was once winterhold. Since it fell to the sea (Many decades ago) most of it has been buried or carried away.

If you look at the topography around the College, it does seem that some artifact inside may have protected the College while the rest of the city washed out around it.

Pure speculation, but thats the way I looked at it. The few houses and such were just the entrance and the rest of the city built around the College just got eroded. Always pictured the College as the center of the city, sort of like how the Mage's Guild in the Imperial City was.

heh M'aiq says something along the lines that if you do not see them, then were they ever there OR just because you don't see them, doesn't mean they aren't there.

Can you make an amulet of waterbreathing and go diving. Would be interesting, yes?

No, people understand that perfectly well. However, if you go down the cliffs, there is no evidence that a city was ever there. No ruins, no stones, nothing. It just doesn't exist in the game like it should. There isn't even any evidence of the walls that would have once surrounded the place.

Which makes the whole "falling into the sea" seem like little more than an excuse to simply not build a big city. Or really a city at all, because what's left hardly qualifies as even a village.

I'm talking about some people, like this:

Wow. I like how it went from a simple question to an accusation of game laziness type. Sad.

There is a transcript of a letter sent to the jarl of winterhold by the then-archmage explaining that the college survived thanks to the fact the college has it's own wards built in, hence the college survived, it was built that way. (And not, contrary to folk talk, that the mages themselves had caused the incident)

Have... you... seen... how.... far.... the... drop... is?

If the water flooded in THAT high, it could easily have been washed away to any number of unknown locations. I know I've seen plenty of stone slabs and broken walls everywhere in the world.

Or...

From that height, it could have just broke into a million pieces and horkers ate them

You are talking about a disaster like of "The Atlantis"?Where an entire continent was destroyed(in this case skyrim)?Or the Old winterhold city was builded next to the college?
Edit:Blah i always confuse the city names.Anyway,if the city was trully destoyed by a water wave....i smell Mehrunes dagon works....

Oh, I know... I know... I was being purposely vague

But thanks

Why am I using so many smilies today? jesus...

The city fell into the sea, guys; pretty much all of it. That's why there's no ruins or remains of foundations; it's at the bottom of the Sea of Ghosts. Yeah, it's probably a cop-out by Bethesda in order to keep the 11/11/11 release date, but it IS explainable as to why there are no ruins of sorts in Winterhold. It's called "The Great Collapse"; not "The Great Avalanche", not "The Great Fire" and not "The Great Earthquake" or any such variation; it was a collapse as in collapsed into the freaking huge body of salt water. Not to mention it happened many years before the game takes place.

The old city existed around the college of winterhold.

Well if you do a little swimming you can still see rubble and such at the bottom of the sea of ghosts. Most of it was probably swept out to sea. I believe the college was in the middle of the town once.

EVERYTHING about winterhold seems rushed. the college, the town, the qusets..they just seem unfinished.

There are some stones found at the base of the cliff near the city. I assume most of the ruins have been carried off.

M'aiq said no one can prove there ever was a large city at Winterhold.

Bah,mages were lame on that event.They should'ven casted a shield to save the citie.

A collapse of that magnitude wasn't 'swept' anywhere; fragile, bouyant things like wood and bodies would have been smashed to splinters, and mostly decayed and swept out to sea. Stone does not 'sweep out to sea'. It goes to the lowest point allowed by the bottom it lands on, allowing for angle, whether or not there =was= strong enough wash to even move it (remember, you are talking about things are are going to way multple tons. And that is just the manmade stuff). And keep in mind it was called a collapse......as in the ground dropped out from beneath the city, and city faw down go boom. The debris field should have been all over the place. There should be sharp edged rocks and stonework scattered all over the place. What's there is sandy bottom and natural rocks; I checked.

Personally, I suspect it was a first strike by the Thalmor. Look at the rock strata and structure; that is good old fashioned granite upthrust, just like most of the area is. Not limestone, not sedimentary. They could never have built Winterhold there if there had been significant caverns.....all that weight would have fractured the ground and things would have fell in. There is no evidence of the kind of geological event that could have caused such a collaps naturally. That leaves enemy action.