Does Paarthurnax Deserve to Die? | Skyrim Lore

Comments · 2.1K

• BA

  @BasiliskArt · 8 months ago · pinned

  something I&apos;ve wondered for a while: Can a dragon&apos;s name change based on their experience?<br>Durnehviir is an example of this, I think. His name Dur-Neh-Viir means Curse-Never-Dying. Now it seems oddly prophetic for this to be his name given by Akatosh. While he is a time god, it&apos;s so literal that it feels more as though Durnehviir chose a new name after his fate was revealed to him.<br>That then doubles up with the following question: If a dragon&apos;s name can change, why hasn&apos;t Paarthurnax&apos;s? Is it still an accurate reflection of him or does he choose not to change it as a warning to himself?

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• BR

  @brianroberts783 · 8 months ago

  I killed him in my first playthrough, and honestly, that decision haunted me for a while. &nbsp;By which I mean that I got a bug where every time I fast-traveled to anywhere in the Rift, Paarthurnax&apos;s skeleton would fall from the sky and land beside me.

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• SH

  @shaderu3402 · 8 months ago

  Consider this too: the ancient Nords had every opportunity to bring him down, if they wanted to (at least temporarily). They had Dragonrend. But they didn&apos;t, despite being more directly wronged by him, and to me, that matters more than Delphine&apos;s nebulous pursuit of justice.

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• MI

  @minerturtle45 · 8 months ago

  i could never hate you, Super Mario dragon

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• DA

  @danjo2080 · 8 months ago

  As Gandalf says, &quot;Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.&quot;

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• RA

  @RalenSharr · 8 months ago

  Paarthurnax called me brother, kin. He fought alongside me against Alduin when the blades did not. Paarthurnax made Alduin&apos;s defeat possible, teaching you a shout that even the greybeards didn&apos;t want you to learn. Paarthurnax is your teacher, your brother, and your friend. The blades treat you as a tool to be used and discarded, they give you an ultimatum rather than making any sort of effort to see your side of the issue if you disagree with them.

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• SU

  @sussurus · 8 months ago

  Ultimately, whether or not Paarthurnax deserves to die isn&apos;t for the Blades to decide.

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• ZO

  @Zodiac20003 · 8 months ago

  Although Paarthurnax tells you he would not trust another dovah, he does exactly that by helping you, the Dovahkiin, learn dragonrend, a shout with which you could kill Paarthurnax. Whilst he did the same for the Tongues, they were not dovah and he could trust that their honor would prevent them from using their power against their newfound friend. He knows that the dragon blood that runs through the Dragonborn makes it far riskier to help them. Thus, I think his advice to the Dragonborn about not trusting a dovah is just a moment of teaching dragon culture rather than a veiled confession of his own untrustworthiness. It could be that, from Paarthurnax&apos;s point of view, being truthful regarding dragon nature is worth the risk of the Dragonborn eventually turning on him. By intentionally rendering himself vulnerable, he subtly communicates that he <b>wants</b> to trust and be trusted.<br><br>Moreover I think as far as prophetic names go, as you said yourself, from the dragons&apos; point of view Paarthurnax is evil. He is a betrayer (twice) and a cruel overlord imposing his own tyranny on his fellow brethren in the wake of Alduin&apos;s demise. However, with the target of his cruelty and betrayal being the dragons, it looks like anything but evil from the point of view of humankind. It is entirely possible that Paarthurnax&apos;s cruel nature towards humankind specifically ended on the day of his betrayal of Alduin without compromising his name. I also like this interpretation because it totally feels like such an elder scrolls thing to force you to reinterpret the meaning of words, even though &quot;evil to whom?&quot; might not necessarily be the most original trope.

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• CO

  @cotho. · 8 months ago

  Paarthurnax never changed. He just understood his nature and sought to overcome it. I always imagined him as a monk-dragon. Just because a monk deprives himself of food doesn&apos;t mean he is no longer hungry. It means he understands what he is and seeks to overcome it. This is why Paarthurnax is awesome. By far the best single character in Skyrim.

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• MA

  @maysen51 · 8 months ago (edited)

  I think we miss understand paarthutnax name. His name shouldn’t imply he does these things to other ppl, but himself as well. His name is ambition overlord cruelty, which would imply this concept of himself is also subjective to it. Paarthutnax does this to himself by denying what he wants thus causing cruelty to his very being, his ambition lies in conquering what tames him which is his name even if he’s got the way of the voice his name still dominates him. The only possible way for paarthurnax to rlly tame himself is if he just gave up on his ambition to tame himself and stop causing himself suffering and finally understand his own cruelty. But he won’t do this out of fear he’ll let loose and want to dominate.

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• TW

  @twglenn9636 · 8 months ago

  I wish I could just straight up lie to the blades. Its not like they will go up there and check

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• JU

  @Jukrates · 8 months ago

  Paarthurnax has pretty much served a prison sentence of thousands of years on the throat of the world by this point

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