What exactly is the "Eye of Magnus"?

[morogoth35]

The "Eye of Magnus" is a really weird "artifact". It has great magickal powers but what exactly is it?

 

Some things I find interesting is that ingame we get a little bit of information, mostly from Tolfdir. Tolfdir says that the markings on the orbs are unlike anything he's ever seen before. It's not ayleid, dwemer, deadric - so what is the language?

 

Ancano manages to interact with the orb and when he does, he becomes immune to damage. This means that when someone unlocks the power of the Eye they become immortal.

 

We know that the eye was the reason for the elves attacking Saarthal. The book "Night of Tears" explains this a bit.

 

Also when we get sent into Mzulft and activate the "map" in the last room we can see that the eye emits great power, because it distorts the picture. We can also see that the Staff of Magnus emits the same powers on the map.

 

This means that the Eye and the Staff of Magnus infact are connected to each other. The staff when used on the eye changes the eye in some way.

 

The psijic order manages to sence the power of the eye but only when the eye has been transported to the College. Why did they not sence it's power when it was buried in Sarthaal?

 

Also, how did the Eye of Magnus get moved to the college? We don't know who at the college moved it but what we do know is that it's far too big to be moved physically so some kind of teleportation magick was used by someone in the College. I find this interesting since we know that the psijic order can teleport and we know that there are teleportation spells in TES lore. I remember in TES 1: Arena there was a teleportation spell.

 

When Ancano interacts with the eye we hear him say "The power to unmake the world at my fingertips". Magnus was the archetect of Mundus and a big part in the creation of the Aurbis. Was Ancano really serious when he meant that he could actually unmake the world? If he was, then now the psijic order now has the orb and thus they have the power to unmake the world themselves.

 

Anyways, I have been rambling now but my questions remains what exactly is the Eye of Magnus? Who created it? Why is it so powerful? Why is the staff connected to it? And why was it buried in Sarthaal?

 

I want to hear your opinions on this!

[DoctorKaizeld]

i always think it is a reference to Magnus the Red from Warhammer 40k: https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Magnus_the_Red

[lazyskeever]

The entire questline for the College is one of the most heavily gutted ones in the entire game. So much stuff was cut from the game in order to rush it out for the original release date, and Winterhold probably suffers the most from this story-wise (whereas the civil war quest suffers more content-wise). Everything would probably have made much more sense and be better explained originally (apparently the destruction of Winterhold itself was originally supposed to tie into the College quest), but what we end up with in the final product is a macguffin in the vaguest sense possible.

[morogoth35]

The entire questline for the College is one of the most heavily gutted ones in the entire game. So much stuff was cut from the game in order to rush it out for the original release date, and Winterhold probably suffers the most from this story-wise (whereas the civil war quest suffers more content-wise). Everything would probably have made much more sense and be better explained originally (apparently the destruction of Winterhold itself was originally supposed to tie into the College quest), but what we end up with in the final product is a macguffin in the vaguest sense possible.

And how do you know this?

[DoctorKaizeld]

 

The entire questline for the College is one of the most heavily gutted ones in the entire game. So much stuff was cut from the game in order to rush it out for the original release date, and Winterhold probably suffers the most from this story-wise (whereas the civil war quest suffers more content-wise). Everything would probably have made much more sense and be better explained originally (apparently the destruction of Winterhold itself was originally supposed to tie into the College quest), but what we end up with in the final product is a macguffin in the vaguest sense possible.

 

And how do you know this?

It's common knowledge... The college is one of the most noticeably unfinished part of the game. Using mods to restore cut content helps but the lore is still missing in a lot of places.

[Moksha8088]

Actually, the Psijic Order not only sensed the power of the Eye of Magnus in Saarthal but could also sense when its hiding place was about to be disturbed and its power unleashed by Ancano. That is why they turned to the Dragonborn to contain the threat till they were able to remove it to a more secure location.

 

Anyway, the Eye is a source of undefined power created by Magnus. The Staff was a tool used by Magnus and has some ability to control the Eye. It was probably buried at Saarthal by some early Nords who discovered a way to cram it through narrow tunnels. The thing to remember is that the concept artists at Bethesda were not confined to conventional reasoning or mechanics. They used the presto-digitation of fantasy.

[protoculturejunkie]

Phinis Gestor has a lecture about it. I'm not sure when he's meant to give it though. I caught it after completing Arniel's Endeavor part 3. But at that point I had already finished the main CoW quest, so some of his lecture was wrong.

 

http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/College_of_Winterhold#Phinis_Gestor:_Eye_of_Magnus

[Zenahk]

My theory is that the eye is the power source Magnus used when creating Mundus. The staff, of course, being a siphon that controlled its energy output.

[Lachdonin]

At the end of the day, we don't even know if it's related to Magnus at all. It was simply named thus because it was powerful, and Magnus is associated with Magic. But then again, so are all Et-ada.

 

Personally, I don't think its from Magnus at all. I've always liked the idea that it's KINMUNE, or some similarly displaced object of extreme power.

[Caerulean]

But even the Augur of Dunlain called it the 'Eye of Magnus' if I remember correctly. I wouldn't be one to question the Augur. xD