Editor's note: This is an excerpt from an ongoing University of Gwylim lecture series. This correspondence lecture series features noteable individuals from across Tamriel speaking on the topics and people in which they are considered experts. This selection is from a longer entry penned by Azandar al-Cybiades, arcanist extraordinary and mystical researcher. These selected questions and answers focus on the core nature of that spellcasting discipline, answering the question: What is an arcanist?

- Gabrielle Benele

Greetings Azandar al-Cybiades,

How does one become an arcanist?

—Lunetta Gleamblossom

There are as many answers to that question as there are arcanists in the world, friend Gleamblossom. A tome travels (somehow) from Apocrypha to Nirn and eventually finds a mortal soul that fits perfectly with its unique infralux resonance. The contents of the tome, circumstances of discovery, and mesh between the mortal and the book are wholly specific to that experience.

The output of that interaction (the arcanist) is also a specific exemplar of the phenomenon. Some arcanists, like myself, view the contents of our tomes with academic detachment. Others see it as a new framework within which to live their lives. Yet others become as thirsty for knowledge as Hermaeus Mora himself, or they shut themselves away in isolated scholarship for the rest of their (usually chaotic) existences.

I hesitate to recount the "discovery tales" of other arcanists I've spoken with, but I'm happy enough to relate my own. I was in a very dour place in my life, emotionally and economically. I was in a second-hand bookstore in Sentinel, seeking out an old edition of a cookbook I'd grown fond of. I recall it quite clearly, I was running my hand along a row of spines when my book quite literally bit me. Nipped the end of my finger and drew a spot of blood. My annoyance turned to extraordinary surprise when I beheld the contents within. And the long and storied career of Azandar al-Cybiades, realm traveler and arcanist, began.

What caused so many arcanists to show themselves right now?

—Fonarik the Wood Orc

As always with magic, good Fonarik, perception is reality. The truth of the matter is that arcanists are not a new phenomenon. In truth, I have been studying my tome and the stacks of Apocrypha for several decades now. I believe the prominence we've garnered of late—the very reason I was asked to engage in this discussion—stems from a sort of statistical tipping point. Despite the inherent secrecy with which we do our work, there are far more arcanists plying their trade now than ever before. The sheer weight of numbers has drawn attention to our magickal framework, you see.

I also want to note I would be a poor scholar indeed if I didn't frame the term "arcanist" as a badge we have self-pinned to our proverbial chests. In a previous University discussion panel, I found the response from the Guild Mage Dhulef along these lines quite insightful, when discussing the "wardens." Magic is magic at the end of the day. The lines we draw around it are mortal constructs, nothing more or less.

Now, as to why there are more arcanists now than ever before? If I had to guess, perhaps some kind of shift in the aetheric fabric of the Aurbis? The Planemeld has been a time for us all, and it will leave each and every one of us with stories to last a lifetime—provided we survive. Perhaps something about this event, or something like it, has changed the relationship between Nirn and the Daedric Realms. And this change, in turn, has prompted more tomes to find their way to mortal hands.

Hello!

I heard Arcanists make use of "Runes" in their spellcasting. Do these Runes have any relation to other runes we know about, such as the Runic language of Runestones?

—Benessa Gibby, Enchanter of The Company

Ah. I suspected an astute observer might ask something about this. Let's compare and contrast. In the enchantment discipline, an ancient and honored trade going back to the First Era, runes are pathways to power. While new runic developments happen fairly regularly, there is a linguistical common tongue amongst enchanters that allow them to imbue items with mystical properties. Runes have specific, measurable meanings and allow for a repetition of output as well as intent. It is a discipline I myself have some skill at, and one which requires precision and artistry in equal measure.

Somewhat embarrassingly, the "runes" arcanists fling about are nothing more than logographic symbols for subconscious metamagical constructs. Arcanist runes mean nothing beyond their internal significance to the arcanist in question.

While study has shown that the language of arcanist runes is universal, they do not represent the same concepts across individual arcanists. I could draw you a symbol that in my spellwork means "power," for example. And you, as another arcanist, might tell me that same symbol means "fire." These sigils are unique to arcanist magecraft, as far as I know, but like the one-to-one relationship between mortal and tome, so too are the uses of these sigils specific to the arcanist.

As a scholar I desperately wish this were not so. It feels as if Mora himself is laughing at me each and every time I consider it.