The holiday of Saturalia is fast approaching, and those playing The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Anniversary Edition will get to celebrate it with the Holiday Pack. Just as in real life, the cultures of the Elder Scrolls universe all hold festivities during the colder seasons of the year, and amongst the most popular is Saturalia. As Tamriel's form of Christmas, the special event has been recognized by Bethesda and implemented into Skyrim nearly 10 years after its initial release.
The Skyrim Holiday Pack is available via Creation Club, a platform where Bethesda offers new content for its games that can be purchased with credits. The DLC commemorates the in-game holidays of Saturalia and the New Life Festival. Both events have been further explored in Elder Scrolls Online with special events, but Bethesda's addition of festive skins to Skyrim is an exciting treat for fans who want to enjoy more elements of the game's lore.
However, Saturalia is a piece of Tamriel's history that remains mysterious even with its appearances in both ESO and Skyrim. Looking into the traditions behind Saturalia, it seems the holiday has seen many iterations to celebrate different deities and concepts, making it and overall confusing holiday. Furthermore, the strange items that come as a part of the Holiday Pack do not seem to fit into the self-serious world of the Elder Scrolls series making it one of Skyrim's less lore-friendly mods, leaving the entirety of the event a bit of a mess.
This disruptive quality does fit into what little is known about Saturalia, however. The gift-giving holiday's roots do not derive from the sweet tale of Santa Claus and instead has a more self-serving, crazed past.
Saturalia Used To Celebrate Skyrim's God Of Debauchery
The history of Saturalia is rather blurry, which makes considering that it used to be held to celebrate a god who would encourage people to intoxicate themselves until they could no longer remember what happened the night before: Sanguine. Sanguine represents excess, especially of sensory pleasures, and is one of the many Daedric Princes who features in Skyrim. Skooma, mead, and partying were thus the main attractions for Saturalia, as the people of Tamriel would do as Sanguine would do and enjoy themselves until they could not possibly do so anymore.
However, Saturalia changed over time to be about gift-giving. It seems the Bretons who were the first to celebrate the holiday strayed away from the selfish indulgences of days past when they realized that giving is the greatest pleasure of all (though partying is still part of the festivities). Hence, Saturalia now resembles gift-giving holidays like Christmas.
Indeed, everything about Saturalia closely resembles Christmas. It is held on the 25th of the last month of the year, Evening Star, sees lights hung up around towns as festive decorations, and even features evergreen trees. The only difference is that the Santa of the Elder Scrolls universe is Skyrim's drunken Daedric Prince.
Skyrim's Saturalia Is Closely Tied To The New Life Festival
A large reason why the traditions of Saturalia have changed dramatically is because of the holiday's connection with the celebration of New Life. In the Elder Scrolls universe, New Years is celebrated on the first day of Morning Star with New Life festivals. These New Life festivals are more widely celebrated in Tamriel than Saturalia in part because its festivities used to be associated with the Emperor but also because the celebration of new opportunities and futures is more widely accepted than the celebration of a hedonistic Daedric Prince.
However, New Life festivals have oddly taken on Saturalia's former festivities. Even though New Life is meant to give people a chance to renew themselves, the holiday is celebrated by enabling people to splurge their vices: Drinks are free in all bars, and many enjoy spending copious amounts of money to purchase presents, making New Life bigger than even ESO's one year anniversary event. Indeed, the few who do not celebrate New Life believe that it is bad for encouraging hedonism.
The parties of New Life are partially why Saturalia has become much more tame. Sustaining that amount of fun over the six days between the two holidays would be impossible even for the taverns in Tamriel's northernmost kingdom to keep up with. Saturalia thus serves as more of a sign for the celebrations to be enjoyed in New Life festivals.
Skyrim's Holiday Pack Provides Holiday Cheer
Players can now take part in Saturalia in The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim Anniversary Edition because of the Holiday Pack. This small DLC originally came out on Bethesda's Creation Club in 2018 alongside Skyrim Special Edition and remains available for fans who repurchased the game on its 10 year anniversary. While the DLC does not add a ton of content, it does provide a fun and unique spin on the usually self-serious world of the Elder Scrolls, which should lighten players' adventures in Skyrim this holiday season.
The Holiday Pack offers players armor based off of Saturalia festivities. Namely, players can wear what looks like Santa's attire but in blue. This is in line with the traditions of Saturalia where people dress specifically in cerulean. The origin behind this ritual is unknown, but the blue garbs are worn again for the New Life festivities that take place later.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the Holiday Pack is the reindeer. Second to only the steed of the Skyrim sect of the Dark Brotherhood, Shadowmere, reindeer have to be amongst the coolest mounts available to players in the game, as their antlers and faces make them wholly unique. There seems to be no existing lore tying these animals to Saturalia, so the reindeer may instead represent Bethesda's all-out love for the spirit of the holiday season.
Skyrim's lore runs deep, but it is great to see Bethesda continually expand upon it 10 years after its release. Between the excessive ale-drinking and Santa Claus costumes, the game presents an opportunity for both players and the world of the Elder Scrolls to let loose for once and simply appreciate the world-building that has been put into the series. There's a lot more to Skyrim than plunging into cavernous Dwemer ruins and battling Falmer, and the Holiday Pack should hopefully serve as a solid reminder of why that's the case. Hopefully, the Elder Scroll VI will continue The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Anniversary Edition's tradition and bring back the Holiday Pack when it comes out.