During the Dark Brotherhood Quest, "Following A Lead", dropping the item, "Mother's Head", near Mathieu Bellamont will trigger special dialogue which hints to him being the traitor, although this is not revealed until the next quest.

In the Shivering Isles DLC, trying to speak to one of the Apostles in The Howling Halls will display "I HAVE NO GREETING".

In the Shivering Isles expansion, Sheogorath is the only character in the game to have a grown-out beard, and the player cannot grow one of their own. If you attack Sheogorath, he will teleport you far above an unmarked location on the map called "Punishment Point", where you will fall to your death among other corpses. If you make it to Punishment Point on your own, a corpse named "Sheogorath's Punished" can be found with the following Death Decree attached to him explaining the "heinous crime" that sealed his fate there:

"Sheogorath, Prince of Madness, Lord of the Never-There, Sovereign of the Shivering Isles, does, on this day, hence-forth make this decree:


Robert Wisnewski is the name of a member of Bethesda's art team that worked on the Shivering Isles expansion, suggesting this Easter egg was a light jab at him for trying to grow a beard during development.

The Paint Brush item does not have any physics properties tied to it, meaning that wherever you drop a Paint Brush, it stays exactly where it is dropped, including floating in the air. This allows you to use Paint Brushes as mid-air platforms to reach places higher than you are intended to go and reach out-of-bounds areas.

Concept art of multiple cities feature amphitheaters, as seen in the Anvil, Chorrol, and Skingrad concept art. These amphitheaters are nowhere to be seen in the final game.

Concept art of Anvil reveal some slight differences from the original design. Originally, the port was connected inside the city walls, the lighthouse was accessed via a paved path, and the bay was much larger. In the final game, the port and lighthouse are located outside of the city walls, in a separate cell, the lighthouse has no paved path leading to it, and the bay is much smaller.

Concept art reveals a vastly different design for the city of Leyawiin than in the final game. The Niben river would have flown through the city, splitting it into 3 different sections, with 2 outer sections on land, and the third section, an island in the Niben River, connected via bridges.

Upon first entering the Market District, a notice will appear on the screen reading "New Topic: Do you need couriers?". However, this topic cannot be discussed with any NPCs. This may be a leftover from a scrapped quest or questline in which the player would deliver letters to NPCs. The string of text's file name is "ImpExWork", with "ImpExDeliveredLetter" and "ImpExGiveLetter" also existing in the game's files.

The game files reveal that High Elves were originally supposed to be 50 points vulnerable to Fire, Frost, Shock, and Magic. In the final game, they only have a 25 points vulnerability, with no general vulnerability to Magic.

An unused "Darkness" spell exists in the files, but ultimately goes unused. It acts oppositely to the "Light" spells in the game, making an area darker (most likely to make it easier to sneak and remain undetected). Similar to the unused "Lock" spell it contains many "DO NOT USE" warnings.

An unused "Lock" spell exists in the files (as well as Easy Lock and Average Lock), but it goes unused in the final game. It would have locked containers and doors. The files include several warnings which read "DO NOT USE". "Lock" existed as a spell in TES III: Morrowind.

Originally, Velwyn Benirus was to die at some point during the Benirus Manor quest. Unused NPC lines exist saying, "I heard that Velwyn Benirus was killed. The manor claims another victim."

In "The Siren's Deception", the player would have only been fought by 2 of the women in Gweden Farm, with the third, Faustina, fleeing to the basement. There, the player would have had multiple dialogue options with her, and ultimately been able to spare her. In the final game, you must fight all 3 women on the first floor with no option to spare any of them. These lines were found in the German version of the game.

There are unused lockpicking animations for NPCs that would have been used when NPCs lockpick locked chests or doors. This is a rare occurrence in-game and when it happens, the NPCs simply use the "activate" animation. There exists animations for locked chests on the ground as well as doors.

There is unused dialogue for Elven, Nord, Breton, and Redguard city guards that go unused due to all city guards being Imperials. The only exception to this being quest specific NPCs who are city guards of a race other than Imperial.

Horses were originally meant to be purchased through an in-game menu like other items in the game. In the final game, they are purchase through dialogue options. There exist unused lines for these purchases, "Need a new mount?" and "Looking to buy a horse? I have some fine animals for sale."

There is unused dialogue showing that merchants would refuse services to the player if their disposition was too low. These lines include "No service for the likes of you. Take a hike."

The Dark Brotherhood member "Antoinetta Marie" is an obvious reference to French Queen Marie Antoinette.

Every city was originally planned to have an Arena. Unused lines exist for the gatekeepers of each city arena, as well as Bruma's Arena being shown in the E3 2001 trailer. The final game uses what was originally the Chorrol Arena as the Imperial City Arena.

The "skooma drinking" animation in the final game is buggy and functions incorrectly. When a character is displaying the animation, their mouth clips through their head, and unlike any other animation in the game, they do not stop the animation when entering dialogue with the player.