Death Mountain: Site of a Massacre

[Dio]

The Gorons are one of the most popular races in Hyrule. It is easy to take a liking to the milk chugging hot spring loving Goron bruddahs. Generally they come across as polite, friendly and approachable. Since OOT they have lived in and around the Death mountain area, and until SS I had assumed they had always lived there, but that game shows a different story. In SS Death mountain (back then known as Eldin volcano) was colonised by the Mogma, a race resembling anthropomorphic dogs with molelike digging abilities.

In SS there were few Gorons scattered around other areas, but not in Eldin province. It is never explained how the Gorons came to be the inhabitants of this area, this is probably because the truth is too horrifying. However if you are smart you can put the pieces of the puzzle together.
1 Gorons live around Death mountain in OOT and TP
2 The Mogma are only present is SS (OOT's prequel) and are never seen again.
3 Eldin Volcano is renamed death mountain

You see... The Gorons murdered the Mogma. With their superior strength and near invincibility, spurred on by the thought of delicious rocks from Eldin province, the Gorons gathered together, led by Gorko, first patriarch of the Goron tribe, crushing the opposition! The Mogma tried to crawl back into their holes but the Gorons filled them with Lava. In a short time the genocide of the Mogma was complete and the Gorons had control. From that moment on, Eldin volcano became Death mountain!

 

[Musicfan]

I doubt this there is little evidence to prove this. There's just about as much evidence for them not have enough genetic diversity to survive a change in the environment. While the Gorons thrive.

 

[Farore's Chosen]

the mogmas do live by an active volcano, it coulda been a volcanic eruption that wiped em out or they coulda headed off to literally greener pastures leaving the Gorons to move in and be perfectly at home considering they are better equipped to deal with lava and extreme heat. besides I didn't see the Gorons around Mt Crenel in MC either and there are quite a few races we've not seen again, Minish, Subrosians, Tokay, Kikwis, Kokiri. SS is still fairly new in this franchise so who is to say we won't see some of those introduced again? Nintendo probably doesn't reintroduce races that people didn't show much interest in and Mogmas weren't exactly interesting. which is a shame because I'd love to see the Minish, Twili and Subrosians come back.

 

[hwrdjacob]

Good theory, I like it... but really there's little to no evidence at all for it. The IRL reason for the name is that it was to keep with how dungeons were named after what they looked like (in this case a Skull) while also making the final dungeon intimidating. But it's still a plausible occurance perhaps due to lack of evidence both supportive and contradictive.

 

[Spiritual Mask Salesman]

Hmmm, well possibly, then again the mogma seem like a tribe of nomadic treasure hunters, maybe they eventually felt that they found everything worth looking for in Eldin Volcano and moved on. Then again maybe they are still around, just living underground and we are unaware of this in OoT and TP?

 

[VitaTempusN92]

I don't think the gorons murdered the mogmas, they are good people at heart and would never actually kill anyone unless they felt as if they're under threat. I do believe they have had some corrupt ancestors/predecessors but the gorons we know of aren't evil. I actually think the mogmas were murdered during the era of Hyrule's unification by probably corrupt rising Hylian folk due to their defiance towards a powerful corrupt ruler. Once the mogmas were murdered, the gorons thrived to move into the Eldin territory and due the tragic death all of the mogmas, the gorons decided it was moral to remember their terrible fate by dubbing the Eldin Volcano "Death Mountain". Afterwards, the gorons then took up the pride to avenge death of such an innocent kind that barely stood much of a chance by storming the Hyrulean territory that was corrupt at the time. Many gorons died in battle except a small group who survived thanks to a kind Hero incarnate at that time who helped set things right. Since then the gorons have always been paranoid when it came dealing with Hylians. That explains why the gorons are always annoyed by the song of the royal family (Zelda's Lullaby) and why they sometimes have conflicts with Hylians (like in Twilight Princess and Hyrule Warriors).

 

[Aewon]

How do you know Eldin Volcano is Death Mountain?

 

[VitaTempusN92]

How do you know Eldin Volcano is Death Mountain?

Cause it's the ONLY mountain in Hyrule that is a volcano.

 

[Doc]

How do you know Eldin Volcano is Death Mountain?

Because we know Death Mountain is in the Eldin Province, and the Eldin Volcano was, you know, in the Eldin Province.

As to the theory, I don't believe there is enough evidence to make a claim such as the gorons being the reason of a mass genocide (especially with Gorko as their leader?). Eldin Volcano is active, so the Mogmas could have easily died off from natural disasters, and perhaps the area became known for being extremely dangerous and was then dubbed Death Mountain. There are just many more likely possibilities than the Gorons killing off the mogmas.

 

[Spiritual Mask Salesman]

There are actually many possibilities that arise when trying to ponder why the Mogma race disappeared. Maybe it was due to war with gorons, maybe it was a war against Hylians as VitaTempus suggests. Then again maybe they were driven away, or killed by natural causes. The Volcano could have erupted at some point, maybe they ran out of food, or their water supplies dried up. There is a possibility that they were wiped out by disease brought by the Hylians/Skyloftians who rapidly began returning to the surface. Their is a possibility that maybe Volvagia scared them away from the region, or killed them off. Maybe those worm things began to rapidly grow in population making the Mogma's move. Since they never show mogma women maybe thins indicates that there are none, making a insufficientcy to reproduce. Once all the mogma we know about in SS die off mogmas would no longer exist. This could yet again explain the disappearance of the mogma.

Do you all see my point, we can never definitivly figure out why the Mogma disappeared because of the many possibilities that could explain it. I guess in the end it all comes down to opinion, which one do you personally think is the right answer, that is the question which should be asked when writing about this topic.

 

[Snow Queen]

Weren't the Mogmas in Minish Cap or did we just forget

 

[Dio]

Weren't the Mogmas in Minish Cap or did we just forget

They were not in Minish Cap. SS is their only appearance in the series.

 

[Beauts]

I assume the Gorons moved to Death Mountain/Eldin Volcano areas because they eat rocks and mountains are pretty rocky.

I don't know what happened to the Mogmas, but I kind of always thought they travelled all over, not just Eldin, although that's where we see them. They hunt for treasure after all. I don't know what happened to them, but I suppose they died out some other way or left Hyrule. I don't think there's anything gruesome involving the Gorons- they seem nice and there's no evidence at all in any of the subsequent games, least of all OoT, that suggests the Gorons ever hurt anybody.

However we do have the Shadow Temple, a pretty horrible place. Maybe during the pre-OoT war the Mogma's were wiped out?

But as has been said, there isn't one answer we can point to. It's like trying to explain why the dinosaurs died out- there were lots of reasons.

 

[Dio]

I assume the Gorons moved to Death Mountain/Eldin Volcano areas because they eat rocks and mountains are pretty rocky.

I don't know what happened to the Mogmas, but I kind of always thought they travelled all over, not just Eldin, although that's where we see them. They hunt for treasure after all. I don't know what happened to them, but I suppose they died out some other way or left Hyrule. I don't think there's anything gruesome involving the Gorons- they seem nice and there's no evidence at all in any of the subsequent games, least of all OoT, that suggests the Gorons ever hurt anybody

In TP a Goron throws link over a high cliff shouting 'A weak spirit is no match for the might of the Gorons'. They are clearly a race obsessed with srength and dominance, a weak species like the mogmas must have seemed beneath them so they got rid of them.
I agree the Goron's moved there for the rocks, but because it was already colonised the Gorons decided to wipe out opposition.
The Gorons are shown to have formed a patriarchal society in TP. This leads me to believe they did in the past. You say the gorons seem nice, well most could actually be, but what the leader says has to be done. If he was a bloodthirsty guy and he wanted mogmas gone, they would be gone.

 

[VitaTempusN92]

In TP a Goron throws link over a high cliff shouting 'A weak spirit is no match for the might of the Gorons'. They are clearly a race obsessed with srength and dominance, a weak species like the mogmas must have seemed beneath them so they got rid of them.
I agree the Goron's moved there for the rocks, but because it was already colonised the Gorons decided to wipe out opposition.
The Gorons are shown to have formed a patriarchal society in TP. This leads me to believe they did in the past. You say the gorons seem nice, well most could actually be, but what the leader says has to be done. If he was a bloodthirsty guy and he wanted mogmas gone, they would be gone.

You do have a point there, I like and respect that but the only real reason the gorons were like that was because of the all trouble caused by the twili who were corrupt at that moment cause of Zant.