Ius , Animal God Content . The statues one sees throughout Valenwood and parts of Hammerfell and Elsweyr that seem to be of a misshapen humanoid carrying a rod are of Ius , The God of Animals . The rod He carries has its origin in the tale of The Ox and The Evil Farmer . It seems that one day an evil farmer decided to kill all of his animals and have a big party . As The story unfolds , animal after animal is killed and prepared for a big meal . Lastly the farmer comes to the ox and prepares to slit its throat . The ox , not wishing to be anybody ' s dinner , prayed very vocally to Ius . This came out as a loud Moo , of course . At that very instant Ius appeared carrying a rather large set of balance weights . Without explanation , Ius ate the farmer and vanished . Ever since that day Ius The Extremely Agitated , has always been portrayed as carrying a large set of scales with him . The local Ius worshippers have no idea why and do not seem to care . Although this story has been called fanciful at best , I personally know a racoon who had actually talked to The Ox . That is , before the Ox became filler for the local inn ' s larder . I do not have any information one way or the other about the validity of this second myth . It is , however , quite traditional . It seems that many , many years ago , before the reign of Uriel Septim VII , before the reign of Cephorus Septim II , yes , even before the age of Pelagius Septim III ( long may his name be praised ! ) , there lived a wombat who was the pet of Lady Greelina , daughter of the Lord Prufrock of Rockcreek . Lady Greelina loved her wombat so , and it loved her too with all the passionate intensity a marsupial can muster . Unfortunately , it was a time of great sorrow in Rockcreek . A pestilence had come through the town , destroying all their cash crops ( which consisted of raspberries and a few scraggly odd weeds that caused Argonian women to look very attractive to those who partook ) ; Then a plague had come , inflicting nearly every cobbler with chronic hiccoughs ; finally a witch had cursed the townspeople so the only words any could utter were " Hmmm . Precisely . " All the businesses , stores , and guilds fled from the town faster than an extremely fast thing . Lady Greelina saw her father despairing the loss the town was suffering , so she brought her wombat in and told him , " Father , my wombat can save us all , for it is sacred to the god Ius , God of Animals . The only reason I didn ' t tell you earlier is because I am an early adolescent going through that period when I don ' t like to communicate . But please , ask a wish of my wombat , and Ius will fulfill it , for my wombat loves me . " The king thought this was fairly flakey , but he had nothing to lose so he uttered a modest wish to the wombat , " All I want is for one business to come to Rockcreek that will never leave no matter the calamity . " I probably should have mentioned before that the king had always been cruel to the wombat ( he used to lick it and try to make it stick to walls ) , so the wombat had Ius create an equipment store in front of the palace gate that would never go away . The royal family ended up going mad and eating one another ( and ironically , the wombat was one of the first to go ) . But that is why there is to this day an equipment store blocking the palace gate in Rockcreek . If you don ' t believe me , go there and see .