Culture, Biology, and Dietary Headcanons

@Frustration in Excelsis  
No. Culture headcanons are cool too. In fact I was recently thinking of changing the title to add culture as well. And now that you posted this, I’m definitely going to do that.
 
Speaking of, I really love the idea of dragons being good at metalsmithing and blacksmithing.

@Frustration in Excelsis
 

@Frustration in Excelsis  
I completely buy the idea of MLP dragons being master metalsmiths. It’s a great overlap of their love of shiny metals, their high heat tolerance, and their long lives in which to perfect their craft.
 
 
@mjangelvortex  

It seems appropriately timed too. What with Twilight’s new school and its diverse student body, we could potentially have all sorts of interesting cultural issues to discuss in coming months.

@Background Pony #4251  
That’s what I’m thinking too. Speaking of, does anyone have any ideas what real world culture(s) the Yaks might be based off of?

@mjangelvortex  

At this point, not really. I feel like we haven’t spent enough time with them yet to know for sure, and aside from that nothing springs to my mind that wouldn’t be a complete guess. I know in real life yak are mainly found around the Himalayan regions and places like Nepal, Tibet and Mongolia, but I’m not sure if any of those cultural elements are present in the show. I do occasionally feel like they have Norse or Scandinavian elements thrown in, but that’s an entirely personal point of view.

@mjangelvortex  
Based on the cold climate and the “Stan” in the name, possibly the Kazakhs and other related cultures.

@Background Pony #4251
 
Same; in my headcanon/AU, their culture is kind of a mix of Tibetan and Norse.

@Wiimeiser  
That could be possible.
 
@Background Pony #4251  
@Mildgyth  
That’s what I was thinking too. Mostly a blend of Norse and Tibetan culture with possibly some other stuff thrown into the mix.

@Background Pony #4251  
There are a lot of small details that don’t quite fit, but allowing for the fact that they’d never put their style of scorched earth warfare accurately into a show for children (or the squeamish of any age), I’d say they’re predominantly Mongol. But with a kid-safe exchange of “massacre every man, woman, child, and animal in each city that doesn’t surrender to you without a fight (except for one child to bear witness to others the futility and error of resistance)” for “stomp on everything that’s not exactly the way they like,” it’s probably a better fit than anything else. Traditional Mongol dress often even included massive “horns” of hair. And the Yak houses, other than the thatched roof, are clearly Yurts. I do agree a few other stylistic details are clearly Tibetan and Kazakh (though the Kazakh were basically the Mongol tribes of Turkic ancestry to begin with).

@Frustration in Excelsis  
Nice analysis and headcanon. Though I would go one step beyond just metal working and also say Dragons are, or at least were, proficient in creating powerful magical artifacts as well using gems/crystals. My two examples being the Bloodstone Scepter and Crystal heart.

@Ferrotter  

Actually, now that you mention that, the first yak visitors to Ponyville were pretty quick to smash anything they didn’t like 100%, not to mention how they momentarily declared war on the ponies. Maybe the people in charge got more of that “scorched earth warfare” style included than we thought.

@MadVillan
 
Hmm. Good point about the Scepter – that must have taken some magical skill to make. I can’t say I remember a connection between the Heart and dragons – is it something from one of the comics or chapter books? I don’t read those much, so it’s highly likely I missed that if it is from there. Besides that, gems and crystals do have a pretty strong association in the show with magic power (the Scepter, the Crystal Heart and the Crystal Empire in general, the Elements and the Tree of Harmony, the glowing crystals occasionally used in lieu of fire or lights, probably a few others I’m missing), and with how often the dragons come in contact with and handle such things it makes sense to assume they’d be at least familiar with the properties or potential of the materials in their hoards.
 
In regards to the yaks, I definitely got a generalized east-central Asian feel for them, something like a cross between a theme park version of Tibetans and Mongolians. Actual Central Asia (the Caucasus-Kazakhstan area) is something I see worked more into the visuals of Griffonstone, especially the clothing and armor the present and past griffons were wearing in “The Lost Treasure of Griffonstone”. I saw someone pointing out that the armor of King Grover’s guards looked like Scythian armor, and I notice that at least the helmets are very similar
 

 
Which makes sense, since Greek historians usually described the griffins as living in eastern Scythia.

@Frustration in Excelsis  
Yeah the Crystal heart is mentioned in one of the chapter books, but it’s pretty confusing.From what I gathered through synopsis A dragon steals the heart from the Crystal Empire, Celestia and Luna go to take it back and ask why the dragon stole it and the dragon says since the heart is originally from the Crystal Mountain, his mountain, it’s his heart since everything in the mountain belongs to him. Celestia and Luna yell at the dragon, he surrenders and gives back the heart.
 
Honestly it raises more questions than it answers.

>>1703898p (deleted)  
Where would the venom go? The dewclaw?
 
Also, someone draw Puppysmiles in this style mixed with my headcanon ideas and ghostly elements. That would be awesome.

@Wiimeiser  
Venom going there would make sense. I think male Platipi do the same.

 
Leather is confirmed (not too sure if it was in the past). Given bovines are sapient in Equestria, maybe this could be yet another reason for ponies to farm pigs (outside of truffles and possible pet food).

@mjangelvortex
 
You’d need something big and with tough skin to make leather, so I don’t see much of an option besides pigs either.

So I’ve been thinking about changelings again, and their switch to a more colorful species, and it got me thinking about the whole concept of them feeding on love. It occurs to me that most people look at their situation as one of regular hunger, where they consume the love for sustenance. But then we have the episode “To Change a Changeling”, where we clearly see them eating physical food as well.  
 
With that in mind I’ve started to wonder if their craving for “love” is more the result of some kind of malnourishment or deficiency than as something they need to eat regularly. If so their situation would be more akin to the hunger symptoms that go along with something like diabetes or hypoglycemia. Plus that way love is still an important part of their biology and something they have need for, but the hunger is an indication that they either don’t produce or efficiently utilize what they have. That might even explain where their shapeshifting abilities evolved from. If other creatures are a better source of love than they (usually) can manage on their own, then being able to look like something those other creatures care about would be a very helpful way to gather love surreptitiously.
 
At least that’s what I’ve come up with so far. It’s still got a few flaws, probably, but I like it better as an explanation than some other ideas I’ve heard floating around.

Their diet consists of other insects, honey, and fruit. Interesting. Though I figured them eating physical food after the change was a result of them no longer needing to rely on love to survive 24/7. Since they now love each other and all that.

@Ranch  
That’s honestly what I thought too.
 
Though I did like someone’s suggestion that feeding off Love is like what drinking water for us is to them. Basically they still need to eat physical food to survive but they also need to feed off of love to live too.

@mjangelvortex
 
@Frustration in Excelsis
 
I like this idea a lot. Gives local farmers another source of income. Since I don’t think ponies will normally eat meat, they wouldn’t have massive pig farms where they are sent to the slaughter. But enough local farms could provide the need for leather. There could be farmers who farm pigs exclusively. And the meat would be used for pet food or shipped to other countries where meat is consumed. (And in my headcanon some pork might be consumed by coastal ponies who already have fish in their diet. The taboo is still there but its less prevalent. You have to go to the “alternative market” to get it.)
 
Pigs can even be kept as pets. It might seem a bit twisted but I really don’t think a pig is going to care if its food is made up of other pigs. They do eat meat. There are urban legends about mafia/criminals throwing victims into pig pens because the pigs will eat the body. Apparently this is true.

I’m not good at this stuff but- I was thinking, ponies can blush but they have fur? What?  
So that got me thinking-maybe they aren’t actually blushing and they have color-changing fur on the side of their face  
Not sure how that works though….

@Ansi-Marelina  
It’s also worth noting that blushing may be a human-only trait (oddly enough), but then again, these are magical talking equines we’re talking about here…
 
Ponies also have cutie marks that appear on their fur magically, so maybe blushing is caused by the same (or a similar) type of magic?

@Ansi-Marelina  
Honestly think this is just a trope common with anthropomorphism in animals. Its very common for animal characters to blush even if that makes no sense due to fur. Animators just expect you to be okay with it. Disney, Warner Bros, all of them.

@Ansi-Marelina  
Ranch is right.