In a world full of swords, it’s no wonder there are plenty of blacksmiths, too. The Hero of Hyrule needs to keep his weapon sharp, after all. While there are all different kinds of blacksmiths in the history of Zelda, ranging from Link’s grandfather in The Minish Cap to the Dwarven Swordsmith of A Link To The Past, today, I want to talk about Gabora, the brawny half of the blacksmith pair of Termina.
Gabora is the huge hammer weilding part of the duo who run the Mountain Smithy from the Snowhead region of Termina. While his partner, Zubora, takes care of the social side of the business, Gabora stays in the back, focusing on the nitty-gritty of the blacksmith work. In fact, it seems Gabora may be incapable of speech or, at least, doesn’t speak whatever language Link and Zubora speak. Having Zubora there as Gabora’s second half ends up being a perfect partnership thanks to this language barrier and Zubora’s general scrawniness. If Link wants to upgrade his weapon in Termina, he’ll have to get well acquainted with the differences between Zubora and Gabora.
Gabora seems to be a member of an unknown and undisclosed race which he hides underneath a mask. This isn’t particularly unusal, as masks are a pretty common cultural accessory in the land of Termina, but what is unusual is Gabora’s physique. Gabora is easily one of the largest characters in Termina, armed to the teeth with muscles, even giving some of the Gorons a run for their money when it comes to his build. His lack of speech seems to imply he may be some kind of beast, but he definitely displays enough intelligence to master the art of blacksmithing.
I personally think Gabora may be a half Goron-half Hylian, which would explain his bulky physique and residence on Snowpeak. Regardless of his race origin, though, Gabora was always extremely cool to me. I thought his mysterious race and mask made him very intriguing, and he stood out to me as one of the most memorable characters in Majora’s Mask. He’s also related to one of my favorite Easter eggs, being mentioned by name on the engraving of Phantom Ganon’s blade in The Wind Waker, implying that he was the craftsman for the ghastly blade. I hope to see some more mysterious races like Gabora’s in the future of the Zelda series, as the existence of Gabora brings a lot of intrigue to the world, in my opinion.
