Thankyou for watching! 😊 Why are they big tho? Yes, I know I spelt mausoleum wrong. It was too late to fix! And by late, I mean early. And by early I mean, I haven’t slept. 😂💀
In this theory: Do you completely ignore the possibility of an albanauric offspring (silver tears) for the giant skeletons artificially made by the nox? Maybe they're not... I'm also unsure, Is there any evidence, albanauric do rot like human in remains of bones? They have white/grey/silver blood if slayed... In albanauric village no bones, but burning corpses... I guess most of it is just mystic artwork without greater meaning and it's easy to find connections just for sake... Or maybe there was at an earlier state, but was cut and left open because it's looking cool creepy and giving the atmosphere of a lost civilization like juggernaut in the first alien movie.
"So, I figured I'd just ask for my tombstone to have a hole in it. You know, so when family members come by to pay respects they can just throw rocks through it, like a game or something. Just seemed like a cool idea, maybe it'll catch on." - some guy a long time ago in the Lands Between
This video I think cracked the secret to understanding how spirits work in Elden Ring. Roderika says "I can see how and why immortal essence exists as spirit under the Golden Order" and I think you do too! Great work, I may need to reference it in the future!
I also immediately thought about Roderika, as she is pretty close to Marika in her story. She is a sole survivor of the horrific grafting ritual with an intuitive understand of spirit calling, and after what she went through she even helps us to kill a god of current order. It seems fitting that her father figure is a misbegotten cursed by Marika. Marika could not embrace her cursed children yet these cursed children embraced her stock.
Blackguard Big Boggart has that line "Marika's tits, you must be 'ungry" which always seemed to stand out from other From Software dialogue. If Marika was big enough to sit on that colossal throne, those would have been quite a landmark to become a saying 🤣🤣
The Sellia Throne is more likely tied to the fate Radahn saved it from. The Eternal Cities were cast underground at some point in their histories. Similarly, Ranni has a strong connection with Nokstella, but her fate was put on hold when Radahn held the stars in place. Both empty thrones being related to the Carian Royalty seems like more than a simple coincidence
The bell under the walking mausoleums is to call the headless soldiers to guard the mausoleum, not for calling the spirits of Marikas deceased children. The Mausoleum Knights disappear as soon as the bell stops ringing.
A great point. Though it is directly referenced in game that the purpose of the Mausoleums are to house her unwanted child(ren). In general, it is a spirit caller bell for sure (And the ones at the compound Don't have a bell beneath them, and no guards, so this lends more credence to your idea) regardless, the purpose of the Mausoleums to me remains the same. Weird how there are exactly 10 of these 'crypts' (only 7 in Mausoleums), and she has 10 children (If you count Messmer and Melina)
There's a Christian academic named Michael Heiser (RIP) who talks about what idols were in the old testament. They were little stone or clay statues crafted by pagans, and they put a hole where the mouth is and performed a ceremony called "opening the mouth" that was to get the spirit of the idol to dwell inside of it. Additionally interesting that giants and golems throughout the souls series have had holes for faces.
And the giants are intrinsically linked to the dark nature of man in the souls series. If the crucible is this games interpretation of the abyss and how it affects any and ALL forms of humanity even those in non human forms then we may have even more information to compare to DS in order to get deeper to the heart of ER.
Dude is either incorrect, or your oversimplifying. The opening of the mouth ceremony was for Egyptian mummies to have all their senses returned to them in the afterlife. The secret ceremonies performed for "idols" as you call them remain a secret.
Halfway through and Iove where you're going with this. One thing I want to mention already are the, "holed stones," of Ireland and Cornwall. Their purpose is unknown but some have used them to make oaths or christen marriages by holding hands in the hole of the stone and performing your oath or wedding ceremony. Some were just used for grave stones. "Hag stones," much smaller holed stones that were sometimes used as beads, also remind me of the sprite stones.
Holed stones do have a known function though it is fairly esoteric. They are called "singing rocks" or lithophonic/ sonorous stones and create a distinct humming noise when the hole is blown or hummed into or struck with some device. There are many references to sound/vibration in this game which is rarely picked up on
I think it's supposed to be an ascetic practice in-game. They were originally in the ringed city of DS3. I think the holes are produced by hand, over a lifetime. Also a possible reference to the Sufi text, Ringstones of Wisdom
Just a tangent, RodeRIKA and MaRIKA are Numen. I would like to believe this naming convention comes from G.R.R. Martin. If you notice the Targaryens in Game of Thrones their names either have AE, YS, or ON. Jaehaerys, Rhaegar, Aegon, Daenerys Targaryen etc. It just so happens that a man with the name of Igon is battling a dragon. I've always wondered why the walking mausoleum had a bell beneath it and now it's been answered. Thank you!
i recently discovered that the one mausoleum without a bell is not inactive, but will only accept souls of things not connected to the erdtree (like ancestor spirit, remembrances coated in blue rather than gold). I wonder what the bell means in this case
also you can faintly hear bell masoleum noises at the beginning of your game, and then after falling from the chapel of anticipation you awake in a hero's grave, implying the tarnished is also a numen and a child of marika, one of her "unwanted demigods"
Upon their deaths some NPCs drop Bell bearings which can be offered to maiden twins for their stuff. Like it holds on to their stuff and reproduces them in the roundtable hold. But I'm not sure what the roundtable hold really is and what twin maiden husks (husks like tree husks!) represent.
Have you seen the theory that we the player are what spawns out of the mausoleums? Very interesting. Basically in the beginning of the game when grace finds us in the "fog" that's where we are. If you boost the sound up you can hear the pounding footsteps and wailing of the mausoleum.
I clicked on that video thinking it was going to be nothing, but that was a groundbreaking observation. Really makes you think why we were brought back. If Godwyn only died in spirit and not body then perhaps we the player are Godwyn's spirit reborn from the mausoleums, but that might be a ridiculous claim.
@@BuffetCrayfish SAME. And yeah it makes sense because the mausoleums represent undead demigods. Maybe demigod offspring is surprisingly common among the Tarnished, Nepheli Loux (probably resurrected alongside Hoarah Loux) is literally cousins with Mohg, Morgott, and Godwyn.
@@TotoIsWritingthe mausoleums house the lifeless corpses of Marika's children (demigods) she was an active goddess man! 😅 So ln respect we the player are one of her cast off children returning to grace and so on..
14:30 You mention the 8-sided shape of the mausoleum, the Dragonkin Soldiers have an 8-pronged symbol on their back. This symbol also appear where Rennala lays, and I think it has something to do with rebirth. (Divine Towers and Astrologer Rises are also octagonal). The symbol probably represents how the Numen saw stages of life, as stages of a Wheel as opposed to binary life/death, but also connecting The Moon more closely to the concepts of life and death.
@@valentai_777 I had the same thought! 8-sides have always historically represented life or seasons, but the Buddhist Dharmachakra, a Golden wheel, has some of the closest relations, specifically to the Frenzied Flame. (WIKIPEDIA) Some historians associate the ancient chakra symbols with solar symbolism. In the Vedas, the god Surya is associated with the solar disc, which is said to be a chariot of one wheel (cakra). Mitra, a form of Surya, is described as "the eye of the world", and thus the sun is conceived of as an eye (cakṣu) which illuminates and perceives the world. Such a wheel is also the main attribute of Vishnu. Two things about this passage: 1-The only time a Golden wheel is mentioned in Elden Ring is the Death Knight Helm: "The decaying Golden Wheel represents their undying loyalty to Godwyn the Golden, who would become Prince of Death" meaning the Golden Wheel was Godwyns symbol before he died, and continues to be. What does it look like? An Eclipsed Sun with radiant solar flares. 2-I think Mitra/Midra, Lord of Frenzied Flame isn't a coincidence. With all the other connections the Frenzied Flame has to Buddhism, it's clear that it's a perversion of Buddhist philosophy of reincarnation/rebirth, and Nirvana. What does the Frenzied Flame look like? An Eclipsed Sun with violent solar flares.
The fire Giants eye being an 8 pronged clockwise wheel also has some extremely deep implications and even has in my opinion a subtle hint at a long time prophetical awaiting of Miquella’s ascension.
I think size is just used to exaggerate a character’s power, make them feel mighty and significant. Humans have long depicted the gods as towering figures.
No No nooooo the size is to reference giant races that may or may not have existed in Eldens Lore and more importantly Human history. The story of all souls is heavily inspired by psilocybin mushrooms and the secrets they have reveled throughout history.
one last quick thing, not related to this video but seeing the grandmother sitting amongst the flowers made me think of it: you should look into the importance of flowers. There's a specific flower that blooms in a variety of colours, each one symbolic of a concept or source of power in the game. This applies to every single major subgroup or faction/culture in the game. Its entirely consistent in every instance where its clear what the relevant group in that area would be, which makes it all the more interesting when these flowers appear in areas where that connection is less apparent. I can't recall the colour for every one, and a few of these are very sporadic in where they appear, so I may be misattributing them, but these are the ones I do recall: Yellow - Golden Order Dark Blue - Carian Red - Moghwyn Dynasty Orange - 3 fingers/frenzy White - Unalloyed gold (I think, this is probably the one I'm least sure of) Pink - Scarlet Rot Lavender - Godwyn/Death There are purely golden flowers that seem to serve the same purpose, but are noticeably a different variety. Theres also many examples of 2 or more colours growing amongst each other, in varying proportions, as if in either conflict over that space, or in unity. These are the same flowers the Festival Dancers weave into their head scarves, though they seem to only pick certain colours.
That would make sense. When in Jarburg, you see all different types of flowers, likely symbolizing all of the different factions of warriors that the living jars have consumed over time. 🖤
I'll have to go back and take a look. It's not the consumables they have, it's a certain kind of flower, purely environmental, can't interact with it. But I do recall the flower in question being there, and there being multiple colours so I'm sure you're right. The specific colours would possibly even tell a hidden story, if it's only specific ones. Either a reflection of who's in the pots, or who helped the pots set up their village and keep them safe. The only road in or out is destroyed, after all, and I don't think the pots are taking the same path we took. Although I've always wondered how tf Alexander managed to leave
Oh my gosh the Primal Glintstone find was SO GOOD!!!! 😱 Loved this video so much, hit another home run! Also "Grandmother Tree" as a euphemism for a hole in a trunk, never going to forget that now!
♡♡♡ IT HAS a FETUS in the middle of it! I saw it while rewatching the vid for mistakes and noticed it but forgot to say something about it. A literal like, larval tear baby looking thing in the middle of the blue circle 😂
@@ScumMageInfa I think you are spot on! The spirit baby tear seems like a direct connection to the primal glintstone. I think we can use this to determine how silver larval tears are made and used
Here's one thing i don't think most lore channels are noticing, which is the use of trees in both this and GRRM's other work, A Song of Ice and Fire, which has a major background element in the Weirwood trees, the white trees with faces that seem to be bleeding sap as tears. These are ancient and part of a single organism that has its roots spread around Westeros. Every one is connected, and they look like they are bleeding because, in fact, they are watered by the bloodshed of the nation. they are also powerful, having been responsible for shattering the land bridge between Westeros and Essos when the first men crossed over, the children of the forest managed this by sacrificing their children to the tree. the network of trees is ancient and sentient, and absolutely would be an old god in the context of elden ring. What i'd like to say is, that it's not impossible that this is not just GRRM repeating himself, but using both ASOIAF and Elden ring as keys to unlock the lore of each other, and something that is more clear in ER might be something hidden in ASOIAF, and visa versa.
Size is strictly related to the contact with the crucible. There's an item (animal horns of some kind if I'm not mistaken) that point out that animals would grow horns and grow in size (lightning sheep) due to their contact with the crucible
I'm new here so I don't know if you've already talked about the Omen and what we find out about them in the DLC but I think they are connected to this in two different ways that also touch on what you discussed specifically in this video, namely that spirits can be manipulated and that the Hornsent tend to modify rituals and occult implements that they find for use as weapons. We know that the Omen are likely connected to the curse that the Hornsent laid on Marika and her descendants (possibly her people in general even) and we also know some things about what the Omen curse does to children that are affected: It makes them grow a profusion of horns to begin with, many more horns than even the most prolific of the Hornsent seems to have been able to manage, we also know that they have innate spirit manipulation powers, they seem to be able to draw angry spirits from inside themselves to attack enemies, and we also know that the Omen killers know that Omens are tormented by nightmares of grinning horned individuals and therefore fashion their masks to scare and mock them even as they cut them down. We furthermore know that Omen blood is considered "tainted" while still providing them with great power, this being connected to the Formless Mother. If we overlook the whole "blood" angle, wouldn't it make sense that the Hornsent, enraged at Marika for ordering their slaughter, used some kind of forbidden ritual as a weapon to gather up all the furious spirits of the slain and then bind them to Marika's bloodline (or possibly just anyone who follows her)? They wouldn't be strong enough to just latch on to adults or even children, so they would have to attack the unborn, pooling into them and tormenting their dreams for the rest of their lives. The multitude of horns would probably just be a side effect of having that many Crucible-touched spirits inhabiting them, and if their will is strong enough while awake they would then be able to use the horns to control the spirits inside them, explaining their abilities. I mean we see the connection between horns and control over spirits in more places, with some even using headdresses featuring horns for this, so having horns over your entire body should probably amplify the effect so much that even an untrained person could do it effortlessly.
At around 9:05 in the vid I came to a realization about the Finger Readers: their eyes are hollow, much like Messmer and Melina when they're puppets of an Outer God. What is it about holes that allows a soul to be housed inside? Something about rings hmmm
If Gods are basically just massive spiritual forces, it would make sense they would find home where the smaller versions do >_> Sentient Runes... Euuughghhhh Kind of like the Old One in Demons Souls
@@1asts1eep is that true? Then it may be like Messmers eyes, when he plucked the seal out it looked empty inside until we saw the writhing abyss. Could be like the design of Shabriri eyes and Daedicars Woe, influence from an Outer God seems to both sink your eye sockets and rock your eyeballs to jelly, but that might just be the Frenzied Flame, perhaps the process is easier for other deities
Could this not also be the reason why eyes are so important? Because they are gateways to the soul that can also allow other spirits to possess a person? This might be why so many factions (Nox, prophets,Oracles) veil their eyes; not only so they can achieve certain "insight", but also to prevent other spirits from entering through the eyes. This might be why Iji uses his mirror helm. Messmer has one eye closed and the other eye is a SEAL. Perhaps Marika slew the Abyssal Serpent, then allowed its eternal spirit to enter into Messmer's eye, then removed his eye and replaced it with a seal. Melina would also house the spirit of the Gloam-Eyed Queen after she was slain by Maliketh. Maliketh is always veiled, too. Additionally, Marika is the vessel for the VISION of the Greater Will; that is to say, she saw the Elden Beast and the Elden Beast thereby inhabited her. Other examples would be Lusat and Azur who looked into the Primeval Current and thereby became possessed by it, transforming into Glintstone. This might also be why the Academy uses glintstone heads when studying the stars: not only to increase Intelligence, but to protect them from being possessed by Glintstone. To see is to become possessed by what is seen.
The shape of the rock is called a Torus (like "bull" in Spanish) just like the "ships" stranded at the Coast and Fissure, carrying spirits from outside the Lands Between... Anyway, there are three kinds of Tori: Horn, Ring and Spindle. Amazing content.
I did not know this, that sounds like exactly the kind of reference that FromSoft loves to put in their games. I'm not enough of a geometry nerd to calculate this from the actual picture in game, but the rock looks like a Horn torus, doesn't it?
The thrones have a tree carved on them, and the eternal cities do have something to do with ghostflames since they're mostly illuminated by ghostflame torches just like crypts. What does have a relation to a Tree and Ghostflame? *Helphen's Steeple*
Saying "his soul is pooled somewhere" somewhat gives me more evidence of our Tarnished having Godwyns soul. Miyazaki says grace is the reason we're undying but he never said how we got the grace, the beginning scenes of our Tarnished being revived may not be through Erdtree burial/birth. Its very likely it was another process altogether since all of that was undoubtedly outside of the Lands Between
There IS some sense to that ! We know that spirits are immortal, only the flame of frenzy can destroy them. Godwyns's spirit should be somewhere since it was not destroyed or pull into the cycle of rebirth (he is not fully dead). I expected to find him in the Lands of Sadows since "all form of death goes here" but he is not, he is nowhere to be found... or is he ?
Nokron an Noksterlla keep me thinking about Chinese Emperor Quin Shihuang's tomb. There are lots of aspect related: In the game: + It burial ground: there is whole system like Siorifa river well: corpses on boat, stone coffins (3 times we travel through this coffin: the twin Gargoyle arena , the Deep root, the Lake of rot): before the Erdtree burial, the Rune of Dead still have it's place they use Siorifa as burial (untill the ErdTree roots touch the river) to return to the underground then the spirit sprout again from the ground (budding horn description). In the end of the way there is pile of corpse: human, animal.. pile up together then the Lake of Rot (the Ants just like: yay free food, I believe they don't eat these silver people since they were from mimic which leave sliver husk when slayed, Clayman nearby are clay, don't even have corpse to rot. + The structure quite not for living, they just like a big palace, don't have any small house, fireplace, kitchen, bed chamber or just bed, these room almost for coffins!; the night maiden, sword man in this city are grave keeper! + The back ground where "Giant woman skeleton" arena: the figure like "the scream painting" are all statue! they were put in there! , in the right side of the arena (from the gate, or left from the woman) you will find one of them have square base corner! ( I leaves a message: "it's a lie" near that statute) who put these kind of statue every where in a living city? It's dead city, for memorial! or just for saying people crying for their lost. In real life: Quin Shihuang was crazy about the Eternal, made Eternal pills from sulfur and cinnabar (crude ancient alchemist @@, guest how he die?); he even make "Eternal" city for after life: Ceramic Soldier (vs in game Clayman), mercury as water- (vs in game silver river, silver tears), lots of people and animals was bury with him...
Godwyn is positioned the same way he died. Almost like that moment is frozen in death. Look at the image of how he's being held by the black knife assassins.
One interesting observation I have about the spritestones and primal glintstones is that their shape may have even bigger implications: in the fact that they're essentially rings. There could be many conclusions to draw from this, but here are my thoughts: When you obtain runes, they are always in the form of a ring, leaving space for a supposed spirit in the center. Perhaps this implies that runes can't simply materialize on their own, but latch onto a person's spirit. The golden threads that Marika takes out of the corpse in the DLC story trailer are notably not in the shape of a ring, their spirit supposedly having passed on. This might have more implications surrounding the significance of eyes. Runes, being more ephemeral in nature, don't have much influence on the physical environment. Spritestones, however, being made out of physical material, have a very direct influence on their physical environment. This might mean that despite both acting as basins for spirits, their material determines their range of influence. Eyes are similarly also in the shape of a basin, much like the spritestones. However, instead of natural laws or the physical environment, they are directly part of one's body, and thus might influence aspects of the body. The Abyssal Serpent was kept within Messmer, his eye socket acting as a basin to keep the spirit trapped. His body was further physically altered with Marika's seal placed upon his eye. The Fire Giants housed the Fell God using their stomachs as basins. Just like Messmer, the trolls' stomachs are bound with an unknown seal. Another note I have is regarding the Grandmother statues. There are actually a number of other instances of that very pose, one of which should be very familiar to any Elden Ring player. It's actually a very distinct pose, with the arms outstretched and palms facing forwards, alongside a downwards gaze. We know from Marika's and Radagon's lore that recurring poses hold significant value in the game's lore. The Minor Erdtree incantation informs us of the purpose of the Grandmother's pose, which is supposedly the planting of a tree. This tree planting pose is also seen in the large beheaded Marika statues in the Lands of Shadow, and most notably in the Stake of Marika statues found throughout the game. The planting of trees is obviously an act that holds great value in Shaman culture. There's an interesting parallel to be made between tree planting and basins. Planting a tree requires more than just placing the seed, but also needs a hole, or basin, to be placed within. If the eye, as a body part, affects the body, then a hole in the earth would affect the land itself.
This is a cool theory, but there is a problem. Marika was a Numen (shaman), and the eternal cities were built and inhabited by the Nox, not the Numen. I hate to shoot the theory down so early but it does ruin the whole thing really. I think it is worth noting though that in the shadow keep storeroom there is ginormous hornsent, crucified. And there are ginormous Nox figures in the eternal cities. It seems that primordial versions, or the leaders of the societies, are generally giant, purer forms of the beings of that society. They are likely revered by that culture like gods which is why Messmer targeted them, resulting in none being left in Belurat and Enir-ilim. Another theory talking about the storeroom. The Beastly Hornsent creatures have striking similarity to Torrent. Now obviously Torrent is a horse, but he does have Horns, which is a strange and specific detail to add. They also seemed to be extremely important and were also exterminated by Messmer’s army, and also Torrent’s being ridden by Miquela into the land of shadow shows that he is definitely relevant
The video is great, but I'd like to point put something that I heard from Tarnished Archeologist: the back of the cryptchair in my opinion, doesn't have a depiction of a tree, but rather, a symmetrical aquatic animal. Like a mollusk, or something of similar nature.
This is very complicated and I am having trouble comprehending it all but I am learning so much from this. Thankyou for all the effort into figuring this out
With the discussion and the other videos mentioned in mind, this would mean that those who are involved in the Night of Black Knives were fully aware of what they're doing, Ranni was more or less the successor of the Shamans through the aforementioned ritual and through lineage, and she wasn't alone during that time on the Divine Tower because someone would have to transfer her soul onto a doll if we follow Sellen's questline.
Grandmother is a nickname for Moon in many many cultures. Ranni (Marika) is the Darkmoon Miquella is the Eclipse both reflect a darkening and a conjoinment of night and flame (Darkmoon = When the moonlight shines as black flame) Radagon used to sit in the Seat of the Sun, but this throne was part of the now Nameless Eternal City where the Sun once reigned from. Instead, the city is buried in the Deeproot Depths (check the name of the site of grace there), and the Seat of the Sun is now the throne for the Prince of Death. Once a seat for all that was holy, now it the root of all evil. A hollowed sun, and a darkened son. All that the sun is: Gold, Light, Yellow, Chaos, Flame, Life. All that the moon is: Eternal, Divinity, Rot, Death, Night, Magic. I would argue all things in Elden Ring are conjoined with aspects of both Sun and moon (or a duality that "tarnished" something once whole/pure), yet all exist in honor/horror of Queen Marika the Eternal. Even both The Tarnished and the Marika follow this: The Tarnished is reborn, and "now Queen Marika is nowhere to be found."
Regarding the different sizes of the people in the game, I suspect it's derivative of Egyptian art. It's been a personal theory of mine that a lot of the prehistory in Elden Ring was directly pulled form Egyptian myth and art and it was a rule in Egyptian art that no one could be larger than the Pharaoh. This made it so that size was almost always a depiction of power, with the most powerful gods and people being the largest. Starscourge Radahn is a perfect example of this.
viewing this video, i was reminded of the rough timeline of the great empires of the west.. the greeks > Egyptians /romans > holy roman empire.. i feel the Rauh civilization to be the greeks, hornsent being thematically roman in copying the greeks, golden order being that ptolemic period roughly..and then the shattering similar to the fall of the roman empire.
As soon as I saw the giant hornsent in the specimen storehouse I came to the conclusion that every race can become giant, maybe its age based or something, with the giants being some of the oldest beings, which could suggest that Radagon was actually a giant all along, just a small one.
Well, it has already been pointed out that they pull a lot from not only Egyptian mythology, but also Greek and Roman. Tarnished archaeologist made a whole video about it years ago
the backing of the crypt thrones (and the similar appearing hornsent statue backs) also distinctly resembles the Elden Beast, bot the nervesystem like gold pattern inside of it, as well as the wing-like appendages sticking out of it. I hadn't noticed until you pointed out the pattern and I really looked at it
Maybe I'm wrong on this, but I think the Watchdog's Greatsword / Watchdog enemies are somehow connected to the hole in the grave symbolism mentioned. The description is as follows: ''Stone greatsword wielded by Erdtree Burial Watchdogs.'' ''Though decorated with the watchman's eye, the pupil was taken by graverobbers and is now hollow, leaving this sword a mere lump of stone.'' Watchman's Eye sounds a lot like the Greater Will in this case. The item says the Eye's Pupil got stolen, and interestingly the Greater will went missing/abandoned the Lands Between. Now that I think of it, the Staff of Beyond has an ''intact'' pupil in its microcosm, and the Maternal staff is devoid of one.
There is a strange huge petrified tree trunk near the Fingerslayer Blade location, and the Dragonkin Soldier of Nokstella arena is covered in tree branches coming out of the walls. With the roots coming out of the Sellia throne, it's almost comical to think that they felt they needed to give this dead tree a burial in multiple locations and set giants to make sure the tree was never rejoined like a castlevania plot but with a tree instead of Dracula. Do you think Eiglay was a Numen? Beheaded and cursed to become a serpent after a great sin? Able to join flesh with other living beings? Perhaps Daedicar became a snake after her skin was flayed?
Last night, I noticed that the giant tree lady in malenias boss chamber that held miquella, was similar to the grandmother's tree in shaman village. Could be a coincidence, but miquella is marikas son so it wouldn't surprise me if that was a method of theirs to attain godhood or create a lord.
I think you are right about the spirit manipulation, but I think the crypt chairs were used in attempts to create saints. Most of the eternal items and enemies allude to trying mimic life with the quick silver beings and the mimic tears. That is also why I think Marika punished those cities because they were in a sense recreating the process of jaring just not as butcherous as the the Hornsent. Regardless of the means it still hit too close to home. The bodies all around the chairs might be failed attempts at trying to merge souls at the base of the chair where the hole is. These bodies are very reminiscent of the divine gate, but I'm pretty sure Marika tricked the Hornsent into merging together to make that. It also came to me that other Numen might have escaped the Hornsent and all were bent on their destructions in someway. The eternal cities just weren't afraid of trying something similar to achieve their goals. This would explain why Marika had connections to the Black Knives, supposedly all numen, and the eternal cities. Fortunately and unfortunately for the eternal cities Marika came out on top. The only thing that makes this muddy is the finger slaying blade. Either Marika banished them on purpose, supposedly out of justified anger, so they could make such a blade outside of the view of the fingers OR they made it in response to their banishment as retaliation against what they thought was an ally. What better way to get revenge than to kill the guiding fingers. Regardless of how it played out I personally feel as though Marika was done with the fingers and it would fit that she manipulated the eternal cities to come together to engineer such a weapon for her. I think it would be super interesting if Nanaya was a Numen who escaped the Hornsent and she was so bitter that the only recourse was to force into being the lord of frenzied flame to utterly burn away the Hornsent. She used Midra's love for her against him, funny considering Nanaya is the name of a Mesopotamian goddess of love, to create a lord seeing how her words to "endure" were more like a curse. Sorry rambling. Great video!
I'll be honest watching your videos has been eye opening. Like, THIRD EYE opening. You are cooking furiously - maybe what comes out of the pot will be a horrible and disgusting dish, but it will be a NEW dish. Your video on Bayle and Crucibles was like receiving a divine revelation - so many things just clicked.
Your videos really put in a lot of work. I am going to point out a correction about the word Gloam that seems to show up in everyone's videos. Gloam is not a color. It describes a time of day. People keep saying "the color of gloaming" or something like that. It's just evening, twilight, or dusk. Gloam can literally be all kind sof color, it doesnt mean purple. First person i saw make this mistake was Ziostorm, and he never got that corrected. Its been repeated by many others too
Thanks ❤😁 When I think of gloam I picture the sky as it was being wrenched in the SOTE trailer hahaha If it is a time of day that can be red and or blue, you do see purple in that. And given gloam time of day the sky shows both red and blue, which make purple, I find it hard to retract my statement- might update and elaborate next time though because you're right in that it doesn't flat out = purple. More so the combinations of the colours involved can and do result in it (so if we saw the effects of gloam at work in a single place, or eye, it'd make sense it blends to purple imo) Correct me if I am wrong though I am no sky expert 😂
You’re right about the definition of gloam, but since it is used to describe an eye in particular, it does follow that it would be used to describe a colour. If I were to describe “emerald eyes,” you’d think of green eyes, even thought emerald is a gem and not a colour. Given the existing association of purple eyes to death in elden ring via Melina and Maliketh, as well as the purple gems worn by the godskins, the connection between the Gloam-Eyed Queen and purple eyes is a valid assumption. Even though gloam itself isn’t a colour. It would be the same if she was called the “Sunset-Eyed Queen,” and red/orange eyes were prominent in game. Hope that makes sense :)
Really interesting finds in this video, particularly the association of spirits and trees. I think much of this goes back to Erdtree burials and how remembrances described beings being hewn into the Erdtree. For example, Horoah Loux’s specifically states his warrior, and not Elden Lord title were hewn into the Erdtree. I think because trees are conduits for primordial energies it all makes sense. While my theories differ drastically from yours, I have an interesting thought on what you said at the end of the video on size = power. One of the biggest unsatisfactory explanations in the lore community was why Radahn’s size was so incredibly massive. Not only does he outsize everyone, but after his attack on Leyndell where he LOSES to Morgott he triples in size. This all takes place during the shattering war. So my theory while very different from yours uses similar elements. I think Radahn lost to Morgott an in a desperate bid for power essentially sold his soul to the Nox for power. I think the crypt in Sellia is for Radahn (which fits the lion motif you mentioned) to become their Lord of Night. We know they’ve been trying to make a lord of night to secure their own age and likely saw Radahn as the prime, demigod materials they would need to make a good lord. They probably pumped him full of mimic juice that enhanced his sorceries and his body, giving him the power he wild need to challenge the stars and secure the Lands Between. This would explain why his body is suddenly so massive and his power so much greater than his initial strike on Leyndell. For the Nox, having a lord of Night that can challenge the stars also gives them the ability to use Radahn to summon a new Black Moon after their moon was destroyed. I think it makes way more sense to conclude that the Nox were actively plotting to secure the new age considering the Night of the Black Knives took place under their authority. The bodies on the crypt chair I think are beings who failed to become a lord, as you yourself stated the glovewarts were given to accompany heroic spirits.
I know it not all about him, but you do mention something i agree with, is that Godwyn's spirit wasn't truly "destroyed". It's more likely that his soul experienced a slate cleaning. An ego death, since we know in game that souls still will retain their personality (Ex: Ranni). So if you were to truly die only in spirit, that would mean the memories of you are gone but because the world isn't taking souls due to the established rule of the elden ring, you simply remain but in a pure and newly untouched state.
The Twiggy Cracked Tear being found above Godwyn’s corpse, possibly implying the loss of his soul being prevented upon his death, is such a good argument for why he could have been the final boss of the DLC
so imo the grandmother spoken about is the tree- not the statue, the statue IS of Marika, I say this because the identical one we find grants us the O' Mother gesture and is headless - like all of the other accessible to the hornsent statues of Marika. That statue IS Marika it's why it's missing one braid too. Trees were clearly sacred to the Numen/Shaman, probably because they are literally family trees. love this video though! Fantastic theorizing
In case someone didn't catch this detail: Amber is fossil resin, implying that they come from trees of spirits, like the Erdtree. The Greater Will may be what is directing the flow of spirits, perhaps related to, or opposed to the Primeval Current.
Sorry for my atrocious grammer by the way. It may be just seeing patterns that aren't intended. When I think of stones with holes, I tend to immediately think of hag stones(they go by many other names. Some examples being: Adder stones, Serpent's egg, Gloine nan Druidh, and Glain Neidr), which in media and folklore, tend to have magical properties. According to folklore they can provide good luck and ward off evil spirits and ailments if worn or hung on something you are trying to ward away bad spirits/invite good luck, or when looked through, can peer into another realm(it's this particular trait of hag stone folklore that gets used a lot in modern film, think Coraline. That's all that is currently popping up in my head, but I know there are others)
there are these trees all over the base game that resemble 2 trees, one wrapped around the other,not unlike the Scacutree. A great example of these trees is found in albunauric village, where we fight the Omen Killer. At the base of many of these trees, we will find some evidence of death. The tree at albunauric village is surrounded by the corpses, possible of the villagers, although that doesn't explain the seperate pile of fresher corpses where we talk to Nepheli. In the same area, the poison swamp around the village has several other examples of these trees, and at their bases are crabs, feasting on the corpses buried underneath it. Basically, they're Erdtree burials at a smaller scale. Not sure exactly how or if it ties in to this, but I thought I'd mention it. The backs of the crypt chairs also happen to resemble the Elden Beast, seen most clearly when it does the attack where it leaps overhead, its "wings" spread outwards, with it's tail very clearly resembling roots. I don't think this is in any way contradictory to anything in your video, simply an addition. There are a number of visual motifs/patterns that repeat over and over and over throughout the game, this specific tree image being one such example. Love your videos, really good insight and analysis into the intricate complexities of the game. Being able to keep track of so many pieces of interrelated information is not easy, and unfortunately many other lore theories often miss some obscure piece of the puzzle that contradict the conclusions drawn, but I have no such criticism of your videos. keep it up!
Omg cannot wait for the grandmother timeline! I have been following a similar path of this pattern. I have been calling it the holy braid, as it seems to get more complex over time. Can't wait to see what you uncover, as I think this is a key pillar of Marika's legacy and power.
I think for the question of size, nobody is as big as they seem to be. The bosses being huge are a gameplay and artistic choice to represent the imposing nature of the challenge to the players but once the bosses are defeated you can see their true size. This artistic contrast of challenge vs reality is why you see Morgott as a withered frail body moments after him being huge, why Midra as Lord of frenzied flame is so much bigger than phase one and Godrick's small corpse getting kicked around by Gostoc after the fight. I think the really telling point about the real size of the bosses is their thrones and in architecture. The demi-god thrones in Morgott's cutscene are all normal sized, the largest throne of a royal figure seen is Godfrey's at Stormveil.
I love this idea. It explains why Radahn was so small in the opening cutscene. I'm not entirely convinced though. In Godrick's case, his size was a direct result of grafting. His defeated state had all the grafts removed. In Morgott's case, the body we see in his defeated state is not his true Omen body, it's the body that most accurately represents who he wishes he was, almost like the Erdtree granted him a "cured" body at the moment of death. The thrones weren't literally there, they were a projection of Morgott, so it could easily be interpretated that the thrones were small because that's how Morgott viewed the demigods. And back to Radahn, his size is baked into his own lore. His horse would not need relief if Radahn was only metaphorically getting larger
@@jeffjefferson2853 I think those are some really valid holes to poke in the theory but in response: In Morgott’s case, Godfrey recognises the body in the cutscene before the boss fight. That would suggest Morgott’s body looks the same/similar enough to how he did before Godfrey became tarnished though frail and defeated so I don’t think he was given a body by the erdtree. Even if the thrones were Morgott’s projections, the Elden throne is real and isn’t huge. That said Morgott uses the royal titles for all of the demigods, even Godrick who he calls golden when no other character does. He may see them as traitors but to besmirch them by viewing them as small would also disrespect the royal line which he would never do. Plus for a bonus, Renalla’s added in throne in the castle Ennis boss room is normal sized suggesting she is too. For Radahn. I think he is consistently described as “mighty”, “mightiest” and “strong” by I don’t think he is ever described as gigantic while Leonard the horse is described as frail. I think it may be more that Radahn was a large man (like his hero Godfrey) but not the behemoth we fight who used the gravity magic to take the weight off a small/weak horse rather than Leonard being a normal horse and Radahn being gigantic. I may be wrong though. Very good point with Godrick, I guess he would need to be big enough to be able to graft additional appendages onto but I think maybe there’s artistic licence in play. The reality is he may not be that big, may not have had all of those arms successfully grafted on etc
I mean Dark Souls runs on the same logic. People get big, for seemingly no reason. The only ones who are big for a reason are Jorm, literally a giant, Smough, who is described as growing in size due to eating the bones(?), and... I think that's it. There's some fast and loose ruling of Gwyn's knights and descendants being a bit bigger than normal humans, but there's plenty of characters with no given origin that are just really big for no adequately explained reason, like Gundyr. And let's not even get into Wolnir, who is even bigger than Radahn or Jorm ever were, for ? reason.
Cool stuff! I’ve always liked the idea of these shamans being like druids (the fantasy trope and not the historical group). Druids who, now, also work with spirit material. It makes sense when you think about Marika’s greatest achievement, the Erdtree, being the product of extrapolating druidic and spiritual arts. Great video as always Infa; looking forward to seeing your grandmother-timeline proposal, and how you tie the patterns together
I explore the concept in a whole other video so I'd watch that BUT, and I don't usually do this lol but Jack is a Mimic made an absolutely compelling video about the guidance of grace 'How Elden Ring Manipulates you' I would 500% recommend watching. Totally convincing IMO.
Kind of adds a little more information to what Miquella was doing at Fort Sol. An eclipse is like a gigantic hole in the sky, to try and catch Godwyn’s soul. But the reason it failed, is likely due to what you found - his soul didn’t exactly “die”. Well, it did, and it already coalesced. So there was no soul for Miquella to direct. Possibly, the Eclipse Shotel appeared instead…signaling to Miquella that there was no hope for resurrecting Godwyn. Hence, he likely made the Epitaph Sword afterwards to completely seal the effect of Godwyn’s soulless never-death.
A closer translation of the name of the shamans from shaman village, is 'shrine-maiden', and not the western idea of shaman as they know it Always handy to look at how the original text is written and what is meant to be interpereted Great video!
I am always a bit here or there with text translations, as the game is spoken in English after all (Though text for sure is an easier point to make). Happy for other's to go that route, and I will find it VERY interesting (Shrine Maiden, like, cmon- SO Darksouls!) :D
Shaman is probably the closest term the translator found to what Fromsoft wanted to convey, but if they would have used the term priestess (shrine maiden is a young priestess) than the working with spirits part would not have been conveyed.
@@ramoraid I stole this from Reddit because some one else worded it better then I could. This person played the game in Japanese initially, and found some inconsistencies with the english translations. While I agree the term might be closely related, simply having a few differences in what is being described will change what that word means in it's entirety "First of all, Shaman Village in Japanese is 巫子の村 (Miko/Ichiko no mura). Miko (巫女, related term) is often translated as shrine maiden in English. Shaman is not inaccurate, but it misses two things that are hard to translate: the connotation of women being the shamans (shamaness village would have been fine in my opinion....), and the association with Shinto and ancestor worship. Ancestor worship and Shinto references are found in other places throughout the DLC so this struck me as worth pointing out. "
The Nameless City doesn't have a throne because it's actually a bit of Leyndell that collapsed, probably during the Shattering War. There's a bit of the city on the map behind the main gate that we can't access and is completely blank. And Leyndell ought to be an Eternal City, always thought it was a little off that Marika the Eternal didn't reside in an Eternal City.
I think it's most likely that Marika and Radagon were initially two separate individuals who were fused. Which tracks extremely well with the alchemical themes by way of the Rebus and societies attempting to create their own gods being a major throughline. Marika was, for all intents and purposes, a successful attempt.
So maybe its the case that Marika isnt a surviving jarsaint, but a scholar from another place searching for her roots? Or maybe on her search she was captured and then stuffed into a jar?
Some stuff is quite far fetched, but nice analysis overall! One thing tho… there is no great tree, it’s a mistranslation from Japanese where the great tree is simply the erd tree. Thus before the erd tree there was the crucible and when Marika created the shadowlands the shadowtree mimicked the shape of the crucible, before being broken and bended by the shattering. Finally when markka removed the rune of death form the ER the erd tree was born from the crucible
Great video. I too am at this moment studying the large grave stones. Notice the lines radiating outwards around the hole in the large grave stones. To my eye it resembles Fia’s Rune of Death mark. Both halves of coarse. And there is an enormous tombstone with the hole, on the island below Morne castle on the Weeping Peninsula. The Grace site is named Morne Moangrave.
And also that picture of godwyn looks like he has the round back hand blades in his hand. Time stamp at 16:32 but I’m also learning lore and paying better attention during my next journeys.
I think the connection between spirits and shaman might indicate Roderika is a Shaman. She refers to others as Chrysalids, butterfly imagery that is common in the flower fields of the Shamn Village and means the grafting wasn't as unknown to her as it's akin to jar melding
And the next one is going to be even harder to put together.. I've already started and it is IMMENSE lol Might do a meme video in between for a breather :'D
Great video, can't wait for the next one! I do believe the answer about size is quite simple, their rune strength inflates them. Inherently some are born bigger than others i.e. giants and trolls, but when Morgott is defeated he becomes quite a shriveled husk of his former self.
Tutelary deities in fact didn't drink the sap of the scadutree, since we know Scadutree didn't exist yet when they died. You're also trying to tie Marika to eternal cities, which would be ok in the base game, but in the DLC we learned she came from shaman village, became a god and build her empire. Nox were a civilization that existed, flurished and were banished underground ages before Marika came into picture, in the Age of the Crucible. With the DLC the only viable theory could be that Marika's family either remained on the surface when the banishment took place OR her family/grandmother are descendants of an eternal cities, just like people who built Selia, lowest part of Leyndell and Ordina which all have identical architecture and egravings, minus the throne in two of them. Mausoleums were built by Nox, we don't know when, but we at least know it didn't happen after the night of black knives, since the whole purpose of mausoleums is keeping the destined death at bay and prevent what happened to Godwyn much later, since he was just thrown next to the roots instead of using the mausoleum technology. Through Selia we know it and identical cities are "descedants of the eternal" but they have their unique architecture, it's not just a copy of Nox architecture. Whereas mausoleums are 100% Nox and not using any symbols related uniquely to cities of Nox descendants above ground. It's possible that somehow in one Mausoleum there is Marika's child, though I'm not really sure the ghost NPC is enough of a reference. I really recommend watching/reading all patch 1.0 lore changes after release and also all the cut content, just so you can realize how much of absolutely fundamental lore they kept changing at the last minute. They never had some complete tight lore all the way, and there are definitely retconns and so on. Also Ranni is not Marika, that's just dumb. Making theories is one thing, but this an example of just making shit up despite knowing with 100% certainty it isn't true.
"Tutelary deities in fact didn't drink the sap of the scadutree, since we know Scadutree didn't exist yet when they died." Citation? Marika IS tied to the eternal city via in-game descriptions and dialogue. "Mausoleums were built by Nox" Citation? "but we at least know it didn't happen after the night of black knives" so? "hrough Selia we know it and identical cities are "descedants of the eternal" but they have their unique architecture, it's not just a copy of Nox architecture" I've already done a video on this ;) "I really recommend watching/reading all patch 1.0 lore changes after release and also all the cut content, just so you can realize how much of absolutely fundamental lore they kept changing at the last minute" - I have. "Also Ranni is not Marika, that's just dumb." - Go watch 'Jack is a Mimic's video 'How Elden Ring Manipulates you' and then feel free to start putting on clown Make-up while you watch my video 'Marika's Great Escape'
Thank you for speaking on this I'm so curious to know the background about them cause the game never really talked about who these huge women were. Now that you're doing a deep dive in the next you officially have me hooked and waiting for the next video. Once again thanks for speaking on these women and who they represent in the game.
Not gonna lie the implications of this video made me go kinda crazy and now i might think just a little that Marika might be pretty much every "God" in the game possibly even either the Greater Will itself or alternatively the biggest opposition of it as the "Great One" and that Miquella is against one or the other of those along with Radahn and him holding back the stars or subsequntly Ranni' fate, and also that we might be Marika in some form so both thank you and why you do dis to me.
Great video! The whole (hole, get it?) idea of the spirit being held in these hollow structures and items makes a lot of sense! I think the beheaded granny in Bonny Village is there so one can make a connection between her and the tutelary Deities. Speaking of the Nameless Eternal City, I find it curious how it's located right underneath Leyndell, and in fact the main road that leads to the main door seems pointless, as behind that big door there's just a huge abyss. Was the nameless eternal city originally Leyndell? Maybe that's why Godwyn was buried there, in an attempt to go back to old rituals? I think that his burial there might be with good intentions, in an attempt to retrieve or recover his soul, which of course didn't work, since his soul's dead.
It would be interesting if it turns out that Marika’s body had been taken over by the soul of the grandmother, hence why she was so powerful. It is shown that souls can be transferred through Miquella’s story arc. In fact, by the time we face Miquella he seems to have become a completely different person after disregarding his values and flesh. Seemingly uninterested in the convictions and people he strived so hard to protect.
Some interesting ideas here. One criticism though: I'm not sure I really agree w/the casting (near the beginning of the "Wisdom of Stone" section) of the Hornsent as bearing responsibility for the perversion of a previously-cyclical/sustainable tree burial/sacrifice culture belonging to the Numen shamans into a society based upon "taking all of the sap to maintain already-extant lives and power until it's dried up completely". Because the thing is... we can clearly see based upon the world's sorry present state that the sap of the transfigured Great Tree ---> Erdtree is and always was a non-renewable resource, at least since the moment natural death was removed from the equation in favor of this stagnant "cycle" of personal immortality with diminishing returns... and that untenable state of affairs is ENTIRELY MARIKA'S OWN DOING; SHE IS THE GWYN OF THIS STORY. If Numen culture were really this idealized "noble savage" shrine maiden "using the whole buffalo" tropecluster posited here, why would she not only sully herself with a practice you're attributing here to her hated enemies, but indeed impose it upon the rest of TLB at large after she had already attained both her vengeance and divine dominion? I suppose one answer would be to say that Marika's quest to avenge her peers led her to eventually become the very thing she opposed, but I'm not sure whether or not that "feels right" to me, it's a little too "on the nose" IMO. I don't think we can handwave that away with "the parts of her that cared were divested/given independent form by then, in the form of Radagon and 'their' 'children'" in this case because that doesn't seem to match up with the timeline as I understand it.
... my 1st thoughts by viewing this video was, maybe too much reading of 'try finger, but hole' lecture 😅 Seriously, the 'hole' in the tree... That's not a unusual phenomenon in botanic of trees... I think in this case it's just random... If not, it should have any marks if carved or even runed signs around.
