The SECOND FOUNDING and EVERY Space Marine Chapter it Created! | Warhammer 40,000 Lore 

The 2nd founding was always so interesting to me. Its basically the heroes of the heresy establishing their own chapters.

I just got on a 3 hour bus ride, this could not have come at a better time

Now I'm just imagining some kid at some recruitment fair and there's like a thousand different Space Marine recruiters, each in their differently coloured power armour, handing out flyers and trying to get the kid into the tent to watch their hype video being like "forget the Ultramarines, you really want to be a Space Shark!"

I always liked that the DA simply painted their armour in different colours and then kept on like earlier

Since Guilliman has returned, he should be able to recall (from memory) his UltraLedger of all Second Founding chapters.

The Silver Skulls "definitely not Iron Warriors" illustrates that at least some of the 2nd Founding chapters might have actually been loyalist members of traitor legions. Given new designations as a way of obscuring their origins, so they could be returned to the Imperial fold with minimal friction. During the post-Heresy years, there was bound to be lots of lingering resentment and paranoia about traitors. So being able to erase the histories of those Blackshield warbands would have sidestepped the issue. Perhaps posted to far-flung territories, away from those loyalist legions with considerable animosity towards their traitorous parents. While some of these chapters might have continued doing their own thing in terms of organization, others likely hewed very close to the Codex Astartes. Reasoning that they couldn't afford suspicion.

All these space marine chapters that picked some variation of skulls as their sigil probably need to watch that Mitchell and Webb sketch "Are we the baddies?". Although I suspect a lot of the chapters would answer proudly "Yes we are".

Be funny if Johnson owns up to Guilliman about Luther and his rebellion, and Guilliman goes, "oh *that* old story, yeah we all knew about that, bad show... what about it? I hope your boys haven't been worrying about that all this time?". 😁

I've noticed that one of the (many) things the Horus Heresy novels have influenced about the 40k fandom is that people nowadays, especially newer entrants, tend to think of Space Marines much more in terms of the Legions than they latch onto Chapters. Back in the 90s and 00s the legion geneseed was obviously an element, but you could just as well obsess about the Black Templars, Crimson Fists, Mantis Warriors, Flesh Tearers, Lamenters, or any of the other wacky 21st Founding chapters, or even the goddamn Legion of the Damned (not actually a legion). I kinda miss when not EVERYTHING was seen through the lens of the HH.

1000 marines always seemed too low, but it makes sense if you think of them as raiding shock troops instead of being the main force like in the heresy or the Great Crusade

Brazen Claws enjoyer here. I like their Iron Hands nutter-ness and the colour scheme blue + red + white, they look like a War of the Roses House of York historicals army. The Brazen Claws also have their roots in the Clan Morragul, though they are specifically the 34th clan company, so they also have a pre 2nd founding heritage. This is why their heraldry is also (confusingly) the red talon.

I always thought the Dark Angel's shame of the Fallen was funny. Every legion had traitor elements, but oh no, not the first. They promise.

And then there are the Space Sharks...um I mean Charcharodons. They may be a Second Founding (or older?) successor of the Raven Guard. Or maybe something completely different, who knows.

Space Marines: Genetically engineered to be able to glean information from eating their enemies. Space Marine Lore: Eating enemies bad! Weird behaviour! No do!

Angels of Absolution: The First Legion successor chapter that got all the Legion's therapists. Thanks for the video.

Wait, writters actually made a homage to Carandiru? It was a massive prison in São Paulo, where a NASTY massacre of inmates occurred.

The prison world of Carandiru is a deep cut of Brazilian recent history

Ian's lore dives are always so well researched. You can tell that he knows most of this by heart.

Ah, the feeling I get when Arbitor Ian videos drop is like seeing Astartes droppods at a warzone as an imperial citizen

Please could you cover the Cursed Founding soon?

So Guilliman takes precaution that no one primarch can wield a lot of power. Yet irony upon irony. When he comes back in 40, he's pretty much given the rule of the Empire.

Woah, a whole hour of listening to the Arbitor? What have we done to be blessed by such a wonderful gift! Praise the Arbitor for sharing such lovely lore with their incredible voice!

Excellent history lesson. I cooked up my DIY chapter during the Rogue Trader days & have tweaked its backstory over the editions. I went with the successor chapter to a successor chapter angle.

Arbitor Ian's videos are definitely my favourite warhammer lore videos on youtube. Always so informative with a nice presentation style. I always come away with a greater appreciation of armies/factions I don't know much about or don't collect.

Seeing the silver skulls is funny having listened to the infinite and the divine

An hour? An HOUR! Well I know where my evening is headed now 🙂

Here is where I get to shout out my chapter, Lets Go White Consuls!!! We are so cool we have two chapter masters Edit; I think both of them are dead though

40k kills me because realistically most legions would have like 10 successors at a minimum while others like the ultramarines should have well over 50 in the 2nd founding

A Flesh Tearer was mad about the new rules, colour me surprised.

Great video. Informative and entertaining. Thank you for having great pacing, this went through smoothly. Keep up the good work.

Wow, you're really uploading at an increased pace these days, love it!

I got a pain reliever advert just after you started talking about the Fists’ pain obsession 😂

Your intro/outro song I find exceptionally moving

Thanks, love going through videos like these. The flesh tearers just confirm as the most hardcore Blood Angels chapter ever (and imo better than the original lol)

Am I the only one who wants to paint up a marine from each of these Second Founding chapters? Thanks, Ian, for the video.

Soul Drinkers lore is crazy if you really get into it. There's a whole video on it if you want to go that far.

This is a lengthy one, very nice! Thanks Ian ^^

Needed this video for around 20 years, emperor knows I LOVE THIS CHANNEL

Absolutely LOVE your longer videos dude! Please keep it up!

"Never again would one person, even a Primarch, command as much power as the expeditionary fleets or legions of old." Roboute Guilliman returns: "Forget all that stuff, I'm in charge of the enormous Indomitus Crusade." No unilateral dictators!* *unless it's me! Just another example of the Imperium's hypocrisy! :D

“You didn’t even bother to paint your minis for the game!” *me looking down at my chapter of Fist Exemplars*

This is a great Video! It would be cool to see something similar for chaos warbands.

Good job as usual Ian! Lots of information even I hadn't encountered - like 2nd founding chapters I've never heard of, or surprisingly in depth background for rather obscure chapters like the Novamarines.

I love you dude especially for these Lore videos your just so good at it even when it's stuffs I already know.

Great video. Really enjoy listening to your lore work whilst I’m working 👍

Thanks for another great lore dump, Ian!

Ian really putting in the work. You should get a shout out in some book as "remembrancer Ian" or "the Arbitor Archivist" or something man. Awesome work!

Ian, our favorite narrator of future history.

50+ mins of Ian is time well spent

Absolutely amazing. This is a great video. Your channel really stands out with work like this. Thank you for all the hard work for our silly hobby. Cheers

That's cool af , just started my dive into the lore !

Holy fuck you uploaded it a day ago, I just started to exactly explore this topic as I want to see all the chapters. God bless dude!

Great to see the Silver Guard get a mention. Really enjoyed this one and hoping you cover some of the other major foundings

I like it when Ian uploads new videos I enjoy watching them

The second founding is always fun to create chapter's with questionable heritages such as the space sharks, silver skulls, doom eagles etc while also creating your own fun homebrews. For example I have 2 homebrews from lost world eaters and Luna wolves companies who just labeled themselves as blood angel and ultramarine successors

Just finished a 12 hour shift…. And this is exactly what I needed

Great lore video Arbitor lan

Really fascinating video! Would love to see more about the other foundings, although they might not be as interesting as the second one!

22:30 easiest paint scheme of any chapter

So my chosen chapter when I make marines is the Red Hunters, and since their lore is so thin, I decided to sort of flush it out. During and following the Horus Heresy, the Imperium had to deal with Marines that seemed to be loyalists amongst traitors. Maybe a squad or company from a traitor legion that were able to escape their traitorous brethren. Maybe a company or squad from a loyalist chapter declared for the warmaster, and a small loyal group kills them before turning themselves in. It was to address this issue that the form and function of the Inquisition began to take shape. Marines that were cleared of being heretics were put together into a task force known as the Red Hunters. They were tasked with hunting heretics and traitors as recompense for not being able to prevent the fall of their brothers. Due to this chapter’s intimate knowledge and extensive contact with Chaos, it was decided that they would not receive new Marines. The chapter's numbers dwindled as attrition took its toll. Following the disastrous 21st “Cursed” founding, Lord Inquisitor Olivarius Rowe approached the chapter master with an offer. The chapter would be brought back up to full strength and they'd be given a solar system with 3 inhabited planets to act as a recruitment base, but in return they would have to agree to a crusade against a group of Cursed Founding chapters. The chapter master agreed, and so during the 22nd founding, the Red Hunters used unknown geneseed to bring their numbers back to that of full chapter strength. They were also supplied Primaris Marines in the closing days of the 41st Millennium.

Lots of representation of the 2nd, 11th, and 20th legion in the /*checks notes*, *adjusts glasses*/ Ultramarine successor chapters.

I always thought it odd that Salamanders never recovered their numbers in 10000 years, but my head cannon is that when the Death Guard assaulted the world around the time Vulcan returned (Vulcan lives, * stomp stomp *) they wrecked absolutely havoc and all sorts of Nurgle nasties! The planet only not being infected still as the contagion was burned away by the natural environment

I loooove this,pleaase make more longer vids!

I wouldve thought that the Soul Drinkers were one of the weird ones. I thought it was discovered during their trial that their geneseed wasn’t Dorne’s, but they had always been present at the feasts of blades for it’s entire history, so it was at some point assumed they must be a Dornean successor.

Fantastic video! Would love to see an episode on the Cursed Founding and on the Pentarchy of Blood!

Thanks for the vid, my marines are mainly charnel guard so its nice to see them mentioned!

The funniest thing about all these successor chapters is when you make up you own unique colour scheme only to find out its been done like 5 times

This was a genuinely lovely way to spend an hour, listening to the lore behind the different chapters that have always been on the periphery of my knowledge... and some surprises there for me (Sons of Medusa weren't 2nd Founding?!) but brilliantly put together. Would love to hear your thoughts on the Soul Drinkers novels, because I was not a massive fan, and really interesting that the Chapter has reappeared as Ultima founding...

I always found it kind of poetic the Emporer that lived on earth through it's history entirely but yet used legions which have proved problematic with coups. The one primarch that is heavily influenced heavily on Roman astetics and lore was the one that said no more, break the legions up. It's fitting.

I like how literally the Blood Drinkers take their name. I wonder which came first, their blood drinking habits or the name of the chapter ?

Hi Ian, I’m not sure if anyone has mentioned it yet but you missed one of the successor chapters of the Dark Angels; the Guardians of the Covenant chapter. In fact they are my favorite successors of the DA. They took part in a number of cooperative missions with their founding chapter including the Siege of the Fenris system in ~999.M41. Their home world is Mortikah VII located in the Segmentum Pacificus sector, where they have their fortress monastery which resembles a large, gothic cathedral. They have a adopted a very monastic existence and this is even apparent in the choice of weaponry as they tend to use a lot maces, clubs and hammers for close combat. The Grand Master of their chapter is Master Himmaeus who has interacted with Supreme Grand Master Azrael on many occasions including in the Battle of Idolatros in part 5 of the Arks of Omen storyline. They wear red, black and silver with their iconography being two downward crossed swords which is the old symbol of the Deathwing during the Horus Heresy, minus the halo or ring encircling the swords. Their current strength is unrecorded but it is presumed to be in accordance with the Codex Astartes. They have only listed one of their ancient relics which is the Record of Oblivion which is a data tome that apparently has an extensive record of the many Xenos civilizations which the Imperium of Man has laid low. Hope this was informative.

I loved this one. Could you do a similar one for the Cursed Founding?

The Dark Angels "grave secret" that half their legion turned traitor is so funny nowadays where entire Chapters have had similar schisms or there are recent chapters that are heavily implied to be founded using traitor geneseed. I like to think that one day the Dark Angels realise how much time they wasted hunting the Fallen and keeping secrets when their dark secret is finally revealed and everyone just goes "Okay whatever we don't really care"

Always enjoy your videos

Great video, Ian. Would you ever cover the fanfiction Dornian Hersey concept?

Consecrators are definitely a Dark Angel successor chapter as they appear as such in the book "Unforgiven" .. their grand master working along side Asrael

Great video! Love diving into chapter lore. This is patreon calibre content.

Bro it's 6:30 am where I live.... Perfect for a pre work video

Well, this was bloody brilliant! =]

Libator: care for a refreshing beverage, my lord primarch? Guilliman: thank you my son, I actual- oh god, what in the warp is that?!

Love it Ian thanks

Fun thing in lore is that, there is always place for more chapters. For example: If second founding split Legions in 1k strenght chapters. And we have only 3 official dark angels successors that means whole Horus Heresy survived only 4k dark angels. It is really low number. There is no official records about how many space marines survived in every Legion. So we can keep adding new and new 2nd founding chapters.

Arbitor Ian, the Rememberancer of The Emperor. ❤

This video is so awesome 🙌

Best way to learn the lore.

that tundra pattern the raptors use reminds me of the hollywood russian camo thats used in the Red Dawn movie

39:25 Carandiru was an actual prison in São Paulo, Brazil where over a 100 inmates were killed by police after a riot took place. Just a (morbid) piece of trivia I wanted to add to the video. Cheers!

I could be wrong but I think the Soul Drinkers always thought themselves to be descendants of the Imperial fists but during their trial in the final soul drinker book Phalanx they were proved not to be.

I find it kinda hard to believe that the mainline chapters are actually only 1000 marines. Like especially the ones that were originally Legions. It just doesnt make any sense to me tbh. The Blood Angels and Ultramarines especially seem to have such a massive presence and have been in so many places and wars and lost so many marines before. They just appear larger than others. The Imperial Fists and Dark Angels also do to a somewhat lesser degree. Black Templars also seem huge. Idk maybe im misinterpreting things.

Outstanding and fascinating video from the apex 40k loremaster.

The foundings sound very similar to the "Aufstellungswelle " of the Werhmacht that created several waves of divisions for the army during ww2

It's a good example of GW being able to spin a story and allow players to do something individually (more skeptical people could say them turing game law into a sales possibility). There were 20 founding legions but if we make it so they are split into chapters, each player can paint their models as they like and it's all still valid. Great idea for GW and allowed a lot of players to make up their own colour schemes.

Does it ever get a bit repetitive reading about / describing Space Marine chapters as brutal or shockingly violent? It feels like that's 1 in 3 chapters. The Iron Knights being actually kinda nice guys was a welcome change.

Do you plan on talking about chapters of unknown founding, like the Blood Ravens or Carcharadons?

You forgot the Master Baiters who's heraldry is a fist around a snake

IIRC when the Soul Drinkers were finally brought to heel it was proven by the mechanicum biologis dudes that the Soul Drinkers were NOT descended from Dorn. Cue Maury Povich music.

I always thought games workshop kind of messed up the second founding. 1000 men in a chapter and 1000 chapters in a laughable size for a military force. They were a couple of orders of magnitude too small.

I can't wait for the 2 sentences known about the silver Eagles

Ian I love your videos but pls do more army showcases!!!!

yay more chill lore