Stormlight Chapter Arch

[Clarkmon22 He/Him]

Somewhat related to thread about the Chapter Arches by @Green Hoodie Mistborn, but seperate enough to start another thread:

I was reading that thread about the Chapter arches, and went back to look for when the crumbling started, when I realized that the "crumbling" actually started with a little crack that went all the way back to WoR at least (I'm rereading it and left my copy of WoK at home)

Does this crack represent anything? Was there already a thread about this and I didn't look hard enough? Is cereal a soup? 

These are all questions that I have no answers to, I am simply asking them to spark conversation.

 EDIT: You can't really see the crack in this picture, it's above the second Herald's head

Edited September 12, 2025 by Clarkmon22

[Treamayne]

3 hours ago, Clarkmon22 said:

I was reading that thread about the Chapter arches, and went back to look for when the crumbling started, when I realized that the "crumbling" actually started with a little crack that went all the way back to WoR at least (I'm rereading it and left my copy of WoK at home)

Does this crack represent anything?

That crack has been there since WoK Chapter 1 (regardless of which herald is in the second spot):

Spoiler

If it has meaning, it's likely just foreshadowing for what we saw happened during WaT. But I cannot find a WoB that specifically addresses the crack in the early books. Here's the WoBs about the Herald Arch itself:

Spoiler

Quote

17th Shard

Please explain the arches and symbols that are seen at the beginning of each chapter and why you decided to do them.

Brandon Sanderson

The arches and symbols are a series of arches and symbols at the beginnings of chapters. There's an explanation for you. They rotate and change for every chapter. What they mean should be intuitively obvious to the casual observer, as Robert Jordan used to say.

I decided to use them because I wanted to have interesting things at the start of each chapter. These were done by Isaac. I originally sat down with Isaac and said, "I want to be able to build symbols at the beginning of my chapters. Something like in The Wheel of Time, which I really like, but I don't want to imitate them, I want to go somewhere different. I want to have different pieces that interlock together that form some stonework symbol that's at the beginning of every chapter." I also told him what I wanted the symbols to mean (among other things) and he actually transmogrified all that into an archway. I had originally been planning it to be some sort of inscribed rock stamp or something like a little relief at the beginning of each chapter, but he persuaded me that an archway with a different kind of symbol in the center [would be better]. So, they became arches through Isaac's working with the art and changing things and deciding what would look good visually.

17th Shard Interview (Oct. 3, 2010)

Quote

Questioner

The arches in The Way of Kings and Words of Radiance. The faces in the arches, are they dependent on something that happens in the chapter, or are they random or is there a pattern?

Brandon Sanderson

They do, but Isaac picks them, not me. So. There is a rubric for it, but-- so there is some significance, but Isaac is behind that.

Words of Radiance Seattle signing (March 8, 2014)

Spoiler

Questioner

You do the [Stormlight Archive chapter header] arches too right?

Isaac Stewart

I did do the arches as well, yeah.

Questioner

Is there like a pattern <though>? 'Cause I'm trying to find a consistent one. Like certain characters or...

Isaac Stewart

You know, the pattern to those is... Peter reads the chapter and then he decides which faces to put on the chapter heading.

Questioner

So it isn't just like whose point of view it's from it could be...

Isaac Stewart

It can be-- It can be more thematic. I'm not sure of all of the things that Peter takes into consideration. That would be a good question to ask him sometime.

Calamity release party (Feb. 16, 2016)

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Argent

Hey Peter,   I've been meaning to ask you about this since Alice's article on the Heralds went up. In it, she lists each Herald's role (e.g. Jezrien is the King, Battar is the Counselor, Kalak is the Maker, etc.), and I noticed that those same roles were listed (but not used) in the Radiant Quiz as the archetypes for each Order. Some of these show up in the books, but a few don't, and the source for those appears to be an old old email from you. I wanted to know how canonical these are, and whether I can include them in the Coppermind (and if I can, it would be nice to know what they are - roles, titles, archetypes?)

Peter Ahlstrom

These, along with Jester, are the names of the Photoshop layers for the faces on the chapter arches. Since the words themselves don’t really appear in the books, I couldn’t say that they’re canon. In our internal wiki we call them Face/Title. I don’t have an opinion on putting them in the Coppermind.

Footnote: The roles, starting with Jezrien's and going clockwise, are: King, Judge, Guard, Healer, Scholar, Artist, Counselor, Maker, Soldier, and Priest.
Miscellaneous 2020 (Aug. 4, 2020)

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Lurcher

Here are the lists of things that I've noticed could be reasons why certain Herald images get chosen. I also picked up on alot of this stuff because the folks over at Tor have done a WoR re-read and have a dedicated "Heraldic Symbolism" subsection they devote for each chapter. They speculate as to why the specific herald(s) were chosen. Specifically Alice Arneson (one of the re-readers) has seemingly done some good research into this, so I'll give her credit for a lot of this.

I mostly listed these out for my own reference as I've been meaning to do so (since I usually keep them in my head when figuring this out when reading).

1. Herald themselves (mentioned, talked about, or actually has an appearance)
2. Some object associated with a herald (example: A specific herald's honorblade)
3. Member of Order (ex: Kaladin=Windrunners=Jezrien)
4. Characters portraying divine attribute behavior (example: Loving and Healing)
5. Characters portraying the inverse of divine attribute behavior (example: Hating and Destroying)

6. Herald of <concept> - things associated with that concept. Known examples: 1) Shalash: Herald of Beauty 2) Nalan: Herald of Justice 3) Jezrien: Herald of Kings 4) Taln: Herald of War 5) Ishar: Herald of Luck

7. Roles associated with a herald Known Examples: 1)Chana: Guards 2)Taln: Soldiers/war 3)Ishar: Ardents/religion 4)Vedel: Physicians

8. Essences (https://coppermind.net/wiki/Ten_Essences Essence, body focus, Soulcasting properties...(this one is a stretch as I've never really could pinpoint this well enough)

9. Jester/Masked face (as mentioned in other posts on this thread). This can be tied to chapters with Wit them or tied to concepts related to him, the biggest one (I think) being storytelling.

How'd I do?

Note: I loved the "Four Lifetimes" chapter's heraldic symbolism in Oathbringer (I'm a little over halfway through the book), but I thought that was great showing the different roles/lives Kaladin has filled: Surgeon (Vedel), Soldier (Taln), Guard (Chana), and Leader/Windrunner (Jezrien). Bravo.

Peter Ahlstrom

How did you do? Pretty much a home run. There's only one thing you're missing, which you may have implied, and that's the gemstones. Also, there's a little bit more to #5 that will be explored further later in the series.

Your "Four Lifetimes" analysis is spot-on. Congratulations.

General Reddit 2017 (Nov. 22, 2017)

 

Hope that helps

3 hours ago, Clarkmon22 said:

Is cereal a soup?

Only if you cooked the cereal in the milk (like oatmeal can be considered a type of stew/porridge). 

Hope that helps.

Edited September 12, 2025 by Treamayne
SPAG

[Clarkmon22 He/Him]

7 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

That crack has been there since WoK Chapter 1

Ok, thanks!

7 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

(regardless of which heral is in the second spot)

Yeah, I meant just above the second spot.

8 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

If it has meaning, it's likely just foreshadowing for what we saw happened during WaT. But I cannot find a WoB that specifically addresses the crack in the early books.

I've just been trying to associate it with a specific character or event... Ulim maybe? that's a stretch... Only other thing I can think of is like the Oathpact or Ishar's sanity.

Was it there in the prequel or prologue?

[Treamayne]

6 minutes ago, Clarkmon22 said:

Was it there in the prequel or prologue?

Prelude to SA in WoK (with the Heralds, Kalak's viewpoint) does not have a Chapter Arch at all.

Prologue in WoK (Szeth) - yes, it is there. 

The first Chapter to show any additional cracks beyond that one is WaT Ch 14 (Day 2), as far as I can find. 

 

[Qianweilian He/him]

On 9/12/2025 at 1:06 PM, Treamayne said:

The first Chapter to show any additional cracks beyond that one is WaT Ch 14 (Day 2), as far as I can find. 

Actually, as far as I can tell, the number of cracks is 2 (starting from the prologue)