Dawnsingers

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Anyone else think they're the Parshendi? This idea is based on something Kabsal said. I know the ardents' ideas are suspect, but I think this one is based on truth.

[pharaoh9000]

Could you provide the Kabsal quote for us?

[Eagle of the Forest Path]

Hmmm, interesting theory, it rathers fits with their Rithms.

 

So Dawnsingers would be sort of the opposite of Voidbringers? With good spren instead of Odiumspren (or Voidspren or whatever they're called)?

[pharaoh9000]

You know... lately I too have been wondering if the parshendi are the Dawnsingers as well.  Like the Parshendi can potentially be either Dawnsinger or Voidbringer... depending on the type of spren they bond with.  There is definitely more to the Parshendi than meets the eye. What if their language is the Dawnchant or is related to it?

[KidWayne]

Doesn't the "though broth are we, their meat is men" line from one of their songs kind of debunk this? Also, they call themselves Listeners, not singers.

I take that to mean that "good" spren will not bond with Parshendi when humans are available.

So, to make this theory work... maybe at one time in the distant past you had Parshendi bonding power-giving spren. However, now that humans are available, the spren spurned the Parshendi. So, now a bitter and betrayed people turns to a new god (Odium) or gods (the Unmade) who is/are willing to restore the glory and power of the Parshendi with hate-spren.

[Titan Arum]

So this has been discussed before. I've thought something similar as well. They are Listeners, but they sing everything thing with the Rhythms. 

 

Other theories about the Dawnsingers: they are Radiant bonding spren. 

 

I haven't decided which camp I may belong to, but I do like both ideas. 

[TwelfthOfSnackTime]

I can't remember if this was a theory I read somewhere or if I dreamed I read it somewhere, but here are my thoughts on the Dawnsingers and why they are gone.

They were superspren, like nightwatcher/stormfather that originally were good, but then Odium turned them to the dark side somehow and now they are the Unmade.

I have no proof of this, I just like the idea for a plot point.

[pharaoh9000]

Doesn't the "though broth are we, their meat is men" line from one of their songs kind of debunk this?

That line is, I suspect, because the Parshendi are little more than spren themselves. Though more in the physical realm than spren.

[DSC01]

I think you're wrong about that. Spren are little bits of power, shaved off of a Shard. Parshendi are very close to humans, but they are more closely attuned to the Cognitive realm. That gives them an affinity to the spren: bonding with these artifacts of the Cognitive realm gives them their form. But they are not all that closely related to spren. If they were, they'd essentially be a race of Splinters.

[pharaoh9000]

I think you're wrong about that. Spren are little bits of power, shaved off of a Shard. Parshendi are very close to humans, but they are more closely attuned to the Cognitive realm. That gives them an affinity to the spren: bonding with these artifacts of the Cognitive realm gives them their form. But they are not all that closely related to spren. If they were, they'd essentially be a race of Splinters.

 

You may be right, of course.... but I can't ignore the numerous similarities between spren and Parshendi.

 

• They have nearly the same reaction when their dead are touched.  Parshendi in reaction to the Parshendi bodies on the battlefield...  and bonded spren in reaction to oathbroken shardblades being touched.
• When the Stormfather spoke to Eshonai during her transformation into stormform, he spoke to her gently and endearingly, as if she were his own child. (I don't remember him talking to anyone but Syl with that fatherly tone.  Though there could be holes in my memory.)
• The parshendi are able to transform into many different forms (though they require spren to accomplish this)... and spren themselves are able to transform into many different forms.  In both cases, the cognitive "concept" of each form directs its appearance, shape, and purpose.  Example: Parshendi would choose mateform for mating... while Syl would use blowing leaves as her form for riding the winds.  The cognitive "idea" associated with the task ends up having everything to do with the chosen form to complete the task... for both spren and parshendi.
• If we can admit that the Parshendi are "closely attuned to the cognitive realm" as you put it, then it's not a far leap to say that the parshendi songs are likely heard via the cognitive realm... (personally I think that all parshendi songs are playing at all times and they just "tune in" to the appropriate "station" at the appropriate time). If this is right, then I believe the "broadcast" is coming from the cognitive realm itself, where part of the parshendi still somewhat exists in order to hear that broadcast.  (Just like spren are mostly cognitive but are pulled a bit toward the physical, I think parshendi are more or less the reverse of that).  How would the Listeners "listen" if some small part of them did not exist in the same realm they are listening to?

...to name just a few. lol

 

Shallan accidentally attuned the parshendi music once.  In Chap 5 of WoK, just as Jasnah soulcasts the giant boulder, it reads "And then, briefly, Shallan heard a sound. A low thrumming, like a distant group of voices, humming together a single, pure note."  Was this not her attuning to shadesmar by accident as she witnessed a soulcasting?  At the very least, she seems to have briefly attuned the same sort of sounds the parshendi do.  And it is even referenced in one of Shallan's books after she steal Jasnah's Soulcaster that "...humming, of all things, could make a Soulcasting more effective." The only difference with Shallan and Jasnah accessing this realm is that only their surgebinding is allowing them access... but by definition, spren and parshendi are not binding surges to do this.   Yet the Parshendi minds are always listening there.

 

If we can admit that the Parshendi have even the slightest connection to the cognitive realm, then we can safely guess that part of them is "there"... though I realize that shadesmar is not a place.  Seen in this light, some of the epigraphs containing Listener Song excerpts possibly reinforce these theories.  Like Chapter 28 in WoR for example.

 

Now, I'm not saying Parshendi and spren are the same thing... but I think their relation goes a whole lot deeper than a mere connection to the cognitive realm.  By the time this all plays out, I think it'll be revealed that they have a lot more in common than we think.

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Well, I agree with everything you said, there. I just think it's a bit much to say that the Parshendi are little more than spren. I think I just misinterpreted your meaning, though, because I'd bet money on subsequent Stormlight books proving pretty much every point you make true.