Why the Alethi are not a medieval society

[SnopyDogy]

I see a lot of people assume that the Alethi and Rosharans in general, are part of a medieval sociality like Europe in the 14^th or 15^th century. I can see how people jump, incorrectly in my opinion, to this conclusion. The way the Alethi fight war is very similar to medieval Europe, especially the weaponry. The system of government is also very similar, they are a feudal system dominate by a select few warlords. They have a cast system, serfdom (effectively) and slaves. All of this together would make you think that it is a medieval society. You might even extrapolate things based on this assumption, which I have seen people do several times on this forum. A recent example of this is this thread.

I have a real problem with people generalising about the Alethi or any part of Roshar based on the idea that they are a medieval society. That’s because I do not believe it is not a medieval society, not even close. So I have been driven to post for the first time in an attempt to prove my point.

Government/Society:

I think this is one of the big reasons why people assume the Alethi are medieval, they see the feudal system, the slaves, the caste system (and how that makes darkeyes of lower dahn effective surfs) and extrapolate to medieval society from there.

But a feudal system of government is not specific to the medieval period; it existed long before and existed long after, if fact Russia didn’t formally abolish serfdom until 1861! That’s 400 years after the end of medieval Europe, 60+ years after the start of the industrial Revolution!

In fact I believe that the feudal system in Alethkar (and Jah Keved) are the result of Shards, and failing any widespread effective counter to a shard bearer on the battlefield an inevitable result of their existence. In face we see in Dalinar's Feverstone Keep vision that within minutes of common people getting a shardbalde they started killing each other to keep them and even get more. Over time the people with the shards would become local warlords and inevitable feudal lords.

Also isn’t it interesting that all the societies we have heard about with different social and governmental systems have fewer, if any, shards? I don’t think we can say that just because Alethkar has a feudal system of government it must therefore be medieval.

Likewise a cast system is not specific to medieval Europe either, the largest democracy in the modern world has a cast system: India. And we can say the same about slavery, when was the American Revolution again?

I would argue that none of these things, even taken together, are enough to say that Alethkar is a medieval society.

Warfare:

I won’t argue that the style of warfare is very much medieval in nature. They predominantly use steel spears and swords, they use bows; they use steel plate and mail armour; use mounted cavalry, etc. however none of these things are specific to medieval Europe. They were used for 1000s of years before then. Instead I would say that is was during the medieval period and especial the high middle ages (14^th and 15^th centuries) that this style of war and its weapons were perfected. This is what we see in Alethkar.

But this doesn’t mean that it is a medieval society; instead consider what happened to warfare next? If war had been perfected why did it change some much over the last 600 years? Well there are three reasons. The first is explosives, specifically gunpowder. The use of gunpowder is often associated with the end of the middle ages in Europe. The other 2 reasons, which came along much later is Instant communications (Semaphores, telegraph radio and telephone) and mechanised transport (trains, armoured cars/trucks and finally tanks). The American civil war is an early example where both of the latter changes were first used to effect.

Now, what do you supposed would have happened to war on earth if gunpowder was invented 500 years later? What would have happened if instead we got telegraph and trains going first? Without gunpowder and therefor guns and artillery it’s hard to beat the weapons and armour of late medieval Europe. We would see men armed with steel tipped spears and dressed in mail shirts boarding trains based on an order received over the telegraph.

I believe that this is what is happening on Roshar. Someone, somewhere, missed their queue to invent gunpowder (not surprising given how different the environment, it is possible that they just couldn’t find the ingredients). So instead they have persisted with the best style of warfare they have been able to develop with the best weaponry they have been able to invent. BUT warfare is about to change on Roshar, they have invent the telegraph, sorry the spanreed.

If you think about it the spanreed serve exactly the same function as the telegraph, except without those pesky wires that can be cut by the enemy. It is not hard to see someone, perhaps Kaladin, adapting it to send taps (like Morse code) instead of text. It could then be used the same way Kaladin uses his spear and shield to signal his squad. (The fact that it wasn’t invented like this in the first place, but instead uses the hideously complex system it does, proves that it was invented by a Vorin women, I’m looking at you Navani!). In fact given that I’m pretty sure that the Alethi know that sound is waves/vibrations (cymatics anyone?) I wouldn’t be surprised if we see the telephone by then end of arc 1, shocked if it wasn’t around by arc 2.

We are also seeing more use of fabrials in warfare, like the tents and dehumidifies used in the battle at the end of WoR. How much longer until these inventions turn into some form of mechanised travel? I believe we could see this by the second arc.

(Also, I’d just like to ask, am I the only one who feels they organise their armies more like it was the 19^th century then the 15^th century?)

TLDR: The warfare is medieval in nature because the lake gunpowder, not because they are medieval.

Religion:

Think about this for a moment, if Jasnah had lived in the 14^th century, and public denounced the Catholic Church like she has Vorinism, what would have happened to her? At best she would have been imprisoned by the church, at worst burnt at the stake as a witch! Unless of course her farther/brother was willing to elect an anti-pope and start a religious war. This is what religion was like in medieval Europe, it dominated everything, and kings couldn’t go to war without the blessing of the pope. And yet on Roshar Jasnah could denounce Vorinism and even flaunt the use of a holy relic.

The Vorin and Catholic churches are in no way comparable. I don’t think the Catholic Church has ever encouraged the pursuit of science the way parts of the Vorin church has. In fact I can’t think of any religion which has ever promoted the pursuit of science like Vorinism appears to do, let alone pursued it itself (how many Ardent's have we seen helping Navani with her fabrials?). And the Vorin church appears to have been doing this for centuries by this point.

I could go on and on about the differences between religion in medieval Europe and Roshar, they really aren’t comparable except in the broadest possible terms (I will admit for instance that they are both religions). I will say that these differences are one the strongest arguments for Alethkar not being a medieval society and may in fact be, at least in parts, the reason for my next argument: Science!

Science (and Technology):

In medieval society there was no science, period. The concept of science didn’t even exist and technology, while progressing, did so slowly. The idea of the natural historian, like Newton, who endeavoured to understand how the world works, was completely missing from the societies of the time. It would develop later, and like gunpowder the development of these early sciences is seen by most to be the end of medieval Europe and the beginning of the renaissance.

In fact Roshar appears to have gone way beyond the idea of the natural historian, they have actual scientist and even have recognised sub disciplines of science, physics, biology, chemistry, etc. (don’t believe me, read Shallan's interview to become Jasnah's ward). This isn’t a 15^th century idea of science, it isn’t a 16 or 17^th century idea of science, it isn’t even and 18^th century idea of science. This is a 19^th century idea of science. Their concept of science is 400 years more advanced the medieval Europe ever got.

It’s not just their concept of science; their medical knowledge is even more advanced too. To me it looks like it is comparable with (very) early 20^th century medicine! So is their engineering (Dalinar's bridges anyone?). What of the fabrials, they have stormlight heaters, hotplates, coolers (refrigeration), dehumidifies (a recent invention), the spanreed (telegraph, almost telephone), elevators (almost). And, from what I can tell, most of these fabrials have been developed in the last 10 years; they are cropping up all over the place.

All of this this looks a lot more like Europe during the industrial revolution then medieval Europe. How long until someone invents the steam engine (or fabrial equivalent)? Hell all you would need to do is make it out of wood, soulcast to iron and water and heating fabrial. They have all the requisite Technology to create the STEAM ENGINE!!! All they need is that last little leap of innovation to get there! In fact I think it is possible that an industrial revolution is already starting (or soon will) in Alethkar. When it started in England at the end of the 18^th century, it started in the textile mills and rope factories making uniforms and rope for the royal navy. We see Sebarial setting up just such mills on the shattered plains during WoR.

My final argument is this:

“You want me to come visit? The pen wrote. This is getting really boring.

Sorry, she wrote back to Adolin, I really need to get this work done. It might be nice to have a spanreed conversation to keep me company, though.”

Page 752, Kindle Edition, Words of Radiance.

At no time during the Middle Ages did any women kill time during a sting operation by texting her boyfriend!! I rest my case, Alethkar, Roshar, is not medieval Europe. I’d appreciate it is people stopped treating it like it is.

I might go fishing for some quotes to support my points later, but for now I'm going to take a break. that took forever to write.

Edited February 26, 2016 by SnopyDogy

[king of nowhere]

roshar is not medieval europe, but that does not mean that it cannot compare over some instances. yes, they are somewhat more enlightened and cosmopolitan than medieval europe (as much as you can use that word for a society with slavery and constant warfare, but medieval europe had the same, plus the whole "burning eretics and witches" that alethkar lacks). they also have some extra bits of technology, but said technology is rare and expensive and by no means available to the general people.

the way they can compare is that they are preindustrial societies. the lives of the common people are similar. the way they make most goods are similar. the amount of wealth and resources that the society can generate is somewhat similar, soulcasters notwithstanding. So, it is clear that while the analogy "roshar = medieval europe" is not generally true, it can be used in specific circumstances.

 

In that thread that you mentioned, for example, the comparison was made to determine the population density. And in that case, the comparison is absolutely reasonable. The amount of population living in a region is determined by the amount of food available, and since roshar lacks industrial agricolture, and in general seems to have the same farming techniques of medieval europe, then we can safely make the comparison that, at least in terms of food produced and population sustained, they can be compared to medieval europe. In fact, the problem with this assumption (something I highlighted in the thread) is not one of technology, but one of ecosystem, because rosharn highstorms and the crem they bring mean that they have no such thing as a desert or a barren steppe, and they can make agriculture everywhere.

 

So, it is true that you ccan't compare roshar to medieval europe for everything. If you were saying "in medieval europe they knew next to nothing about china, so in alethkar they must know nothing of shinovar", then this would be a bad argument, because in roshar they have spanreeds. But if you say "in roshar they use the same farming techniques of medieval europe, so they must produce similar amounts of food", then the comparison makes sense.

[Yata he/him]

First of all... Welcome

You have put together a nice argomentation, but to me you are thinking without flexibility.

 

It's hard (if not impossible) to compare two setting so different using arbitrary example.

 

For example, you said that Vorinism hasn't the same power of the Church during the medieval because on Roshar the science develops free.

But actually the progression of Science is part of the Vorin doctrine, the Heralds themself returned on Roshar to teach people the forgotten science.

It's impossible use it like a comparative example.

 

Anyway your analysis is good but to me you are tring to fit things too much through stereotypes.

Edited February 26, 2016 by Yata

[SnopyDogy]

I don't think I made my point too well. Both King of nowhere and Yata have made it better for me. with fewer words too. 

My point was that people seem to generalise about Althi society and extrapolate accordingly, most often they assuming it is medieval. I wanted to push back against that, in part because I believe that they might be on the cusp of something like an industrial revolution (feel free to persuade me otherwise). I suppose my post achived its goal if people are making similar points.

 

 

@ King of nowhere:

I agree that the new fabrial tech isn't affecting the lives of common people yet (with the possible exception of spanreeds), but how long until it does? My point was the innovation and rapid development we see is more like what you would see in an industrialised society, the distribution/manufacturing however still needs improvement.

 

I regards to farming on Roshar, I don't think it is possible to say they are using farming methods similar to medieval Europe, they are completely different crops in, as you say, completely different ecosystems. I mean does crop rotation on Roshar even make sense if highstorms are dropping nutrient rich crem every week or so? Also given that no one has re-settled and cultivated the unclaimed hills i suspect that farming might not be a limiting factor on population in Alethikar.

 

@Yata

Thanks for the Welcome. Been lurking for ages and finally got around to posting something. You have precisely and succinctly made my point for me. I do take issue with this tho:

 

Anyway your analysis is good but to me you are tring to fit things too much through stereotypes.

My point was that other people were applying Stereotypes and if I have used them it was only to better make that point... yeah, that was totally the reason. 

[Jimmy he/him]

I agree that Roshar doesn't fit neatly into our understanding of the European Middle Ages. But I think the main argument from me towards the Alethi being feudal in nature is the organisation of their leadership. The King may call the country to war but it is the local lords who must raise an army, train and equip it and then lead it. In a nation state this responsibility goes solely to the ruler. The lord has near total rule over his domain and responsibility for its management. We see this with the Alethi too, nobody recruits and fights for the King directly, just Amaram or Sadeas or Dalinar who in turn pledge their armies to the King's service. Classic feudalism. 

 

The eventual downfall of the monarchy in England was due to the fact that these lords had too much power to raise and equip armies. So much so that they became stronger than the King and didn't see the point in keeping him around any more. This is a very real threat to Elokhar and the reason why he encourages his lords to bicker amongst each other, it keeps them too weak and disorganised to get any ideas about challenging him for the throne. This leads to inefficiency, paranoia and a fracturing Kingdom. 

 

This is feudalism's main weakness as well. It is built on the lords following through with their pledges of fealty to the King. If the King called for a war and the lords suddenly developed deafness, there would be no army to fight for the King. 

 

Taxes are another matter in which the two are similar. In our society we pay tax and it goes either to state or federal government, depending on the type. In a feudal system it all goes to the local lord, who then passes it up the chain until it eventually reaches the King. Typically with each layer keeping a little extra for themselves, which leads to higher taxes just to get what the King thinks he deserves, then more corruption etc.

 

I believe that the middle ages were more of a time period than a system of government. The early dark age after the fall of Rome was aptly named, but there was scientific progress in Europe until eventually we came to the later medieval age and then the Renaissance. I think that Shardblades are responsible for the lack of gunpowder and development in weaponry. A musket slug would bounce right off Shardplate and make the firer a target for the angry man with a lightsaber Shardblade.

 

People will go for the easiest option that leads to the most reward. Shards may be difficult to get a hold of but everyone knows how powerful they are and how to go about getting them. Kind of like why it makes sense for fantasy settings to stick to a certain level of technology. What's the point in inventing all these things when you can simply use magic to do something similar? 

 

And with that I've strayed completely off topic. But I think somewhere in that confused rambling I made a point. Probably.

[TwelfthOfSnackTime he/him]

I've always viewed Alethkar as an early 1800's Prussian society with the Feudal system still in place and no artillery. It was the uniforms for the Kholin Army that brought it home. They remind me of pre WW1 Uniforms.

[Rasarr she/her]

SnopyDogy - excellent analysis! I'd upvote you several times if I could.

 

I'd certainly agree with sentiment in this thread that while Roshar is feudal, it isn't medieval - it's pretty common to treat those two as synonymous, but as at least two people pointed it out already, they're not. The Shards are the biggest "lynchpin" holding the system back in place, as Jimmy pointed out, but note that people were already figuring out a way to counter Shardblades without getting ahold of them - remember Jah Keved's fabrial-shields (can't remember their formal name right now)? Unfortunately, this particular line of development might've been killed along with Jah Keved's integrity, but something tells me Taravangian may resurrect it, given how he sees Radians as a problem.

 

What I'm getting at somewhat roundabout-ish-ly is that the areas in which Roshar is less advanced compared to our world are the ones which are impacted by Shardplate/blades. Feudal systems stays in place because you can't really argue with a guy who's pretty much a small tank. Warfare remains medieval, because things that would impact weaker protective armour are useless against Shardplate and hence not investigated as much as they should be (a modern sniper rifle would pretty certainly breach Shardplate, but it takes a lot of imagination to get to it from a primitive musket). Caste system is stuck in place because everyone can see Shardblade bleaches your eyes. By comparison, areas where Shardplates and Shardblades don't have much impact, such as spanreeds, military organization, science, medical knowledge and fabrial tech are flourishing and are much closer to our "tech level".

 

 

I've always viewed Alethkar as an early 1800's Prussian society with the Feudal system still in place and no artillery. It was the uniforms for the Kholin Army that brought it home. They remind me of pre WW1 Uniforms.

 

Good catch, haven't thought of that (and you'd think a person living in old Prussian lands would catch this...  ). I've always imagined Roshar in my mind as more of XIX-century America without trains and gunpowder.

[sheep]

I read Alethkar culture as reminiscent of Early Modern Europe (~1650s-1750) with random anachronistic bits from all the way up to the 1930's thrown in, due to the meddling of the Heralds and how much wisdom they managed to preserve.

 

1.  Independent princedoms operating autonomously, giving lip service to the King.  To me, it was like the duchies and principalities to the Holy Roman Emperor, but instead of electing their emperor, he was just a warlord.  In non-English translations of WoK/WoR, "Highprince" is "Archduke" so that further drove it in for me.

 

2.  Church was important in daily life, but not a governing power.  In that time period, Protestantism's many sects grew farther from Rome, so many people believed and interpreted the Bible as they wanted to, with no real harm to their souls or their physical bodies.  In medieval times, the Church owned lands, decided kings, and excommunicated heretics.  Perhaps "medieval" would be more suitable for describing the Hierocracy period.  Jasnah is an open atheist but no one is giving her a forced exorcism or sending her to the nunnery. 

 

3.  People still believed in social hierarchy and their place in it.  If you were lighteyes or born noble, your place was given by God/the Almighty as a leader of men, and should be unquestioned in authority.  If you were a darkeyes or a servant or peasant, you had to know your place and station in life, and if you questioned your place, it wasn't because you thought that being a servant was bad, but rather that someone else should be one rather than you.  It wasn't until later that secular humanism and the individual value of human life, and the equality of all men (and women too) was a thing in Earth history.  And I don't think it will happen to Alethkar as long as they're at war.

 

4.  The dress codes, especially safesleeves/safegloves for the differently ranked women, and side swords being worn by lighteyed men, while the darkeyes had to make do with side knives put me in mind of sumptuary laws.  Adolin was shocked when Navani wore a glove to give him a demonstration of the lifting platform fabrials.  And in early modern city states, only nobles got to carry swords around town.  Everyone else could carry knives if they were under a certain length (usually a hand length blade or smaller) and turned their swords over to the gate guards.

 

 

 

It was the uniforms for the Kholin Army that brought it home. They remind me of pre WW1 Uniforms.

 

Oh man, those uniforms.

Before and after the description from WoR (which felt very Napoleonic to me), I had a lot of interpretations for how they were supposed to look.  I am an enthusiast for historical costuming and had a lot of enjoyment trying to design the look of the uniform and Alethi dress in general.

 

I went all over the place, but if Aladar can wear a takama (traditional warriors' manskirt) to a plateau battle underneath his uniform coat, then historical anachronism is practically canon.

 

[Cortez he/him]

Personally I tend to view the Alethi and Vedens as more of a classical, i.e. Greco-Roman society, due to the descriptions of their traditional uniforms (although the more modern uniforms sound more 18th-19th century) and relative rarity of cavalry in their armies. Their grasp of science, engineering and medicine also tends to feel more appropriate for that period rather than the middle ages as does their class system with it's distinct ranks.

[ecohansen]

Snopy, which specific extrapolations particularly irk you?  In the thread you cited, I tried to make a very rough estimate of Alethkar's annual death toll by assuming a population density similar to medieval Europe.  I did that because the pictures of village life showed an agrarian society dependent on human and animal muscle-power, and because the Shattered Plains warcamps, with approximately a half-million people, were now considered a major population center.  Given that both villages and larger population-centers had populations similar to those in medieval Europe, and given that Alethi geography seems less fertile than European, it seemed reasonable to guess that Alethi population density would, if anything, be a bit lower than medieval Europe's population density.  That particular extrapolation still seems reasonable to me--although it could definitely be disputed

[king of nowhere]

What I'm getting at somewhat roundabout-ish-ly is that the areas in which Roshar is less advanced compared to our world are the ones which are impacted by Shardplate/blades. Feudal systems stays in place because you can't really argue with a guy who's pretty much a small tank. Warfare remains medieval, because things that would impact weaker protective armour are useless against Shardplate and hence not investigated as much as they should be (a modern sniper rifle would pretty certainly breach Shardplate, but it takes a lot of imagination to get to it from a primitive musket). Caste system is stuck in place because everyone can see Shardblade bleaches your eyes. By comparison, areas where Shardplates and Shardblades don't have much impact, such as spanreeds, military organization, science, medical knowledge and fabrial tech are flourishing and are much closer to our "tech level".

 

Ah, see, here is a point where I disagree. While shards certainly influenced feudalism, I don't see them affecting technology. They certainly had nothing to do with the development of gunpowder; the argument that a musket wouldn't damage a shardplate falls flat because a bow deals even less damage to shardplate, and yet they keep using bows. Most of their wars are done among normal armies, and anything that works against light infantry is widely used.

No, I think roshar technology, per se, is medieval at best. They don't have anything non-magical that wasn't available in the middle age, or maybe even in ancient rome, correct me if I'm wrong. It is roshar's magic that makes a difference. They have all kinds of fabrials, but they are a different kind of technology that cannot really be compared to our world. And that's why their technology seem so alien to us: because what is easier to do with fabrials is completely different from what is easier to do with engineering, and so they have stuff that we only achieved a few decades ago, but they miss other that we discovered centuries before. I expect that if they invented rifles, they would be done with acceleration fabrials rather than chemically powered.

[Esaias he/him]

1) But this doesn’t mean that it is a medieval society; instead consider what happened to warfare next? If war had been perfected why did it change some much over the last 600 years? Well there are three reasons. The first is explosives, specifically gunpowder.

2) In fact I can’t think of any religion which has ever promoted the pursuit of science like Vorinism appears to do, let alone pursued it itself

1) Gunpowder as an explosive has existed for a long time.

2) Here's one Not to the same extent of Vorinism maybe, but it's possibly one of Brandon's inspirations.

Overall, I agree with the Alethi, or any part of Roshar, not being strictly medieval. As Brandon has said:

"When I approached writing the Stormlight Archive—when I approached creating Roshar—I very consciously said, "I want to create something that feels new to me." I'm not the only one who does this, and I'm certainly not the one who does it best, but I wanted a world that was not medieval Europe. At all. I wanted a world that was its own thing."

Source

[ecohansen]

Alchemical Taoism would be another example of a spiritual tradition that wound up driving a very great deal of real-world research.  For instance, the Taoist quest for immortality-medicines led to vast compendia of herbs, which had the side effect of recording a and systematizing a great deal of real natural history and botany.

[Jimmy he/him]

Ah, see, here is a point where I disagree. While shards certainly influenced feudalism, I don't see them affecting technology. They certainly had nothing to do with the development of gunpowder; the argument that a musket wouldn't damage a shardplate falls flat because a bow deals even less damage to shardplate, and yet they keep using bows. Most of their wars are done among normal armies, and anything that works against light infantry is widely used.

 

Archery is a pretty ancient invention that is effective against the majority of people the Alethi fight against. A spear isn't much use against shard plate either, but the common soldiers have to be armed with something. What I was getting at is that it is a huge leap from archery to gunpowder. Even with gunpowder it is difficult to build a reliable firearm that only blows up in your face four times out of ten. Then add in the manufacturing process and we have one of the seeds for the industrial revolution. 

 

With a more effective weapon already in place, why would anyone change it for a weapon that, to use properly, must completely change your entire society?

[SnopyDogy]

Snopy, which specific extrapolations particularly irk you?  In the thread you cited, I tried to make a very rough estimate of Alethkar's annual death toll by assuming a population density similar to medieval Europe.  I did that because the pictures of village life showed an agrarian society dependent on human and animal muscle-power, and because the Shattered Plains warcamps, with approximately a half-million people, were now considered a major population center.  Given that both villages and larger population-centers had populations similar to those in medieval Europe, and given that Alethi geography seems less fertile than European, it seemed reasonable to guess that Alethi population density would, if anything, be a bit lower than medieval Europe's population density.  That particular extrapolation still seems reasonable to me--although it could definitely be disputed

 

The problem i have with this is that the same assumptions could be used to justify other starting points, instead of Europe in the middle ages, what about late feudal Japan? That would give a population of as much as 29 million (with a lot less extrapolation based on further assumptions about the size of the country). What about a comparisons with Yuan Dynisty China (for 60 million) or with Ming Dynasty (for 110 million)? My point is, what you describe, rural labour intensive farming and large population centres of 500,000+ could be used to describe multiple time periods in human history. I don't think we have enough information to really say that medieval Europe is a good starting point (altho I think it is no better or worse than any of the others I have mentioned, they all have their flaws).

The only village we have really seen is Hearthstone and that is describe as being more rural then most and the shattered plains isn't really useful to us as an indication of "normal" large population centres. We have no indication of the population of the cities we have seen either. What I would really like to know is the population of Kholinar. That would be a really good indication.

For the record I agree with your estimate of Alethkar's population.

[DreamEternal]

Archery is a pretty ancient invention that is effective against the majority of people the Alethi fight against. A spear isn't much use against shard plate either, but the common soldiers have to be armed with something. What I was getting at is that it is a huge leap from archery to gunpowder. Even with gunpowder it is difficult to build a reliable firearm that only blows up in your face four times out of ten. Then add in the manufacturing process and we have one of the seeds for the industrial revolution.

With a more effective weapon already in place, why would anyone change it for a weapon that, to use properly, must completely change your entire society?

Why was gunpowder originaly developed in our world then? It was used for centuries before it became better at piercing armor than crossbows, and I doubt the people who made tge first firearms knew how it would change warfare long after their deaths.

Plus, you can also use gunpowder to make cannons, wich I am quite sure are powerful enough to kill shardbearers, and due to being more compact and made of much less pieces than other siege weapons, are tge most pratical siege weaponry for a storm-ravaged planet were you must hide them from the wind every week.

The reason there is no gunpowder in Roshar is most likely because they never found it, not because they found it useless.

Edited February 27, 2016 by DreamEternal

[ecohansen]

Sure, but the only agriculture we've seen is field agriculture rather than paddy agriculture.  Just before the Yuan Dynasty which you cite, China was divided between the wheat-eating northern Jin and the rice-eating  Southern Song.   The two states had similar area, but the Southern Song had over twice the population of Jin, and therefore twice the population density.  Before the Industrial and Green revolutions, you could consistently get much higher population densities in rice-growing regions than in wheat-growing regions.  In other threads, I've talked about the wastefulness of using moving plants like rockbuds as a foodsource--I definitely can't imagine that, given similar landuse, you could maintain a higher population density with rockbuds than you could with wheat.  Therefore, I would say that wheat-dependent regions provide a better model for Alethkar than rice-dependent regions do.  For that, our best options are northern China, parts of India, and Europe.  Europe had the least trade and interdependence with rice-regions, so it provides the cleanest model.

 

--All of which is to say, even if Alethkar is in no way medieval europe, medieval europe still might be the best model we have for certain questions.  For other questions, other places might provide better models--we definitely shouldn't ignore Brandon's experience in Korea or the American Southwest, for example.  However, the people on this board will generally be more familiar with western history--if I can make the same point using either Germans or Jurchens as my example, I'll probably pick the Germans, because more people will be familiar with them.

Edited February 27, 2016 by ecohansen

[king of nowhere]

I would be very careful making assumptions about the agricultural productivity of roshar, because there are so many variables we don't know. we know you can harvest a couple handfuls of grain from every rockbud, but how many rockbuds can you grow in a hectare? one thousand? ten thousands? one hundred thousands? we don't even know an order of magnitude. How labor intensive it is? we know the farmers must spend a few days looking for plant parasites, but that's hardly what we need. How many people are needed to tend that hectare of rockbud coltivation? Ten? One hundred? We don't even know if you can get one, two or three crops in one year. And we don't know how much of the land is suitable for rockbud coltivation. Alll of it? most of it, except the most exposed places? very little of it, only some laits? too many variables we know nothing about. Estimates on crop productivity could vary by over an order of magniftude very easily.

[Ari he/him]

Ah, see, here is a point where I disagree. While shards certainly influenced feudalism, I don't see them affecting technology. They certainly had nothing to do with the development of gunpowder; the argument that a musket wouldn't damage a shardplate falls flat because a bow deals even less damage to shardplate, and yet they keep using bows. Most of their wars are done among normal armies, and anything that works against light infantry is widely used.

No, I think roshar technology, per se, is medieval at best. They don't have anything non-magical that wasn't available in the middle age, or maybe even in ancient rome, correct me if I'm wrong. It is roshar's magic that makes a difference. They have all kinds of fabrials, but they are a different kind of technology that cannot really be compared to our world. And that's why their technology seem so alien to us: because what is easier to do with fabrials is completely different from what is easier to do with engineering, and so they have stuff that we only achieved a few decades ago, but they miss other that we discovered centuries before. I expect that if they invented rifles, they would be done with acceleration fabrials rather than chemically powered.

Ah, but Brandon has established, and for good reasons, that with sufficient magic, cultural attitudes, and abundance of natural resources, magic can slow or supress technology in one of his other works. (I won't say which to avoid minor spoilers, but you'll know it if you've read it) Spanreeds would take away the impetus to invent telegraph, for instance, without which you would probably delay technologies like the telephone, as they'd be a larger leap to develop. Likewise shardblades might not halt technological advancement in weapons development so much as distort and slow it, gearing technology towards things like "half-shards" instead of siege weapons, impeding understanding of physics.

[DreamEternal]

I don't see why shardblades would delay the development of siege weapons, since those have a better chance of killing a shardbearer than throwing a hundred of soldiers at them.

[Jimmy he/him]

I don't see why shardblades would delay the development of siege weapons, since those have a better chance of killing a shardbearer than throwing a hundred of soldiers at them.

 

I disagree. Have an up vote though.

 

Having fired both modern and older artillery pieces, I can tell you that aiming a cannon is not easy.

 

At its most basic, aiming a cannon requires that you adjust left or right for accuracy. Then lock that in place or the force of the shot will ruin your next one. Then you need to adjust for range, up and down. The only way to do that is to guess, then fire the cannon and see where the shot lands. Modern armies use spotters for this. Again, having done this, it takes a few minutes for even a well practiced spotter and artillery crew to get rounds on target. 

 

Then you've got the bloke in shard plate who is no longer where your shot just landed and just cut through your entire army in that time and is busily hacking your crew apart. Did I mention that for a modern shell, each one weighs about 20 - 40 kilograms? Takes time to load that shell and you don't want to store it too close to the cannon just in case one cooks off and kills everything. 

 

I can't see how an older cannon would survive long enough to hit a shard bearer with solid shot. You'd need grapeshot to even come close and that wouldn't carry enough force over sufficient range to penetrate a shard plate. At the range required to pack that kind of punch the shard bearer is already on top of you.

 

Bear with me on this rant, it'll probably make sense at the end. 

 

Any shot fired, even from the most high powered modern rifle, is effected by wind. Enough that aiming straight at a target at 150 meters with a strong breeze will make that bullet miss. It's easy for a trained rifleman to compensate, but a cannon crew of (at least) 4 men? A cannonball has more surface area to catch the wind too so it would move further off. How is a cannon going to hit an extremely fast moving target at close or long range when it takes minutes to adjust each time, then flight time for the shot?

 

How good is the average steel made on Roshar? High quality steel wasn't common until 1856 by Sir Henry Bessemer. Until then steel was of low quality and quite likely to fracture after extended use, meaning a supply of parts would be needed. This is a common failing of the Alethi army at least, it is specifically mentioned that their army relies extensively on soul casters to provision their army. Cannons cannot be made by blacksmiths in camp and a damaged barrel must be completely reconstructed because it would never have the requisite strength otherwise. The Alethi could not maintain firearms or artillery without a direct supply line to Alethkar.

 

Modern artillery kills by the explosive force it delivers. Older models used blunt force trauma with a much smaller explosion. Grapeshot, the stuff you use to kill infantry, doesn't explode at all. Unless you hit directly, which is difficult, the explosive force of gunpowder isn't enough to put out a big enough blast wave to kill a shard bearer. The fire from an explosion is just an afterthought, the real damage comes from the shockwave which precedes this. That does more damage to the internal organs than you see on the outside. Shard plate would take that force and neutralise it before it got the soft squishy stuff inside. 

 

What is the incentive to make these things? They won't kill shard bearers, who would have to be university level stupid to get hit by something the size of a cannon. To defeat an army? Your own shard bearers can do that with no expense and far faster. To intimidate? The Alethi charged into freaking lightning. If that doesn't break them then an old school cannon is a cakewalk. To look cool? Shard. Plate. 

 

tl;dr - The Alethi don't have the capability or incentive to make gunpowder weapons. In place of that they'll stick with what works, like every other people on Earth did until they were shown something different by the British. 

[sheep]

So there's no incentive to develop gunpowder weapons - and I can see a lot of problems with storage of gunpowder on continent where you have massive storms every 2-5 days

 

 

The Palanaeum was shaped like an inverted pyramid carved down into the rock. It had balcony walkways suspended around its perimeter. Slanted gently downward, they ran around all four walls to form a majestic square spiral, a giant staircase pointing toward the center of Roshar. A series of lifts provided a quicker method of descending.

 

 

The room was silent and dark, her lantern light revealing the ends of bookshelves to her right and a smooth stone wall to her left. The air smelled of old paper and dust. Not wet. It was never damp in the Palanaeum. Perhaps the dryness had something to do with the long troughs of white powder at the ends of each room.

Chapter 33, "Cymatics, WoK

 

Since this is what they use to keep their library from rotting into mildew.

And obviously, you can't aim early muskets and they take minutes to reload with black powder.  Winning comes from lining up the most men in a row and getting the most volleys in before they get charged at melee range.   The variability in size and shape of plateaus prevents making good formations.  It's too bad that most of Roshar is all rock and no soil, because that rules out trenches for cover, or planting rows of spears angled outwards to deflect a charge from your ranged units.

 

 

 

 

Dalinar’s force eventually reached the end of the permanent bridges, and had to start waiting for the chull bridges to be lowered across the chasms. The big machines were built like siege towers, with enormous wheels and armored sections at the side where soldiers could push. At a chasm, they unhooked the chulls, pushed the machine forward by hand, and ratcheted a crank at the back to lower the bridge. Once the bridge was set down, the machinery was unlocked and pulled across. The bridge was  built so they could lock the machine onto the other side, pull the bridge up, then turn and hook the chulls up again.

Chapter 26, "Stillness" WoK

 

So the question is, if Alethi carpenters and blacksmiths can build a mechanical folding siege portable bridge, can they build a crossbow?  Of course there are many social issues to do with arming darkeyes when archery is traditionally considered a lighteyed sport.  But could a formation of crossbows crack Shardplate?  A Shardbearer has enough force to crack Plate with a hammer or a fabrial grandbow.  A fall of 30-50 feet will send Stormlight puffing out of Plate. 

 

Normally the only way you could kill a Shardbearer with archery is with a lucky eye hit while they're distracted by spearmen or another Shardbearer.  If you could concentrate enough force accurately enough to crack a Shardbearer's sabatons and greaves (foot and shin plates) or hit the loadbearing sections at breast and back at range, that would change a lot of battles.  Most would have to drop sections that become too heavy, in order to keep moving.  If you have enough Plate fragments and Stormlight infused large gems, you could regrow the Plate before the actual Bearer could.

[Jimmy he/him]

By the way, ingredients for gunpowder are: Potassium Nitrate, which can be distilled from manure, charcoal (or interestingly enough, bone) and sulphur. It's on wikipedia for all those federal agents reading this. None of these things are hard to come by so I don't think it can be said that "gunpowder" doesn't exist on Roshar. 

[Jimmy he/him]

I think that they could certainly make crossbows if they had a mind to. My point was never that they're stupid, just that shards and magic have altered their way of thinking along different paths to ours and kept them in a feudal state.

 

Would crossbows be effective though? Depends on the tactics. I try not to get caught up with how strong shard plate is and think about how fast it makes them. F=MA after all. A shard bearer screened by light cavalry and supported by his own archers and infantry would easily overwhelm a massive amount of crossbowmen until it became no more of a threat than a regular bowman. A longbow has a much greater range than even a very good crossbow and both were historically terrible against cavalry. 

 

I guess it comes back to tactics on how to bring down a shard bearer and his army which seems to reinforce that what they're doing works. I don't think that gunpowder would be useful to the Rosharans even without the hassle of storing it as mentioned above. 

[Ari he/him]

I don't see why shardblades would delay the development of siege weapons, since those have a better chance of killing a shardbearer than throwing a hundred of soldiers at them.

 

Have you seen any siege weapons on Roshar? In many ways Shardbearers fulfill the same role in Alethi conflicts, determining the ultimate momentum of their armies. The only ranged weapon they've mentioned are archers.

 

 

I think that they could certainly make crossbows if they had a mind to. My point was never that they're stupid, just that shards and magic have altered their way of thinking along different paths to ours and kept them in a feudal state.

 

Would crossbows be effective though? Depends on the tactics. I try not to get caught up with how strong shard plate is and think about how fast it makes them. F=MA after all. A shard bearer screened by light cavalry and supported by his own archers and infantry would easily overwhelm a massive amount of crossbowmen until it became no more of a threat than a regular bowman. A longbow has a much greater range than even a very good crossbow and both were historically terrible against cavalry. 

 

I guess it comes back to tactics on how to bring down a shard bearer and his army which seems to reinforce that what they're doing works. I don't think that gunpowder would be useful to the Rosharans even without the hassle of storing it as mentioned above. 

 

Indeed. Having Shardbearers isn't going to stop these developments, because there's always an incentive to develop novel weapons of war. But it will remove many of the incentives to figure them out as quickly as we did.