Sea of Spears = Sea of Shardblades?

[Mestiv he/him]

Time for my first theory topic of the Shard... would you believe that?

So, there are those two scenes:

First, Kaladin's vision while riding the Highstorm:

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In a moment, he was past them, continuing north and west to soar across the Sea of Spears, a shallow inland sea where broken fingers of rock jutted above the water. 

The second one, is from Dalinar's vision (the Feverstone Keep one):

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One knight stepped ahead of his companions, his brilliant cape a rich blue. His Shardblade of rippling steel had intricate carvings along the center. He held it toward the keep for a moment.

Then he drove it point-first into the stone plain. Dalinar blinked. The Shardbearer removed his helm, exposing a handsome head with blond hair and pale skin, light as that of a man from Shinovar. He tossed the helm to the ground beside his blade. It rolled slightly as the Shardbearer made fists in his gauntlets, arms at his sides. He opened his palms wide, and the gauntlets fell free to the rocky ground.

He turned, his Shardplate falling off his body—breastplate dropping free, greaves slipping off. Underneath, he wore a rumpled blue uniform. He stepped free of his bootlike sabatons and continued to walk away, Shardplate and Shardblade—the most precious treasures any man could own—tossed to the ground and abandoned like refuse.

The others began to follow suit. Hundreds of men and women, driving Shardblades into the stone and then removing their Plate. The sound of metal hitting stone came like rain. Then like thunder.

We know, that after Recreance many Shardblades and Shardplates were missing. There were far more Knights Radiant than there are Shardblades and Shardplates used by humans now. My idea is this: there was a huge group of Radiants that left their blades thrust into the ground in an area that would be later known as Sea of Spears. The blades weren't found by anyone for hundreds of years and were covered with crem, just like the buildings on Shattered Plains. Now, they just look like "broken fingers of rock jutted above the water".

[Gizmosowner he/him]

Sounds plausible and there is nothing to disprove it that I know of but is it even possible for shard blades to get covered in crem the way other substances are considering they can cut through anything.

[Pagerunner he/him]

The Sea of Spheres occupies a significant portion of Alethkar, and has at least two major Alethi cities built on or near its banks. That would need to be a lot of Shardblades that go unnoticed right in the middle of a country where they love their Shards.

[Mestiv he/him]

Well, maybe not the whole sea is filled with those rocks? 

I think Shsrdblade can be covered in crem just fine. It's the edge that cuts everything, other parts behave like normal material I guess. 

[Weltall]

The two Orders that were at Feverstone seem to have wanted to make a public spectacle of their decision so the other seven that participated might have as well, but we know opinions were divided among the Radiants so it's certainly possible another group decided to ditch their shards in a more remote location that wasn't regularly visited for long enough for crem to accumulate on top of them. We know that the region that's now Alethkar has been an inhabited region for thousands of years but it's not impossible for that particular spot to have been somewhat remote from settled areas at the time given how little we know. Interesting idea and it would be pretty funny if shard-hungry Alethkar was sitting on a huge treasure trove of Blades and Plate all this time, especially as we know that it used to be the home of the Radiants back when it was Alethela.

Edited June 5, 2017 by Weltall

[Stormlightning she/her]

Below is a very unspoilery note about a released interlude chapter in Oathbringer. Again, it's really not a spoiler, but I figure it should be in tags anyway:

Spoiler

An interlude chapter talks about a phenomenon similar to this near Aimia. So although I don't necessarily think it's the Shardblades (that didn't seem to be the case near Aimia), learning more about it could reveal something interesting. It seemed more related to the significance of stone on Roshar.

I don't think the formations are insignificant, but I think they may be more related to some other form of magic than the shardblades. Like Dalinar's part mentions, a lot of the shardblades and plates were taken up by people at Feverstone, although that still doesn't explain why so few remain.