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Dead Shards


Gray to

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We don't know if they are Splintered but:

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Questioner

Are there currently any Shards, besides Harmony, that are not held by their original Vessel?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)

Possibly because:

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Questioner

Can holders of Shards give them up voluntarily? If so, what would happen?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, a Vessel for a Shard of Adonalsium can give up their power if they wish.

As for what would happen...well, there are some variables in there. Kind of like the variables in what happens to a bucket of water if you dump it out. Depends on where it falls, how strong the wind is, what the air is like.

Power dropped like this, if left alone, could end up Splintering and turning into something like spren/seons. It could become something more like the Stormfather--a large, self-aware entity. It could become something like the Dor or many of the Unmade--something proto-aware, but not truly an individual. There are other possibilities as well, depending on lots of factors. (Are sapient beings involved? what is being done with the power--is it concentrated in the Spiritual Realm as normal, or is it being pushed somewhere else?)

FAQFriday 2017 (June 9, 2017)

Aside from that, the ones that we know that got Splintered are: Devotion and Dominion, Ambition and Honor

If this question came from this WoB, then check the footnote:

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Questioner

How many Shards have been Splintered, besides the four we know?

Brandon Sanderson

You're gonna make me canonize this? I can't canonize this. There's a couple that I'm just kind of...

Questioner

Odium, Endowment, Devotion...

Brandon Sanderson

Okay, Odium has not been Splintered. Endowment and Devotion have been Splintered... Endowment hasn't been Splintered, sorry. Dominion and Devotion have been Splintered. I've confirmed that one other has been Splintered. And then Honor has been Splintered. Those are your four that I've canonized. The other one is, I don't know if I've mentioned who exactly it is, but it's not one that you've seen on one of the planets...

Yeah, I'm not gonna canonize it, exactly how many there are. Because there are things going on in the cosmere that I wanna settle down and decide on once I get to it, exactly what. And Splintering can be a vague term sometimes, too... So that's a RAFO.

Footnote: Brandon has named the fourth canonized Splintered Shard, in Arcanum Unbounded. It is Ambition.
Salt Lake City ComicCon 2017 (Sept. 21, 2017)

 

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@Honorless Just to point out, Brandon has clarified that a Shard not being held by its original Vessel can include ones that have been Splintered, explicitly including in that category Devotion and Dominion. So the WoB about Harmony not being the only case of a Shard not being held by the original Vessel doesn't really tell us anything by itself. Brandon's fond of this kind of hair-splitting. xD

2 hours ago, Ookla the Prolific said:

At least one.  We know Odium has splintered 5 shards but we only know 4(Honor, Ambition, Dominion, and Devotion).

We do? I've seen Brandon RAFO questions on the topic and I've seen the WoB already provided where he explicitly canonizes four but sort of stumbles over the point because he can't remember when he's speaking whether or not he's confirmed that the fourth was Ambition but I can't recall ever seeing one where he unambiguously says that more have been splintered than the four we know of.

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The 5 Shards thing was the questioner's phrasing. Brandon doesn't correct people, especially such RAFO worthy questions.

@Ookla the Nameless, he said that the Dor wouldn't be counted as a Vessel. I've already included the WoBs I thought relevant for how I viewed the topic, I think the not held by the original Vessel quote is quite explicit, but feel free to keep a more cautious approach, "the man who calls himself Taln" comes to mind

Edited by Honorless
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9 hours ago, Honorless said:

I think the not held by the original Vessel quote is quite explicit, but feel free to keep a more cautious approach, "the man who calls himself Taln" comes to mind

Given that 'not held by the original Vessel' can encompass Shards that aren't being held at all, yeah, I'm going to be more cautious on this one until we get something that's explicit about another Shard being held by somebody who's not the original Vessel. But I'll concede that the wording is ambiguous enough that either reading is possible.

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1 hour ago, Gray to said:

Quick question: Do we know if any of the unrevealed Shards are dead/splintered?

At least one.  We know Odium has splintered 5 shards but we only know 4(Honor, Ambition, Dominion, and Devotion).

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