Urithiru

[Wyndle88 he/him]

Who created Urithiru? The strategic importance of Urithiru cannot be stressed enough. The Oathgates system cannot be held by the enemy. If that happens, all hope is lost.

My question is when was it made? I say made and not built as I don't think it's humanely possible to build this. 

Was it made by Honor to help the Heralds? I don't think so. My guess is Honor did not forsee the weakness of humans when he made the Oathpact and Honorblades.

His plan turned out to be full of holes. So Cultivation took a hand in saving the planet. She lent a part of the power and helped Honor in making the Sibling group of Sprens. 

This was done as Honor and Cultivation made new plans based on actions of spren making Knight Radiants.

So Urithiru was actually for Radiants and not Heralds. Each order was given a set of gemstones that make an Oathgate which has connection to a Spren of Urithiru.

What do you guys think?

 

[Quantus he/him]

We know there was some debate on where to put the Radiant's headquarters, with a block wanting to place it in Alethela/Alethkar, so I think it's safe to say it was after the initial Herald emergence (which was the first generation after the migration). There is a lot of speculation and evidence that the Sibling is directly connected to it, and reasonable theories that it requires that level of spren to operate all it's systems.  Given the fractal nature of both Urithiru and the main Silver Kingdom cities that have Oathgates, I think it's reasonable to think they were made with similar processes.  One Ive seen was that it used some sort of super-enhanced Lightweaving that propagated the design out in waves combined with a Soulcasting effect. 

My more fringe theory is that that Sibling is something akin to a massive Cryptic, and is the Spirit of the Continent itself (which is itself a supernaturally created Julia set fractal), in the same way the Stormfather is the Spirit of the Highstorm.  I think they went with the location they did because it's just about the exact center of the continent, and maaaybe (havent done the research) might be the true center of the fractal, mathematically speaking.  If true, it would mean that the rest of the continent radiates out from that location, making it ideal for interfacing with the God-spren of the Continent (assuming again that is what the Sibling actually is).

Now, if Im right about the Sibling being a Cryptic of the Contitent, that might imply that the other Silver Cities are or were similarly large (but not God-spren large) sleeping fractal Spren, and the shape on the landscape similar to how Pattern causes ripples in his form when he merges with a surface rather than being a floating entity.

[Karger he/him]

1 hour ago, Wyndle88 said:

My question is when was it made? I say made and not built as I don't think it's humanely possible to build this. 

It was made after the emergence of the radiants.  We don't know how it was built although Shallan notices similar strata patterns in Kholinar.

[Honorless he/him]

It was made way after Ashyn and the Oathpact, as the emergence of the Radiants is still a more recent memory to the Heralds.

There was an argument about where to place the city and had Oathgates to the major Silver Kingdom cities, so this was after the Radiants had established themselves. Ultimately the location was chosen as it was somehow central and "closest to Honor"

Who made it and how is as of yet unknown but the Sibling is deeply connected to it as their slumber left many of the tower's features dormant

[Wyndle88 he/him]

Is there any chance Urithiru is on top of the Horneaters Peak , Near Cultivation' Perpendicularity?

[TheWadehart he/him]

2 hours ago, Wyndle88 said:

Is there any chance Urithiru is on top of the Horneaters Peak , Near Cultivation' Perpendicularity?

No the map in Oathbringer shows it location closer to the center of the continent.

[Karger he/him]

4 hours ago, Wyndle88 said:

Is there any chance Urithiru is on top of the Horneaters Peak , Near Cultivation' Perpendicularity?

Although interestingly it was supposedly built "in the place nearest Honor" whatever that means.

[Wyndle88 he/him]

Something has been bugging me.

Urithiru is built such a way that the Eastern side I think is flat. As though cut by shard blade.

So that got me thinking, what else do we know that is huge and is perfectly flat?

My answer is Purelake which is described as water reaching up to a man's knee throughout. 

So my guess is the whole section is carved out  with a huge shardblade, maybe by Honor himself, then that carved out section is then transported and made to stand vertical, transformed through Surges to make Urithiru as we know it.

Prior to cutting the mountain block ,it could have been a mountain with a small peak but great length like Mt Kailash of Nepal, so that once stood up vertical after getting cut the shape would resemble the present shape of Urithiru. Wider at base and narrower as  height increases. Since the mountain is huge stone, makes sense the Spren of Urithiru is a Spren of Stones.

Maybe Honor's Perpendicularity is in that small strip of land in present Makabakam, north of present day Purelake on the map. 

The cut section was later filled with water making it the Purelake as we know it today.

 

[Gilphon]

On 4/21/2020 at 0:41 PM, Karger said:

It was made after the emergence of the radiants.  We don't know how it was built although Shallan notices similar strata patterns in Kholinar.

Not so. Nohadon has to be pre-Radiant, since the Knights based their ideals and philosophies off of his writings. And he of course walked to Urithiru, so the city had to have been build before he wrote his book. And indeed, we have a Ketek in the WoK epigraphs referring to the city as 'the birthplace of Radiants':

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"Radiant / of birthplace / the announcer comes / to come announce / the birthplace of Radiants."

But, of course, he wasn't pre-Surgebinding, since Nohadon himself was a surgebinder, and the city can't be pre-surgebinder because you need a Shardblade to access it. But that's kind of a distinction that matters when we're talking timelines. And when we're talking Urithiru. It's thought of today as the stronghold of the Radiants, but it pre-dates any form of Radiant organization and thus certainly wasn't built by the Radiants. 

It's also worth noting that they are reference to Urithiru not being built by mortal hands:

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"They lived high atop a place no man could reach, but all could visit. The tower city itself, crafted by the hands of no man."

And then of course there's the line that says that they asked for it to be placed in the mountains:

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"Though many wished Urithiru to be built in Alethela, it was obvious that it could not be. And so it was that we asked for it to be placed westward, in the place nearest to Honor."

So whoever decided to build the city had to convince some third party to actually make the thing. Which would fit if it was created by Honor or The Sibling or some powerful entity like that. Which also makes sense because it's the more advanced piece of architecture we've seen on Roshar; far beyond the Dawncities. So whatever was done to make it, it wasn't something repeatable. 

[RShara she/her]

6 hours ago, Wyndle88 said:

Something has been bugging me.

Urithiru is built such a way that the Eastern side I think is flat. As though cut by shard blade.

So that got me thinking, what else do we know that is huge and is perfectly flat?

My answer is Purelake which is described as water reaching up to a man's knee throughout. 

So my guess is the whole section is carved out  with a huge shardblade, maybe by Honor himself, then that carved out section is then transported and made to stand vertical, transformed through Surges to make Urithiru as we know it.

Prior to cutting the mountain block ,it could have been a mountain with a small peak but great length like Mt Kailash of Nepal, so that once stood up vertical after getting cut the shape would resemble the present shape of Urithiru. Wider at base and narrower as  height increases. Since the mountain is huge stone, makes sense the Spren of Urithiru is a Spren of Stones.

Maybe Honor's Perpendicularity is in that small strip of land in present Makabakam, north of present day Purelake on the map. 

The cut section was later filled with water making it the Purelake as we know it today.

 

The Purelake isn't perfectly flat. The water is, because it's so shallow and still. The lake bed has crevices and crannies and promontories and the like and it varies in depth.

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At its deepest, it was never more than six feet from shimmering surface to the bottom—and in most places, the warm, slow-moving water came up only to about mid calf.

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He walked confidently through the water, though the footing could sometimes be precarious. The pleasantly warm water lapped at his legs just below the knees, and he made very few splashes. He knew to move slowly, careful not to put his weight down before he was sure he wasn’t stepping on a spikemane or a sharp lip of rock.

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The Purelake drained into pits and holes when the storms came, and so you just shoved your raft into a crevice between two ridges of stone and huddled up next to it, using it to break the fury of the tempest. 

And I'm pretty sure the stormward side of Urithiru is flat because it's a giant pane of glass?

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The tiers of the city, despite looking circular from the front, were actually more half-circles, with the flat sides facing east. The edges of the lower levels melded into the mountains to either side, but the very center was open to the east. The rooms up against that flat side had windows there, providing a view toward the Origin.

And here, in this central shaft, those windows made up one wall. A pure, single unbroken pane of glass hundreds of feet tall. In the day, that lit the shaft with brilliant sunlight. Now, it was dark with the gloom of night.

 

Edited April 25, 2020 by RShara