Rhyshadium Aren't Horses

[ElMonoEstupendo]

Not as we understand them, at least.

Brandon's been sly with his fauna naming in Stormlight - Rosharans call birds "chickens", small mammals "minks", and insects "cremlings". We know that we would recognise a lot of animals as something else.

What would we recognise Rhyshadium as?

Behold, Oathbringer: Chapter 10:

Quote

He reached in with the other hand and took out some sugar lumps, which Gallant consumed eagerly.
"You're as bad as Aunt Navani," Adolin noted. "That's why you came running, isn't it? You smelled treats."
The horse turned his head, looking at Adolin with one watery blue eye, rectangular pupil at the center. He almost seemed... offended.

That's right. Rhyshadium are Giant War Goats.

The other possibilities are sheep, octopuses, and toads. That would be ridiculous, though.

[Brgst13]

Unfortunately...

Quote

Questioner #1 (in Mistborn cosplay) (paraphrased)

Do Ryshadium exist because of a spren bond, like greatshells?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yea, they evolved symbiotically with spren, unlike other horses. They can still mate will other horses, but they are genetically distinct.

OdysseyCon 2016 (April 8, 2016)

 

[ElMonoEstupendo]

33 minutes ago, Brgst13 said:

Unfortunately...

 

There are other War Goats the Rosharans call horses, which you will not convince me Brandon isn't talking about here.

[+robardin he/him]

Um, horses (IRL) also have horizontal "rectangular" pupils, as do goats.

 

[Inquisitor #5]

Slight problem:

Horses very much also have horizontal pupils.

 

¤_¤

[ElMonoEstupendo]

I'm going to die fighting on this Giant War Goat hill.

You fools! You've fallen into the classic trap, of mistaking a compressed oval for a rectangle. Ha! Surely Adolin would not make such an error.

[Frustration he/him]

3 hours ago, ElMonoEstupendo said:

You fools! You've fallen into the classic trap, of mistaking a compressed oval for a rectangle. Ha! Surely Adolin would not make such an error.

Brandon is scared of horses, so I doubt he has in depth knowledge

[ElMonoEstupendo]

1 minute ago, Frustration said:

Brandon is scared of horses, so I doubt he has in depth knowledge

This sounds to me like more evidence for Rosharan "horses" really being Giant Goats.

[Weltall]

...you realize that you're arguing against both biology and the author's direct statements, right? At this point you're either not going to be convinced or you're just having a joke for the sake of it. Also, have a few more WoBs:

Quote

Questioner

I'm really curious about Ryshadium. Is there something bigger about them?

Brandon Sanderson

It's not super-huge. They are non-native species who have started to form spren bonds like native species do. So, a symbiotic bond with a spren has started happening. Ryshadium are horses that have done that, basically. You could say that humans have done the same thing. Non-native species that have started to form spren bonds. The Ryshadium are the only other non-native species that that has started happening. Like the chasmfiends have a symbiotic relationship with the spren that they have, the Ryshadium have a spren.

It's not as visible, but it is there.

Idaho Falls signing (July 21, 2018)

Quote

And I did write one more scene for it this morning that I needed to add, in Kraków, so when you read Stormlight 3 you can know there was one scene that was written in my hotel here.

It involves one of the Ryshadium horses, so you'll know.

Footnote: the scene in question is from Chapter 10 of Oathbringer
Kraków signing (March 21, 2017)

Assuming you're still going to insist on your interpretation for either of the above reasons at this point, further discussion is basically a waste of time.

Edited September 7, 2021 by Weltall

[ElMonoEstupendo]

18 minutes ago, Weltall said:

...you realize that you're arguing against both biology and the author's direct statements, right? At this point you're either not going to be convinced or you're just having a joke for the sake of it. Also, have a few more WoBs:

Assuming you're still going to insist on your interpretation for either of the above reasons at this point, further discussion is basically a waste of time.

You have keenly discerned that I'm having a bit of fun. But it's also an exercise in spinning out crackpot theories from a single phrase, because it's not explicitly denied anywhere, and testing ideas through argument, and learning more about the cosmere through incidental research. 

I think the above are an enjoyable feature of these forums. Probably related to Brandon's propensity to play with wording and to leave a mixture of foreshadowing clues, mechanical progression, and fun red herrings (is there a Rosharan word for "herring"?).

So I'm afraid these WoBs fall into the same issue that the previous one did - Brandon often refers to creatures by their in-universe label. The best you can say is I'm probably wrong. I AM probably wrong. But can you prove it?

[Inquisitor #5]

Quote

Unfortunately there was nothing to steal there—unless you liked eating mush, and this strange meat they put in everything. It came from some beast that lived on the mountain slopes, an ugly thing with dirty hair all over it. Lift thought they tasted disgusting, and she'd once tried to eat a roofing tile.

-Edgedancer, chapter 4

Quote

He was using a strange little horse—it was shaggy and white, and had horns on its head. Looked like those animals that were terrible to eat out west.

-Edgedancer, chapter 7

These are, IMO, clear descriptions of goats and the second quote also gives us a list of traits that make this "horse" different, being shaggy, white and horned, implying that this is not true for regular horses.

There's also the fact that the textual description of actual horses people ride have never sounded like they were describing not-a-horse to me and I have experience both with horseback riding and just being around horses because one of my parents used to own a horse.

Also, it's unlikely that Brandon wouldn't have steered us right in ten plus years, I don't think he'd play around with common words like that without making it clear. Compare how chicken is used.

Quote

"Rhyshadium have stone hooves," Renarin said, "stronger than ordinary horses'. Never need to be shod."

-Oathbringer, chapter 10

So, a goat's foot looks like this:

Pray, how would you shoe that? 

Keep in mind that goat's hooves grow quickly enough that they need regular trimming if the ground isn't rough, presumably because goats are adapted to rocky terrain.

This would then imply that War Goats would be a better fit to the very rocky Roshar than the Rosharan horses, which is definitely a point in favour of camp not-goat.

And for completeness, shod horse's hooves:

I hope this helps settle this.

 

 

¤_¤

[ElMonoEstupendo]

Now that's some quality evidence. Textual proof that:

• Goats are a thing on Roshar.
• They're called "horses" by Rosharans, but they...
• Are distinct from the horse-horses people ride.
• Horse-horses are shod.

So that's pretty conclusive that normal horse breeds on Roshar are not goats, but what we would recognise as genuine horses. It doesn't on its own mean that Rhyshadium aren't Giant War Goats, because if anything it reads that they're well suited to rocky terrain, aren't shod, and goats are called horses.

Together with the WoB about them being genetically close to normal Rosharan horses, though, I think that narrows down my hope to one small possibility: that Brandon was talking about the goat-horses, not the far more widespread horse-horses, in that WoB.

I think that's stretching the limits of believability. I concede the point.

Edited September 7, 2021 by ElMonoEstupendo

[Brgst13]

13 hours ago, ElMonoEstupendo said:

I'm going to die fighting on this Giant War Goat hill.

You fools! You've fallen into the classic trap, of mistaking a compressed oval for a rectangle. Ha! Surely Adolin would not make such an error.

Inconceiveable!

[Frustration he/him]

49 minutes ago, Brgst13 said:

Inconceiveable!

 

Edited September 8, 2021 by Frustration