How the Desolations Started

[Letryx13]

So, I've had a couple of theories for a while now that I've wanted to put out there. I don't know if a WoB contradicts them, but I figured I should post this first one. 

The storm father's explanation in Oathbringer of how the desolations started began with the fuzed and singers attacking humans and the heralds creating the oathpact to stop them. But why exactly did the ancient singers attack in the first place?

The way the books are set up, it appears as though after humans arrived on Roshar, they attacked the singers, and the singers retaliated, turning to Odium for power.  But this never made much sense to me.  First of all, it's never explicitly stated what the humans did to the ancient singers, and second, why would Honor choose to side with human invaders over the people of the world he'd made his home?  The first point is actually very important.  Sanderson has managed to use character's assumptions to set the tone of the series to great effect so far.  Describing the thrill in such a way that readers naturally assumed it to be adrenaline is one of the best examples. The Ella Stele, the ancient document showing that humans were the original VoidBringers, only states that the humans betrayed them, with the betrayal extending to spren, stone, and wind.  But, just as with the "Lost Radiants", the betrayal is not explicitly described.  That seems intentionally vague to me.  As if leaving enough room for something to be interpreted as a betrayal, with the singers interpreting the humans' actions as one, even if it hadn't been intended as one.

As I said, the second thing that didn't make sense was why Honor would choose humans who'd supported Odium over the singers who had been of Roshar, especially if they had betrayed the singers who had taken them in.  Imagining it as humans going back and forth between Honor and Odium seems unlikely.  I think it much more likely that the human abandoned Odium shortly after arriving on Roshar.  They saw Honor, and maybe Cultivation, as being more worthy deities, and chose to worship them instead.  But then, what triggered the Desolations?

Jealousy.

As the introduction to chapter 32 of WoR, we get the following passage from a listener's song. 

The spren betrayed us, it's often felt.

Our minds are too close to their realm

That gives us our forms, but more is then

Demanded by the smartest spren,

We can't provide what the humans lend,

Though broth are we, their meat is men.

This is the passage that sparked this theory when I first read WoR and then Oathbringer a few years ago, with the last line being the most significant to me. If the Listeners had this song, then they knew about the bond between spren and humans/singers.  And this passage makes it seem like spren seem to prefer humans to singers for some reason.

The betrayals between singers and spren are mentioned in RoW on at least two occasions.  The first is mentioned by Blended during Adolin's trial, when she's testifying against him.  The second betrayal is implied by Leshwi to Venli, when she says the spren have forgiven them.  But what exactly were these betrayals? I think it has to do with how humans can become surge binders much more easily than singers.  Syl tells Kaladin in WoR that Parshendi can't become surgebinders, and Venli expresses her surprise to bonding Timbre in Oathbringer for the same reason.  I don't know why spren can bond humans more easily, my current guess is because their emotions are more accessible, but if large numbers of spren were drawn to humans and away from singers after the humans arrived, that could easily be seen as a betrayal that extends to the spren, wind, and stones.  

This leads to my previous conclusion, where singer jealousy is specifically what triggered all this, which is also the betrayal mentioned by Blended.  Odium almost certainly fanned the flames, increasing the ancient singers' jealousy of humans drawing the spren, and making them angry at the spren for "betraying" them, but that jealousy was his opening. The singers turned to Odium, who granted them the power to take revenge on humans, which made them the easily manipulated army he wanted. 

Thoughts?

Edited November 8, 2021 by Letryx13

[+mdross81 he/him]

1 hour ago, Letryx13 said:

But then, what triggered the Desolations?

Jealousy.

As the introduction to chapter 32 of WoR, we get the following passage from a listener's song. 

The spren betrayed us, it's often felt.

Our minds are too close to their realm

That gives us our forms, but more is then

Demanded by the smartest spren,

We can't provide what the humans lend,

Though broth are we, their meat is men.

This is the passage that sparked this theory when I first read WoR and then Oathbringer a few years ago, with the last line being the most significant to me. If the Listeners had this song, then they knew about the bond between spren and humans/singers.  And this passage makes it seem like spren seem to prefer humans to singers for some reason.

The betrayals between singers and spren are mentioned in RoW on at least two occasions.  The first is mentioned by Blended during Adolin's trial, when she's testifying against him.  The second betrayal is implied by Leshwi to Venli, when she says the spren have forgiven them.  But what exactly were these betrayals? I think it has to do with how humans can become surge binders much more easily than singers.  Syl tells Kaladin in WoR that Parshendi can't become surgebinders, and Venli expresses her surprise to bonding Timbre in Oathbringer for the same reason.  I don't know why spren can bond humans more easily, my current guess is because their emotions are more accessible, but if large numbers of spren were drawn to humans and away from singers after the humans arrived, that could easily be seen as a betrayal that extends to the spren, wind, and stones.  

This leads to my previous conclusion, where singer jealousy is specifically what triggered all this, which is also the betrayal mentioned by Blended.  Odium almost certainly fanned the flames, increasing the ancient singers' jealousy of humans drawing the spren, and making them angry at the spren for "betraying" them, but that jealousy was his opening. The singers turned to Odium, who granted them the power to take revenge on humans, which made them the easily manipulated army he wanted. 

Thoughts?

I think you might be on to something here. But I wonder if it wasn't simply a matter of jealousy, but more that when the spren were drawn to humans, it impacted the singers' ability to work with the spren to manipulate surges to build and create.

We see how this used to happen when Venli is practicing her stoneshaping in RoW 67:

Quote

Remember, the stones said. The ground in front of her stopped rippling and formed shapes. Little homes made of stone, with figures standing beside them. Shaping them. She heard them humming.

She saw them. Ancient people, the Dawnsingers, working the stone. Creating cities, tools. They didn't need Soulcasting or forges. They'd dip lengths of wood into the stone, and come out with axes. They'd shape bowls with their fingers. All the while, the stone would sing to them.

Feel me, shaper. Create from me. We are one. The stone shapes your life as you shape the stone.

Welcome home, child of the ancients.

"How?" Venli asked. "Radiants didn't exist then. Spren didn't bond us ... did they?"

Things are new, the stones hummed, but new things are made from old things, and old peoples give birth to new ones. Old stones remember.

Although it's only said that the "stone would sing to them," I think it's fairly likely that spren were involved in this kind of manipulation of stone. The ancient singers could communicate with them via the rhythms and the spren would then help them manipulate the surges, without any more permanent bond being required.

But, as noted in the listener song you quoted, the singers' minds were too close to the Cognitive Realm. Presumably they could not pull the spren through to the Physical as well as the humans could. And we've heard from at least one spren who has suggested that spren had an interest in exploring the Physical Realm. Here's Pattern in RoW 75:

Quote

"You and the others," Pattern said, "refer to Shadesmar as the world of the spren, and the Physical Realm as 'your' world. Or the 'real' world. That is not true. We are not two worlds, but one. And we are not two peoples, but one. Humans. Spren. Two halves. Neither complete.

"I wanted to be in the other realm. See that part of our world."

So the spren flock to the humans, and the singers lose their abilities to work with the spren to shape stone (and presumably manipulate other surges as well). So not just jealousy but an actual threat to their ability to build and create.

[lukaash]

1 hour ago, mdross81 said:

Although it's only said that the "stone would sing to them," I think it's fairly likely that spren were involved in this kind of manipulation of stone. The ancient singers could communicate with them via the rhythms and the spren would then help them manipulate the surges, without any more permanent bond being required.

This is a really interesting idea. I wonder if the spren could not control this. I don't remember exactly where this is said, but I remember someone talking about how spren were influenced by human thoughts. Mabye the "betrayal" of the spren was more them changing as humans arrived. It was an natural process because people are so open with their emotions and such. Spren were not created by Honor or Cultivation, so they wouldn't know this would happen. The singers would feel betrayed by their gods and turn to Odium. 

3 hours ago, Letryx13 said:

The betrayals between singers and spren are mentioned in RoW on at least two occasions.  The first is mentioned by Blended during Adolin's trial, when she's testifying against him.  The second betrayal is implied by Leshwi to Venli, when she says the spren have forgiven them.  But what exactly were these betrayals? I think it has to do with how humans can become surge binders much more easily than singers.  Syl tells Kaladin in WoR that Parshendi can't become surgebinders, and Venli expresses her surprise to bonding Timbre in Oathbringer for the same reason.  I don't know why spren can bond humans more easily, my current guess is because their emotions are more accessible, but if large numbers of spren were drawn to humans and away from singers after the humans arrived, that could easily be seen as a betrayal that extends to the spren, wind, and stones.  

You bring up two really interesting points here. The first one that I want to bring up is that the spren's leaving of the singers. The emotional spren would have obviously left for humans because they show more emotions, but the spren that represent ideals (honor spren, ink spren, etc.) had the ability to choose. My theory is that the spren that represent ideals never liked the singers. They worked with them because emotional spren worked with them. The singers could get a weaker version of surges from emotion spren. We can see that a bunch of wind spren can stop high storm winds. Mabye all of the emotional spren (when a lot of them are gathered) could influence the surges. The spren that represent ideals would play along and basically allow this manipulation of the surges to happen. Then the emotional spren left, and the spren that represent ideals decided to not give singers bonds to return them the surges. This is at least my theory. The second idea that would be really interesting is what the singers did after they were betrayed. I cannot think of anything that they could have done. Mabye it was something with siding with Odium or mabye they started to mass kill humans. War form singers would be unstoppable for normal humans with no shards. But the singers had to do something really bad. This is kinda out of left field, but mabye the singers did something to create the unmade. They corrupted some spren for odium and then all intelligence spren turned away from them. This would explain why the betrayal was so large because these were important spren.

 

4 hours ago, Letryx13 said:

This leads to my previous conclusion, where singer jealousy is specifically what triggered all this, which is also the betrayal mentioned by Blended.  Odium almost certainly fanned the flames, increasing the ancient singers' jealousy of humans drawing the spren, and making them angry at the spren for "betraying" them, but that jealousy was his opening. The singers turned to Odium, who granted them the power to take revenge on humans, which made them the easily manipulated army he wanted. 

This would also support the idea the singers did something to make the unmade. Odium influenced them to corrupt the spren somehow., and they then spren left them fully.

 

I don't know if I fully agree with what I said above but it is a possibility. I am just trying to think of what the singers could do that would get that reaction. Hopefully we will find out later.

[Letryx13]

5 hours ago, mdross81 said:

I think you might be on to something here. But I wonder if it wasn't simply a matter of jealousy, but more that when the spren were drawn to humans, it impacted the singers' ability to work with the spren to manipulate surges to build and create.

Although it's only said that the "stone would sing to them," I think it's fairly likely that spren were involved in this kind of manipulation of stone. The ancient singers could communicate with them via the rhythms and the spren would then help them manipulate the surges, without any more permanent bond being required.

So the spren flock to the humans, and the singers lose their abilities to work with the spren to shape stone (and presumably manipulate other surges as well). So not just jealousy but an actual threat to their ability to build and create.

It's possible they lost some form of connection to Roshar when the spren started favoring humans, but I doubt they had anything as significant as a Radiant bond.  Sylphrena and Venli both stated that wasn't possible.  The truth is we only really have three confirmed instances of singers actually bonding a radiant spren; Eshonai, Venli, and Rlain.  And all three of those  involved Odium's power in some form or another. Two of them had Void spren inside them, and the third bonded a radiant spren touched by Sja-Anat. Yes, Venli's mother started to recover at the end, but that could just be her becoming a squire.

I think jealousy makes more sense because it's emotional, and that's the sort of thing Odium strikes at to manipulate people. Like Amaram's disappointment over the heralds or Dalinar's guilt over his past. There's a good chance the loss of such connections played a part, but I don't think it was the core problem.

1 hour ago, lukaash said:

This is a really interesting idea. I wonder if the spren could not control this. I don't remember exactly where this is said, but I remember someone talking about how spren were influenced by human thoughts. Mabye the "betrayal" of the spren was more them changing as humans arrived. It was an natural process because people are so open with their emotions and such. Spren were not created by Honor or Cultivation, so they wouldn't know this would happen. The singers would feel betrayed by their gods and turn to Odium. 

You bring up two really interesting points here. The first one that I want to bring up is that the spren's leaving of the singers. The emotional spren would have obviously left for humans because they show more emotions, but the spren that represent ideals (honor spren, ink spren, etc.) had the ability to choose. My theory is that the spren that represent ideals never liked the singers. They worked with them because emotional spren worked with them. The singers could get a weaker version of surges from emotion spren. We can see that a bunch of wind spren can stop high storm winds. Mabye all of the emotional spren (when a lot of them are gathered) could influence the surges. The spren that represent ideals would play along and basically allow this manipulation of the surges to happen. Then the emotional spren left, and the spren that represent ideals decided to not give singers bonds to return them the surges. This is at least my theory. The second idea that would be really interesting is what the singers did after they were betrayed. I cannot think of anything that they could have done. Mabye it was something with siding with Odium or mabye they started to mass kill humans. War form singers would be unstoppable for normal humans with no shards. But the singers had to do something really bad. This is kinda out of left field, but mabye the singers did something to create the unmade. They corrupted some spren for odium and then all intelligence spren turned away from them. This would explain why the betrayal was so large because these were important spren.

 

This would also support the idea the singers did something to make the unmade. Odium influenced them to corrupt the spren somehow., and they then spren left them fully.

I like your point about the spren not being able to fully control the reaction.  I see it more as just instinctively moving to a better source of food, but that also seems possible. But I doubt the singers could do anything to make the unmade without Odium being directly involved.  They would have needed his power to do something like that.

[LuckyJim]

I think there's a very strong chance that there's going to be some revelation about how the singers were the original aggressors who kicked off the Desolations rather than the humans, but I really don't want that to be the case. Despite seeming like such a huge deal in Oathbringer, the reveal that the humans were the original Voidbringers didn't really do anything to change the way the war progressed. All it really did was change the name they used to refer to the enemy. So if book 5 comes around and reveals the original human settlers didn't actually do anything (intentionally, at least) to harm the singers it would just make me wonder what was even the point of that plot twist in the first place.

[Alcatur]

There is also the conversation between Jezerezeh and Nale to consider:

Quote

“An enemy, yes,” Jezerezeh said. “But an enemy who was correct all along, making me the villain, not you. We will fix what we’ve broken. Ishar and I agreed.

So if this is the conversation before Oathpact was sworn, it means that:

-in the initial conflict Nale opposed Jezerezeh

-Jezerezeh thinks that Nale was right and he himself was wrong

-Oathpact will "fix what they have broken"

 

This implies something more than just the singers starting war; humans see something they had done badly. I am not sure what it means; but Jezerezeh implies that he himself and Ishar broke something which started the cycle. Maybe some of the first bonds were forged by Ishar? Something they did caused the war with Singers? Clearly if Nale opposed them, there must have been some split in humanity. But not on a level so fundamental that they wouldn't agree in the end. Nale doesn't blame Jezerezeh here at all and accepts their offer, so it clearly is not that J&I started the whole thing. 

 

Edited November 9, 2021 by Alcatur

[Letryx13]

7 hours ago, LuckyJim said:

I think there's a very strong chance that there's going to be some revelation about how the singers were the original aggressors who kicked off the Desolations rather than the humans, but I really don't want that to be the case. Despite seeming like such a huge deal in Oathbringer, the reveal that the humans were the original Voidbringers didn't really do anything to change the way the war progressed. All it really did was change the name they used to refer to the enemy. So if book 5 comes around and reveals the original human settlers didn't actually do anything (intentionally, at least) to harm the singers it would just make me wonder what was even the point of that plot twist in the first place.

I think the purpose of that revelation was to show what caused the Recreance, or at least what contributed to it.  And I think the point is to show that in most wars, there's not really an innocent side.  The main reason the singers are fighting now is because of the years their people were enslaved as Parshmen. That's the terrible act humans committed that created the situation they're in. But if it was the singers that started the conflict, and I'm confident it was, then it helps to show how much a tangled up mess a war can become. Which is also kind of the message Dalinar's memoir/biography conveyed.

47 minutes ago, Alcatur said:

There is also the conversation between Jezerezeh and Nale to consider:

So if this is the conversation before Oathpact was sworn, it means that:

-in the initial conflict Nale opposed Jezerezeh

-Jezerezeh thinks that Nale was right and he himself was wrong

-Oathpact will "fix what they have broken"

 

This implies something more than just the singers starting war; humans see something they had done badly. I am not sure what it means; but Jezerezeh implies that he himself and Ishar broke something which started the cycle. Maybe some of the first bonds were forged by Ishar? Something they did caused the war with Singers? Clearly if Nale opposed them, there must have been some split in humanity. But not on a level so fundamental that they wouldn't agree in the end. Nale doesn't blame Jezerezeh here at all and accepts their offer, so it clearly is not that J&I started the whole thing. 

 

That's definitely worth considering, and they're probably discussing the oath pact, but we also don't know who was on which side, or what specific conflict they're talking about. I'm not sure how to weigh it in regards to this theory.

[Blackwarder]

I always thought that the singer betrayal of the spern is somehow connected to the Unmade, my best guess is that odium enticed some of the singers into unmaking one or several sprens into the Unmade we all know and love today. By doing so they effectively killed those spren (maybe the first time a spren ever truely died), a so heinous crime only eclipsed later by the mass genocide the recreance caused.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Blackwarder

[Letryx13]

1 hour ago, Blackwarder said:

I always thought that the singer betrayal of the spern is somehow connected to the Unmade, my best guess is that odium enticed some of the singers into unmaking one or several sprens into the Unmade we all know and love today. By doing so they effectively killed those spren (maybe the first time a spren ever truely died), a so heinous crime only eclipsed later by the mass genocide the recreance caused.

I get why some people would think the Singers created the unmade, but I just don't think they'd have the power before siding with Odium. Plus, changing only nine spren doesn't seem like it would provoke such a reaction. Although I admit, Blended says the Singer betrayal wasn't on such a large scale as the Recreance.

The only evidence against the theory is that Sja-Anat says that she was unmade by Odium's hand. Unless she means that indirectly, then he's the one who created the unmade.

[Blackwarder]

2 hours ago, Letryx13 said:

I get why some people would think the Singers created the unmade, but I just don't think they'd have the power before siding with Odium. Plus, changing only nine spren doesn't seem like it would provoke such a reaction. Although I admit, Blended says the Singer betrayal wasn't on such a large scale as the Recreance.

The only evidence against the theory is that Sja-Anat says that she was unmade by Odium's hand. Unless she means that indirectly, then he's the one who created the unmade.

Not necessarily, I mean it’s a given that Odium was a part of it after all they are His unmades, but let’s say that you have some sort of ancient powerful nearly godspren like type of spren that by allying with Odium the singers were part of the reason they were unmade, maybe the moment the fused were made the unmade were well... unmade.

So the spren flocked to the humans.

[Letryx13]

18 hours ago, Blackwarder said:

Not necessarily, I mean it’s a given that Odium was a part of it after all they are His unmades, but let’s say that you have some sort of ancient powerful nearly godspren like type of spren that by allying with Odium the singers were part of the reason they were unmade, maybe the moment the fused were made the unmade were well... unmade.

So the spren flocked to the humans.

I suppose it's possible. But I don't think there's any evidence to support them having that level of power. Or am I forgetting something?

[Blackwarder]

35 minutes ago, Letryx13 said:

I suppose it's possible. But I don't think there's any evidence to support them having that level of power. Or am I forgetting something?

Whos’ level of power? The unmade?

If you mean the singers than I’m sure we will find out that Ulim was there all along whispering instructions from Odium.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Blackwarder

[Frustration]

1 hour ago, Letryx13 said:

I suppose it's possible. But I don't think there's any evidence to support them having that level of power. Or am I forgetting something?

The Unmade are on par with the Sibling and the Nightwatcher.

[Letryx13]

1 hour ago, Blackwarder said:

Whos’ level of power? The unmade?

If you mean the singers than I’m sure we will find out that Ulim was there all along whispering instructions from Odium.

I'm sorry, that was unclear. I meant there wasn't anything supporting the singers having the level of power to create the unmade. I suppose it's possible Odium influenced the singers into it, but they would still have needed His power to pull it off.

5 minutes ago, Frustration said:

The Unmade are on par with the Sibling and the Nightwatcher.

I meant the singers didn't have the power to make the unmade, sorry, I wasn't clear.  But I always kind of figured the unmade were on par with BondSmith spren.  Imagine if one of them bonded someone to make a "radiant".

 

[City of Sauronicon]

On 11/8/2021 at 1:06 PM, mdross81 said:

(...) the spren flock to the humans, and the singers lose their abilities to work with the spren to shape stone (and presumably manipulate other surges as well). So not just jealousy but an actual threat to their ability to build and create.

I wonder if this is somehow foreshadowed by Eshoni's musings over not being able to find Art Form, and the further emphasis on the listeners being terrible at it and admiring human creations. It seems like throw away world building, but...

Edited November 15, 2021 by City of Sauronicon

[Letryx13]

5 hours ago, City of Sauronicon said:

I wonder if this is somehow foreshadowed by Eshoni's musings over not being able to find Art Form, and the further emphasis on the listeners being terrible at it and admiring human creations. It seems like throw away world building, but...

The Thrill seemed like a throwaway description of adrenaline until Oathbringer. Never underestimate the subtlety of a write of Sanderson's caliber.