Aether

This somewhat supports my idea that Dalinar is being prepared to be more than a KR.  I think he may be being prepared as a replacement Herald.

 

If we're going to get really technical, Dalinar is already a herald. A herald is defined as "a person who announces important news". Given that Dalinar is shown these visions in the first place, and even directly told to re-establish the Knights Radiant, one could go as far as to describe him as a Herald of the Almighty (though dead).

I would interpret the beggar as asking if Szeth has "seen me" as in, seen him as represented by the statue of Jezerezeh.

 

Interesting. I had not thought of that. With this last piece of circumstantial evidence, I find myself inclined to join the ranks of sharders believing this theory.

 

I am, however, not entirely sold on the idea that the quote about the drooling is indeed referring to Jezrien. It might as well be, but it didn't name him, and it hasn't - to my knowledge - been otherwise confirmed. Could someone conjure up the actual quote?

 

If this were the case, I'd be surprised. Not because it's implausible, but because it's a boring answer to an interesting question, and Brandon is not one to take the fun away from a good question like that.

 

What he said.

Really? Cool! *queue

*

Except Gavilar had gone all Way of Kings on everybody, and the book is pretty clear about how a leader should behave. Bringing back the greatshells so he can use them, one way or another, to take over the world doesn't sound like something Gavilar would do. Try imagining Dalinar telling Adolin that he has a plan that will put him in charge of every Vorin kingdom, and that plan involves pretending that he is a gift from the Almighty himself.

Well, he is receiving visions from the Almighty himself (even though he is dead), he knows that now. So it wouldn't be too far-fetched to extrapolate wildly and randomly and suppose that Dalinar in his megalomaniac schemes to force everyone to bow before The Way of Kings would proclaim himself a prophet of the One True (though dead) God and conquer all Vorin kingdoms as Blackthorn, the Mighty warrior-general of the AlMighty! Even if Gavilar, the wuzz, wouldn't have.

 

I realise, of course, that Dalinar has proclaimed himself utterly uninterested in ruling in one of his POV-chapters, but this is completely irrelevant.

By the gods!

! It all falls into place now!

Anyway, I think the honorblades, assuming they are still in the same place they were left, would now be buried under centuries of crem...

 

Well, we still do not know where on Roshar they are situated, and we do not know the nature of the Highstorms at the time of Aharietiam. For all we know, the battlefield described in the prelude might be far enough away from the Origin for crem not to matter too much. Also, one of the Epigraphs have been suggested as referring to the resting place of the Honourblades:

“Taking the Dawnshard, known to bind any creature voidish or mortal, he crawled up the steps crafted for Heralds, ten strides tall apiece, toward the grand temple above.”

- Epigraph from Chapter 36 of tWoK

 

Of course, it wouldn't be too far-fetched to assume that they are indeed buried away somewhere, but seen in the context of dramatic writing, it seems like a rather boring solution. I suspect Great Master Brandon has something else planned for them.

And thus, with their powers of investing, the Bondsmiths provided for the financial needs of the Kinghts Radiant. 

 

Upvote for being the funniest thing I've read all day!

The Honourblades are described to stand apart even from Shardblades, so I do not find it strange that they would not have been heard from for 4500 years, even if they were found at some point. They could have been hidden away as holy relics, only to be looked upon by the highest of priests, or maybe stored away and hidden from mortal eyes, fearing that they would be too perilous to use and too dangerous to risk getting into enemies eyes, only to in time be forgotten and lost.

 

 

What I do find likely, however, is that they will resurface at some point during the Stormligh Archive decalogy.

 

Also, I like the idea of them having been found by the Shin and made a part of their Stone Shamanism, though the evidence for it is rather flimsy.

Just to add to the idea of Shardplates being different from Shardblades: Syl's apparent revulsion for Shardblades - all the while saying nothing about -plates - might indicate that there is indeed something that makes them fundamentally differ.

 

Rereading this thread, I find myself amused by how far away we've gotten from the original point of debate.

 

And by the way, are we sure that Brandon was actually referring to the Navani's notebook pages in the quote from the first post? It seems likely as it is the only evident thing that we have to "decode", but on the other hand, he refers to it as "Shallan's letter" and places it in the beginning of the book.

 

But if the hints he describes are indeed in Navani's notebook-pages, then I think we can be safe to assume that the Black Sphere is indeed some kind of fabrial (i.e. a gemstone (maybe smokestone/heiodor?) with an (unkown) type of Spren trapped inside).

 

 

@name_here: "Or possibly he intended to resurrect the extinct Greatshell species (Aside from Chasmfiends, they've basically been hunted to extinction), which would provide excellent grounds for proclaiming himself High King of Roshar by Will of the Almighty."

 

I am not sure what you are basing your assumptions on. While Gavilar might have been interested in the challenge of hunting truly gargantuan Greatshells, at least in his early days of exploring the Plains, I do not see how this would lead him to proclaim himself as a High King of Roshar, and definitely not how this would be in the best interest of the Parshendi.

 

You are correct, on the other hand, that the people he listed might have been willing to kill him for political reasons. Sadeas and similar Highlords might have been willing to kill him to stop him from forcing the Codes on them, much like Sadeas betrayed Dalinar (and by the way, Dalinar to comment on Alethi Highlords penchant for not dirtying their own hands by not killing their targets directly, which would fit this into a scenario where the Parshendi were manipulated by a third party). But the mention of Thaidakar and his connection to the Ghostbloods (as mentioned by Amaram in chapter 51) seems ominous, and I think this group is much more likely to be the real puppeteers behind the king's assassination.

It was established that 'gibberish' was the word used in TwoK to describe the Dawnchant Dalinar was speaking, Dawnchant Wit was speaking, and the crazy drunk guy. Also the Lift interlude suggests that Jezrien is currently "drooling" on a permanent basis.

Wait what? When was Wit speakng Dawnchant? I know he used that word when asking Dalinar about Adonalsium, but I don't see how the "gibberish" he then proceeded to use has anything to do with the Dawnchant. Sure, they might, but to me it seems more likely that he was indeed speaking gibberish just to take Dalinar's attention away from the one real word he did use, i. e. Adonalsium.

 

And yes, it is interesting to note that Dalinar's Highstorm language was indeed described as gibberish. From what I understand about Brandon as a writer, it could indeed be the type of subtle easter-egg he would use, but it is still mightily weak grounds for assuming the drunkard was indeed speaking in Dawnchant. And after a careful reread of the prologue, he is nowhere referred to as drooling.

 

The only other evidence is that in TWoKs, it appears that pretty much all the Heralds we know we've seen were casual mentions, including Darkness and his companion. It looks like Brandon was placing them in important places, but he wasn't introducing them to us. This may or may not be the case with Jezrien. If that was Jezrien though, and Szeth practically bumped into him while possessing his sword, I'm kind of surprised that no reference to that was made.

It would be surprising, yes, but that's assuming Szeth's Shardblade is an Honorblade in the first place. I am not entirely convinced it is.

 

Also, the only thing Brandon has said is that all Heralds were either seen or mentioned in tWoK. As far as I know, he did not say to what extent, so the mention and viewing Jezrien got in the Prelude might be all he ever got in the book. In my opinion, there is just WAY to little to go on here. Of course, he might still be Jezrien, but at this point, wehave no firm evidence, only maybe shadows of possible would-be hints and red-herrings.

with regard to bringing back surgebinders, if it happened the night that Gavilar died then Jasnah certainly attracted a spren VERY quickly as she is noticing issues with her shadow almost at the same time as Szeth is beginning his rampage.

 

There is certainly some evidence connecting Gavilars actions / intentions to both the return of Surgebinding and the coming of the Desolation: 

 

Assuming that Return of Parshendo dark gods = Voidbringers = Desolation. Then the Parshendi essentially feared that Gavilar would trigger a Desolation.

 

Good point. It seems whatever made surgebinding resurge (pardon the awful pun) happened some time before the assassination; I assume around the same time as the Death Visions started freaking out surgeons and doctors alike.

 

Also, the timing. Everything seems to start happening the night of Gavilars Assassination. Given other speculation, it seems that many of the Heralds may also have been present at the party that night.

 

Also

The information from the Lift interlude implies that Surgebinders somehow cause a Desolation

 

Didn't Brandon say somewhere that there would be at least some more information about the Sphere already in the next book? And yes you are right

 

 

Also, can someone please explain to me how people can argue for the drunk bearded man being Jezrien (or whomever)? Other then using the "Hey!-A-man-with-a-black-beard!-Jezrien-has-a-black-beard!"-argument, I fail to see how. If one were to really nitpick, one might extrapolate heavily from this quote:

"Have you seen me?" The man asked with a slurred speech. He laughed, then began to speak gibberish, reaching for his wineskin.

- From tWoK Prologue, page 23. (My bold lettering)

"to speak" implies the presence of a structured language, which might be described as "gibberish" by someone failing to understand. Maybe the man was speaking in the Dawnchant or whatever one might call the language of the Heralds? Which Szeth only would have understood as gibberish?

 

Other than that, only the setting itself and that drooling quote from Darkness in the Jasnah WoR chapter (though I don't get how people can deduce that it refers to this drunk man) would indicate that he is anything more than a black.bearded, drunk man who only serves as a means to let on in on a unique part of Alethi culture (i.e. the Beggar's Feast).

I see 1 of 2 possibilities:

 

1) Gavilar wanted the return of the KR.

1a) The Parshendi seem to have a similar notion as Darkness, that having a bunch of surgebinders around will trigger a desolation.

Just like Darkness is out and about executing surgebinders, the parshendi thought of getting rid of a man with these dangerous notions. Maybe the gods of the parshendi are nothing more than surgebinders, and since some of them are turning bad, they are the "dark gods"...

 

1b) There is something that Gavilar would have done thinking it will change the shards in better/make a surgebinder, that the parshendi knew more about and they knew that it would have the side effect - e.g. you can't bring back only the good guys, the bad guys will come with that as well.

 

2) There was something else besides restoring the KR orders that Gavilar had in mind.

 

Those are good guesses, but my point was and is that we have very little information about this stuff, and at best we can only make educated/calculated guesses. I find it quite plausible that Gavilar might have been interested in getting the KR (or at the very least surgebinding) back - the fact that he had acquired an interest in "The Way of Kings" and that he told Dalinar to "find the most important words a man can say" seem to point to this - but in the end we have very little to go on. My intended goal was to try to avoid extrapolation and instead firmly establish that there was indeed several things going on here. What that entails remains to be seen.

 

Regarding the hypothetical return of the Parshendi gods - keep in mind that both Gavilar and Dalinar (at least in the beginning) suspected those to be a few "Monsters of the Chasms" even bigger than the rest.

 

I sincerely doubt that the Parshendi gods has anything to do with the Great-shells of the Plains - at least not in their current form. That particular remark seemed to come from men who still dismissed the Parshendi as uncivilized savages. Besides, there is nothing in the Eshonai chapter to indicate that they are referring to some "Monster of the Chasms" when talking about their gods.

 

Apparently he did do it.  Consider what he said to Szeth:  "You can tell Thaidakar that he's too late."

 

And Taravangian in chapter 71: "But the dying see something.  It began seven years ago, about the time that Gavilar was investigating the Shattered Plains for the first time."

 

He did do something, but not what the Parshendi feared. Again, the whole point of the overly long reasoning was to show that the plan they tried to stop and the plan King Gavilar described as too late to stop are two different things.

 

And yes, I find it extremely interesting that the death visions started approximately a year prior to his assassination. Something happened at the plains, and I wonder what.

Thanks and "warm fuzzies" to both of you. Wish me luck=)

Your [Gloom's] logic is sound. Presented in that light, it seems rather evident that the Parshendi did not know about the Black Sphere (it is referred to as a sphere in the book, and described as black, thus I prefer this terminology). Also, just before he died, Gavilar seemed quite intent on having the sphere remain hidden from whomever he suspected wanted it. It seems thus unlikely that he would show it to the Parshendi or anyone at all.

 

 

But something is not quite right here. It seems to me that there must be several parts to whatever he was planning. First, let's look at it from the Parshendi perspective:

 

 

 

TL;DR: King Gavilar had at the very least two separate major ploys going on, one of which had little to nothing to do with the Parshendi. He was oblivious to the fact that his other plan scared the living rust out of the Parshendi, and the result that they feared was not his intended goal. Whatever the plan entailed, he was killed before he could do it.

 

Gavilar did however expect to be assassinated, not because of what he told the Parshendi ambassadors, but because of the first plan, which seems to have something to do with Thaidakar and the Dark Sphere he gave to Szeth. Whatever the plan entailed, he had already put it into action at the time of his death.

I am not sure we have enough information to assume whether or not the gem contains/traps a Voidspren, a corrupted Spren, or just some Voidlight or whatnot. What seems fair to assume, on the other hand, is that it is intricate to what Gavilar was planning to do, and to what

Hello,

 

I discovered "The Way of Kings" a few years back and found it a fantastical read. Recently, I reread it and found myself trapped by the immensity of lore, plot and character building, in addition to all that bloody (but fun!) foreshadowing-, red-herring- and Easter egg-stuff. Thus, I have plunged myself deep into the wikia, titbits about WoR, and of course, the endless (but fun!) theory crafting. I predict I'll be rather visible on the forums for the next couple of months, and pardon me in advance for any miss-filing of topics and/or repeats of old theories I might do

 

 

But before I begin to post for real, would anyone mind explaining to me how upvotes/downvotes and reputation works? Also, I've noticed some of you have a sort of signature where you show what theories you espouse and stuff. Is there any information somewhere about how one can play around with that?