Specifcally in terms of Hawking it is a bit hard to look past the King Arthur comparisons, i find the actual tactical discussions and how the battles are managed to have clearer traces. A lot of what Mat quotes when discussing war and a general's place in it is extremely similar to Clausewitz or Machiavelli (although Mat is extremely ANTI-Machiavellian in areas other than war of course), the insistence that a general that leads the charge has surrendered his baton and the capability to lead and the very strong insistence on adaptability for example. his invention of cannons too and his instruction on their uses. The incredible value Mat places on speed and his desired results are very 'Blitzkrieg'-ish too...various considerations around scouting and logistics...but so much has become general knowledge it could have also all so easily been incidental. The cannon thing makes me think the closest historical figure to Mat in terms of war is Napoleon, who was an expert in use of cannon and especially 'defeat in detail' which Mat is arguably the absolute best in (not even mentioning them both being preeminent tacticians and generals of course). ...also OP Genghis Khan did not create the largest empire in history, that would be the British Empire.

Does Callandor -> Excalibur belong on the list? Information about Excalibur's etymology indicates it has historically been referred to by names that are similar to Callandor.

Cadsuane never had children. Everything else seems right. I guess if you'll probably outlive your children and grandchildren it can be a bit off-putting to having kids. It reminds me of the witches in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy, where the witches have children with mortal men but if its a boy the kid dies and the witch long outlives them.

HOW DID I NOT KNOW ABOUT THIS!!!

I'll make your day: YJVG OVVT PECP CZWG FXCK OECD UIWO WEJK ZNIB ONXR WZXS FHUT KBHG HYYS TYNX EHPX TAP

Aes Sedai with family ties, husbands, or children appear to be a rare exception. In that sense, they could be seen as forerunners of modern career women, devoting themselves primarily to their duties and responsibilities within the White Tower while avoiding emotional attachments whenever possible. The only exception I am aware of seems to be Cadsuane Melaidhrin, who is mentioned somewhere as having had children in the distant past. Beyond that, I cannot recall any other example of an Aes Sedai maintaining family bonds. Moreover, due to their longevity, Aes Sedai generally outlive their children and grandchildren, should they ever have had any. Do you have information I may have overlooked?

Well, the Aes Sedai actually know the Creator and the Dark One exist. Do you pray to the most powerful being you know exists? I bet he'd like it, but it's not going to get you anywhere. The whole thing about religion is that you believe without having concrete evidence. Otherwise it's no longer religion and becomes science, politics, and so on.

The Creator is mentioned muliple times as the being who spun the Wheel of Time and imprisoned the Dark One. The Creator does not intervene in the world, nor is worship directed toward them. Peopl seem to talk about him, but there seems to be neither veneration, or any sort of prayer directed towards him. Isn't that somewhat peculiar? On the other hand there is the Dark One, a direct opponent to the Creator and though feared by most people, there must be quite a lot of them (Darkfriends mainly) who revere and even venerate him. So these people obiously adhere to some sort of religion, even though it's the Shadow and not the Light they enshrine. The group that comes closest to a religious order are the Children of the Light, though their creed is largely confined to a fanatical persecution of those they deem their enemies. It seems to me that the Creator of the universe is left wanting, since not even his most steadfast champions, the Aes Sedai, display the slightest trace of a religious inclination. Correct?

Thank you for your comment, I must have forgotten this detail, for its already quite a while, when I finished reading the whole epos. Padan Fain must have shed his outward semblance and all trace of ordinary human bearing with dreadful haste, descending into the pitiful shadow of a form he now parades before the world.

Moiraine, like most of her order, once again embodies the great silent ones—mysterious, aloof, and seemingly too exalted to convey even the simplest matters to “ordinary” mortals. I know my criticism is severe, yet with many of our heroines I find myself missing the touch of normal human behavior, and my sympathy for them remains rather limited.

She used the one power while handing them out in the first place to compel them, the use of the one power should have been enough, with normal people those coins would have become family heirlooms passed down for a hundred years. It would have been a thousand times weirder for an AES SEDAI to actually bother explaining ANYTHING to a bunch of village kids, if that happened there would just be a post instead of this one called "Why does Moiraine TELL the boys that they should keep the coins and thus tip them off that something is strange with them? Why would an Aes Sedai bother explaining themselves when they ddin't have to? Isn't this passage in the book weird? it doesn't make sense!!!"

It is the Fain. Rand confirms it in Fal Dara when they capture him.

I think RJ lost “the drive” to move this series forward as his health declined. Even though things started slowing down in POD and WH, those books have improved significantly upon re-read. This morass of Crossroads and Knife is really putting a sour taste on the series. And I’ve been reading straight through. Perhaps in a few more years, it would be fun to load the first nine books into AI, pepper in some good excerpts plus a few notes on various storylines (Galad and the Whitecloaks, the Moraine rescue, The Last Battle, etc.) and give it 2,000 pages to finish out the series. I wonder…

Also he sees that Wolfbrother in Ghealdan and hes afraid of losing himself like that becoming an actuall wolf in a man's body.

I thought he would pretend to come across them escaping and kill them as a way to get rid of darkfriends. Isn't that the very conclusion Perrin comes to.

Who is the beggar, clad in rags and hiding his face beneath a hood, who pursues Rand in Caemlyn and forces him to vanish into the crowd? Is it Padan Fain? On the other hand, it is unclear—indeed even unlikely—that Padan Fain could have entered into a symbiosis with Mordeth AND the Dark Lord in such a relatively short time (since the boys had left the Two Rivers), and thus present himself in such a degraded appearance.

So nobody tried his luck? I'm a little bit disappointed, it isn't as difficult as you might think. Need any further help from me? Be free to contact me my friends!

Thanks a lot for showing me this picture, this guy must realy be well known in your country! I am deeply moved that a Black African is being honored with a statue. Greetings and best 73 from Caelan --.../...--

Perrin and Egwene find themselves in the hands of the Whitecloaks, and should they reach Caemlyn, they face torture and death. Because of Perrin’s bond with the wolves, they are branded as Darkfriends, and Jaret Byar in particular delights in painting vivid pictures of the fate that awaits them. As a side note: while reading The Wheel of Time series, I was never entirely certain whether Byar was merely an odious fanatic or in truth a Darkfriend—just my personal impression. Now to my question: why does Byar offer his prisoners the chance to escape, even providing them with the means (he lets a stone blade fall beside Perrin)? Is it simply his fear that the wolves might wreak havoc upon the company? Or is it a more insidious scheme—to let the captives flee only to hunt them down and kill them while on the run? I would welcome your thoughts.

I can see why RJ set things up the way he did, then how Sanderson wrapped it up. It just seemed RJ didn't know how he wanted to get there, and yeah, those chapters and that journey took way way longer than it really needed to.

Yep, that’s The Great Hunt. Except it was just Rand who had the instruments.

'Manually drilled holes' makes me think of a hand-held manual drill with a hand crank. But John Henry made holes in the rock by by hitting a steel spike/drill with a large hammer, maybe a sledge. This picture shows what I had always imagined. He look ready to crush some trolloc skulls...

If I remember correctly, Rand and Mat had both flute and harp. They return both to Thom later on and he grouses about the harp being out of tune.

In Whitebridge, Mat and Rand are separated from Thom during an attack by a Fade. Thom abandons—or perhaps loses—his instruments as he hurls himself against the Myrddraal to save the boys. From this event, Rand comes into possession of the flute, which sustains him during his long journey to Caemlyn by providing a means of livelihood. Yet the fate of the harp remains uncertain. Was it lost, or did Rand dispose of it along the way? Has anyone a clue?

It wasn't a list on merit 🙂 Mehmet is something of a hero to me. I was a huge fan of Alan Savage as a young man (a pseudonym of Christophe Nicole iirc) with such titles as Ottoman, the Eight Banners and Moghul, and while his books centre on English imports into the narrative I think they are fairly historically accurate. Don't think I have Ottoman in my collection (was a library kid) but have picked up a few since. And I'm sure there is a whole bunch of interesting historical figures I haven't touched on. My brain was obviously busy with Japan if you look at my examples. Not that there is anything wrong with that, the Sedoku Jidai is a fascinating period of history, but there are many many many such eras around the world. Sadly. When you think about it.