Previous Dragons

[Bentrudagi]

Is LTT the only other Dragon that we know by name?

Do the Dragons always come from the same area of Randland?

It just seems odd that given the size of the world, two Dragons in a row came from the same geographic region. If the Dragon were to be spun into Seanchan or the Land of Madmen, would anyone outside of that area even know about it?

 

Anyway, just a thought as I am re reading through the series.

 

[wotfan4472]

Yes, LTT is the only other named Dragon.

 

Rand is connected to LTT only because he was prophesied to be born where he died. Which is kind of the point of that soul when fulfilling the role as Dragon, though that soul was reborn between those two lives.

 

That the soul was born more than once after LTT is a huge can of worms for the story, and one with an ongoing debate of the implications, and which lives they lived.

Edited August 24 by wotfan4472

[Sabio]

I forget if RJ ever said if Ishy sometimes is the dragon, but LTT's and Ishy's souls are linked so they will always oppose one another.  The heores of the horn are rare souls who are always destined to play a part in things throughout history (though not every rebirth is a heroic life, Brigette once mentioned something about being a farmers wife or something and being miserable),  LTT and Ishy souls will always eventually end up as the light and dark champions. 

 

It's also hard to say if they're from the same region since the land changed so much after the breaking.  

Edited August 31 by Sabio

[Andra]

It is my understanding that while "Champion of the Light" is a role the Wheel spins out time after time, "Dragon" was just a nickname - Lews Therin's nickname.

In the same way that "Silverbow," "Farstrider" and "Goldeneyes" are nicknames.

 

It's not that LTT is the only Dragon we know by name, it's that the name only ever applied to him.  Rand is the Dragon Reborn because he is literally LTT's soul reincarnated.  He is also the "Champion of the Light" - just as LTT was.

The Light's champion could be anyone.  Man or woman.  Channeler or not.  But only one person at any given time.

[Asthereal]

On 9/1/2024 at 9:13 PM, Andra said:

It is my understanding that while "Champion of the Light" is a role the Wheel spins out time after time, "Dragon" was just a nickname - Lews Therin's nickname.

In the same way that "Silverbow," "Farstrider" and "Goldeneyes" are nicknames.

 

It's not that LTT is the only Dragon we know by name, it's that the name only ever applied to him.  Rand is the Dragon Reborn because he is literally LTT's soul reincarnated.  He is also the "Champion of the Light" - just as LTT was.

The Light's champion could be anyone.  Man or woman.  Channeler or not.  But only one person at any given time.

 

This is a good point. In previous turnings of the Wheel, the champion of the Light may have been called the Tiger or whatever else you can think of. Dragon is a nickname for Lews Therin, but perhaps earlier champions got different nicknames. From book 1 onwards it's made clear that we can't know what happens in previous turnings of the Wheel. Stories turn to myth, myth turns to legend and will be long forgotten when the Age that gave them birth comes again.

 

In the story we get actual accounts of things that happen in the last bit of the Second Age, and we get hints of things that happened in the First Age (pay attention to stories that Thom tells in book 1 especially), but we get nothing from before then. We're at the end of the Third Age, so we're missing all info from Ages seven, six and five. We do get a few hints of what COULD happen in the fourth Age, but Rand prevents that particular disaster, so we're not sure what we can expect the fourth Age to bring.

 

My personal theory is that at least one of the Ages will be extremely long (think in terms of hundreds of millions of years, perhaps a billion+) and at least one of the Ages will have no humans at all. Probably those two align. During that time, the entire surface of the Earth is renewed, all evidence of human activity is erased and when humans arrive again and start to get organized, we get the First Age where humans achieve technological advancements, then after discovery of the One Power we get the Second Age and from here everything we know happens again in roughly the same way as it always does, because the Creator designed it that way.

Edited September 3 by Asthereal

[Samt]

There are a lot of questions regarding past and future turnings of the wheel that aren't really answered conclusively.  What does it really mean for ages to repeat?  Certainly, it's not the exact same down to every random farmer choosing to get a drink of water at the exact same time.  It's probably just a repetition of general movements of history, and even that seems to have a good deal of variability.  The champion of the light coming back to fulfill his destiny in the 3rd age after failing before is a major theme of the story we get, but I'm not even sure that this always happens in every turning.  

 

How often do souls come back and what is the significance of this?  The heroes of the horn and certain others seem to frequently occupy important roles, but even for them it seems to vary.  They also sometimes come back in mundane roles.  Some eastern religions that feature reincarnation also have concepts of progression and consequences that reverberate through incarnations.  Similar concepts would give more meaning to the repetitions in WoT, but they aren't really explored much.  What does it really mean for the same soul to come back if he or she has no memory of past lives and the present life doesn't seem to be connected to or dependent on past lives in any way?  Why does it matter that it's the same soul? 

 

Rand is the only main character that has a defined past life.  Maybe Egwene is Latra Posae Decume.  Maybe Elayne is Ilyena.  Maybe Mat is Aemon.  But in spite of the similarities, there are good reasons to doubt that those are actually the same souls.  

[Sabio]

Very few souls are destined for important roles every time, RJ said the forsaken are not destined to be forsaken every time, that would eliminate free will.  The good and bad people will mostly be different.,  LTT, Ishy, hero of the horn are the exceptions.

 

As for the turnings, the only thing that is guaranteed to be the same are certain events.  Things such as at some time the world will forget the DO exists, a hole will be drilled, breaking.  But what happens in each age and the length of each age varies.