Seanchan Prophecy; Fact or Fiction

[Majsju]

Ishy was only partially sealed, so he was free at various points during the last 3000 years. Manipulating Hawkwing, as Cuba mentioned, and also running the trolloc war, and creating the Black Ajah.

 

And of course, Healing LTT from his madness, resulting in LTTs suicide and the creation of Dragonmount... ;D

[Smalley]

I missed that. Where was it mentioned?

[a5m]

One mention was during Rand's time in the columns of Rhuidean. An Aes Sedai mentions that one of the forsaken was loose. Ishamael also mentions during various dream sequences with the Taveren.

[Majsju]

The very start of WOT, the prologue of TEOTW shows Ishy out and about after he was supposed to be sealed in the Bore...

[Seaine Sedai]

I missed that. Where was it mentioned?

 

First off, in the Prologue of EOTW, when LTT meets with Ishy, Ishy is already supposed to be bound like the other Forsaken, but obviously he's not.  Over the course of many books and through some references in the BWB, you can piece together by several tauntings from Ishy/Moridin that he was only partially bound and had certain influence over some periods of time when all the other Forsaken were still bound.  The BWB hints heavily that some people in these periods of time might have been Ishy's alter ego during then.  The two biggest hints being that they would show up out of nowhere and disappear (I think around 40 year later) just as as quickly, chaos would ensue around this person alone, and that he never aged a day in those 40 years.

So although nobody ever comes out and just states everything clearly, you're beaten over the head by so many clues that this is the only conclusion you can draw about Ishy and his influence on the world in the past Age, despite that he was supposedly bound with all the other Forsaken.  That Aginor and Balthamel were only partially bound in a such a way where they aged to the point of being walking rot (Aginor confirms this at the end of TEOTW) shows that being partially bound is possible.  But Aginor and Bathamel were too tightly bound to actually DO anything, unlike Ishy.

[Sharaman]

Ok - Loony theory time.

The Crystal Throne was originally the ceremonial seat of Lews Therin Telamon in the Hall of the Servants.

So Rand will serve the CT and bow to the CT by reclaiming it.

Like Callandor, the CT is attuned to his personal vibrations in some fashion and when he comes before it, it will "recognise" him and allow him to sit in it, or sparkle with rainbows or produce some other sign, maybe even a voice-recorded "Hail Master, Awaiting your command" to acknowledge that he is the boss.

He will then bow to it and swear to serve it in a recreation of his AoL oath-of office.

Fortuona will accept his authority due to the CT's response. 

 

Evidence for this (admittedly thin)

The CT is a ter'angreal that induces awe. The seanchan don't make ter'angreal except for A'dam. So it must be pre-Breaking. Since it induces awe, it was presumably the ceremonial seat of some major honcho. The most major honcho was the chief of the AS. Hence, it was his/hers.

It may also be a sang'real (unlikely but possible), perhaps even the once-mentioned male sang'real that is in-between Callandor and CK in power.

 

If this is true, the CT was taken over by the Seanchan imperial line and they sat on it.

 

But it would have been attuned to the last AS who formally swore an oath to serve it and it would recognise him and he (assuming Rand can draw on LTT's memories) will know what to do with it.

The Seanchan imperial family will have some secret legends that the "High King" has first claim on the throne and since Rand also has the High King's sword --.; maybe Justice itself is some sort of key as well.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Diederichos]

I think that if the Seanchan found Hawkwing's empire alive and well and his descendants, they still would have invaded as their claim was stronger to them. Yes, they consider themselves his successors, but ultimately they are number one. I think it's more likely that Justice might be considered theirs and not be a...how can I put it, momentous deal-sealing thing. That is if they somehow even realize that it is his to begin with.

[Luckers]

I've often wondered what would happen if the Seanchan returned to find Hawkwing's Empire intact and a descendent of Hawkwing on the Throne as High King. The Seanchan themselves don't award the throne to the eldest, so claims that Luthair's descendents should have supremacy over the line of High King's is problematic.

 

Plus, what would have happened if they returned, everything was well except Aes Sedai don't wear leashes.

 

I suspect war as well, but I would have been interested to see their reactions.

[Sentinel78]

Alright--though I would point out that wide-spread is not universal. There is a wide-spread belief that the Forsaken were bound at the moment of creation, and that the Dragon will fight on the side of the Shadow, but many know the truth there. Similarily the sul'dam--those who would be recording these 'fortunes' may well know that only some damane can do it, even though the population in general believes all can.

 

But, ok, say they do believe it of all damane--consider, most damane would be telling fortunes based on the omens and the like, not giving genuine foretellings. As such why would they give a fortune on the Dragon or the Last Battle?

 

Random Sul'dam: Tell my fortune.

 

Random damane: er... in 800 years your descendent would go to a meeting with the Dragon Reborn?

 

Random Sul'dam: With the Emperor?

 

Random damane: Uh... yeah sure, let's go with that.

 

See what I'm saying. Even if damane were fabricating fortunes its still likely that those given about the Dragon or the Last Battle are genuine foretellings because... well, why would a fake speak about that?

 

I can think of several reasons as to why a damane with no ability to Foretell would fabricate prophecies.

 

(1) It is reasonable to expect that damane that cannot Foretell mistakenly believe that they can.  It seems to be an accepted assumption, by most in Seanchan, that all damane can Foretell.  So damane #1 can Foretell but damane #2 can't.  Damane #2 sees what damane #1 is doing, figures she should be doing something similar, and so starts describing dreams that she had or something similar because she thinks that's how it's done.  I know people in our world that do similar things without having a culturally-assumed ability.  In other words, maybe they tell themselves they're not lying but convince themselves of their own ability.

 

(2) It is reasonable to assume that damane that produce a high number of prophecies are well rewarded, because the damane-reward structure would incentivize such behavior.  Consider Egwene's experience with Renna in Book 2:

 

"Renna gave me a test, yesterday. I picked out the piece of iron ore, and the copper ore, blindfolded, every time she mixed them up. She left them all here to remind me of my success. She seemed to think it was some kind of reward to be reminded."

 

"It doesn't seem any worse than the rest - not nearly as bad as making things explode like fireworks - but couldn't you have lied? Told her you didn't know which was which?"

 

"You still do not know what this is like." Egwene tugged at the collar; pulling did no more good than channeling had. "When Renna is wearing that bracelet, she knows what I am doing with the Power, and what I am not. Sometimes she even seems to know when she isn't wearing it; she says sul'dam develop - an affinity, she calls it - after a while." She sighed. "No one even thought to test me on this earlier. Earth is one of the Five Powers that was strongest in men. When I picked out those rocks, she took me outside the town, and I was able to point right to an abandoned iron mine. It was all overgrown, and there wasn't any opening to be seen at all, but once I knew how, I could feel the iron ore still in the ground. There hasn't been enough to make it worth working in a hundred years, but I knew it was there. I couldn't lie to her, Min. She knew I had sensed the mine as soon as I did. She was so excited, she promised me a pudding with my supper." She felt her cheeks growing hot, in anger and embarrassment. "Apparently," she said bitterly, "I am now too valuable to be wasted making things explode. Any damane can do that; only a handful can find ores in the ground. Light, I hate making things explode, but I wish that was all I could do."

 

Egwene was given a 'treat' because she had a native ability with ore-detection.  The reward was not based on any strong effort on Egwene's part or to incentivize future good behavior (Egwene notes that she couldn't have lied about it anyway), but simply because she had the ability.  It follows that damane that spout out a Foretelling a day could get a Scooby-snack with dinner every night.

 

Put yourselves in the shoes of a damane.  You could be sent off to battle other damane, to blow-up non-channelers in battle and do other horrible things.  Or, you could become a charlatan Fortune-teller, get special treatment and become too valuable to waste.

 

I'm not trying to suggest this practice is particularly widespread among damane.  My position was mainly that the Essanik cycle is suspect because it is generated and preserved by a culture that fundamentally misunderstands the nature of Foretelling.  Thus, there is weakness in vetting 'good' prophecy from 'bad' prophecy.  The Seanchan version of the K-cycle may be somewhat corrupted, but Ishamael has shown (again and again) that every good lie is comprised of 99% truth so even the Seanchan K-cycle is likely mostly true.  The E-Cycle is of unknown quality.  Personally, I'd put the E-cycle at 85% truth but that's a total guess.

 

 

[Sentinel78]

I couldn't lie to her, Min. She knew I had sensed the mine as soon as I did.

 

Rereading that passage from Egwene, I'll concede that the sul'dam very likely know a true Foretelling from a fake one.  Any sul'dam that has 'felt' a true Foretelling from her damane would be able to recognize it I'd imagine.  So the sul'dam could function as the gatekeepers to keep out fake prophecy perhaps.  Although, if sul'dam are similarly rewarded they'd have the same perverse incentives towards fabrication. 

 

 

[Luckers]

Quote from: Luckers on June 04, 2010, 07:55:26 PM

Alright--though I would point out that wide-spread is not universal. There is a wide-spread belief that the Forsaken were bound at the moment of creation, and that the Dragon will fight on the side of the Shadow, but many know the truth there. Similarily the sul'dam--those who would be recording these 'fortunes' may well know that only some damane can do it, even though the population in general believes all can.

 

But, ok, say they do believe it of all damane--consider, most damane would be telling fortunes based on the omens and the like, not giving genuine foretellings. As such why would they give a fortune on the Dragon or the Last Battle?

 

Random Sul'dam: Tell my fortune.

 

Random damane: er... in 800 years your descendent would go to a meeting with the Dragon Reborn?

 

Random Sul'dam: With the Emperor?

 

Random damane: Uh... yeah sure, let's go with that.

 

See what I'm saying. Even if damane were fabricating fortunes its still likely that those given about the Dragon or the Last Battle are genuine foretellings because... well, why would a fake speak about that?

 

 

 

I can think of several reasons as to why a damane with no ability to Foretell would fabricate prophecies.

 

(1) It is reasonable to expect that damane that cannot Foretell mistakenly believe that they can.  It seems to be an accepted assumption, by most in Seanchan, that all damane can Foretell.  So damane #1 can Foretell but damane #2 can't.  Damane #2 sees what damane #1 is doing, figures she should be doing something similar, and so starts describing dreams that she had or something similar because she thinks that's how it's done.  I know people in our world that do similar things without having a culturally-assumed ability.  In other words, maybe they tell themselves they're not lying but convince themselves of their own ability.

 

(2) It is reasonable to assume that damane that produce a high number of prophecies are well rewarded, because the damane-reward structure would incentivize such behavior.  Consider Egwene's experience with Renna in Book 2:

 

You missed the point. The question was not why would damane fabricate fortunes, but why would they be fabricating fortunes about the Last Battle? It does not serve the purpose they are attempting to achieve--to satisfy their master and gain a reward. As such Fortunes told about the Last Battle are likely to be true, because unless the gift raised the subject, no one else would.

[farthammer]

Wait, why is it assumed that foretellings regarding the LB would not be a big enough deal to the powers that be to start making fabrications about?  The most important upcoming event anyone in the world can think of, and the Empress is just going to be like "Stfu lol" when a damane comes out and says the Dragon Reborn is totally going to kiss Seanchan ass?

[Sentinel78]

 

You missed the point. The question was not why would damane fabricate fortunes, but why would they be fabricating fortunes about the Last Battle? It does not serve the purpose they are attempting to achieve--to satisfy their master and gain a reward. As such Fortunes told about the Last Battle are likely to be true, because unless the gift raised the subject, no one else would.

 

(1) Let's assume you are correct.  Even so (and please correct me if I'm wrong on this point), nothing we've been told indicates that the E-cycle is exclusively about the Last Battle.  It could simply be an aggregation of all alleged Seanchan (even pre-Consolidation Seanchan) prophecies, with some pertaining to the Last Battle.  In this case, your position would be that, at the very least, the Last Battle prophecies would be valid while other prophecies, potentially, less so.

 

(2) I still think that end of world scenarios would be a likely candidate for fabrication.  Look at what Fortune-tellers do in our own world.  They make projections that cannot possibly be verified, and are either set-up to tell you what to want to hear or are about the end of the world.  For example, 200 years into the Consolidation, I heard Damane Nostradamus had all kinds of prophecies.  ;D

 

Everyone in Randland/Seanchan seems to be aware that 'some' titanic struggle with the Dark One will occur at TG (even if some people like Pedron Niall thought the Dragon wouldn't be crucial to it).  I think prophecizing about the end of the world is just a sad fact of human nature.

 

This can't really be resolved, we just have different interpretations of human nature.  Maybe I'm more cynical.

[sumquy]

Doing a reread recently and came across this. One of Egwene's visions in TFoH.

 

"Rand sitting down in a chair, and somehow she knew that the chair’s owner would be murderously angry at having her chair taken; that the owner was a woman was as much as she could pick out of that, and not a thing more."

 

I remember reading it before and had always assumed that it was referring to the Amyrlin seats' seat, but with recent events that seems less likely. Maybe it is the crystal throne that he sits in.

 

Also, the Karetheon Cycle says that he has to bind the daughter of the nine moons to serve him, but with Fortuona claiming the title of empress for herself, who is her heir? Who is the daughter of the nine moons now?

[farthammer]

Wasn't that scene about the lions throne and elayne most likely?  Also I thought the prophecy just said 'nine moons' and not necessarily daughter of.

[sumquy]

Ok, yeah just looked it up. It is "he ‘shall bind the nine moons to serve him’". Moraine says it in TDR. As for it being the lion throne, it doesn't say. The snippet I posted is all it says, but I don't think he ever sat in the lion throne. He put it up on a pedestal behind another chair that he used.

[azrael.1289]

Wasn't that scene about the lions throne and elayne most likely?

Did Rand ever actually sit on the Lion throne? IIRC he wanted to avoid just the reaction described and brought in another throne to sit on.

[farthammer]

No but I wasn't sure if her visions were things that were literally going to be true, when I read that book I had thought it was more open to interpretation than straight foretellings.

 

Edit: Actually now I can't remember if he did in fact sit in it at some point, sorry.

[Cirin]

Wasn't that scene about the lions throne and elayne most likely?  Also I thought the prophecy just said 'nine moons' and not necessarily daughter of.

 

Also, I don't know that Elayne would be described as "murderously angry," since she did still, uh, fool around with him afterwards... unless they mean once the pregnancy hormones set in... I suppose that might make her murderously angry...  ;D

 

I always took that as being the Amyrlin Seat as well, especially coupled with the prophecy about Rand "knowing the Amyrlin's anger" or whatever, but I suppose the Crystal Throne is maybe a possibility.  Since RJ said they're not going to Seanchan again, it'd have to find a way across the ocean on its own, though, so that makes it more unlikely in my book... but we'll see.

[sumquy]

The more I think about this, the more I like it. It doesn't have to be the actual crystal throne that Rand sits in. Tuon was sitting in some kind of throne when she accepted Beslans pledge.

Plus, she was able to resist Rands tavereness before because she saw the darkness around him and would not pledge to that, but could she resist again, if that darkness were no longer there?

[yoniy0]

Everyone in Randland/Seanchan seems to be aware that 'some' titanic struggle with the Dark One will occur at TG (even if some people like Pedron Niall thought the Dragon wouldn't be crucial to it).  I think prophecizing about the end of the world is just a sad fact of human nature.

 

This can't really be resolved, we just have different interpretations of human nature.  Maybe I'm more cynical.

No, I agree. Look at our world. How many different prophecies of the end of the world (or some sort of apocalypse) do you know? Even assuming some are true prophecies (which I don't believe, but that doesn't matter), they can't all be - they contradict one another. Hence we can safely deduce that people would prophesize the end of the world from time to time, be them true prophets, deluded individuals, or charlatans.

 

Ok, yeah just looked it up. It is "he ‘shall bind the nine moons to serve him’". Moraine says it in TDR. As for it being the lion throne, it doesn't say. The snippet I posted is all it says, but I don't think he ever sat in the lion throne. He put it up on a pedestal behind another chair that he used.

In Seanchan calture, the Empror/Empress is 'The Nine Moons' (hence the derived title of the heir, 'the daughter of the nine moons'). Therefore the prophecy refers to Rand biding Fortuona, or else the Empire in general.

Regarding the Lion Throne, I thought it was supposed to be Morgase that was furious with him for that (or would have been, if she learned of it), not Elayne (though she certainly wouldn't appreciate the act, as well). At the time, Morgase was still the true owner of the Rose Crown. And yes, Rand did sit on it once:

Theyre both dead, Rand said bleakly. He sat down on the throne, his head resting against the moonstone Lion of Andor. The throne had been sized for women. I killed Gaebril, but not before he killed Morgase.

[farthammer]

In Seanchan calture, the Empror/Empress is 'The Nine Moons' (hence the derived title of the heir, 'the daughter of the nine moons').

 

Is there a solid reference for this somewhere because it seems to me it might be one of those subtle ambiguities that causes confusion.  Not that you're wrong, but I just don't know if one of her titles is literally "The Nine Moons" or if nine moons is a reference to the empire itself, a collection of regions, or some other entity/entities.

[Cirin]

I don't remember exactly where they mention it, but the royal court is called the "Court of Nine Moons" or something like that.

[yoniy0]

I was assured that this is indeed the case by people who read the BWB. I'd look there for confirmation (or else someone that owns it might supply us with an appropriate quote).

[al Caldazar seicair]

Ishy had Artur Hawkwing send Luthair across the Aryth Ocean. Artur and Luthair are god like in the eyes of the Seanchan. The "pure" version that Luthair had taken with him would be the corrupted version created by Ishy. To prevent the Crystal Throne to kneel before the Dragon. In the culture of Seanchan it would be inconceivable to think that the Empress may she live forever kneel to anyone whether it is the Dragon or the Creator.

 

I would believe that Ishy used Compulsion on Artur not only to attack the White Tower but also have him send his heirs to Seanchan and Shara which left no one to claim his thrown after his death thus leaving the Westlands with multiple sovereignties fighting amongst themselves.

 

I would believe that Ishy had used compulsion on both Luthair as well as his sister. He would have given not only Luthair a "pure" copy but his sister as well. Thus the Blood believes that there copy is unadulterated. The sisters copy would either be lost or destroyed as with her army. Shara defeated her they were either all killed or enslaved.

 

Tuon must submit to the Dragon.

 

I do not think the Dragon will sit on the Crystal thrown. I think that Min's vision is when Rand sat on the Lion thrown and commented that is was made for a woman.