Hints of Our Age

[Joshua Hendrickson]

"Ghoetam, sitting beneath Avendesora for forty years to gain wisdom."

Ghoetam = Gotama Buddha

[Albion]

"Elsbet, queen of all." Queen Elizabeth, I'm guessing the first as she had an empire.

[idiostock]

"Ghoetam, sitting beneath Avendesora for forty years to gain wisdom."

Ghoetam = Gotama Buddha

 

*Siddhartha Gautama, but yeah, good catch.

[Mrs. Cindy Gill]

Harriet: Peach PITS are poisonous here and now. They’re full of – strychnine? Arsenic? I’ve forgotten which, but they really are bad. The flesh is not. You could look it up. But after one encounter with peach pits, a person would decide the whole thing was poison. This is on a par with the eighteenth century belief that tomatoes were poisonous – some people have an allergic reaction to them.

 

 

That's from Luckers' interview w/ Harriet.

 

 

I googled it not so long ago. I told my friend "As surely as peaches are poison" and he was like "what's that all about?" So I told him it's from WoT. I googled "peaches are poison" thinking that all entries would be WoT related, but instead all entries were related to peaches actually being poisonous right here in our Age. Weird stuff.

 

 

It would be interesting if one the characters didn't know peaches are poison, and went ahead and ate some. Are they really poisonous? Or is it just that people think that? Hmmmm....

 

 

as harriet indicates, the people of the WOT are mistaken - they believe peaches to be poisonous because the pits are, as people used to believe tomatoes are poisonous because the leaves are (nightshade - not just an allergy). but neither the peaches nor the tomatoes are poisonous.

 

it is weird that they singled out peaches since so many fruit have poisonous pits and leaves etc.

[Mr Ares]

Harriet might indicate that the good people of the WoT are mistaken, but RJ seems to indicate the reverse:

- For Child of Lir, peaches being poisonous in the world of The Wheel of Time is one of the things I did to make the world different. Though peach pits do contain small amounts of cyanide, which was once manufactured through processing peach pits. Several other fruits with pits, such as apricots, also have trace amounts of cyanide in the pits. And almonds may be the first genetically engineered plant since humans bred the deadly, to humans, cyanide levels out them to make them edible for people.

That's from the blog. Combined with what's in the text, I'd say weight of evidence indicates that peaches really are poison in WoT.

[Mrs. Cindy Gill]

i will be obstreperous and refuse to accept that as conclusive evidence. because i like harriet, and peaches, and i'm in a mood.

 

but i will not argue with you, because i am not a complete idiot, all evidence to the contrary.

 

please post the link to the blog page, though, if you have a moment.

[Mr Ares]

One blog link, as requested.

[Mrs. Cindy Gill]

cool, thanks for that!

 

there really is some great stuff in that blog.

[Malruhn]

From the first page of the thread - and the reference to "Materese". The passage in Eye of the World was, "Materese, the little mother of Ind" can very easily be a reference to the very diminutive Mother Teresa, the (now) Saint of India.

 

Another thing I just ran into today was a request for a translation for a French term... n'aibliez pas - which means, depending upon context, "always remember" or "don't/never forget".

 

With The Foresaken fighting to be named, "Number One" and that term being "Naeblis" - and with RJ's habit of twisting names and such - I believe that the effective translation for the Biggest of the Foresaken would be, "Memory." There are some Biblical scholars that have said that the Tree of Knowledge from which Adam and Eve ate did not grant actual KNOWLEDGE, but the ability to remember - and thus bear shame and guilt for any transgressions (that we all make). Since the forbidden fruit was offered by the devil - which we/RJ call Shaitan - it is my opinion that it was a direct attempt at direct plagiarism of the old legend. (good plagiarism, not bad!!)

 

I've also said this before, but almost every one of the "secrets" and conspiracy theories of the Freemasons and such are contained within the series. I'm just waiting for some bad guy to mispronounce a word and be outed as being bad... it would make the entire reveal complete.

[Naeff]

long time lurker, first time poster :D

this topic of hints alluding to the era of the audience is one of the reasons i became interested in the series before i started reading (the other being friends with great taste)

just wanted to add that in a PoV from Alviarin when she is at the White Tower, it is mentioned that at one time, the tower had some device that allowed them to travel from floor to floor without the hassle of stairs. Elevators was my first thought.

[Joshua Hendrickson]

Birgitte, in TFOH:

 

"I have not seen anyone trussed like that since the Tourag took Mareesh."

 

If I remember correctly, there used to be (maybe still is) an Arab warrior tribe called the Touregs, and there is a city somewhere in the middle east called Mareeshekesh. Could be!

 

Also, in the following chapter, Birgitte takes the alias Maerion, saying she was once called that. A Robin Hood reference, perhaps?

[dwn]

From the first page of the thread - and the reference to "Materese". The passage in Eye of the World was, "Materese, the little mother of Ind" can very easily be a reference to the very diminutive Mother Teresa, the (now) Saint of India.

 

Another thing I just ran into today was a request for a translation for a French term... n'aibliez pas - which means, depending upon context, "always remember" or "don't/never forget".

 

With The Foresaken fighting to be named, "Number One" and that term being "Naeblis" - and with RJ's habit of twisting names and such - I believe that the effective translation for the Biggest of the Foresaken would be, "Memory." There are some Biblical scholars that have said that the Tree of Knowledge from which Adam and Eve ate did not grant actual KNOWLEDGE, but the ability to remember - and thus bear shame and guilt for any transgressions (that we all make). Since the forbidden fruit was offered by the devil - which we/RJ call Shaitan - it is my opinion that it was a direct attempt at direct plagiarism of the old legend. (good plagiarism, not bad!!)

 

I've also said this before, but almost every one of the "secrets" and conspiracy theories of the Freemasons and such are contained within the series. I'm just waiting for some bad guy to mispronounce a word and be outed as being bad... it would make the entire reveal complete.

 

We know (from Graendal?) that Nae'blis translates to "Last to Die".

 

-- dwn

[Rose]

Also, the French term for "don't forget" is spelled "n'oubliez pas", which sounds like "noo-blee-ay pa", nothing like Nae'blis.

 

However, I remember reading somewhere that Nae'blis is a distortion of Iblis (also spelled Ablis or Eblis), the name of the angel in the Koran who refused to bow before Adam and became the Devil.

 

Sorry I can't provide a reference, but I'm sure other people know where that information can be found.

[True Source Creator]

Is the Aes Sedai symbol and the Dragon symbol, with the black and white halves, an allusion to the yin-yang of Chinese philosophy?

[Agitel]

Shorelle, the port town mentioned by Asmodean in tSR, was on the Caspian or Aral Sea, or their equivalents in the AoL, which I assume may have been slightly change, though I strongly believe the geography was pretty much as it is now in the AoL.

[Joshua Hendrickson]

Is the Aes Sedai symbol and the Dragon symbol, with the black and white halves, an allusion to the yin-yang of Chinese philosophy?

 

Oh yeah--how could it not be?

[Joshua Hendrickson]

Shorelle, the port town mentioned by Asmodean in tSR, was on the Caspian or Aral Sea, or their equivalents in the AoL, which I assume may have been slightly change, though I strongly believe the geography was pretty much as it is now in the AoL.

 

Is that so? Interesting.

[SylvanFox]

long time lurker, first time poster :D

this topic of hints alluding to the era of the audience is one of the reasons i became interested in the series before i started reading (the other being friends with great taste)

just wanted to add that in a PoV from Alviarin when she is at the White Tower, it is mentioned that at one time, the tower had some device that allowed them to travel from floor to floor without the hassle of stairs. Elevators was my first thought.

 

I like that thought, as the White Tower is supposed to be so tall and grand, but nobody would build a tower that tall if they had to walk up and down the stairs all the time.

[Alric]

RJ has confirmed that our world is the WoT world in another age. So everything from our history is the past/present of WoT.

 

Do you have a quote? I would assume that this was the kind of thing he'd want to leave hanging but if he has indeed confirmed its quite interesting.

[Alric]

I believe the 1st age is our age but The Horn and Portal Stone were all made in the 1st age so I think there is allot more time is going to pass from 2011 to when the dragon is born in our age.

Could they be from another turning of the wheel? The Horn seems indestructible and the Portal Stones are only a little worn.

 

So little seems to be known of the First Age and nobody has thought to ask the Forsaken what they knew, so I guess we'll never know if it referred to our own time or why it is even called that. One thing that speaks in favor of "our time" being closer to the Age of Legends is that some legends and names remain. If it was even longer ago, no trace would probably have remained.

 

 

 

[Mulk]

The Horn pre-dates the Age of Legends, but had Age of Legends era script carved upon it. That has been confirmed, I believe. Portal stones, I don't know that we've seen ANYONE say where they might have come from.

 

I tend to believe our Age would fall later, perhaps the Sixth or Seventh, personally. We are a "post magic" society; that is, our forbears had much more belief in that sort of thing than we do. I would posit that a full on nuclear war might be the happening at the end of the Seventh Age that resets the Wheel and restarts the cycle. /shrug

 

There's no way to prove it either way, at least not to my knowledge - I don't possess Terez's inexhaustible quote, chatlot, etc storage (I'm half certain Terez has memorized it by now. :D), nor am I inclined to search it for every answer to every question about the WoTverse, though, so I may not be correct in that. But I don't recall anything more than speculation on which Age is which, beyond reading that the end of the First Age was the discovery of channeling.

[Xcorpyo001]

I believe the 1st age is our age but The Horn and Portal Stone were all made in the 1st age so I think there is allot more time is going to pass from 2011 to when the dragon is born in our age.

Could they be from another turning of the wheel? The Horn seems indestructible and the Portal Stones are only a little worn.

 

So little seems to be known of the First Age and nobody has thought to ask the Forsaken what they knew, so I guess we'll never know if it referred to our own time or why it is even called that. One thing that speaks in favor of "our time" being closer to the Age of Legends is that some legends and names remain. If it was even longer ago, no trace would probably have remained.

 

 

Who said we didn't had OP in our age?!?

Moses was probably a very powerful AS with an affinity for water, Jesus was a member of the Yellow Ajah(if not the Dragon himself).

Not to mention the Children(inquisition) were hunting/burning AS(also known as witches, as in the Third Era) until several hundred years ago.

You have lost faith so fast. Shai'tan will have our souls for sure.

 

You are looking at this the wrong way. Maybe this is our history. We are the ....(insert number >3 here) age.

I think that if we dig deep enough, we'll find some of those stones somewhere.

After all, our resources are very limited, and they don't seem to have any problem with finding metals, oil, gems, even with their limited technology.

 

Adam and Eve will be the only surviving people in the world after a huge Breaking at the end of the Third Era, and the Garden of Eden is the only remaining Stedding. The snake is one of Valdemort's horcruxes, which enters this book through a bubble of evil.

They gain knowledge not because they it the apple, but because they eat it inside a ter'angreal similar to the one in Rhuidean. If you remember, the first people lived for hundreds of years and had many many many children, which can only mean one thing: they were OP users that survived the spark.

Some people still have the Old Blood, so they remember things from time to time(words, songs, shape of buildings, etc).

Some can use the OP(Moses, Jesus, Bill Clinton), but since all knowledge was lost, few actually learn to control it, and so the former glory of the OP users will never be reached again.

[Puny]

I believe the 1st age is our age but The Horn and Portal Stone were all made in the 1st age so I think there is allot more time is going to pass from 2011 to when the dragon is born in our age.

Could they be from another turning of the wheel? The Horn seems indestructible and the Portal Stones are only a little worn.

 

So little seems to be known of the First Age and nobody has thought to ask the Forsaken what they knew, so I guess we'll never know if it referred to our own time or why it is even called that. One thing that speaks in favor of "our time" being closer to the Age of Legends is that some legends and names remain. If it was even longer ago, no trace would probably have remained.

 

 

Who said we didn't had OP in our age?!?

Moses was probably a very powerful AS with an affinity for water, Jesus was a member of the Yellow Ajah(if not the Dragon himself).

Not to mention the Children(inquisition) were hunting/burning AS(also known as witches, as in the Third Era) until several hundred years ago.

You have lost faith so fast. Shai'tan will have our souls for sure.

 

You are looking at this the wrong way. Maybe this is our history. We are the ....(insert number >3 here) age.

I think that if we dig deep enough, we'll find some of those stones somewhere.

After all, our resources are very limited, and they don't seem to have any problem with finding metals, oil, gems, even with their limited technology.

 

Adam and Eve will be the only surviving people in the world after a huge Breaking at the end of the Third Era, and the Garden of Eden is the only remaining Stedding. The snake is one of Valdemort's horcruxes, which enters this book through a bubble of evil.

They gain knowledge not because they it the apple, but because they eat it inside a ter'angreal similar to the one in Rhuidean. If you remember, the first people lived for hundreds of years and had many many many children, which can only mean one thing: they were OP users that survived the spark.

Some people still have the Old Blood, so they remember things from time to time(words, songs, shape of buildings, etc).

Some can use the OP(Moses, Jesus, Bill Clinton), but since all knowledge was lost, few actually learn to control it, and so the former glory of the OP users will never be reached again.

+1

[MauricXe]

The contrails in the sky in the portal stone world in TGH.

 

I've always been intrigued by those contrails. I've theorized for a while now that there could still be satellites in orbit that have not decayed from the Age of Legends. What if in an alternate universe there were folks who never returned from manned space stations in orbit and instead witnessed in horror the Breaking. They stayed in space and tried to preserve humanity in that new setting (space--who knows, the space stations from the AoL could have been nig enough to support a community fo humans). I think perhaps 3,000 years would be a long time, but what if they were puit into suspended animation? Maybe what Rand saw was a recon group from orbit surveying the planet to see if it was habitable?

 

Ive also always been intrigued by them. Cant anyone ask BS about them?=)

 

 

I think the contrails are traces of Saidin. Rand notes no one else can see them. That would fit with the "contrails" being Saidin residue.

[Sakaea]

Everything I've noticed has been mentioned already, but on my next re-read, I'll see if I notice anything else.

 

My personal favorite is the lemonade reference. Also the s'redit