Origin of Stone Shamanism

[Jondesu he/him]

Wait a second, I just thought of something. One of the orders we see at Feverstone Keep was the Stonewards, right? What if the subterfuge was that they faked their part in the Recreance. Could they simply have left their plate and blades, but not actually broken their vows, and later just had their spren leave whoever claimed the blades and return to them? There would have been so much confusion, the people who had claimed those would probably just think they had been stolen. That would be a great amount of subterfuge, and would allow for the Stonewards to still be the origins of the Stone Shamans.  In fact, even if another order was more likely, they could have accomplished it the same way, and no one would have known.

jW

[Argel he/him]

I just suggested something very similar 4 or posts back....

On 9/18/2016 at 1:23 PM, Argel said:

I will throw one out there -- what if the great subterfuge was having most of their order participate in the Recreance -- performing the same betrayal as the rest?

 

Edited September 19, 2016 by Argel

[Krandacth]

25 minutes ago, Argel said:

I just suggested something very similar 4 or posts back....

I assume that is why @Jondesu italicised faked. Gotta say that seems more likely than their really taking part, though the effect of breaking the bonds (stopping the blade and plate from glowing) seems hard to fake, from what little we know so far.

[Jondesu he/him]

3 hours ago, Argel said:

I just suggested something very similar 4 or posts back....

 

 

2 hours ago, Krandacth said:

I assume that is why @Jondesu italicised faked. Gotta say that seems more likely than their really taking part, though the effect of breaking the bonds (stopping the blade and plate from glowing) seems hard to fake, from what little we know so far.

Exactly, instead of having most of the order kill their spren but have some survive, I'm suggesting they pretended to, but didn't actually. I have no idea how possible it would be to have the glowing stop, but I can't imagine it'd be impossible.

jW

[Argel he/him]

Sorry, your theory felt disconnected with the thread. Why not say something like "Argel may have been on the right track, but what if...." 

Anyway, I guess the question is how hard/easy would it be to catch them at it? And what do the spren do? Pretend to act like the dead ones and stay with whoever picked them up? If they just summon them later on then people would notice a bunch suddenly went missing. Though maybe those people were quickly killed off.

Regardless, if no one can poke a hole into either one of these theories then every order is back on the table. That sounds like something Brandon might do to us..... 

 

 

[Krandacth]

On ‎20‎/‎09‎/‎2016 at 0:32 AM, Argel said:

Regardless, if no one can poke a hole into either one of these theories then every order is back on the table. That sounds like something Brandon might do to us..... 

Probably any Order for which we don't have an example of their spren saying they are the only one doing what they are doing, e.g. Syl.

[Yata he/him]

On 20/9/2016 at 1:32 AM, Argel said:

Anyway, I guess the question is how hard/easy would it be to catch them at it? And what do the spren do? Pretend to act like the dead ones and stay with whoever picked them up? If they just summon them later on then people would notice a bunch suddenly went missing. Though maybe those people were quickly killed off.

If the Radiant Actually broke their Oaths the Spren would die BUT if the Radiant didn't broke their Oath the Shardblade would not last while his Radiant-partner go too far.

Rememebr also that took years-century for the human to figure how to bond a Deadblade. Before that moment I think the Shardblade was observed quite 24/7.

[The One Who Connects he/him]

5 hours ago, Yata said:

If the Radiant Actually broke their Oaths the Spren would die BUT if the Radiant didn't broke their Oath the Shardblade would not last while his Radiant-partner go too far.

Remember also that took years-century for the human to figure how to bond a Deadblade. Before that moment I think the Shardblade was observed quite 24/7.

This is true, although I can imagine one possibility that almost works with several facts that we know. I imagine the people at Feverstone Keep were more occupied with fighting over the blades than where the former Radiants were going, at least for a while. The ones that faked the broken bond could hide behind some hill or broken building nearby (since the blade would despawn if the Radiant got too far away, do you imagine that the glow would fade as the distance increases too?) That could solve one issue.

As for getting the blades back, that could also work assuming the spren have enough control while in bladeform. I fully expect several officers or former thieves attempting to grab as many as they could take and try and escape with them. Someone would see them doing that and attack them, and (since you can't fight and carry extra giant swords) the living sprenblades could "disappear" and no one would know the difference.

Something that I realized is that such a thing could account for (or at least help with) the large disparity in old and current blade count that Dalinar noticed.

Note: this is another one of my "designed 2 minutes earlier" theories, so it's definitely reaching at times.

[Argel he/him]

8 hours ago, Krandacth said:

Probably any Order for which we don't have an example of their spren saying they are the only one doing what they are doing, e.g. Syl.

Except in my theory some of the order would have broken their oaths to hide the fact that some did not.

[galendo]

The best possibility for an Order that "broke" their oaths (i.e., pretended to break their oaths but didn't) is probably one of the two Orders with access to Illumination -- the Lightweavers or the Truthwatchers.  We know from Shallan's scenes that Illumination can be used to mask Stormlight, so the Knights of either Order could have pretended to break their oaths by Lightweaving to make their Blades look dull.  No need to break your oaths at all, either in whole or in part.  Just make it look as if you did.

If you believe Pattern when he says that all the Cryptics from that time got killed, then the betraying order is probably the Truthwatchers.  They're the one my money's on, at least.  If you're more the conspiracy-theorist type, though, you might wonder whether a spren so fascinated by lies is really quite as truthful as he seems....

[Sand Master]

1 hour ago, galendo said:

The best possibility for an Order that "broke" their oaths (i.e., pretended to break their oaths but didn't) is probably one of the two Orders with access to Illumination -- the Lightweavers or the Truthwatchers.  We know from Shallan's scenes that Illumination can be used to mask Stormlight, so the Knights of either Order could have pretended to break their oaths by Lightweaving to make their Blades look dull.  No need to break your oaths at all, either in whole or in part.  Just make it look as if you did.

If you believe Pattern when he says that all the Cryptics from that time got killed, then the betraying order is probably the Truthwatchers.  They're the one my money's on, at least.  If you're more the conspiracy-theorist type, though, you might wonder whether a spren so fascinated by lies is really quite as truthful as he seems....

I also considered the fact that the liespren might be lying. But Pattern seemed to be genuine when he tried to hide from Shallan the fact that he was convinced she would eventually kill him. Not necessarily hard evidence, but I feel pretty confident that he wasn't lying about that.

[Yata he/him]

5 hours ago, galendo said:

If you believe Pattern when he says that all the Cryptics from that time got killed, then the betraying order is probably the Truthwatchers.  They're the one my money's on, at least.  If you're more the conspiracy-theorist type, though, you might wonder whether a spren so fascinated by lies is really quite as truthful as he seems....

this may also be the reason Brandon's RAFO about Glys's form

[Garglemesh he/him]

This is really interesting. So essentially, we're looking for an order that would be able to last thousands of years undetected by the rest of society with little or no guidance or restrictions placed on them.

Maybe that order would be more secretive or reclusive.  

Maybe that order would come to be demonized by religious leaders who knew of their persistence but wanted to mitigate that threat to their authority. 

Maybe that order "saw things".

 

I'm just thinking. If you're a Skybreaker, you fly around and break stuff. It's what you do. If you're a Windrunner, you run with the wind. It's what you do. No honor spren will tell you "don't fly, it's dangerous, people will see". No high spren will either. In fact, we've seen the opposite. The same, I imagine, goes for the other orders. So it'd have to be an order that could freely use their abilities while not being discovered. Truthwatchers sound very convincing. In fact, you've convinced me. I was sure it was the Skybreakers because the High spren seemed to know so much, but then not every spren was bound back then. I'm sure there are those who stayed unbound and survived to pass on knowledge.

In other thoughts, is "Words of Radiance" not a very popular or easily attainable book? You'd think that knowledge of an active order of Knights Radiant would be common knowledge. I guess she did spend most of the book trying to get a copy. Hmm. Just seems odd. Maybe the Hierarchy did a good job discrediting such literature.

[Xaklys he/him]

To add to the point about the Stone Shamans, I do remember Szeth (maybe it was him, I can't produce a quote right now so feel free to shoot me down) mentioning something about the Spirit of Stones, or Spirit in the Stones.  Those are the ones who named him Truthless, and told him that the Voidbringers could never come back.  So that also supports the Stoneward theory because that could be the spren of the Stonewards.  Obviously though, something is wrong because they named him Truthless when he wasn't, maybe they were just afraid to admit the truth and lied... but either way, Nale is gonna allow Szeth to get his justice against the Stone Shamans.

Edited September 24, 2016 by Xaklys

[Yata he/him]

This morning I have (what I thought to be) a great Idea....The remain Order have to be an Order who may "betray" all the other without Breaking its Oaths. Therefore I took the Ten Essences chart (I printed a copy of it for a side project of mine) to search in the divine attributes of the Heralds something in line with this fact...without a real answer.

Anyway now I will try to made a reverse enginering from the Shin Society habit to try to figure what kind of Dogma may be influence it

PS: I also discovered that I am an idiot to not notice that the Heralds' Order in the Chart isn't random but instead they follow the "near Heralds share a Surge" 

[Sand Master]

I just finished re-reading Words of Radiance, and an idea struck me in the epilogue that I haven't seen here yet. What if the Order that "entertained great subterfuge" was the Elsecallers? It is mentioned in the epigraphs from the in-world Words of Radiance that they were the only true masters of Shadesmar, though other Orders also had a lesser affinity for it. And in the epilogue of WoR, we see Wit and Jasnah have this conversation:

Quote

J: "I'm lucky to be here at all."

W: "Lucky? I don't know if I'd say that."

J: "Why?"

W: "You'd likely be better off on the other side, Jasnah Kholin. The Desolation has come, and with it, the end of this land."

This seems to imply that, regardless of what happens in the Physical Realm, beings in Shadesmar are safer than those that are not. If the Elsecallers had hidden away from the other Orders by hiding in Shadesmar, it would still appear to the world as if they had betrayed their Oaths like the rest. Everyone would think that the reason they were no longer around is because they had given up on their Oaths like everyone else. However, if they hid in Shadesmar, it would fit with the "subterfuge" talked about in the book, and allow them to continue on without breaking their bonds. Thoughts?

[marianmi]

There are several orders that could have done it....

1) Truthwatchers, because they saw the future

2) Skybreakers, since there are people calling themselves "skybreakers" led by someone who appears to be Nalan

3) Bondsmiths, because they were bonded to rare spren

4) Willshapers, because they were unreliable and erratic

probably not Elsecallers, because hiding in Shadesmare does not require much "great subterfuge" (and also Jasnah seems to be the first human to drop-in shadesmare and ask the highspren stuff). Surely not windrunners and stonewards, since they are "on-screen" dropping their blades, and it's not faked because Dalinar hears the spren screaming. not lightweavers, because I trust Pattern, not edgedancers, because of how i interpret Wyndle.

I prefer the idea of Bondsmiths, since there were a smaller number of them, and their spren have greater powers, and maybe, like Dalinar, they were not in shards form. But I doubt it, since I also think Cusicesh was a bondsmith's spren. Skybreakers also seem like regular humans, and willshapers, being unreliable, would not agree as a whole order...

But maybe dustbringers => stone shamanism? "Even some sections of rock smoldered. The dustbringers had done their work well." Since dustbringers could work stone => stone was sacred? Maybe dustbringer spren is like a rock-spren?

Edited September 30, 2016 by marianmi

[Sand Master]

Your reasoning for why it wouldn't be Elsecallers is because it wouldn't require much and Jasnah asked the spren questions? The dictionary defines subterfuge as "deceit used in order to achieve one's goal". I think that hiding from all the other Orders to make them think that their bond had been broken would count as deceit. As for Jasnah questioning the highspren, it never says that she's the first one to have done it. In fact, one of the epigraphs in Words of Radiance says that Elsecallers "were prodigiously benevolent, allowing others as auxiliary to their visits and interactions; though they did never relinquish their place as prime liaisons with the great ones of the spren". This would imply that Elsecallers used to speak to spren in Shadesmar all the time.

[The One Who Connects he/him]

12 hours ago, marianmi said:

1) Truthwatchers, because they saw the future

2) Skybreakers, since there are people calling themselves "Skybreakers" led by someone who appears to be Nalan

3) Bondsmiths, because they were bonded to rare spren

4) Willshapers, because they were unreliable and erratic

1) Possible, some have even made "connections" to seeing the future and the supposed visions the priests received during the Heirocracy
2) It could happen, but not having seen any of them Surgebind, and Nalan's policy on Surgebinders makes this debatable
3) I highly doubt it, but that depends on how much you trust Pattern. WoR Chapter 75

Quote

"Not just one people," Pattern said, solemn. "Many. Spren with minds were less plentiful then, and the majorities of several spren people were all bonded. There were very few survivors. The one you call Stormfather lived. Some others. The rest, thousands of us, were killed when the event happened. You call it the Recreance."

Highlight added. Pattern makes it sound like the Stormfather managed to survive a broken bond (perhaps on account of his "no shard" policy) Having his own trust be broken would certainly account for why he did not wish to bond again.
Actually, now that I think about it, perhaps he survived because Tanavast's Cognitive Shadow merged with him afterwards..?

As for Willshapers, we don't really know anything about them, so it may have been them. If only we knew why the Recreance happened..

[marianmi]

On 30/09/2016 at 2:10 PM, Sand Master said:

Your reasoning for why it wouldn't be Elsecallers is because it wouldn't require much and Jasnah asked the spren questions? The dictionary defines subterfuge as "deceit used in order to achieve one's goal". I think that hiding from all the other Orders to make them think that their bond had been broken would count as deceit. As for Jasnah questioning the highspren, it never says that she's the first one to have done it. In fact, one of the epigraphs in Words of Radiance says that Elsecallers "were prodigiously benevolent, allowing others as auxiliary to their visits and interactions; though they did never relinquish their place as prime liaisons with the great ones of the spren". This would imply that Elsecallers used to speak to spren in Shadesmar all the time.

I don;t think spren would have allowed people in shadesmar after the recreance. I think bridges were burned. There were no more radiants, not even from the last order. I actually think that order also unbonded, but in a way that did not kill the spren

[Argel he/him]

On 9/29/2016 at 10:18 PM, marianmi said:

Surely not windrunners and stonewards, since they are "on-screen" dropping their blades, and it's not faked because Dalinar hears the spren screaming.

Except the great subterfuge could be that the majority of the order's members did break their oaths to hide that some did not. 

Edited October 2, 2016 by Argel

[marianmi]

3 hours ago, Argel said:

Except the great subterfuge could be that the majority of the order's members did break their oaths to hide that some did not. 

Then you can argue for any order to have done that

[dionysus]

A long time has passed since the Recreance. And we know the spren bond requires cracks in your soul from great internal trauma to form, making it extremely rare. I find it plausible that while an order probably did survive the Recreance, it could easily have died out from lack of new nahel bonds because 1) it would be hard to identify proto-radiants for training while in hiding and 2) spren may have chosen to stay away. After all the Stormfather did ban lesser spren from forming nahel bonds, and he may have influence over more than just honorspren.

I am just proposing that their may not be an order in hiding in current times, even if there was one in the past.