Probably The Thousandth Adonalsium Theory Thread You've Seen On This Site

[soyperson]

As the title states, this is probably the thousandth Adonalsium theory thread you've seen on this site. 

But this one might actually hold some weight. POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD. 

 

After some careful rereading of the entire Mistborn series, and lots and lots of pondering, I have come up with an idea:

What if Adonalsium was a substance, or something similar? 

The "god metals" in Mistborn are Atium and Lerasium, and they are metals named after the holders of that world's Shards, Ati and Leras. The pattern is "name"-"-ium".

What if Adonalsium was a metal/substance so powerful it could only be described as godlike? And the 16 broke the metal/substance into physical Shards of Adonalsium?

 

So... Thoughts? Angles? Impressions?

[KnightRadiant she/her]

Oh wow... I've never... just, wow. I will definitely pay more attention to things that relate to this now. Even if this proves to be false, I don't think I'll think about Adonalsium the same again. 

Ah, this just goes to show my ignorance. (Cosmere knowledge, why must you defy me?) I've got nothing to add, but I sure would like to see what other, more knowledgable people, have to say.

[Eki]

Well, Adonalsium has definitely been described as "he" before, meaning it was "alive". Whether it had a holder or just developed sentience on its own, we don't know.

I have thought about the -ium thing before, but I never really thought it held up, really. I mean, shards are pieces of Adonalsium... so if the pattern were to hold, it would be the shards that were called Atium and Lerasium, rather than the metals they can make from their bodies. Similarly, if Adonalsium was the god metal of... itself, I guess... wouldn't it make more sense to use the name of the actual being, as we do with the shards? So... I'm leaning towards coincidence here.

Besides, atium and lerasium are probably translations, since the -ium suffix is latin. It's apparently used to create abstact nouns. They might not even share a suffix in-universe.

[Blightsong he/him]

The Sixteen did break Adonalsium into something, but they aren't physical, they transcend the realms. The only thing we know that does that is investiture, so that is what Adonalsium was composed of. Regardless, we have confirmation that Adonalsium was investiture.

 

Let's look at the etymology of Adonalsium regardless of confirmation

-ium (New Latin): A suffix used to denote a substantive noun to a nominal noun. Plutonium basicly can mean "stuff of Pluto" in new Latin. A noun with the suffix ium isnt neccesarily a metal or physical substance/element, but is only used that way because the only real substances are physical things (which while true for our world, isn't the case in the Cosmere).

So when you look at a god substance, which only forms as a metal on Scadrial (which is that shardplanets physical focus), it makes sense that it would be called Atium or Lerasium. It is the physical form of the shards they hold, so people who would find it would name it something that translates to a noun with the suffix -ium. A tear of Edgli (the flowers theorized to be the physical form of Endowment) could rightly be called Edglium. 

 

Adonai (Hebrew): God

So when you combine these two roots you get "substance of God" or the translation that fits the theory best but is less accurate, "godly substance". This perfectly describes what Investiture is, a substance that transcends many of the laws of the Cosmere.

Edited October 30, 2016 by Blightsong

[Assassin in Burgundy he/him]

Could Adonalsium be all of the forms of Investiture solidified into one physical form? And then when it was split apart then all of the Shards were each type of Investiture. Also kinda random, if someone found all of the Shards and absorbed the or whatever, would that make them Adonalsium?

[Eki]

1 hour ago, Assassin in Burgundy said:

Could Adonalsium be all of the forms of Investiture solidified into one physical form? And then when it was split apart then all of the Shards were each type of Investiture. Also kinda random, if someone found all of the Shards and absorbed the or whatever, would that make them Adonalsium?

I think there's a WoB that the split could have happened in other ways, so I don't think there are sixteen discrete types. And I think if you combined all shards again, they would... kind of be Adonalsium, except that some parts of the original Investiture have been splintered off, and might not be part of the new Adonalsium. We also don't really know the effects of a shard Investing in a planet. But it might be Adonalsium by default, even if it isn't exactly the same as the old one.

[Darkness Ascendant he/him]

Bingo. Adonalsium was a massive piece of awakened, god metal

[Blightsong he/him]

6 hours ago, Assassin in Burgundy said:

Could Adonalsium be all of the forms of Investiture solidified into one physical form? And then when it was split apart then all of the Shards were each type of Investiture. Also kinda random, if someone found all of the Shards and absorbed the or whatever, would that make them Adonalsium?

Your still thinking along the lines of "Types of Investiture". There is no type of investiture, only investiture and which realm that investiture is directly affecting. If you are saying "What if Adonalsium was investiture that was invested into one physical object" then it makes more sense realmatically, but we know that they is an upper limit on how much investiture a physical object can be invested in, and we also know that even if an object has a physical presence it still exists within each of the other realms, like any other shard.

 

Also, if he was invested into a physical object than how did he invest in multiple shardworlds? How did he create multiple different forms of life? He would have had to have been able to actually use his investiture in the physical realm for him to have accomplished things that we absolutely know he did, so I don't think the theory is correct.

[soyperson]

7 hours ago, Assassin in Burgundy said:

Could Adonalsium be all of the forms of Investiture solidified into one physical form? And then when it was split apart then all of the Shards were each type of Investiture. Also kinda random, if someone found all of the Shards and absorbed the or whatever, would that make them Adonalsium?

I was thinking, like, not that Atium and Lerasium are the shards, cause they're not, but that Adonalsium could be the physical representation of the being known as the God Beyond, or the Unknown God. The God Beyond created the cosmere, and left Adonalsium as his Physical Representation. Much like Ruin with Atium and Preservation with Lerasium on Scadrial. The God Beyond expended almost all his power creating the cosmere, and thus could not exist fully in all three Realms at once, leaving a representation of himself in the Physical, and the shattered pieces of his personality in the Cognitive/Spiritual.

[Blightsong he/him]

4 minutes ago, bleeder said:

I was thinking, like, not that Atium and Lerasium are the shards, cause they're not, but that Adonalsium could be the physical representation of the being known as the God Beyond, or the Unknown God. The God Beyond created the cosmere, and left Adonalsium as his Physical Representation. Much like Ruin with Atium and Preservation with Lerasium on Scadrial. The God Beyond expended almost all his power creating the cosmere, and thus could not exist fully in all three Realms at once, leaving a representation of himself in the Physical, and the shattered pieces of his personality in the Cognitive/Spiritual.

But we know via WoB that Adonalsium is the one who created everything, and that he is composed of investiture, so he doesn't just exist in the physical realm. Also, shards aren't only in the Cogntive/Spirtual realm. Stormlight and Atium are both examples of Shardic investiture within the physical realm.