i can’t think of another game that nobody can figure out what’s going on after almost 3 years after release. the lore is so deep i pray miyazaki is lying to us and cooking up elden ring 2.
In Alchemy the 3 main colors towards reaching the Magnum Opus are Red, Black, and White. Marika represented White as that was likely her hair color prior to being jarred/mixed with various other beings(all shaman have greyish-white hair), Radagon who was descended from giants represented Red with his fiery hair, and the GEQ was the Black part of her, the abyssal serpentine aspect of herself which is where Messmer's snakes come from. Whats really interesting is that in Alchemy the steps are supposed to go Nigredo(Putrefaction and Spiritual Death) THEN Albedo/White(Purification) THEN Cinitras/Yellowing(AKA Gold?) and FINALLY Rubedo/Red which wikipedia describes as "The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world.The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantiation of insights and experiences." That sounds a WHOOOOLE lot like what Radagon did doesnt it? He strived to become complete through studying Intelligence with Rennala and then after he was done left her to reintegrate into the Golden Order and created Fundamentalism. Knowing all this, it makes the statement by Marika, "Thou art yet to become me, thou art yet to become a god" SO much more impactful. Just as its implied that St. Trina was ultimately what Miquella was meant to become, Radagon was ALWAYS going to be Marika's fate and she did not want this. So "let us be shattered, both, mine other half."
Disguises are a reoccurring theme in ER, as characters often utilize monikers or other names to achieve their goals. As such, part of me wonders if the Marika-Radagon entity that we meet is in fact the original Marika, or if Marika herself simply took the name and place of another, prior god who was both life and death in one. I first had this idea when looking at the defaced statues of Marika in the Shadowlands. The statues are only missing their heads and faces, as if Marika's armies wanted to replace a previous Goddess's iconography with her own. In addition, the use of the term "fled" when discussing Placidusax's God mirrors how the Gate of Divinity is not said to create Gods but usher their "return," as the White Birch Scroll says. It may be that the purpose of the Gate was to create a passage for Placidusax's God to return, but Marika-Radagon found a way to manipulate it to her own ends and claim to be the Eternal Queen returned. And for all intents and purposes they succeeded. This idea has its holes, and it may be be that the GEQ was an unrelated rival to Marika, or a former aspect of her akin to Radagon. However, I do think that whoever Placidusax's God originally was Marika was trying to emulate her. Much like how Ymir tried to usurp Metyr or Radagon tried to usurp Marika, she intended to do a better job than the prior god but failed.
If this theory is true, this explains the single Gloam Eye on Melina in the Frenzied Flame ending. Messmer and Melina might have been born from the GEQ and Marika as Miquella and Malenia were born of Radagon and Marika. Messmer inherited the Abyssal Serpent from the GEQ and Melina might have had a single Gloam Eye and a single Golden Eye as a result. After betraying and killing the GEQ Marika sealed away the attributes Messmer and Melina inherited from the GEQ. Thus in the FF ending with the Marika's source of Power the Erd Tree destroyed the seal breaks and Melina's Gloam half awakens just as her Golden half dies. If Messmer is still alive at this point in the Lands of Shadow, my guess is the Serpent overwhelms him just as it does in the second stage of his boss fight when he discards his Seal of Grace.
Thats a very interesting point but the only thing that doesnt make sense to me is then why messmer and melina (kinda) have red hair when its explicitly stated that red hair is from fire giants only, and radagon (and its sons/daughters) as a curse, other than than (if im not mistaken) your comment makes a lot of sense :) (also sorry for my English)
@@youdontknow1541 I am not sure if red hair only comes from fire giants or there are other sources. It is possible that the Gloam Eyed Queen also had red hair. The RL Dark Goddess Lilith is traditionally depicted with red hair likely due to her association with blood. Also, In am sure you speak English better than I speak your native language. :)
If the ER is like the first flame inheritors which accumulated as the Soul of Cider then perhaps the GEQ was its previous host and when Marika inherited the ER she got part of the GEQ within her. Maybe that's why some of the things Marika does seem to contrast how she behaves at one point and differently at another.
Hey bro, I remember commenting my lore write-up about this on your older vids. Here it is again. This is an old write-up now, with some recent updates from the DLC. Marika is the Gloam/Dusk-Eyed Queen. - Red and black spike of death impales Marika and keeps her in place when we find her at the end. Only Maliketh wields this power, and only he could even defeat a God like Marika. But he's so loyal to her, why would he? - Maliketh "defeated" the Gloam/Dusk-Eyed Queen. We know Shadowbound hounds have to attack their former master if The Fingers feel like the Empyrean is acting against them. We play through this reality with Ranni's quest, and both she and Iji know Blaidd will go mad as she enacts her vision. How do they know this happens? They saw/heard of it happening to Maliketh and Marika already. - Only Marika would be able to guide Ranni to the location of the Rune of Death and how to use it for it to be stolen in the first place to forge the Black Knives. Remember, "Marika... is this what it is to sin?" "Why gull me..." Marika, after all, had only one use for Maliketh in the end, after the other work was done... a vessel to seal away Destined Death. And even then, she betrayed him. - The Beast Eye is a purple, scratched up eye. It's Marika's eye from being defeated and imprisoned by her Shadowbound. No other Queen or Empyrean is "defeated" but not slain, as the text implies there except Marika. And who but her purpose-made hound could even stop her, a God? The one entity empowered enough by the Ring/Fingers to be able to do so should the need arise. - Dominula Village is much like the Hinterlands and the Shaman Village. We find a skinning ritual and a Godskin Apostle there in Dominula. We learn that the "festival" is old and tacitly accepted by the Golden Order. The aesthetic of these villages is much the same, and they're intimately tied to Marika herself. - Gideon gives us a boon in the form of a secret rite known only to him, Black Flame Protection. He is alleged to have peered into the will of Queen Marika, and shuddered at the end that should not be. - The Scadutree is of a dual nature. So is Queen Marika. When Gold arose, so too was Shadow born. Gold and Shadow exist as necessary contrasts to each other, yet in a God, in Marika, this duality exists in coalesce, or it did once. - No other characters are named as Queen or Empyrean that aren't already accounted for/ruled out to be the GEQ, and by that I mean Melina, she was given purpose by her mother at the foot of the Erdtree and that means she is a daughter of Marika, not old enough to be the GEQ but possesses traits of both Marika and Radagon. Eye color and hair color are passed down traits we see in game. Well, sure enough, Melina shows us a purple/gloamy eye in one ending. Inherited trait from her mother, the Queen in Black. Marika's eyes are never shown to us, to judge their color. - Duskborn ending sees Godwyn rise to ascendancy and sees Death restored, with him as the Prince of Death itself. These titles aren't meaningless. Duskborn? The "Prince" of Death? Well, who would the Queen be? If Godwyn is Duskborn, and if he is a Prince, his mother would, of course, be associated with "Dusk" and be a Queen. And we know his mother is Queen Marika. - Fia is hooded with a black cloak and comes from some other land. She also helps create Godwyn's Duskborn ending and is Death-aligned. We see Marika wearing black hooded garb in a statue where she also is holding the twins Miquella and Malenia. Her tattered clothing as we find her at the end is also black. She is also associated with the Nox/Numen race and the Black Knife Assassins that come from there as well. - Statues of Marika in her crucified pose all show her with a flowing black cloth that wraps behind her in almost the exact same shape as the Godslayer Greatsword, which was the weapon or ritual sword of the GEQ/DEQ. You have to pivot the camera a bit to get a good view, but the shape is very similar. Coiled and then open, with one flap slightly longer than the other, same tip design on the Godslayer Greatsword. It's possible that she was propped up by the Hornsent culture and then part of the betrayal was killing other Gods in their pantheon, but what's maybe more possible is as Centered Tarnished pointed out, that Marika culled some other of her "unwanted" children after learning the truth of the broken Fingers and flawed foundations of her Order. - Godwyn is referred to as the "Prince of Gold" in an item description. If a Prince of Death could have been a Prince of Gold, why couldn't his mother hold this potential as well, even necessarily so? We see from the Death Knights that Gold and Death can somehow synergize even still... Gold and Shadow, born at the same time, same as it ever was. - Hewg prays to Queen Marika about his given task to craft a Godslaying weapon. Very interesting and specific task. Marika wants a God slain. He mentions "the sheer terror of Her..." regarding Marika. Godskins certainly take an interest in killing a God. Who was their leader? A "defeated" Queen who was once an Empyrean. Marika. - Raging Wolf Vargram is a would-be Shadow. Wolf imagery is on his armor. He wields the Godslayer Greatsword. The weapon art is "The Queen's Black Flame", of course. A statue of Marika exists in Farum Azula showing her with three wolves. - Marika learned the secrets of the Golden Order and realized her children would "amount only to sacrifices" as she instructed them. She knew the Erdtree was a soul parasite, and by sealing Death away, she weakened the Erdtree over time. She also had Godwyn buried at the roots of it, knowing that he would grow and overtake them, choking the Erdtree further. As he was, Godwyn was an "unwanted" child since he embodied the Golden Order, and she was a prisoner to it. He would end up much like Miquella would, a caged divinity of some kind. She was likely opposed to the Erdtree and Greater Will/Fingers for a long time, weaving plots in secret until the Shattering. She realized, only too late, that ultimate power has a way of becoming a curse when the truth of the nature of it all is finally revealed. Just as Marika shined so brightly with her Golden Order, another aspect of her was as deep as the abyss and as dark as any shadow.
@@DinoboyLou The elden beast can grab you and "imprison" you, just like marika herself was imprisoned by it. But the spears the elden beast impales you with are nothing like the red one we see on marika's body, the only character who is able to wield a red power is maliketh, and maliketh is also the only other being besides the elden beast that can even hurt marika.
@@patrascu1485 true that it’s not the same colour, but it doesn’t need to be. If you look at the Elden Beasts grab attack, the first spear to impale you is in exactly the same place that Marika was impaled. Why would Maliketh impale Marika in the same place that the Elden Beast does when he uses his grab attack? I think the existence of that grab attack is supposed to suggest that it was the Elden Beast who imprisoned Marika in the way that we see her prior to the boss fight, not Maliketh The amber starlight shard is a “passing flash of starlight”, which “must command the fates of the gods”. Maliketh has no ties to anything spatial related as far as I’m aware, it would be more closely related to the Elden Beast. If you want to use colour, you could say that (in real life) Amber in coloration is golden, and the Elden Beast is far more closely related to gold than Maliketh is. It may be that it looks red because it is a primordial gold, as primordial gold has a “red tint” as stated by the Ordovisis Greatsword. If you really want to be follow colour theory, Maliketh is not the only person who uses a “red power” so just because the Amber Starlight is red, doesn’t necessarily = Maliketh did it
@ But i never said maliketh imprisoned marika, i am saying maliketh was commanded by the two fingers to help the elden beast imprison marika. This theory makes even more sense when you consider that maliketh is said to have defeated the gloam eyed queen, but where is she then? The game never said maliketh slayed her. Are shadowbound beasts not supposed to kill their empyreans if they betray them? Did marika not betray maliketh? Were the black knife assassins not apart of marika's people?
to bring up even more about the concepts surrounding the iconography around "seven": there's plenty of 7-spoked wheels and architecture found throughout all of Elden Ring. Notably, the Cape of the Dragonkin Solider, and Rennala's first phase arena. I think it has lots to do with the concept of "rebirth". It may have roots in Sun worship because, when diffracted, the rays of the Sun could appear in 7-spokes, similar to how the Great Runes resemble rays of diffracted light. Also, in Dark Souls, the symbol of Sun worship found on Solaire's famous chestpiece is of a 7-spoked Sun.
"Castle Sol" is already English. Castrum Solis is what it would be in Latin. Sol is just what our sun is called. It's kinda like how The All-father is actually called Óðinn. The All-father just describes what Óðinn is; The Sun just describes what Sol is.
I always interpreted Ranni & specifically Blaidd’s quest lines to reflect the story behind Marika/The GEQ. That she, or I suppose her other self, had acted against the Greater Will in some way, setting off Maliketh’s shadow programming. The game doesn’t specify that Marika told him to go after her, just that he did.
??? When did Marika to against the Greater Will? Also Maliketh’s situation is a bit more convoluted than Blaidd’s, him being the center of the Golden Order and all.
@@BlacklistedSoupMarika went against everything, not just the Golden Order. And Maliketh is not the center of the Golden Order, he's probably been around since before the Erdtree was even grown.
This would explain why the Deathrite Birds attack us at Night: they are still attempting to avenge their Queen and thwart the will of Marika (ie, the mission of the Tarnished). In ER not all opposites are necessarily opposed. The paradox is that the opposites empower one another, however unwittingly, and, so, there are oxymorons abounding in ER. There are those that Live-in-Death, and there is Death that grows from Life (Scarlet Rot). Deathblight literally grows from Life, killing Life in the process while birthing Life (flies). The boluses that cure us require plants that sprout from the very ailments we are seeking to cure ourselves of. Perhaps it is like an allergy where you slowly immunize a child by slowly administering the allergen to them. Perhaps Frigg should have introduced mistletoe to Baldr, bit by bit, to immunize him to its deathly touch. Another note: Maliketh's Destined Death attack was purple in vers 1.0, aligning with the GEQ and the purple jewels of the Godskin. What is the opposite color of purple on the color wheel? Yellow, or gold. By draining gold from the sun (Eclipsed by the Erdtree) the Geass (fated doom) was removed from Death.
@G4meplus I also think that St Trina being purple, and causing "sleep" that is akin to Death, is not incidental. Sometimes I think that her velvety sleep is a new form of the Gloam Eyed Queen, making Miquella very much his mother come-again and St Trina the new GEQ. It is no coincidence that we find St Trina in the Cerulean Coast, and that Charo's Grave is nearby. Blue and Red make Purple. One of the Twinbirds is Red on Blue, and Red + Blue = Purple. What is purple-coded, however? Not only St Trina, the Gloam-Eyed Queen, and her Godskins' jewels, but Metyr and the Fingercreepers. The Fingercreepers themselves are alike to the Hand of Glory, and can cause paralysis like the Hand of Glory does. There are Finger mushrooms that grow around the Finger Ruins, and Fungi are Lifeforms that grow from Death. I think Metyr did very much have a hand (pun) in the original dynamic between the GEQ and Marika. It also seems odd that Radagon is so capable with a sewing needle, as is his son Miquella. It is almost like Radagon was once aligned with the Godskins. He is a Fire Giant (or related to them). What is interesting about the Fire Giants is that they house the Fell God in their own bodies, and the Godskins house dead demigods in their own attire, almost as if emulating the Fire Giants, but in such a way as to not fully commit.
Not to mention - we see the EXACT thing happen in the DLC. Miquella, just like his mother, sheds his other half, and attempts to ascend to Godhood from that, just as Marika sheds the Gloam Eyed Queen and ascends, herself. Melina is NOT the Gloam eyed queen, but instead a reincarnation/birth from her. Given Kitetales' video on how Melina and Messmer might be the children of the Gloam Eyed Queen, i find that theory even more likely after this video.
Really great video. The Dominula celebration of life and death is a great observation. I've considered that the GEQ was a twin sister or possibly Marika's mother. But, the duel soul in one body makes so much sense. Especially with Miquella casting out Saint Trina. Love your use of the Eclipse.
I truly subscribe to your points. I would like to add that all 3 Empyreans (Ranni, Malenia, and Miquella) shares a story that are parallel to Marika's nature. Ranni has Blaidd and Marika as the GEQ has Maliketh. Both shadowbound beasts eventually become hostile to them. Melina shares the same nature as Millicent which are buds of Marika and Malenia, respectively. I now kinda think that the black knife assassins are buds of Marika as well similar to Millicent's sisters. Miquella's separation from St. Trina through putrefaction is parallel to Marika's separation from the GEQ. Hence, the former file name of the putrescent knight is GloamEyedKnight. If the GEQ and Marika have the same mind and body, then it is no coincidence that the Apostles and Nobles share the same traits with Mesmmer. I think children/soulles demigods of GEQ/Marika were doing some battle royale, collecting runes enough to achieve demigod status or higher. I think this practice is similar to the quote directed to her modern children; "Be it a Lord. Be it a God. But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. Amounting only to sacrifices." I think Radagon only merged with Marika just after the GEQ was evicted. It is just one big Magnum Opus for achieving immortality/godhood. As for the timeline, I propose this happened after the War against the Giants since Amon, the black flame monk, must have faced the GEQ forces during the war and eventually switched sides due to cowardice. If the eclipse happened after this war to separate the GEQ, then it is safe to say that Godfrey has his eyes tarnished due to gazing into the eclipse (i.e., eclipse blindness). I am also working on a theory on how Mesmmer's crusade against the hornsent could coincide or just right after the War against the Giants
i think it became ruinous, like the true process lost to time sort of thing? i may be remembering wrong but i think in the DLC we discover that people did/could become dragons which is essentially what the rock heart and other one do to us
@davidmorcombe6779 yeah but i assume even this was ruinous, as the character class describes the draconians as short lived, and the ancient dragon man was apparently looking like a draconian in his human form in the game files, then there's the magma wyrm inside the cave where his boss battle takes place.
Overall, the theme of the game is outer deities exploiting people by giving them favors, and dragon communion is faith based, meaning the ancient dragons also take the role of the exploitative deity, whereas non faith based stats seem to flow from the character's own strength instead
@comedygold6249 Cept Dragon communion uses Arcane, now vanilla uses more fth stat requirments than arcane but both the seal and the dlc communion abilities are weighted Arcane. Leads me to think the faith aspect of communion isn't to tap into an outer gods power but to open the communer to channeling a power beyond their nature - and the Arcane 'stat that governs magic / secrets of the body' is the main part of communioning by reinforcing / warping the body toward the draconic aspect. The Magma Wyrms are stated outright to be the result of failures, of Drake warriors who began the process toward becoming a dragon but did not manage to perfect the transformation. (Too little Arcane perhaps?) The Dragon Priestess herself can enter the players service with a prayer and implication that the player can and would be able to become a true dragon and worthy lord of dragons after devouring Bayle. Since the Bayle incants require what 50 ish arcane and no faith I figure this hints that while faith is needed to wield communion the true nature of it leans Arcane and leaning into faith with ones communion leads to failure like the Wyrms.
@SolusLupi the failures are the nox dragons with blue lightning who failed to become real dragons, while the magma wyrms were warriors who were "punished for their transgressions", most likely the result of bayle's curse, with the fire "one day consuming the body and soul of the communion devourer"
I hope the Gloam Eyed Queen makes a cameo in Nightreign, it would be a fantastic final boss that would make sense in terms of strength. Weaker than Maliketh but still strong enough to be a threat to Marika
I don’t wanna build your hope but look at the color of the cover of Neightrein and Melina’s gloamed eye. And if you look at the interview. If he had to put nightreign in the timeline it’s post base game Elden Ring. I’d also note in the frenzied flame ending where we see this Gloam eyed Melina she also finds torrents ring fading away, and who’s happens to be missing and isn’t useable in nightreign?
hey, the stone sword can either become the sword of light or sword of darkness, but you have to sacrifice your chance to get one in order to get the other, maybe a nod to how one of the duo of Marika and The Gloam Eyed Queen had to die in order for the other to ascend, hence TGEQ being dead when the game takes place
hey, in that scene in the SOTE story trailer, when Marika pulls threads from the eye socket of a serpent, I saw some people theorise that the serpent was the gloam eyed queen, like as well as massacreing the hornsent so she would have the bodies to create a gate of divinity, she also needed something from the gloam eyed queen to ascend. If this theory is true, then maybe as two halves of the same person TGEQ was holding her back from ascending so Marika needed to kill her to gain full autonomy, similar to how radagon was trying to stop her from shattering the elden ring
if you see light and dark, gold and shadow of two sides of the same coin, then one can't exist without the other. It makes sense death would be powerless in an eclipse because death is shadow and you can't have shadows if there's no light. Also this is a stretch but Maliketh's armor being black with golden borders almost looks like the light bleeding out from behind the moon during an eclipse, it's a metaphor for what the armor represents, Maliketh being used by Marika to defeat the Gloam Eyed Queen
omg it also makes sense why Maliketh was known as Marika's shadow if this is the case. Obviously all the empyreans area meant to have shadows, granted to them by the two fingers. But it goes deeper in Marika's case. Marika and the Gloam Eyed Queen were previously one, but Marika couldn't control the other half of herself, so she killed TGEQ and became Queen Marika the Eternal, an embodyment of eternal life. She couldn't control the part of herself that dealt with death, so she killed it and basically hired Maliketh, someone she could more easily manipulate and control, to death death in TGEQ's place. Maliketh was adopting the title of Marika's shadow from TGEQ after he killed her
Dominula was one of my favorite spot in ER, and those enlightments regarding Marika who plucked Death/GEQ -her twin- from Godhood makes all of it even better. I love how the celebrants represents both Marika and GEQ still rejoicing together in the same dance of life and death. It also makes a great parallèle with how the Hornsent and the Pests saw/sees Rot. It's maybe after divesting herself of GEQ that Marika needed Radagon to still be a whole god based on her ascension at Enir-Ilim ? I'm stepping out the main subject my bad. Edit: okay so you speak about it at the end of the video that's satisfying, but yeah the timeline makes thing complicated. The more I think about it the more I think GEQ was in a similar position like Rykard, Maliketh may have slayed her at that time like it stated and I guess this is when Marika splits Death and the Shadow Realm to create her lil kingdom.
In Alchemy the 3 main colors towards reaching Gold are Red, Black, and White. Marika represented White as that was likely her hair color prior to being jarred/mixed with various other beings(all shaman have greyish-white hair), Radagon who was descended from giants represented Red with his fiery hair, and the GEQ was the Black part of her, the abyssal serpentine aspect of herself which is where Messmer's snakes come from. Whats really interesting is that in Alchemy the steps are supposed to go Nigredo(Putrefaction and Spiritual Death) THEN Albedo/White(Purification) THEN Cinitras/Yellowing(AKA Gold?) and FINALLY Rubedo/Red which wikipedia describes as "The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world.The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantiation of insights and experiences." That sounds a WHOOOOLE lot like what Radagon did doesnt it? He strived to become complete through studying Intelligence with Rennala and then after he was done left her to reintegrate into the Golden Order and created Fundamentalism. Knowing all this, it makes the statement by Marika, "Thou art yet to become me, thou art yet to become a god" SO much more impactful. Just as its implied that St. Trina was ultimately what Miquella was meant to become, Radagon was ALWAYS going to be Marika's fate and she did not want this. So "let us be shattered, both, mine other half."
This is an excellent theory and yes the only sticking point is the timeline which I hope you are able to unravel. I do think that Marika NO DOUBT had a serpentine and death related nature which shows itself in Messmer and Melina. I firmly believe that the GEQ was a part of herself that she divested in order for Maliketh to defeat. And in divesting herself of the GEQ, only Radagon was left within her. In Alchemy the three stages/colors to create Gold/The Rebis/Philosopher's Stone are Black(GEQ), Red(Radagon), and White(Marika). You can only reach gold after moving past the stage of Nigredo or Black. Fromsoft have twisted this idea with Marika full on removing that aspect from her vessel.
The big sticking point is the fact that his “the dragon heads are different heights” is a false interpretation of the image. The “taller” head only appears that way because it is closer to the camera. Because the camera is below the closer head is going to look taller, the heads are actually the same height
I had this same exact theory but never succinctly executed like this. On the topic of time-twisting, god killing, and Metyr I had a wild speculation that Metyr can kill gods much like the black flame due to her ability to spawn a BLACK HOLE, which twists time. The Ancient Dragon Smithing Stone says it slightly twists time allowing for godslaying, and metyr's head has helical imagery which parallels the Godslayer Sword. So I always thought the connection was something along these lines.
This video is a combination of amazing insights and extremely tenuous connections. I suppose that's the price you pay for finding patterns where others don't.
Ok I finished the video and i am convinced, i think this is the most important lore video released about Elden Ring. Some things to add: 1) The dominula assymetrical braid was an amazing catch. If the GEQ and Marika were the same, the symbolism becomes obvious: Marika cutting only one of her braids is symbolic of her killing her other half. One braid/one side destroyed, the other remains. People were theorizing awhile back about the braids being the key to the timeline in the Lands Between, since some statues in the Shadow Lands do not depict the cut braids. I bet those statues will tell us exactly when Marika cut out her alternate identity. 2) I have always been puzzled by the Godskins having the Grace of Gold. Zullie's video about eyes in Elden Ring showed that Godskins had grace in their eyes. I've always wondered why this is if they were enemies of the Golden Order. If they were actually Marika's children and the godskinning was part of an early ritual, this would make a lot of sense. 3) Perhaps Marika and the GEQ were created by jarring rituals that involved flaying and potting Shaman, so maybe the Godskinning ritual was a follow on from that. 4) The symbolism of the spiral also makes sense in this interpretation. Life and Death, Marika and the GEQ, spiraling around each other. It explains why the GEQ had a spiral sword. It also explains why her eyes are Gloam/Dusk instead of Night. Dusk is the time in between day and night, life and death in the Lands Between. And the setting of the sun. 5) This would also explain how the GEQ even had the Rune of Death if Marika already had the Elden Ring (which we know from timeline stuff she did). If they're the same, then it explains how Marika could pluck the rune from the Elden Ring and take it from the GEQ at the same time. It was the same action. 6) Corhyn tells us the Golden Order was founded on the principle that "Marika is the one true god." Interesting wording, no? What other option is there after all. Well the Golden Order was founded by sealing Destined Death and, in this interpretation, Marika's other half, so it makes total sense. Before the founding of the Golden Order, there were two goddesses. Afterwards, only one true goddess.
At this point, with this video, I am convinced that she is a silver tear like creature. The shape shifting, the alchemy nods, the ease of grafting, the divesting, the cracking of her body. The shaman were treated by the hornsent exactly the way the albinaurics were treated by Rykhard.
a lot of the things you mentioned can also be attributed to trees. in shaman village we see the 2 corpses that seemingly turned into wood upon death. seeing the importance of the great tree(s) on life it wouldnt surprise me if the shaman were special because of their tree like properties and their connection to the great trees that define each generation of life. the tarnished archaeologist has a video all about how tree grafting directly relates to the history of the lands between and its fascinating. I think its more likely that the silver tears were made to mimic the properties of the shamans, a lot of the things the nox did underground seems to be botched attempts at making a new god using similar tactics to what they know Marika and the Hornsent had done in the past.
I don't know if it can be connected but in the end of the frenzy flame, the tree is destroyed and in the sky there is the frenzy flame, as if it has taken the place of the sun now that the erdtree has been destroyed
As useuall~ Excellent deductions, Silky smooth threading, Puzzling piece by piece the large picture through the small details. Love your work thank you
One thing I woul be fascinated to hear your take on, why exactly is Marika's Rune shaped like her stance at the gate. I am unsure if it is a homage to some sort of the idea of her defining moment or if posture is part of how these beings activate their power. It would explain a lot of why we see people strung up on those crosses if you could someone take Marika's power and replicate it, one is literally right outside the tomb we wake up at. Finally what does it truly mean to have so little Radagon? Are they truly distinct or is Marika just his guise at another time? I think it is more likely Radagon is the true ruler and somehow he is being cut out of history after Marika's arrival. The Mimic Veil is also called "Marika's Mischief" and I think Radagon was incognito and suddenly hears Marika is back in town, and he says to himself "no i am not" and goes to see what that is about. Radagon the changeling and Marika the Mimic explains a lot actually, they both change their identities a lot.
A lot of the same finds I have been playing with and Im glad to see someone less lazy than me put them together. ♡ There's power in kings blood. Keep up the great work!
This makes sense with the dialogue we get about Marika telling her kids to be gods or become sacrifices, as they’d need the strength of a god to defend themselves from the gloam eyed queen and the skinning festival. Those could be less harsh, and more pessimistic words than we originally thought 🤔🧐 and maybe she hid messmer not completely in shame but to hide and keep him safe from the GEQ
It makes sense that the wandering mausoleums house demigods from an older era. The statue inside the mausoleum of Godfrey is younger with unbroken axe. Definitely before the night of black knives.
i think the 2 villages (Merikas home and the dancing village) are connected. The dancers could be the remaining survivors who moved there before the slaughter, which explains why there are only a few homes at Merikas place.
When the dlc first dropped, And I first fought and defeated Rellana, I took a moment to look back and tie her in to the existing Carian lore. In doing so, I noticed something very odd. The item description of Rennala's crown states that it depicts the full moon. However, I have a basic understanding of geometry, and concluded that the crown is not a circle. After looking at it for some time, I noticed that it looked kinda like a bird. Hence, I now believe that the moons of Elden Ring are aspects of the Twinbird.
Called it long ago, finally someone sees the truth. So here's another piece of truth for you: Miquela is a golden mimic, he can perfectly imitate other human beings, in his case his mother. He was so good at this that he ended imitating both her sides, so Miquela is Marika and St.Trina is how the Geq appeared back when he was born. Also, that's why he can't grow. And he can create those unalloyed needles from his body. He was created by Marika to defeat the outer gods and the elden beast.
Thanks for this, the absence of the sun the and the gloam eyed queen stuck out for me when I played on release. Suspicions confirmed, I obviously didn't go deep enough. I focused too much on rani and Godfrey and that mystery and assumed that was the deepest I could go.
After reading a theory on reddit the I had the same thought I think youre going to expand on (Im only 10 seconds into the vid). That the twin birds ‘watch over’ both ‘gold/life’ and ‘black/death’, like how Marika and the GEQ do, only who was the outer god to whom they are envoys? Looking forward to the video!
Probably knew my opinion on the twinbird from the video, regarding their outer god I think the usage of the symbol changed over time but, it's certainly not just the outer god of death like many people believe, we need to dig more.
@@G4meplus Epic video, can’t wait for the next one! By the way, where do you think Godwyn’s birth and life fit on the timeline? He puzzles me so much, as in how important was he and which parts of his importance were hidden. Dusk is a synonym of Gloam, why was he grafted onto the Erdtree, was his gold necessary for it to live/flourish? Was it watered with his blood? How much has he got to do with the ancient dragons and why is his lightning the same colour as everything storm related? I don’t know I’m probably just throwing shit a the wall.
Interesting. What might support your theory is the headless statues in the shadow realm. I believe they are beheaded on Messmer's orders. If they were demolished in rage, they likely would be more disfugured. It is just the head each time. They are also beheaded in Messmer's castle, so probable with his approval. The pose of the statues is also different from those in the normal lands. Some have hinted it resembles the rune of Death more then that of Marika's.
I don't think you have managed to actually account for the amount of time between Marika fleeing the sun realm (killing the GEQ), and the hornsent culture coming to power and building the divine gate, necessary for her to become a god again in your theory. there must of been quite some time between the two event's and according to yourself she would not have been a god during this time. How did she survive and why would she abandon rulership during this period? Would Radagon have been part of both marika and the GEQ or was he added afterwards? (I am not fully familiar with all your works so you might have already explained that) That all said there was some enlightening stuff in here, such as the entire dominula revelation, and the observation about the night of the black knives,
The reason the soulless demigods are connected to the Night of the Black Knives is that in the trailer, Ranni says that "On the night of wintry fog, the Rune of Death was stolen and the demigods began to fall, starting with Godwyn the Golden". Moreover, Godwyn is said to be the first demigod to die (i.e. no other demigod could have died before him). Therefore, the soulless demigods must have died after the Night of the Black Knives. By that time, the Gloam-Eyed Queen was already defeated as the assassins stole the Rune of Death from Maliketh who had gotten it by defeating the Gloam Eyed Queen. Whichever gods the Gloam-Eyed Queen killed and skinned, it couldn't have been any demigods.
I'm with you up until the "GEQ=Marika" part. There is a lot suggestive of that, but at the same time there are tons of holes in the idea. For example if the Fingers are about light and dark and Messmer hid the shrines to hide Marika's true nature, why did the Fingers continue to support Marika and why are the stone sheathed swords a common symbol in the Lands Between? If the Gloam-Eyed Queen and Marika are two parts of a dualistic deity, then how does Radagon relate to any of that? If Marika/the GEQ were related to the dragons, then what do they have to do with the Shaman and the Hornsent, or the ruins of Rauh? I lean towards Messmer and Melina not even being children of Marika to begin with, and their relation to the GEQ being a result of them being taken by Marika afterwards.
Great lore vid! I dunno if you do requests, but if you do, could you please make a lore video explaining the Loathsome Dung Eater’s involvement in the disappearance of the Brown Eyed Queen?
What Marika pulls is literally just strands of golden hair. That by itself doesn't sound like much, but gold has power in Elden Ring, a considerable amount. Metanarratively, the golden strands are supposed to symbolize the golden thread of fate; and even in the game, the garbs of demigods are woven in golden thread. Radagon notoriously was a seamster (generally a craftsman), and one of hisain symbols is the cross-hatching seen sewn over the Elden Ring - he literally mended the Elden Ring with the golden thread of fate. I assume Marika tied herself to this new Order, to the Greater Will, with that golden thread. Her crucifixion pose was also symbolic, being the perfect shape to slot into the gap of the Gate of Divinity. No wonder then, that she braided her golden hair - it's hard to find something closer to the divine than a double spiral of golden thread with the inherently divine properties that gold has.
Remember also that according to other youtube video, Stormveil Castle has another gate of Divinity. This means that there was an attempt to replicate the Gate of Divinity.
I literally got in a fight about this with somebody like a few months back, and mentioned that there was a ton of evidence to point out that she was in fact the daughter of, or an incarnation of (similarly to how messmer is the incarnation of the abyssal serpent) the gloam eyed queen, not saying I thought of it first, but I definitely noticed some of the evidence❤ just like, has anyone else seen the Rune in the Moon I think that's where Rannie's great rune went😁
Overall, it's an interesting video, and I especially like the moment with the soulless demigods, because their coffins in the DLC raised questions. But there are moments that seemed a little far-fetched, for example 1. the connection of the phoenix bird with the shield and bas-relief in Farum Azul, 2. the altars of light and darkness that Messmer "hid", and 3. Marika's attitude towards her children, if the first two points can still be accepted somehow because they cannot be refuted due to lack of information, but in the case of Marika, we have her quote where she does not speak very flatteringly about her children (If I remember correctly, she instructed them to strive for something, because otherwise they will be "forsaken").
golden braids resemble the roots and golden erd tree glom eye resembles the eyes we see on deathroot sprouting from godwin glom eyed queen - black bird marika - white bird radagon - red bird that explains
There's a hidden room just off the church of the cuckoo, behind an illusory wall, where similar coffins can be found to the ones inside the mausoleums, lined up in two rows, but the corpses all still have their heads, whereas those in the mausoleums don't. Their hands are also composed restfully, whereas the mausoleum corpses are reaching upward, as if to give or receive something. Who are these people? Why are they hidden? Why weren't they returned to the erdtree? And why is there a rune arc, a piece of the shattered elden ring, in this room? I'm still not convinced Marika was anything but a monster. I think the gloam eyed queen served a valuable purpose in ensuring that no age endured longer than it was supposed to. I think the fingers were done with her (why else would they have started grooming possible successors for someone whose title was "the eternal"?) and rather than become another skinned God, she removed the rune of death from the elden ring and destroyed the gloam eyed queen
I'm convinced the fans of this video put more thought and effort into all of the iconography in this game then the actual art designers and those crafting the story. We know there are reused assets in this game from Dark Souls. How can we even trust that because there is some symbol carved in stone somewhere it even is supposed to have any specific meaning? The most fascinating videos I see about lore are the mis-translations between Japanese English where things potentially didn't describe parts of the story in the same way in the west.
My personal theory in regards to the Gloam eyed Queen and Messmer is that they are the physical manifestations of the runes of death and the rune of Fire. I believe that Marika's soul is the one controlling Melina's body. Hence why Marika ordered Maliketh to kill the gloam eyed Queen.
Yeah went from Radagon being her alter ego, to the GEQ ? So they are three parts then ? Like the three birds in alchemy ? Or is there the GEQ on one side, and Marika+Radagon on another ? But it's unbalanced then..
I think that destined death is slightly different than death. It is more the entirety of the cycle of life and death. And I think it has to do with the old worship of sun and moon. If you look at the symbolism on the Godskin, they have 2 symbols: They have the one of the crucible and the other one is the purple stone that is, an Onyx. They also use the fingerprint like symbol for their spells. I think they represent the union of the crucible, the sun, and the fingers, the moon. The deity associated to the moon being, probably, Metyr. Most of the fingers that wear gems, wear purples ones. These are Onyx. This is also seen on the Onyx lord, that came when a star fell from the sky (Who's probably Metyr, then). Also, Onyx come from the ancient greek "Onus" meaning nail. Yes, nail, like on fingers. And I think that the god of sun is probably the fell God. His symbol, found on the golem furnace (the face with hair evoking the sun) is extremely similar to the symbol of the crucible on the Godskin as well. The rune of the fell curse, also, is reminescent of the fell God. The symbol of the Dung eater is also a sun with a face in it, that is similar to the one of the furnaces. The mending rune of the fell curse reminds a lot of a rotting sun. It is also a rune that is a curse of life: It will curse the people, their children and grand children for eternity. It would be fitting, as a curse of the god of life, to curse life. Also, the sword of the dung eater, sword of Miloas, says: " Sinister greatsword fashioned from a giant's backbone. Metes out wounds like a lopsided saw-blade, and restores some FP upon defeating an enemy. Milos was undersized for a giant, and was viewed as sullied and terribly grotesque. " Two things, first it evokes quite a lot the sword of the Elden beast, being made of a backbone. And is is said to be made for (and from) a giant, further connecting it to the fell god. There's also the parallel between the fire of the giant (worshiping the fell god) and the cold of the moon. But this isn't the only parallel: This is also encapsulated by the sword of night and flame: It's description says that the astrologers (ancestors to sorcerers) considered fire giants are their neighbors, and lived with them. This sword shows the union of the sun and moon. Godskin are the soldiers of the Gloam eye queen, and they carried the destined death: They have the symbols of the sun, and the symbol of the moon on them, because destined death is the two: It is this cycle. Also, the Gloam eye queen is said to give birth. She isn't only death, she also give life eternally. And the Godskins have two shapes, which is snake like. Or is it just snake? Because if it has to follow this parallel, the apostle has a very similar shape as the leeches, which are associated to Metyr. The noble, on the other hand, would be associated to the crucible then, which could be some of the fat inquisitor from Enir Elim? After all, they were adopting animal shape when ascending, which could have led to the godskin noble. And they could be snakes, actually, as snakes seems to have connection to flames (Rykhard, Mesmer, lava sorcery of the Men serpent). Metyr could also be the representation of the Destined death instead of the moon. Or, both. If you think about it, the fell god was defeated. He reappears on the stomach of the giants. Metyr has a gaping hole on her stomach. Metyr, mother of finger, was also abandonned by the greater will, and the finger decided to follow Marika instead of their Mother. Maybe Marika stole the rune of death from Metyr at the same time she defeated the fell God, because they are the same being. The fingers of her tail are also doing the spiral, with one being greater than the other one, evoking the shape of the Godslayer greatsword. Of a parallel with the Elden beast, who has a sword, Metyr has none. She has the symbolism of birth (Mother of fingers), and she can give birth endlessly (Evoking the description of the Gloam eyed queen, giving birth to her children, the Godskin, endlessly). The symbol of the Godskin being the fingerprint, Metyr could represent the Destined death and be its original owner. If her and the fell God where one, this further align with the twin nature of her. And if you put the land of shadow to its place in the lands between, which is in the middle (message from the suppressing pillar), she is just under the mountaintop of the giants. In term of color patern, it also works: The deathbird and the twin birds have the blue and red associated with them. Red is the color of the giants hair (sun) and blue the color of the moon (Lapis lazuli is the color of the Carian Royal family, worshiping the moon). Metyr color being associated to Onyx, Onyx is purple which is red and blue together. I think the parallel of Moon and Sun, being the two side of destined death, is recurring through Elden Ring lore, with many characters being the reincarnation of it. And yeah, Maybe Marika was one. She has link with the fingers after all, and so to the moon. Radagon, with his red hairs, could have been the sun. Also, many allegory to his hairs evoke flames: Radhann helm: "Radahn inherited the furious, flaming red hair of his father Radagon" and the giant's red braid "Hefty whip woven from the flame-red hair of a Fire Giant. Every giant is red of hair, and Radagon was said to have despised his own red locks. Perhaps that was a curse of their kind. " Let's also remember that Radagon, who was Marika, was also married to Rennalla of the full moon. An another character embodying this opposition is Rellana, which is the twin moon, is with Mesmer (That has also the power of flames similar to those of the fell God) and wields both moonlight and flames. And it isn't simple flame, it is in the description of her sword, "Golden flame" which remind of, well, sun. And I think the last iteration might be Melina and Rani (Or her Mentor). They have the opposite eyes closed, with claws tatoo under it. Melina has 3 claws, and Rani 2. But Ranni body is a doll shaped after her Mentor (which was a witch, mastering cold, and a heretical..) so it's either Rani's or her Mentor's mark. Melina has the power of the flame, related to the fell God (of sun) while Ranni has the power of the moon. Funnily enough 3 and 2 remembers the fingers, with the two fingers and 3 fingers. And Ranni quest make you kill the two fingers, while Melina hates on the Chaos and the 3 fingers. Ranni hide, as well, in the area named "three sister", which draw an other parallel to Noskstella and the dark moon. By the way, the talisman moon of Noskstella has, on its top, 2 birds. But for the parallel, I think it is interesting to give a look at the old Tarot cards. The sun card has a horse represented on it, and Melina give you Torrent. The sun is also a symbol of fire, which is a power Melina bear (burn the tree). The sun represent in tarrot the source of all life, which evoke the crucible. The horse represents purity. On the other side, the Moon has a wolf and a dog represented, which could illustrate Ranni, whose shade is a wolf, and there's wolves before her tower (and she gives you a spirit ash of wolves). The card also is depicted with 2 towers, and Ranni has Ranni's rise and Renna rise that she takes both names during the game (a pseudonym and the real one). Also, the Moon card is associated to the mind (The wolf being the wild side of our mind, and the dog the tamed one), and moon in elden ring is associated to sorcery and spirits. The idea of the Wolf is also true for Marika, who has Maliketh. And the death card in tarot has a skeleton wearing a black armour on a white horse (the same white horse as the sun card), has a white flag with a 5 petal flower and with the sun between the two towers of the moon card. You also usually have the symbol of the boat, which is the one carrying the deads into the afterlife. The boat is a symbol in Elden ring of the deads as well, that was used to carry the deads and we can find them in the cerulean coast and the stone coffin fissure. The 5 petals flower, in Elden ring, can be found on the Eternal city symbols as well as on the Maliketh boss arena pillar for those I know. So on the death card, you have the symbolism of the Sun and the Moon united, and the death card represent "ending and beginning", "birth and rebirth" and "change", or when reversed "stagnation", "decay". These are just small details here and here. But I think there's something behind it. I would have love to know more about the old civilization of Elden ring. There seems to be so many cool things about it, and it was sadly left abandoned.
Just a theory, but I believe the "Twin Birds" are the two snakes, Eiglay and The Abyssal. In Alchemy, there's the symbol of the Ouroboros, which represents cyclical rebirth and destruction.
Likewise, the Serpents Yin & Yang Marika & Radagon vs. The GEQ & The Fell God (two defeated characters with one powerful eye that wields flame). The Festival is reminiscent of Midsomnar -- a Spring celebration. After the death of the Sun/Son in Winter comes its/his rebirth.
But the age of the dragons was long before hornsent civilisation, yet marika became a god during the time of the hornsent, using their divine gate? How then could she have been a god during the time of the dragons?
If I am right then she was a god of dual nature and then she got rid of the GEQ and used the hornsent gate of divinity to become a god once more, in matter of fact I went over the concept of the gate of divinity on an older video and speculated that the dragons had a gate of their own, check it out.
There's a lot of good in here, but I think the point you had with Placidusax's heads not being at the same height is more a problem of perspective than an actual clue.
It work really well I just think we're missing something about Radagon in this new theory. Would the GEQ have her own Radagon ? Or are Marika/GEQ/Radagon at the same level and she has 3 identity ?
love the fact that you are creating lore/theory content that isn't just regurgitating the same talking points every other channel is, now i don't really agree with any of this, but i do appreciate the fact that you are making more unique lore stuff
Normal Player: “Whoa, cool shield.”
Alchemist: “20 minute vid.”
Lol, hopefully you enjoyed it ❤️
@@G4meplus very much, thank you.
Praise the Sun… Realm.
Fair. I don’t know why I never read the items in the game I’m like GOGO GOO. GRAB IT
I swear Elden ring will be one of those mysteries that we spend decades on
i can’t think of another game that nobody can figure out what’s going on after almost 3 years after release. the lore is so deep i pray miyazaki is lying to us and cooking up elden ring 2.
Miyazaki wants to drive us mad, may chaos take the world.
na, we got this. 30 years top
GEQ is Velka of Elden Ring. Another unsolved character with heavy influence on the story of the game behind the scenes
@@muramasa870 there is a video conecting her and radagon if you want more of a headeche
And the Divine Beast shows us that dancing and movement invokes divinity. The maidens have a never ending dance..
A flow state prevents stagnation
In Alchemy the 3 main colors towards reaching the Magnum Opus are Red, Black, and White. Marika represented White as that was likely her hair color prior to being jarred/mixed with various other beings(all shaman have greyish-white hair), Radagon who was descended from giants represented Red with his fiery hair, and the GEQ was the Black part of her, the abyssal serpentine aspect of herself which is where Messmer's snakes come from.
Whats really interesting is that in Alchemy the steps are supposed to go Nigredo(Putrefaction and Spiritual Death) THEN Albedo/White(Purification) THEN Cinitras/Yellowing(AKA Gold?) and FINALLY Rubedo/Red which wikipedia describes as "The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world.The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantiation of insights and experiences."
That sounds a WHOOOOLE lot like what Radagon did doesnt it? He strived to become complete through studying Intelligence with Rennala and then after he was done left her to reintegrate into the Golden Order and created Fundamentalism.
Knowing all this, it makes the statement by Marika, "Thou art yet to become me, thou art yet to become a god" SO much more impactful. Just as its implied that St. Trina was ultimately what Miquella was meant to become, Radagon was ALWAYS going to be Marika's fate and she did not want this. So "let us be shattered, both, mine other half."
radagon hates his red hair because he's still marika and she hated what shed become with time?
@@NihilisticRealism i think it means that Radagon is more perfect version of her for being a pupper of the Golden Order
Miyazaki: “huh oh, yeah that’s uhhh…. Cool?”
Disguises are a reoccurring theme in ER, as characters often utilize monikers or other names to achieve their goals. As such, part of me wonders if the Marika-Radagon entity that we meet is in fact the original Marika, or if Marika herself simply took the name and place of another, prior god who was both life and death in one.
I first had this idea when looking at the defaced statues of Marika in the Shadowlands. The statues are only missing their heads and faces, as if Marika's armies wanted to replace a previous Goddess's iconography with her own.
In addition, the use of the term "fled" when discussing Placidusax's God mirrors how the Gate of Divinity is not said to create Gods but usher their "return," as the White Birch Scroll says. It may be that the purpose of the Gate was to create a passage for Placidusax's God to return, but Marika-Radagon found a way to manipulate it to her own ends and claim to be the Eternal Queen returned. And for all intents and purposes they succeeded.
This idea has its holes, and it may be be that the GEQ was an unrelated rival to Marika, or a former aspect of her akin to Radagon. However, I do think that whoever Placidusax's God originally was Marika was trying to emulate her. Much like how Ymir tried to usurp Metyr or Radagon tried to usurp Marika, she intended to do a better job than the prior god but failed.
If this theory is true, this explains the single Gloam Eye on Melina in the Frenzied Flame ending. Messmer and Melina might have been born from the GEQ and Marika as Miquella and Malenia were born of Radagon and Marika. Messmer inherited the Abyssal Serpent from the GEQ and Melina might have had a single Gloam Eye and a single Golden Eye as a result. After betraying and killing the GEQ Marika sealed away the attributes Messmer and Melina inherited from the GEQ. Thus in the FF ending with the Marika's source of Power the Erd Tree destroyed the seal breaks and Melina's Gloam half awakens just as her Golden half dies. If Messmer is still alive at this point in the Lands of Shadow, my guess is the Serpent overwhelms him just as it does in the second stage of his boss fight when he discards his Seal of Grace.
Thats a very interesting point but the only thing that doesnt make sense to me is then why messmer and melina (kinda) have red hair when its explicitly stated that red hair is from fire giants only, and radagon (and its sons/daughters) as a curse, other than than (if im not mistaken) your comment makes a lot of sense :) (also sorry for my English)
@@youdontknow1541 I am not sure if red hair only comes from fire giants or there are other sources. It is possible that the Gloam Eyed Queen also had red hair. The RL Dark Goddess Lilith is traditionally depicted with red hair likely due to her association with blood.
Also, In am sure you speak English better than I speak your native language. :)
@@ravendelacour1917 mmm never thought about it that way thank u :)
If the ER is like the first flame inheritors which accumulated as the Soul of Cider then perhaps the GEQ was its previous host and when Marika inherited the ER she got part of the GEQ within her. Maybe that's why some of the things Marika does seem to contrast how she behaves at one point and differently at another.
@@Demokaze If true, Ranni is going to be seriously messed up in her ending with the psychos she's inheriting with the ER.
Hey bro, I remember commenting my lore write-up about this on your older vids. Here it is again.
This is an old write-up now, with some recent updates from the DLC.
Marika is the Gloam/Dusk-Eyed Queen.
- Red and black spike of death impales Marika and keeps her in place when we find her at the end. Only Maliketh wields this power, and only he could even defeat a God like Marika. But he's so loyal to her, why would he?
- Maliketh "defeated" the Gloam/Dusk-Eyed Queen. We know Shadowbound hounds have to attack their former master if The Fingers feel like the Empyrean is acting against them. We play through this reality with Ranni's quest, and both she and Iji know Blaidd will go mad as she enacts her vision. How do they know this happens? They saw/heard of it happening to Maliketh and Marika already.
- Only Marika would be able to guide Ranni to the location of the Rune of Death and how to use it for it to be stolen in the first place to forge the Black Knives. Remember, "Marika... is this what it is to sin?" "Why gull me..." Marika, after all, had only one use for Maliketh in the end, after the other work was done... a vessel to seal away Destined Death. And even then, she betrayed him.
- The Beast Eye is a purple, scratched up eye. It's Marika's eye from being defeated and imprisoned by her Shadowbound. No other Queen or Empyrean is "defeated" but not slain, as the text implies there except Marika. And who but her purpose-made hound could even stop her, a God? The one entity empowered enough by the Ring/Fingers to be able to do so should the need arise.
- Dominula Village is much like the Hinterlands and the Shaman Village. We find a skinning ritual and a Godskin Apostle there in Dominula. We learn that the "festival" is old and tacitly accepted by the Golden Order. The aesthetic of these villages is much the same, and they're intimately tied to Marika herself.
- Gideon gives us a boon in the form of a secret rite known only to him, Black Flame Protection. He is alleged to have peered into the will of Queen Marika, and shuddered at the end that should not be.
- The Scadutree is of a dual nature. So is Queen Marika. When Gold arose, so too was Shadow born. Gold and Shadow exist as necessary contrasts to each other, yet in a God, in Marika, this duality exists in coalesce, or it did once.
- No other characters are named as Queen or Empyrean that aren't already accounted for/ruled out to be the GEQ, and by that I mean Melina, she was given purpose by her mother at the foot of the Erdtree and that means she is a daughter of Marika, not old enough to be the GEQ but possesses traits of both Marika and Radagon. Eye color and hair color are passed down traits we see in game. Well, sure enough, Melina shows us a purple/gloamy eye in one ending. Inherited trait from her mother, the Queen in Black. Marika's eyes are never shown to us, to judge their color.
- Duskborn ending sees Godwyn rise to ascendancy and sees Death restored, with him as the Prince of Death itself. These titles aren't meaningless. Duskborn? The "Prince" of Death? Well, who would the Queen be? If Godwyn is Duskborn, and if he is a Prince, his mother would, of course, be associated with "Dusk" and be a Queen. And we know his mother is Queen Marika.
- Fia is hooded with a black cloak and comes from some other land. She also helps create Godwyn's Duskborn ending and is Death-aligned. We see Marika wearing black hooded garb in a statue where she also is holding the twins Miquella and Malenia. Her tattered clothing as we find her at the end is also black. She is also associated with the Nox/Numen race and the Black Knife Assassins that come from there as well.
- Statues of Marika in her crucified pose all show her with a flowing black cloth that wraps behind her in almost the exact same shape as the Godslayer Greatsword, which was the weapon or ritual sword of the GEQ/DEQ. You have to pivot the camera a bit to get a good view, but the shape is very similar. Coiled and then open, with one flap slightly longer than the other, same tip design on the Godslayer Greatsword. It's possible that she was propped up by the Hornsent culture and then part of the betrayal was killing other Gods in their pantheon, but what's maybe more possible is as Centered Tarnished pointed out, that Marika culled some other of her "unwanted" children after learning the truth of the broken Fingers and flawed foundations of her Order.
- Godwyn is referred to as the "Prince of Gold" in an item description. If a Prince of Death could have been a Prince of Gold, why couldn't his mother hold this potential as well, even necessarily so? We see from the Death Knights that Gold and Death can somehow synergize even still... Gold and Shadow, born at the same time, same as it ever was.
- Hewg prays to Queen Marika about his given task to craft a Godslaying weapon. Very interesting and specific task. Marika wants a God slain. He mentions "the sheer terror of Her..." regarding Marika. Godskins certainly take an interest in killing a God. Who was their leader? A "defeated" Queen who was once an Empyrean. Marika.
- Raging Wolf Vargram is a would-be Shadow. Wolf imagery is on his armor. He wields the Godslayer Greatsword. The weapon art is "The Queen's Black Flame", of course. A statue of Marika exists in Farum Azula showing her with three wolves.
- Marika learned the secrets of the Golden Order and realized her children would "amount only to sacrifices" as she instructed them. She knew the Erdtree was a soul parasite, and by sealing Death away, she weakened the Erdtree over time. She also had Godwyn buried at the roots of it, knowing that he would grow and overtake them, choking the Erdtree further. As he was, Godwyn was an "unwanted" child since he embodied the Golden Order, and she was a prisoner to it. He would end up much like Miquella would, a caged divinity of some kind. She was likely opposed to the Erdtree and Greater Will/Fingers for a long time, weaving plots in secret until the Shattering. She realized, only too late, that ultimate power has a way of becoming a curse when the truth of the nature of it all is finally revealed.
Just as Marika shined so brightly with her Golden Order, another aspect of her was as deep as the abyss and as dark as any shadow.
Nope, u r wrong, Ranni wuz trained by a witch, who wuz the gloameyed queen, marika is not a witch.
It is not a black spike of death. It is an amber starlight shard used by the Elden Beast to imprison her
@@DinoboyLou The elden beast can grab you and "imprison" you, just like marika herself was imprisoned by it. But the spears the elden beast impales you with are nothing like the red one we see on marika's body, the only character who is able to wield a red power is maliketh, and maliketh is also the only other being besides the elden beast that can even hurt marika.
@@patrascu1485 true that it’s not the same colour, but it doesn’t need to be. If you look at the Elden Beasts grab attack, the first spear to impale you is in exactly the same place that Marika was impaled. Why would Maliketh impale Marika in the same place that the Elden Beast does when he uses his grab attack? I think the existence of that grab attack is supposed to suggest that it was the Elden Beast who imprisoned Marika in the way that we see her prior to the boss fight, not Maliketh
The amber starlight shard is a “passing flash of starlight”, which “must command the fates of the gods”. Maliketh has no ties to anything spatial related as far as I’m aware, it would be more closely related to the Elden Beast.
If you want to use colour, you could say that (in real life) Amber in coloration is golden, and the Elden Beast is far more closely related to gold than Maliketh is. It may be that it looks red because it is a primordial gold, as primordial gold has a “red tint” as stated by the Ordovisis Greatsword.
If you really want to be follow colour theory, Maliketh is not the only person who uses a “red power” so just because the Amber Starlight is red, doesn’t necessarily = Maliketh did it
@ But i never said maliketh imprisoned marika, i am saying maliketh was commanded by the two fingers to help the elden beast imprison marika. This theory makes even more sense when you consider that maliketh is said to have defeated the gloam eyed queen, but where is she then? The game never said maliketh slayed her. Are shadowbound beasts not supposed to kill their empyreans if they betray them? Did marika not betray maliketh? Were the black knife assassins not apart of marika's people?
to bring up even more about the concepts surrounding the iconography around "seven": there's plenty of 7-spoked wheels and architecture found throughout all of Elden Ring. Notably, the Cape of the Dragonkin Solider, and Rennala's first phase arena. I think it has lots to do with the concept of "rebirth". It may have roots in Sun worship because, when diffracted, the rays of the Sun could appear in 7-spokes, similar to how the Great Runes resemble rays of diffracted light. Also, in Dark Souls, the symbol of Sun worship found on Solaire's famous chestpiece is of a 7-spoked Sun.
"Castle Sol" is already English. Castrum Solis is what it would be in Latin. Sol is just what our sun is called. It's kinda like how The All-father is actually called Óðinn. The All-father just describes what Óðinn is; The Sun just describes what Sol is.
I always interpreted Ranni & specifically Blaidd’s quest lines to reflect the story behind Marika/The GEQ. That she, or I suppose her other self, had acted against the Greater Will in some way, setting off Maliketh’s shadow programming.
The game doesn’t specify that Marika told him to go after her, just that he did.
??? When did Marika to against the Greater Will? Also Maliketh’s situation is a bit more convoluted than Blaidd’s, him being the center of the Golden Order and all.
This is nonsense.@@BlacklistedSoup
@@StevenWays what is
@@BlacklistedSoupMarika went against everything, not just the Golden Order. And Maliketh is not the center of the Golden Order, he's probably been around since before the Erdtree was even grown.
@@jackreacher7495 the Golden Order is founded upon the removal of Destined Death which Maliketh is responsible for keeping sealed.
This would explain why the Deathrite Birds attack us at Night: they are still attempting to avenge their Queen and thwart the will of Marika (ie, the mission of the Tarnished). In ER not all opposites are necessarily opposed. The paradox is that the opposites empower one another, however unwittingly, and, so, there are oxymorons abounding in ER. There are those that Live-in-Death, and there is Death that grows from Life (Scarlet Rot). Deathblight literally grows from Life, killing Life in the process while birthing Life (flies). The boluses that cure us require plants that sprout from the very ailments we are seeking to cure ourselves of. Perhaps it is like an allergy where you slowly immunize a child by slowly administering the allergen to them. Perhaps Frigg should have introduced mistletoe to Baldr, bit by bit, to immunize him to its deathly touch.
Another note: Maliketh's Destined Death attack was purple in vers 1.0, aligning with the GEQ and the purple jewels of the Godskin. What is the opposite color of purple on the color wheel? Yellow, or gold. By draining gold from the sun (Eclipsed by the Erdtree) the Geass (fated doom) was removed from Death.
Great job bringing the note about Maliketh, indeed some of his attacks end up in purple color in version 1.0.
@G4meplus I also think that St Trina being purple, and causing "sleep" that is akin to Death, is not incidental. Sometimes I think that her velvety sleep is a new form of the Gloam Eyed Queen, making Miquella very much his mother come-again and St Trina the new GEQ. It is no coincidence that we find St Trina in the Cerulean Coast, and that Charo's Grave is nearby. Blue and Red make Purple. One of the Twinbirds is Red on Blue, and Red + Blue = Purple. What is purple-coded, however? Not only St Trina, the Gloam-Eyed Queen, and her Godskins' jewels, but Metyr and the Fingercreepers. The Fingercreepers themselves are alike to the Hand of Glory, and can cause paralysis like the Hand of Glory does. There are Finger mushrooms that grow around the Finger Ruins, and Fungi are Lifeforms that grow from Death. I think Metyr did very much have a hand (pun) in the original dynamic between the GEQ and Marika. It also seems odd that Radagon is so capable with a sewing needle, as is his son Miquella. It is almost like Radagon was once aligned with the Godskins. He is a Fire Giant (or related to them). What is interesting about the Fire Giants is that they house the Fell God in their own bodies, and the Godskins house dead demigods in their own attire, almost as if emulating the Fire Giants, but in such a way as to not fully commit.
Not to mention - we see the EXACT thing happen in the DLC. Miquella, just like his mother, sheds his other half, and attempts to ascend to Godhood from that, just as Marika sheds the Gloam Eyed Queen and ascends, herself.
Melina is NOT the Gloam eyed queen, but instead a reincarnation/birth from her. Given Kitetales' video on how Melina and Messmer might be the children of the Gloam Eyed Queen, i find that theory even more likely after this video.
Ok the cut braids of the dancing Dominulas actually blew my mind. Could they living Shaman women...?
Really great video. The Dominula celebration of life and death is a great observation.
I've considered that the GEQ was a twin sister or possibly Marika's mother. But, the duel soul in one body makes so much sense. Especially with Miquella casting out Saint Trina. Love your use of the Eclipse.
Thanks a lot, glad you enjoyed.
@G4meplus dude, you are top tier for lore. Congrats on the awesome video! It has been a joy
Elden ring is indeed a story about Dual-natures.
Light /Dark
Life / Death
Type A / Type B.
Clocking the braids in Dominula is legit incredible. Love your work!
miquella waitin on eclipse only to find he’s stuck in it without end
Long time Twinbird=Marika x Gloam Eyed Queen believer, super excited more people are buying into it!
Seeing a praise the sun fills me with unparalleled joy and nostalgia
The earliest known mention of the phoenix is in the poem Precepts of Chiron by the Greek poet Hesiod, not Egypt. Small correction
I always assumed Marika was the one that "betrayed" the Gloam Eyed Queen when they discuss in the trailer how Marika became a god.
I truly subscribe to your points.
I would like to add that all 3 Empyreans (Ranni, Malenia, and Miquella) shares a story that are parallel to Marika's nature.
Ranni has Blaidd and Marika as the GEQ has Maliketh. Both shadowbound beasts eventually become hostile to them.
Melina shares the same nature as Millicent which are buds of Marika and Malenia, respectively. I now kinda think that the black knife assassins are buds of Marika as well similar to Millicent's sisters.
Miquella's separation from St. Trina through putrefaction is parallel to Marika's separation from the GEQ. Hence, the former file name of the putrescent knight is GloamEyedKnight.
If the GEQ and Marika have the same mind and body, then it is no coincidence that the Apostles and Nobles share the same traits with Mesmmer. I think children/soulles demigods of GEQ/Marika were doing some battle royale, collecting runes enough to achieve demigod status or higher. I think this practice is similar to the quote directed to her modern children; "Be it a Lord. Be it a God. But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. Amounting only to sacrifices."
I think Radagon only merged with Marika just after the GEQ was evicted. It is just one big Magnum Opus for achieving immortality/godhood.
As for the timeline, I propose this happened after the War against the Giants since Amon, the black flame monk, must have faced the GEQ forces during the war and eventually switched sides due to cowardice. If the eclipse happened after this war to separate the GEQ, then it is safe to say that Godfrey has his eyes tarnished due to gazing into the eclipse (i.e., eclipse blindness).
I am also working on a theory on how Mesmmer's crusade against the hornsent could coincide or just right after the War against the Giants
Isn't dragon communion supposed to be ruinous? It comes off as the ancient dragons using others as pawns without regard to what happens to these pawns
i think it became ruinous, like the true process lost to time sort of thing? i may be remembering wrong but i think in the DLC we discover that people did/could become dragons which is essentially what the rock heart and other one do to us
@davidmorcombe6779 yeah but i assume even this was ruinous, as the character class describes the draconians as short lived, and the ancient dragon man was apparently looking like a draconian in his human form in the game files, then there's the magma wyrm inside the cave where his boss battle takes place.
Overall, the theme of the game is outer deities exploiting people by giving them favors, and dragon communion is faith based, meaning the ancient dragons also take the role of the exploitative deity, whereas non faith based stats seem to flow from the character's own strength instead
@comedygold6249 Cept Dragon communion uses Arcane, now vanilla uses more fth stat requirments than arcane but both the seal and the dlc communion abilities are weighted Arcane. Leads me to think the faith aspect of communion isn't to tap into an outer gods power but to open the communer to channeling a power beyond their nature - and the Arcane 'stat that governs magic / secrets of the body' is the main part of communioning by reinforcing / warping the body toward the draconic aspect.
The Magma Wyrms are stated outright to be the result of failures, of Drake warriors who began the process toward becoming a dragon but did not manage to perfect the transformation. (Too little Arcane perhaps?) The Dragon Priestess herself can enter the players service with a prayer and implication that the player can and would be able to become a true dragon and worthy lord of dragons after devouring Bayle. Since the Bayle incants require what 50 ish arcane and no faith I figure this hints that while faith is needed to wield communion the true nature of it leans Arcane and leaning into faith with ones communion leads to failure like the Wyrms.
@SolusLupi the failures are the nox dragons with blue lightning who failed to become real dragons, while the magma wyrms were warriors who were "punished for their transgressions", most likely the result of bayle's curse, with the fire "one day consuming the body and soul of the communion devourer"
I hope the Gloam Eyed Queen makes a cameo in Nightreign, it would be a fantastic final boss that would make sense in terms of strength. Weaker than Maliketh but still strong enough to be a threat to Marika
I don’t wanna build your hope but look at the color of the cover of Neightrein and Melina’s gloamed eye. And if you look at the interview. If he had to put nightreign in the timeline it’s post base game Elden Ring. I’d also note in the frenzied flame ending where we see this Gloam eyed Melina she also finds torrents ring fading away, and who’s happens to be missing and isn’t useable in nightreign?
I hope not, i love the Velka/Oedon/Tomoe
Like Tom Bombadil, a character that is a mystery to us and to the characters.
I still want a Godwyn fight. I think he would make sense as "the Night King" even.
hey, the stone sword can either become the sword of light or sword of darkness, but you have to sacrifice your chance to get one in order to get the other, maybe a nod to how one of the duo of Marika and The Gloam Eyed Queen had to die in order for the other to ascend, hence TGEQ being dead when the game takes place
hey, in that scene in the SOTE story trailer, when Marika pulls threads from the eye socket of a serpent, I saw some people theorise that the serpent was the gloam eyed queen, like as well as massacreing the hornsent so she would have the bodies to create a gate of divinity, she also needed something from the gloam eyed queen to ascend. If this theory is true, then maybe as two halves of the same person TGEQ was holding her back from ascending so Marika needed to kill her to gain full autonomy, similar to how radagon was trying to stop her from shattering the elden ring
if you see light and dark, gold and shadow of two sides of the same coin, then one can't exist without the other. It makes sense death would be powerless in an eclipse because death is shadow and you can't have shadows if there's no light. Also this is a stretch but Maliketh's armor being black with golden borders almost looks like the light bleeding out from behind the moon during an eclipse, it's a metaphor for what the armor represents, Maliketh being used by Marika to defeat the Gloam Eyed Queen
omg it also makes sense why Maliketh was known as Marika's shadow if this is the case. Obviously all the empyreans area meant to have shadows, granted to them by the two fingers. But it goes deeper in Marika's case. Marika and the Gloam Eyed Queen were previously one, but Marika couldn't control the other half of herself, so she killed TGEQ and became Queen Marika the Eternal, an embodyment of eternal life. She couldn't control the part of herself that dealt with death, so she killed it and basically hired Maliketh, someone she could more easily manipulate and control, to death death in TGEQ's place. Maliketh was adopting the title of Marika's shadow from TGEQ after he killed her
I’m consistently reminded of the line in Dune. You are heir to more than just one line
@Act43 Miquella’s choices for the ritual cover all the bases as well for color representation. 😮
after reading shaman village lore im hopping back on the queen marika bandwagon,
gloam eyed queen? never heard of her
She must have been gloam eyed mean cause Marika would never do anything wrong
Dominula was one of my favorite spot in ER, and those enlightments regarding Marika who plucked Death/GEQ -her twin- from Godhood makes all of it even better. I love how the celebrants represents both Marika and GEQ still rejoicing together in the same dance of life and death. It also makes a great parallèle with how the Hornsent and the Pests saw/sees Rot. It's maybe after divesting herself of GEQ that Marika needed Radagon to still be a whole god based on her ascension at Enir-Ilim ? I'm stepping out the main subject my bad. Edit: okay so you speak about it at the end of the video that's satisfying, but yeah the timeline makes thing complicated. The more I think about it the more I think GEQ was in a similar position like Rykard, Maliketh may have slayed her at that time like it stated and I guess this is when Marika splits Death and the Shadow Realm to create her lil kingdom.
In Alchemy the 3 main colors towards reaching Gold are Red, Black, and White. Marika represented White as that was likely her hair color prior to being jarred/mixed with various other beings(all shaman have greyish-white hair), Radagon who was descended from giants represented Red with his fiery hair, and the GEQ was the Black part of her, the abyssal serpentine aspect of herself which is where Messmer's snakes come from.
Whats really interesting is that in Alchemy the steps are supposed to go Nigredo(Putrefaction and Spiritual Death) THEN Albedo/White(Purification) THEN Cinitras/Yellowing(AKA Gold?) and FINALLY Rubedo/Red which wikipedia describes as "The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world.The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantiation of insights and experiences."
That sounds a WHOOOOLE lot like what Radagon did doesnt it? He strived to become complete through studying Intelligence with Rennala and then after he was done left her to reintegrate into the Golden Order and created Fundamentalism.
Knowing all this, it makes the statement by Marika, "Thou art yet to become me, thou art yet to become a god" SO much more impactful. Just as its implied that St. Trina was ultimately what Miquella was meant to become, Radagon was ALWAYS going to be Marika's fate and she did not want this. So "let us be shattered, both, mine other half."
This is an excellent theory and yes the only sticking point is the timeline which I hope you are able to unravel. I do think that Marika NO DOUBT had a serpentine and death related nature which shows itself in Messmer and Melina. I firmly believe that the GEQ was a part of herself that she divested in order for Maliketh to defeat. And in divesting herself of the GEQ, only Radagon was left within her. In Alchemy the three stages/colors to create Gold/The Rebis/Philosopher's Stone are Black(GEQ), Red(Radagon), and White(Marika). You can only reach gold after moving past the stage of Nigredo or Black. Fromsoft have twisted this idea with Marika full on removing that aspect from her vessel.
The big sticking point is the fact that his “the dragon heads are different heights” is a false interpretation of the image. The “taller” head only appears that way because it is closer to the camera. Because the camera is below the closer head is going to look taller, the heads are actually the same height
Don't you think fromsoft was sending a message by deliberately using that camera angle ? I mean it's not hard to change the camera angle you know.
This would tie in with gold being obtain or extracted vs. Reaching that stage properly.
I wouldn’t know these games had a storyline without UA-cam
I had this same exact theory but never succinctly executed like this.
On the topic of time-twisting, god killing, and Metyr I had a wild speculation that Metyr can kill gods much like the black flame due to her ability to spawn a BLACK HOLE, which twists time. The Ancient Dragon Smithing Stone says it slightly twists time allowing for godslaying, and metyr's head has helical imagery which parallels the Godslayer Sword. So I always thought the connection was something along these lines.
This video is a combination of amazing insights and extremely tenuous connections. I suppose that's the price you pay for finding patterns where others don't.
Ok I finished the video and i am convinced, i think this is the most important lore video released about Elden Ring.
Some things to add:
1) The dominula assymetrical braid was an amazing catch. If the GEQ and Marika were the same, the symbolism becomes obvious: Marika cutting only one of her braids is symbolic of her killing her other half. One braid/one side destroyed, the other remains. People were theorizing awhile back about the braids being the key to the timeline in the Lands Between, since some statues in the Shadow Lands do not depict the cut braids. I bet those statues will tell us exactly when Marika cut out her alternate identity.
2) I have always been puzzled by the Godskins having the Grace of Gold. Zullie's video about eyes in Elden Ring showed that Godskins had grace in their eyes. I've always wondered why this is if they were enemies of the Golden Order. If they were actually Marika's children and the godskinning was part of an early ritual, this would make a lot of sense.
3) Perhaps Marika and the GEQ were created by jarring rituals that involved flaying and potting Shaman, so maybe the Godskinning ritual was a follow on from that.
4) The symbolism of the spiral also makes sense in this interpretation. Life and Death, Marika and the GEQ, spiraling around each other. It explains why the GEQ had a spiral sword. It also explains why her eyes are Gloam/Dusk instead of Night. Dusk is the time in between day and night, life and death in the Lands Between. And the setting of the sun.
5) This would also explain how the GEQ even had the Rune of Death if Marika already had the Elden Ring (which we know from timeline stuff she did). If they're the same, then it explains how Marika could pluck the rune from the Elden Ring and take it from the GEQ at the same time. It was the same action.
6) Corhyn tells us the Golden Order was founded on the principle that "Marika is the one true god." Interesting wording, no? What other option is there after all. Well the Golden Order was founded by sealing Destined Death and, in this interpretation, Marika's other half, so it makes total sense. Before the founding of the Golden Order, there were two goddesses. Afterwards, only one true goddess.
At this point, with this video, I am convinced that she is a silver tear like creature. The shape shifting, the alchemy nods, the ease of grafting, the divesting, the cracking of her body. The shaman were treated by the hornsent exactly the way the albinaurics were treated by Rykhard.
Some might say a MANY FACED GOD.
I've seen a video on Godwyn being a silver tear dragon lord. So this would make a lot of sense.
She is indeed. The albinaurics are artificial shamans, a manufactured replica of the biological phenomenon.
a lot of the things you mentioned can also be attributed to trees. in shaman village we see the 2 corpses that seemingly turned into wood upon death. seeing the importance of the great tree(s) on life it wouldnt surprise me if the shaman were special because of their tree like properties and their connection to the great trees that define each generation of life. the tarnished archaeologist has a video all about how tree grafting directly relates to the history of the lands between and its fascinating. I think its more likely that the silver tears were made to mimic the properties of the shamans, a lot of the things the nox did underground seems to be botched attempts at making a new god using similar tactics to what they know Marika and the Hornsent had done in the past.
I don't know if it can be connected but in the end of the frenzy flame, the tree is destroyed and in the sky there is the frenzy flame, as if it has taken the place of the sun now that the erdtree has been destroyed
As useuall~
Excellent deductions,
Silky smooth threading,
Puzzling piece by piece the large picture through the small details.
Love your work thank you
One might argue that Radagon is Marika's attempt at discarding her old split self as the gloam eyed queen
@10:45 that's not the erdtree symbol on the back of the cape. Its close, but distinctly different.
The eclipse symbolism even goes back to Dark Souls in the Darksign
I don't usually pay much mind to these kinds of videos, but.... really nice analysis!
the stone-sheathed swords and the fingerprint headless demigons completely went over my head and ignored. thanks for showing their connection!
One thing I woul be fascinated to hear your take on, why exactly is Marika's Rune shaped like her stance at the gate. I am unsure if it is a homage to some sort of the idea of her defining moment or if posture is part of how these beings activate their power. It would explain a lot of why we see people strung up on those crosses if you could someone take Marika's power and replicate it, one is literally right outside the tomb we wake up at. Finally what does it truly mean to have so little Radagon? Are they truly distinct or is Marika just his guise at another time? I think it is more likely Radagon is the true ruler and somehow he is being cut out of history after Marika's arrival. The Mimic Veil is also called "Marika's Mischief" and I think Radagon was incognito and suddenly hears Marika is back in town, and he says to himself "no i am not" and goes to see what that is about. Radagon the changeling and Marika the Mimic explains a lot actually, they both change their identities a lot.
A lot of the same finds I have been playing with and Im glad to see someone less lazy than me put them together. ♡ There's power in kings blood.
Keep up the great work!
Thanks a lot my friend ❤️
This makes sense with the dialogue we get about Marika telling her kids to be gods or become sacrifices, as they’d need the strength of a god to defend themselves from the gloam eyed queen and the skinning festival. Those could be less harsh, and more pessimistic words than we originally thought 🤔🧐 and maybe she hid messmer not completely in shame but to hide and keep him safe from the GEQ
It makes sense that the wandering mausoleums house demigods from an older era. The statue inside the mausoleum of Godfrey is younger with unbroken axe. Definitely before the night of black knives.
I’ve been knowing that the gloom eyed queen and Marika are the same person for awhile now. It’s pretty in your face from what the game gives you
Marika’s name as the Gloam-Eyed Queen? VELKA!
Explanation ….. Humans are like plants in Elden ring …
i think the 2 villages (Merikas home and the dancing village) are connected. The dancers could be the remaining survivors who moved there before the slaughter, which explains why there are only a few homes at Merikas place.
George Martin has actual super powers bro. The more you zoom in the more intricate it gets.
When the dlc first dropped, And I first fought and defeated Rellana, I took a moment to look back and tie her in to the existing Carian lore. In doing so, I noticed something very odd. The item description of Rennala's crown states that it depicts the full moon. However, I have a basic understanding of geometry, and concluded that the crown is not a circle. After looking at it for some time, I noticed that it looked kinda like a bird. Hence, I now believe that the moons of Elden Ring are aspects of the Twinbird.
Called it long ago, finally someone sees the truth. So here's another piece of truth for you: Miquela is a golden mimic, he can perfectly imitate other human beings, in his case his mother. He was so good at this that he ended imitating both her sides, so Miquela is Marika and St.Trina is how the Geq appeared back when he was born. Also, that's why he can't grow. And he can create those unalloyed needles from his body. He was created by Marika to defeat the outer gods and the elden beast.
Merry Christmas y’all ☦️❤️
Thanks for this, the absence of the sun the and the gloam eyed queen stuck out for me when I played on release. Suspicions confirmed, I obviously didn't go deep enough. I focused too much on rani and Godfrey and that mystery and assumed that was the deepest I could go.
After reading a theory on reddit the I had the same thought I think youre going to expand on (Im only 10 seconds into the vid). That the twin birds ‘watch over’ both ‘gold/life’ and ‘black/death’, like how Marika and the GEQ do, only who was the outer god to whom they are envoys? Looking forward to the video!
Probably knew my opinion on the twinbird from the video, regarding their outer god I think the usage of the symbol changed over time but, it's certainly not just the outer god of death like many people believe, we need to dig more.
@@G4meplus Epic video, can’t wait for the next one! By the way, where do you think Godwyn’s birth and life fit on the timeline? He puzzles me so much, as in how important was he and which parts of his importance were hidden. Dusk is a synonym of Gloam, why was he grafted onto the Erdtree, was his gold necessary for it to live/flourish? Was it watered with his blood? How much has he got to do with the ancient dragons and why is his lightning the same colour as everything storm related? I don’t know I’m probably just throwing shit a the wall.
Oh and an observation: the shape painted onto the Veterans Set seems to be the same as the one on the Twinbird Kite Shield beneath the birds.
Interesting. What might support your theory is the headless statues in the shadow realm. I believe they are beheaded on Messmer's orders. If they were demolished in rage, they likely would be more disfugured. It is just the head each time. They are also beheaded in Messmer's castle, so probable with his approval. The pose of the statues is also different from those in the normal lands. Some have hinted it resembles the rune of Death more then that of Marika's.
I don't think you have managed to actually account for the amount of time between Marika fleeing the sun realm (killing the GEQ), and the hornsent culture coming to power and building the divine gate, necessary for her to become a god again in your theory. there must of been quite some time between the two event's and according to yourself she would not have been a god during this time. How did she survive and why would she abandon rulership during this period?
Would Radagon have been part of both marika and the GEQ or was he added afterwards? (I am not fully familiar with all your works so you might have already explained that)
That all said there was some enlightening stuff in here, such as the entire dominula revelation, and the observation about the night of the black knives,
Ah you were at my side all along
The reason the soulless demigods are connected to the Night of the Black Knives is that in the trailer, Ranni says that "On the night of wintry fog, the Rune of Death was stolen and the demigods began to fall, starting with Godwyn the Golden". Moreover, Godwyn is said to be the first demigod to die (i.e. no other demigod could have died before him). Therefore, the soulless demigods must have died after the Night of the Black Knives.
By that time, the Gloam-Eyed Queen was already defeated as the assassins stole the Rune of Death from Maliketh who had gotten it by defeating the Gloam Eyed Queen.
Whichever gods the Gloam-Eyed Queen killed and skinned, it couldn't have been any demigods.
I'm with you up until the "GEQ=Marika" part. There is a lot suggestive of that, but at the same time there are tons of holes in the idea. For example if the Fingers are about light and dark and Messmer hid the shrines to hide Marika's true nature, why did the Fingers continue to support Marika and why are the stone sheathed swords a common symbol in the Lands Between? If the Gloam-Eyed Queen and Marika are two parts of a dualistic deity, then how does Radagon relate to any of that? If Marika/the GEQ were related to the dragons, then what do they have to do with the Shaman and the Hornsent, or the ruins of Rauh?
I lean towards Messmer and Melina not even being children of Marika to begin with, and their relation to the GEQ being a result of them being taken by Marika afterwards.
Great lore vid!
I dunno if you do requests, but if you do, could you please make a lore video explaining the Loathsome Dung Eater’s involvement in the disappearance of the Brown Eyed Queen?
one thing to notice is that the Erdtree is completely hidden in fog when standing at the windmill village. why? i dont know but it is a cool detail
What Marika pulls is literally just strands of golden hair. That by itself doesn't sound like much, but gold has power in Elden Ring, a considerable amount.
Metanarratively, the golden strands are supposed to symbolize the golden thread of fate; and even in the game, the garbs of demigods are woven in golden thread.
Radagon notoriously was a seamster (generally a craftsman), and one of hisain symbols is the cross-hatching seen sewn over the Elden Ring - he literally mended the Elden Ring with the golden thread of fate.
I assume Marika tied herself to this new Order, to the Greater Will, with that golden thread. Her crucifixion pose was also symbolic, being the perfect shape to slot into the gap of the Gate of Divinity.
No wonder then, that she braided her golden hair - it's hard to find something closer to the divine than a double spiral of golden thread with the inherently divine properties that gold has.
Remember also that according to other youtube video, Stormveil Castle has another gate of Divinity. This means that there was an attempt to replicate the Gate of Divinity.
I believe the gate of divinity goes way back than that, check my video about the divine gates. You will like it.
I literally got in a fight about this with somebody like a few months back, and mentioned that there was a ton of evidence to point out that she was in fact the daughter of, or an incarnation of (similarly to how messmer is the incarnation of the abyssal serpent) the gloam eyed queen, not saying I thought of it first, but I definitely noticed some of the evidence❤ just like, has anyone else seen the Rune in the Moon I think that's where Rannie's great rune went😁
Great video! You sir have just earned a subscriber
Overall, it's an interesting video, and I especially like the moment with the soulless demigods, because their coffins in the DLC raised questions. But there are moments that seemed a little far-fetched, for example 1. the connection of the phoenix bird with the shield and bas-relief in Farum Azul, 2. the altars of light and darkness that Messmer "hid", and 3. Marika's attitude towards her children, if the first two points can still be accepted somehow because they cannot be refuted due to lack of information, but in the case of Marika, we have her quote where she does not speak very flatteringly about her children (If I remember correctly, she instructed them to strive for something, because otherwise they will be "forsaken").
“Soulless Demigods” meaning Ranni never gave the black knives the ability to kill the body of gods, only their souls.
Wow, this is really thought provoking. Great video!
This is incredible! Great research man
golden braids resemble the roots and golden erd tree
glom eye resembles the eyes we see on deathroot sprouting from godwin
glom eyed queen - black bird
marika - white bird
radagon - red bird
that explains
5:37 so you're saying Placidusax was doing the Bloodborne Make Contact gesture?
We are told explicitly that he is waiting for his fled god so yeah he is trying to commune.
There's a hidden room just off the church of the cuckoo, behind an illusory wall, where similar coffins can be found to the ones inside the mausoleums, lined up in two rows, but the corpses all still have their heads, whereas those in the mausoleums don't. Their hands are also composed restfully, whereas the mausoleum corpses are reaching upward, as if to give or receive something. Who are these people? Why are they hidden? Why weren't they returned to the erdtree? And why is there a rune arc, a piece of the shattered elden ring, in this room?
I'm still not convinced Marika was anything but a monster. I think the gloam eyed queen served a valuable purpose in ensuring that no age endured longer than it was supposed to. I think the fingers were done with her (why else would they have started grooming possible successors for someone whose title was "the eternal"?) and rather than become another skinned God, she removed the rune of death from the elden ring and destroyed the gloam eyed queen
Wow bro uncovered another secret 🙏❤️
holy crap you are so right esp about the erdtree eclipsing the sun!
I'm convinced the fans of this video put more thought and effort into all of the iconography in this game then the actual art designers and those crafting the story. We know there are reused assets in this game from Dark Souls. How can we even trust that because there is some symbol carved in stone somewhere it even is supposed to have any specific meaning?
The most fascinating videos I see about lore are the mis-translations between Japanese English where things potentially didn't describe parts of the story in the same way in the west.
My personal theory in regards to the Gloam eyed Queen and Messmer is that they are the physical manifestations of the runes of death and the rune of Fire.
I believe that Marika's soul is the one controlling Melina's body. Hence why Marika ordered Maliketh to kill the gloam eyed Queen.
So where the hell does Radagon come in to the picture!?!?
Yeah went from Radagon being her alter ego, to the GEQ ?
So they are three parts then ? Like the three birds in alchemy ?
Or is there the GEQ on one side, and Marika+Radagon on another ? But it's unbalanced then..
So basically it was Marika all along
16:00 Isn't the imprint of the fingerprint a symbol of the 3 fingers?
twin bird probably represents closer to something like death and rebirth rather than life. Semantics I guess
I think that destined death is slightly different than death. It is more the entirety of the cycle of life and death.
And I think it has to do with the old worship of sun and moon.
If you look at the symbolism on the Godskin, they have 2 symbols: They have the one of the crucible and the other one is the purple stone that is, an Onyx. They also use the fingerprint like symbol for their spells.
I think they represent the union of the crucible, the sun, and the fingers, the moon.
The deity associated to the moon being, probably, Metyr. Most of the fingers that wear gems, wear purples ones. These are Onyx. This is also seen on the Onyx lord, that came when a star fell from the sky (Who's probably Metyr, then). Also, Onyx come from the ancient greek "Onus" meaning nail. Yes, nail, like on fingers.
And I think that the god of sun is probably the fell God. His symbol, found on the golem furnace (the face with hair evoking the sun) is extremely similar to the symbol of the crucible on the Godskin as well.
The rune of the fell curse, also, is reminescent of the fell God. The symbol of the Dung eater is also a sun with a face in it, that is similar to the one of the furnaces. The mending rune of the fell curse reminds a lot of a rotting sun. It is also a rune that is a curse of life: It will curse the people, their children and grand children for eternity. It would be fitting, as a curse of the god of life, to curse life.
Also, the sword of the dung eater, sword of Miloas, says: " Sinister greatsword fashioned from a giant's backbone. Metes out wounds like a lopsided saw-blade, and restores some FP upon defeating an enemy. Milos was undersized for a giant, and was viewed as sullied and terribly grotesque. "
Two things, first it evokes quite a lot the sword of the Elden beast, being made of a backbone. And is is said to be made for (and from) a giant, further connecting it to the fell god.
There's also the parallel between the fire of the giant (worshiping the fell god) and the cold of the moon.
But this isn't the only parallel: This is also encapsulated by the sword of night and flame: It's description says that the astrologers (ancestors to sorcerers) considered fire giants are their neighbors, and lived with them.
This sword shows the union of the sun and moon.
Godskin are the soldiers of the Gloam eye queen, and they carried the destined death: They have the symbols of the sun, and the symbol of the moon on them, because destined death is the two: It is this cycle.
Also, the Gloam eye queen is said to give birth. She isn't only death, she also give life eternally.
And the Godskins have two shapes, which is snake like. Or is it just snake?
Because if it has to follow this parallel, the apostle has a very similar shape as the leeches, which are associated to Metyr.
The noble, on the other hand, would be associated to the crucible then, which could be some of the fat inquisitor from Enir Elim? After all, they were adopting animal shape when ascending, which could have led to the godskin noble. And they could be snakes, actually, as snakes seems to have connection to flames (Rykhard, Mesmer, lava sorcery of the Men serpent).
Metyr could also be the representation of the Destined death instead of the moon. Or, both. If you think about it, the fell god was defeated. He reappears on the stomach of the giants. Metyr has a gaping hole on her stomach.
Metyr, mother of finger, was also abandonned by the greater will, and the finger decided to follow Marika instead of their Mother.
Maybe Marika stole the rune of death from Metyr at the same time she defeated the fell God, because they are the same being.
The fingers of her tail are also doing the spiral, with one being greater than the other one, evoking the shape of the Godslayer greatsword.
Of a parallel with the Elden beast, who has a sword, Metyr has none. She has the symbolism of birth (Mother of fingers), and she can give birth endlessly (Evoking the description of the Gloam eyed queen, giving birth to her children, the Godskin, endlessly).
The symbol of the Godskin being the fingerprint, Metyr could represent the Destined death and be its original owner.
If her and the fell God where one, this further align with the twin nature of her. And if you put the land of shadow to its place in the lands between, which is in the middle (message from the suppressing pillar), she is just under the mountaintop of the giants.
In term of color patern, it also works: The deathbird and the twin birds have the blue and red associated with them. Red is the color of the giants hair (sun) and blue the color of the moon (Lapis lazuli is the color of the Carian Royal family, worshiping the moon).
Metyr color being associated to Onyx, Onyx is purple which is red and blue together.
I think the parallel of Moon and Sun, being the two side of destined death, is recurring through Elden Ring lore, with many characters being the reincarnation of it.
And yeah, Maybe Marika was one. She has link with the fingers after all, and so to the moon. Radagon, with his red hairs, could have been the sun. Also, many allegory to his hairs evoke flames: Radhann helm: "Radahn inherited the furious, flaming red hair of his father Radagon" and the giant's red braid "Hefty whip woven from the flame-red hair of a Fire Giant. Every giant is red of hair, and Radagon was said to have despised his own red locks. Perhaps that was a curse of their kind. "
Let's also remember that Radagon, who was Marika, was also married to Rennalla of the full moon.
An another character embodying this opposition is Rellana, which is the twin moon, is with Mesmer (That has also the power of flames similar to those of the fell God) and wields both moonlight and flames. And it isn't simple flame, it is in the description of her sword, "Golden flame" which remind of, well, sun.
And I think the last iteration might be Melina and Rani (Or her Mentor).
They have the opposite eyes closed, with claws tatoo under it. Melina has 3 claws, and Rani 2. But Ranni body is a doll shaped after her Mentor (which was a witch, mastering cold, and a heretical..) so it's either Rani's or her Mentor's mark.
Melina has the power of the flame, related to the fell God (of sun) while Ranni has the power of the moon.
Funnily enough 3 and 2 remembers the fingers, with the two fingers and 3 fingers. And Ranni quest make you kill the two fingers, while Melina hates on the Chaos and the 3 fingers.
Ranni hide, as well, in the area named "three sister", which draw an other parallel to Noskstella and the dark moon. By the way, the talisman moon of Noskstella has, on its top, 2 birds.
But for the parallel, I think it is interesting to give a look at the old Tarot cards.
The sun card has a horse represented on it, and Melina give you Torrent. The sun is also a symbol of fire, which is a power Melina bear (burn the tree). The sun represent in tarrot the source of all life, which evoke the crucible. The horse represents purity.
On the other side, the Moon has a wolf and a dog represented, which could illustrate Ranni, whose shade is a wolf, and there's wolves before her tower (and she gives you a spirit ash of wolves). The card also is depicted with 2 towers, and Ranni has Ranni's rise and Renna rise that she takes both names during the game (a pseudonym and the real one). Also, the Moon card is associated to the mind (The wolf being the wild side of our mind, and the dog the tamed one), and moon in elden ring is associated to sorcery and spirits.
The idea of the Wolf is also true for Marika, who has Maliketh.
And the death card in tarot has a skeleton wearing a black armour on a white horse (the same white horse as the sun card), has a white flag with a 5 petal flower and with the sun between the two towers of the moon card. You also usually have the symbol of the boat, which is the one carrying the deads into the afterlife. The boat is a symbol in Elden ring of the deads as well, that was used to carry the deads and we can find them in the cerulean coast and the stone coffin fissure.
The 5 petals flower, in Elden ring, can be found on the Eternal city symbols as well as on the Maliketh boss arena pillar for those I know.
So on the death card, you have the symbolism of the Sun and the Moon united, and the death card represent "ending and beginning", "birth and rebirth" and "change", or when reversed "stagnation", "decay".
These are just small details here and here. But I think there's something behind it. I would have love to know more about the old civilization of Elden ring. There seems to be so many cool things about it, and it was sadly left abandoned.
Just a theory, but I believe the "Twin Birds" are the two snakes, Eiglay and The Abyssal. In Alchemy, there's the symbol of the Ouroboros, which represents cyclical rebirth and destruction.
Likewise, the Serpents Yin & Yang Marika & Radagon vs. The GEQ & The Fell God (two defeated characters with one powerful eye that wields flame).
The Festival is reminiscent of Midsomnar -- a Spring celebration. After the death of the Sun/Son in Winter comes its/his rebirth.
This video just blew my mind
But the age of the dragons was long before hornsent civilisation, yet marika became a god during the time of the hornsent, using their divine gate? How then could she have been a god during the time of the dragons?
If I am right then she was a god of dual nature and then she got rid of the GEQ and used the hornsent gate of divinity to become a god once more, in matter of fact I went over the concept of the gate of divinity on an older video and speculated that the dragons had a gate of their own, check it out.
amazing video man.
There's a lot of good in here, but I think the point you had with Placidusax's heads not being at the same height is more a problem of perspective than an actual clue.
Good work man
Excellent video!
This is so freaking cool.
It work really well
I just think we're missing something about Radagon in this new theory.
Would the GEQ have her own Radagon ?
Or are Marika/GEQ/Radagon at the same level and she has 3 identity ?
People overthink it. The frienzied flame ending is 100% clear : Melina is the Gloam Eyed Queen.
Incredible finding
I believe Marika replaced Gloam eyed queen with Radigon, which is why the red hair is seen as blasphemous.
Man, having to wait until the year 2026 for the next video... Oh right, this came out a while ago.
You spoil us brother, kudos to you
The Eclipse happened because of the Dark ending in DS3 😂
Elden Ring Nightreign joined the chat 😂
The nameless king is called SEN or gwyndosen
SENS fortress
love the fact that you are creating lore/theory content that isn't just regurgitating the same talking points every other channel is, now i don't really agree with any of this, but i do appreciate the fact that you are making more unique lore stuff