MBirkhofer wrote...
The old gods/dragons could not communicate with people directly. And still can't. They do so in dreams. This is established in the lore in a few places. one, the codex on the old gods, speaks of the Tvinter mages communicating with them.
The codex on dragon cults also mirrors this, mentioned again, the dragons are "thought" to be bare sentient, but clearly cults form around them symbiotically. The answer being, the dragon does communicate via dreams.
The archdemons continue this as well, speaking to the grey wardens in dreams.
As well as the Dalish origin mirror. Which is one of the means the Tvinter mages used to communicate with their old gods.
The old gods are simply very powerful dragons, a step higher, and more in touch with the fade/magic.
The Dalish origin is interesting as it does show Tvinter mages, with Elven artifacts and gods, in the ruins where they communicate with their Old gods. This is strong suggestion that the Dalish god pantheon is, in fact, the old dragon gods, under different names or something.
Bare in mind, the Dalish lore is also very fractured. it is word of mouth spoken, and largely lost with the loss of the Dales.
It, much like the chantry lore on the Maker is likely subject to lack of real facts, and is very biased.
This was very interesting. The idea that the elven pantheon actually is the Old Gods seems both cool and likely.
Perhaps the following timeline can be established:
1. The elves live alone in Thedas and are worshiping the Old Gods.
2. The humans arrive from the north, at first being very primitive compared to the elves.
3. Through contact with the advanced elves the humans become civilized and the Tevinter tribes becomes the strongest and conqur the other human tribes.
4. Tevinter conquer and enslave the elves and also take the elven religion and make it their own. Kind of in the way the Romans conquered and absorbed Greek religion.
5. During enslavement the elves lose their religion and history.
6. After the fall of Tevinter and the end of elven slavery the Dalish are starting to reconstruct the elven pantheon from hearsay. They never understand that the the elven gods and the Old Gods are the same.
The two events
* The elven gods are tricked and locked away
* The maker imprison the Old Gods underground
are in fact the same event. The question is when did this take place? I can see two scenarios:
The imprisonment took place...
A, ...when the Tevinter conquered Arlathan.
B, ...long before even the rise of the pre-human-arrival elven society, and in a time when a society ruled that is today completely forgotten.
I want to go for A, that seems to the coolest option. But this post by David Gaider complicate things:
http://old.dragonage...ngle/1245169500As far as what the Old Gods were, legend says they were giant dragons
-- high dragons, most likely, but they were never seen in the skies at
any time. There were no Old Gods flying overhead or landing in cities
demanding that mankind worship them. These Old Gods were imprisoned in
ancient times (only recorded in legend, in other words) by the Maker
beneath the earth for teaching early man to turn away from the Maker
and worship them instead. Supposedly, these Old Gods then spoke to the
magisters of Tevinter in the Fade and taught them the secrets of
magic-- all for a promise that these magisters would one day free them
from their prisons.
So they "were never seen in the skies at any time"? I interpret this as there is no recorded history of Old Gods flying about. But perhaps they could still have been sen flying in the sky during the time of elven rule in Thedas, though all memory of this was of course lost after the elven enslavement. All of what is known of pre-tevinter days are legend.
--
A thing I think we can agree on is that the Old Gods aren't tied to just one body. Just like Flemeth they possess bodies, and can switch bodies when they need to. For some reason they have chosen to possess dragons, perhaps simply because dragons are strong and hard to kill?
One important thing is that the Old Gods still need bodies. They aren't fade spirits that can continue to exist in the fade when their physical bodies are destroyed.
So they still are creatures of this world, not creatures of the fade. They can switch bodies, but with no body at all they die.
--
Since the elven pantheon of today is just a reconstruction we don't know how the cult of the Old Gods looked like during the days of Arlathan. Perhaps it wasn't an religion at all. Perhaps the Old Gods were some kind of powerful elven mages that took the bodies of dragons. With their magic they performed great wonders, and were very much appreciated by elven society. Somehow they were trapped under the earth when Arlathan fell. Was this human doing? Was it a mistake, did they perhaps flee underground to escape the Tevinter onslaught and through accident they later couldn't get out.
Modifié par Kalle88, 25 novembre 2009 - 05:21 .
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