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So is it official that "Elven Gods" = Old Gods?


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#51
Gervaise

Gervaise
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So you're saying that the identification is based off old statues, that in the case of all the archdemons except the first, were likely to be falling into disrepair since people no longer honoured or worshipped them.   In Asunder Rhys sees a statue in Tevinter that he assumes must be an old god, since it has such malevolent features, but is made from marble and has both its front legs and wings missing.   So I struggle to understand how looking at an old statue made from marble is going to allow you to identify the arch demon in question, particularly since it has itself been altered by the taint.    Even if they had been preserved, each statue and picture would only likely be a stylised idea of how they looked, as you can see from the images in the source books.   Take Andraste; there are all sorts of statues and images of her in the Chantries, yet it is likely that if she suddenly reappeared in Thedas she wouldn't look like any of them.  If she didn't actually say, "Hi there, I'm Andraste", how would people know?

 

As for the elf gods = old gods theory, well there are a lot of similarities in what they are meant to represent, particularly if you ignore gender.   Toth the dragon of fire would then be Sylaise the hearthkeeper (whose fire cannot be quenched);  Urthemiel the dragon of works of Beauty would be June, the crafter of wonders; Razikale the dragon of Mystery would be Dirthamen the Keeper of Secrets and Luscan the dragon of Night would be Falon'din the god of death/the dead.   The other three are a bit more difficult to pin down but Zazikel (variously described as both male and female) who is known as the dragon of either freedom or chaos could be Andruil (free spirited hunter who brought chaos to her lands when her hunts took her to the Void); Andoral is known both as the dragon of unity and the dragon of slaves, but I suppose could be Ghilan'nain who was herself a subject of the Evanuris until raised to godhood by Andruil.   That would leave Dumat (silence) as Elgar'nan (vengeance) purely because both are said to be the head of their particular pantheon.  

 

There are certainly far more similarities between the old gods' supposed areas of responsibility and those of the Creators than there are with those of the Forgotten Ones, who are the only other likely candidates.    Their areas of interest were meant to be terror, malice, spite and disease.    Now if you think that the old gods were responsible for the Blight and not simply victims of it; then that would fit.    Arch demons are said to draw their magic from the Void, which is where the Forgotten Ones are said to dwell.    There is also apparently an ancient text that suggests that Dumat created the first darkspawn rather than the darkspawn finding him and turning him into an arch demon.

 

The argument against this is that why would Mythal want to capture the essence of one of these beings that were clearly inferior to the Creators?    Plus, despite being called the Dark Ritual, the resulting offspring whilst a little odd sounding, with rather unique insights into the races, does not strike you as being the host of an ancient being of evil.    So either the Forgotten Ones were not as terrible as they were made out (a distinct possibility apart from the fact that Gelduran didn't strike me as sounding particularly benign) or the being was suffering from a similar sort of amnesia to that of the Architect (again a possibility because of having been affected by spending time infected with the Blight)

 

I suppose there could be a third possibility and that is all the various gods we have been presented with: Elven(Creators and Forgotten Ones), Tevinter, Avaar, etc, are all different but something tells me that is not how it is going to work out.