Inchoroi Gods

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Bertxi

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« on: March 21, 2014, 04:43:25 am »
I don’t know if this has been brought up before, but after re-reading both series, atrocity tales, and Bakkers interviews it seems to me that the Three Seas gods are not their own. They are instead either the Inchoroi’s which they have brought with them world to world, or something that the Inchoroi planted in the 5 Tribes of Men and belief created them. If we look at the Interview Bakker did with Pat, Bakker seems to confirm parts of this.

Pat-Were there ever Nonmen in Eänna? And if not, why not? They certainly seem to have had both the time, capability and inclination for an invasion before the Inchoroi showed up. Instead they just fortified the passes. Why?
Bakker-…When the Inchoroi began using Men to master the Aporos and produce the first Chorae; they gave the first sorcery-destroying spheres to the Sranc, only to discover that the creatures were far too reckless. Having fixed and morbid habits of ornamentation, the Sranc rarely valued the spheres, and were thus prone to lose them. So the Inchoroi began giving them to the Men of Eärwa, hoping to incite them to rebellion. But the Halaroi had no stomach for rousing a feared, and most importantly, absent master, and so rendered the deadly gifts to their Nonmen overlords. The Inchoroi then looked to Eänna, where the Men were both more fierce and more naive. They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, they gave a great tusk inscribed with their hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’

And in the Appendence in the TTT we have, “The Chronicle of the Tusk, which records the coming of Men to Eärwa, generally refers to Nonmen as Oserukki, the “Not Us.” In the Book of Tribes, the Prophet Angeshraël alternately refers to them as “the Accursed Ones” and “the sodomite Kings of Eärwa,” and he incites the Four Nations of Men to embark on a holy war of extermination. Even after four millennia, this xenocidal mission remains a part of the Inrithi holy canon. According to the Tusk, the Nonmen are anathema:

Hearken, for this the God has said,
These False Men offend Me;
blot out all mark of their Passing.”


From this we can guess that either the Prophet Angeshraël is really the Inchoroi Aurax in disguise or he met with Aurax on Mount Eshki before he lowered his face into the fire. But it’s the fact that he is giving the 5 Tribes their “Most hallowed stories” and not this devious addition that is intriguing. From the books, we know that the Tusk is stories about the gods of the world and how to properly worship them, so does that make the gods of the Three Seas the gods of the Inchoroi? And if they are the gods of the Inchoroi do they truly ever worship them because it doesn’t seem like they do anymore.

What makes this even more plausible is the fact that before Kian was defeated by the First Holy war, they had declared several Jihads to conquer the Nansur Empire and to destroy the Rouk Spara, or “Cursed Thorn” which they call the Tusk. The central tenets of Fanimry deal with the solitary nature and transcendence of the God, the falseness of the Hundred Gods (who are considered demons by the Fanim), the repudiation of the Tusk as unholy, and the prohibition of all representations of the God.

Bakker further says in his interview with Pat, “…Damnation is not local. There is a right and wrong way to believe in Eärwa, which means that entire nations will be damned. Since the question of just who will be saved and who will be damned is a cornerstone of The Aspect-Emperor’s plot, there’s not much more that I can say.”

This gets more intriguing when you consider the exchange between Aurang and Titirga in the False Sun.

But Aurang continued his shining scrutiny of Titirga. A transgression that Shaeönanra found unnerving.
“Do you not fear damnation?”
A careful look from the Hero-Mage.
“The Nonmen…” he said evenly. “They have taught us how to hide our Voices. How to bypass the Outside, find Oblivion.”
Eyes like bladders of ink, each reflecting the tripods across their shining curve. The fluting of gill-tissues along the neck. “You worship the spaces between the Gods…”
“Yes.”
A rasp like the screams of faraway children tangled in the wind. Inchoroi laughter. “You are already damned. All of you are already damned. “
“So say you.”
A deep chested rumble. Popping mucous. “So says the Inverse Fire.”


Aurang could very well be implying here that the two surviving Inchoroi did indeed worship the gods. Or maybe they were not even real gods until the Inchoroi gave the Tusk to the 5 Tribes, and the 5 Tribes belief in the stories made the gods real since it seems that belief can shape reality in Earwa. 






Madness

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« Reply #1 on: March 21, 2014, 11:10:51 am »
Hi Bertxi, a couple thoughts:

Bakker - The Inchoroi then looked to Eänna, where the Men were both more fierce and more naive. They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, they gave a great tusk inscribed with their hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’

If he could have only been more specific! Argh! This line, this word, has caused too much ambiguity.

Would it change your speculation any if Bakker had said for sure here that "they gave" = the Inchoroi gave and "inscribed with their" = inscribed with the Ketyai's?

From this we can guess that either the Prophet Angeshraël is really the Inchoroi Aurax in disguise or he met with Aurax on Mount Eshki before he lowered his face into the fire. But it’s the fact that he is giving the 5 Tribes their “Most hallowed stories” and not this devious addition that is intriguing. From the books, we know that the Tusk is stories about the gods of the world and how to properly worship them, so does that make the gods of the Three Seas the gods of the Inchoroi? And if they are the gods of the Inchoroi do they truly ever worship them because it doesn’t seem like they do anymore.

Well, the communication could have happened when there were more than just two Inchoroi?

But again that "their." Bakker could have meant the Inchoroi... but he probably meant the Ketyai's belief and they slipped in those two thoughts.

Bakker further says in his interview with Pat, “…Damnation is not local. There is a right and wrong way to believe in Eärwa, which means that entire nations will be damned. Since the question of just who will be saved and who will be damned is a cornerstone of The Aspect-Emperor’s plot, there’s not much more that I can say.”

Can't wait :).

This gets more intriguing when you consider the exchange between Aurang and Titirga in the False Sun.

...

Aurang could very well be implying here that the two surviving Inchoroi did indeed worship the gods. Or maybe they were not even real gods until the Inchoroi gave the Tusk to the 5 Tribes, and the 5 Tribes belief in the stories made the gods real since it seems that belief can shape reality in Earwa.

Maybe... it's all speculation :).
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SkiesOfAzel

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« Reply #2 on: March 21, 2014, 11:59:22 am »
The fact that the inverse fire shows damnation is by itself an indication the Inchoroi are somehow connected to Earwa. Damnation is a part of the Earwan belief system, they had to come to Earwa to fight it. My guess is that at some point they indeed shared the same beliefs with the Earwans because they were humans. Even their basic form seems to be bipedal (although we can never be certain of that with the Tekne) and that's very improbable for an alien race. Some great catastrophe forced them to leave the planet and they probably thought they were the only survivors since they named their mothership the Ark. But they weren't, humans resurfaced, and started to multiply again. NonMen are probably a mutation, and that's were their name comes from, they were newer, so they had to be compared with the old which was man. And that's why they are called the false men.

This is interesting as a metaphor. Man is still the common man, but NonMan is a philosopher, Dunyain is a scientist and Inchoroi is a materialist/hedonist. Three important schools of thought that try to explain the meaning of life made races, all taken through the route of excess.

This is pure speculation of course, but it's the only logical conclusion i could come up that tied Inchoroi to Earwan damnation. They came from Earwa, so their souls are a part of Earwa that return there to burn eternally in the pits of hell when they die :P.
« Last Edit: March 21, 2014, 03:00:44 pm by SkiesOfAzel »

Aural

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« Reply #3 on: March 21, 2014, 02:34:49 pm »
I always took the 'their' in question here to mean the 'Ketyai's'. It doesn't make sense for the Tusk to contain the Inchoroi's most hallowed laws and revered stories, if it did, they shouldn't be surprised to find themselves damned.

Quote
Well, the communication could have happened when there were more than just two Inchoroi?

I think you're right, after all, how could the two Inchoroi who were stuck in the Ark until the Shae/Mek broke the glamour have communicated with the Men of Eänna? But this is something that I find a bit confusing, IIRC Bakker said on TSF that the Tusk came a few thousand years after the landing. Given that the landing and Womb Plague both happened in Cujara's lifetime, and that the Inchoroi were Annihilated 500 years after the Womb Plague, the timeline wouldn't make sense unless the Tusk came when there were only two Inchoroi left, no?

locke

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« Reply #4 on: March 23, 2014, 08:30:37 am »
Bertxi, it's a cool thought, that the tusk is inscribed with the gods of the inchoroi.

But it is really hard to say whether or not it is, because it can go either way.

1. Either every reader in the world except Bertxi has screwed up and Bakker meant his words literally, wrote the line with a gramattical error and the context doesn't change them: the Tusk is inscribed with the gods and sacred text of the inchoroi.

2. Or Bakker made a minor error in subject/object wordplay, the tusk was inscribed with the gods and sacred texts of the Eanna, that minor error is easily/automatically/thoughtlessly corrected by all the readers in the world except Bertxi via the larger context.

3. Bakker wanted it deliberately ambiguous, but thought it would be fun to hide the ambiguity where no one would see it, under the giant waving revelation banner of the Tusk's origin/falseness.  All the readers in the world missed this possibility/detail because we were so excited about the macro of the statement.

4. You're Bakker and you cannot conceive that all of us have missed it, and it's driving you nuts that we haven't figured this out yet; if so it's your own fucking fault for writing it so poorly if you wanted us to realize that. :) 

The likelyhood is that 2 is correct, but the best evidence in your corner is that Bakker is usually rather careful, however, failing to be ubercareful in attributing the proper subject when talking about multiple subjects is one of the most common mistakes of written english (and sometimes conversational english it happens as well, but people usually self correct or hear the ambiguity when it's said out loud).

It seems to me it is just a grammatical mistake, the final proper noun of the ambiguous passage in question is KETYAI.  This is followoed by "their."  English grammer demands that readers interpret the "Their" as referring to the most recent personage, in this case the Ketyai.  However, reading it like that, makes the sentence make no sense, because then it reads that the Ketyai gave themselves a tusk.  Looking back you see that a different proper noun was the active subject before the mention of Ketyai, therefore it is reasonable to assume the first "Their" means The inchoroi. 

The question then is does the first and second "THEIR" match in the sentence that follows the invocation of the Ketyai? They should match, but we've already seen that context indicates a significant grammatical mistake has already occurred within the sentence because of unclear writing, so we cannot assume that the two occurrences of "THEIR" match. These two Theirs could be each referring to different subjects.  Considering the first one is cocked up and is right next to the subject it is supposed to belong to but does not belong to it is reasonable to assume the second THEIR is cocked up as well and does not pair with the first THEIR but belongs to the proper noun it grammatically should belong to, Ketyai.   

In any event, Bakker screwed up in the writing of that particular answer, you are correct that a literal reading does suggest Inchoroi is the possessor of the THEIR, but the presence of the word Ketyai screws things around and opens the door to many reasonable alternative readings and is the reason that no one has considered the possibility that the tusk is inscribed with the gods and sacred texts of the inchoroi.

If we have all missed this revelation we can all blame bakker for doing it wrong. :-p

these four iterations are subtly different, but the latter two say the same thing. The first one, Bakker's text, could match the latter two, or it could mean what the fourth one says.
Quote
They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, they gave a great tusk inscribed with their hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’
Quote
They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, the Inchoroi gave a great tusk inscribed with the Ketyai's hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’
Quote
They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, was given a great tusk inscribed with their hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’
Quote
They gave the Chorae to the Five Tribes as gifts, and to one tribe, the black-haired Ketyai, the Inchoroi gave a great tusk inscribed with their hallowed laws and most revered stories–as well as one devious addition: the divine imperative to invade the ‘Land of the Felled Sun’ and hunt down and exterminate the ‘False Men.’
« Last Edit: March 23, 2014, 08:34:55 am by locke »

Madness

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« Reply #5 on: March 23, 2014, 11:50:27 am »
The fact that the inverse fire shows damnation is by itself an indication the Inchoroi are somehow connected to Earwa.

Maybe?

Quote
Well, the communication could have happened when there were more than just two Inchoroi?

I think you're right, after all, how could the two Inchoroi who were stuck in the Ark until the Shae/Mek broke the glamour have communicated with the Men of Eänna? But this is something that I find a bit confusing, IIRC Bakker said on TSF that the Tusk came a few thousand years after the landing. Given that the landing and Womb Plague both happened in Cujara's lifetime, and that the Inchoroi were Annihilated 500 years after the Womb Plague, the timeline wouldn't make sense unless the Tusk came when there were only two Inchoroi left, no?

Well... the timeline at most for the Cuno-Inchoroi Wars stretches about 1000 years? There are no few thousand extra to go around unless the Nonmen seal the Glamour and then Aurang and Aurax have actually been able to come and go as they please for a couple thousand years before the Breaking of the Gates, though the Glossary implies no such gap. Also, the interview doesn't make clear but first Bakker writes:

Quote
The Inchoroi only possessed the Tekne when they arrived in Eärwa. All of the Inchoroi are the products of successive Graftings, species-wide rewrites of their genotype

...

The Grafting that produced Aurang and Aurax was also devised during the age-long Cuno-Inchoroi Wars, one of many failed attempts to biologically redesign themselves to overcome the Nonmen. But they had been outrun by their debauchery by this time, and had lost any comprehensive understanding of the Tekne. The Graftings had become a matter of guesswork, more likely to kill than enhance those who received them.

Aurang and Aurax are two of six who survived the attempt to Graft the ability to see the onta.

Except the bold, I take him to mean that Aurang and Aurax are the last two of the last six Inchoroi - because "species-wide rewrites of their genotype." However, the bold seems to imply that "those who received them" are a particular rather than total number of Inchoroi.

Being the last of something, of the Few, with no allies, makes it difficult to give the Halaroi Chorae... I always figured that the Inchoroi gave the Five Tribes Chorae before this attempt at Grafting for the Onta, which happens late in the Cuno-Inchoroi Wars... I'd have to find it elsewhere but I timed this out :-\.

Thoughts?

3. Bakker wanted it deliberately ambiguous, but thought it would be fun to hide the ambiguity where no one would see it, under the giant waving revelation banner of the Tusk's origin/falseness.  All the readers in the world missed this possibility/detail because we were so excited about the macro of the statement.

+1 post and this option :).
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Aural

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« Reply #6 on: March 23, 2014, 12:51:41 pm »
Well... the timeline at most for the Cuno-Inchoroi Wars stretches about 1000 years? There are no few thousand extra to go around unless the Nonmen seal the Glamour and then Aurang and Aurax have actually been able to come and go as they please for a couple thousand years before the Breaking of the Gates, though the Glossary implies no such gap.

Agree, but this is what I was talking about,

Quote from: Cu'jara Cinmoi
So far, the deepest the histories go is to the Fall, which is to say, the arrival of the Inchoroi in the last Age of Nonmen. At the moment, that feels plenty deep, and it precedes the Tusk by quite a few thousand years.

So, is he talking about the actual breaking of the gates here and not the Tusk itself? I'm guessing he wasn't quite sure about the timeline at that point.

SkiesOfAzel

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« Reply #7 on: March 23, 2014, 01:28:40 pm »
Maybe?

There are more indications. Kellhus and others tell us that every soul is a part of the God. This implies a form of reincarnation similar to Pythagoreanism's. Souls cycle between the outside and the world. Why would the Inchoroi souls return to the Earwan outside if they didn't originate from it?

Also, think on this. The Inchies have already destroyed countless other planets/civilizations in their quest which implies there had to be a lot of other aliens in Bakker's Cosmos. Why is it that none of those aliens came knocking at Earwa's door to escape damnation? Were they all compatible with the Earwan morality? I find it doubtful. It makes more sense to assume they simply weren't damned because they weren't from Earwa.

locke

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« Reply #8 on: March 24, 2014, 08:27:22 am »
worth mentioning is this.

The inchoroi called the nonmen "false" in the tusk, presumably the inchoroi gods think the same thing, that the cunoroi are "false" which would be the ciphrang, yatwer etc.

so that take could add an interesting new dimension and interpretation to probing Kellhus with "they called us false."  Perhaps the nonment want to know if Kellhus worships the gods of the inchoroi like the rest of the tusk worshippers. :-p

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« Reply #9 on: March 24, 2014, 02:25:05 pm »
Quote from: Cu'jara Cinmoi
So far, the deepest the histories go is to the Fall, which is to say, the arrival of the Inchoroi in the last Age of Nonmen. At the moment, that feels plenty deep, and it precedes the Tusk by quite a few thousand years.

So, is he talking about the actual breaking of the gates here and not the Tusk itself? I'm guessing he wasn't quite sure about the timeline at that point.

Maybe he meant the histories reach further back from the Fall itself - or he hadn't figured it out yet? It'd be something to ask him.

There are more indications. Kellhus and others tell us that every soul is a part of the God. This implies a form of reincarnation similar to Pythagoreanism's. Souls cycle between the outside and the world. Why would the Inchoroi souls return to the Earwan outside if they didn't originate from it?

Also, think on this. The Inchies have already destroyed countless other planets/civilizations in their quest which implies there had to be a lot of other aliens in Bakker's Cosmos. Why is it that none of those aliens came knocking at Earwa's door to escape damnation? Were they all compatible with the Earwan morality? I find it doubtful. It makes more sense to assume they simply weren't damned because they weren't from Earwa.

Maybe none of them ever got as fair as the Inchoroi did to figuring it out?
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SkiesOfAzel

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« Reply #10 on: March 24, 2014, 04:02:43 pm »
Maybe none of them ever got as fair as the Inchoroi did to figuring it out?

You have to admit it's still improbable. Why only one alien race has figured it out? And even if we assume that this very small probability came through, why not employ the help of others? I am sure the Inchies would be an insignificant percentage of the damned population in the universe if Earwan judgement applied everywhere.

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« Reply #11 on: March 25, 2014, 10:31:48 am »
Maybe?

Positing that the Inchoroi are Damned because they are from Earwa is takes more assumptions for me than the Outside affecting everyone in Earwa's Void Universe.
« Last Edit: March 25, 2014, 11:15:02 am by Madness »
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mrganondorf

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« Reply #12 on: March 25, 2014, 11:08:05 am »
I'm kind of thinking that the Inchoroi are from Earwa just super-duper ages ago.  IDK, a million years pre-ark fall.  They have penises!  That's an Earwa thing!

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« Reply #13 on: March 25, 2014, 11:53:31 am »
They have penises!  That's an Earwa thing!

Exactly :P!

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« Reply #14 on: March 27, 2014, 10:52:48 pm »
Thought of another explanation for the human-like for of the inchoroi: they didn't used to look that way at all, but after the crash, they spent years reworking their bodies to resemble nonmen.  Why, i have no idea.  But I think there was a significant interval between ark-fall and inchoroi sighting.

While on the subject of graftings, does Aurang and Aurax's capacity for sorcery mean they successfully were able to graft an Earwan soul onto their own?  That the head in the mouth is actually a quya or shaman?