The Meaning of Revelstone.

[peter]

I was always fascinated by the message contained in the facade of Revelstone - a story so replete with meaning that it was beyond the powers of even Giants to render it into a form that would be comprehended by non-giants. Has anybody got any thoughts on this. Are we given any clues to what it's content might have been. Did the Haruchai know it's details - could they indeed 'read' the facade of Revelstone as the Giants were able to. I love the idea of this and would love to have been allowed a little deeper into the Giantish lore behind this story.

[Vraith]

Interesting thought on the Haruchai reading it...I'd think if any non-Giant could get it, it would be them in potential.
But I think they didn't, or misread, but I can't say why without Last Chron's stuff.
The idea spawned a "hmmm...what if" idea/speculation about stuff coming in "the last dark," too. [just a little piece, nothing grand.]

But I've always loved the idea of Revelstone...the spirit/essence materially expressed, metaphysical meaning in concrete [heh...stone] form.

[Cambo]

I've always thought it would be some form of "poetry" expressing what the Land and the Lords meant to the Unhomed Giants. Some distilled essence of beauty, lore and healthsense perhaps?

[Vraith]

I've always thought it would be some form of "poetry" expressing what the Land and the Lords meant to the Unhomed Giants. Some distilled essence of beauty, lore and healthsense perhaps?

For sure all that's in there...especially I think if you look at it in a double sense: it is a mythic/epic expression ABOUT things, in its subject matter, but also as a "thing" itself. Like Beowulf, or as I understand it the Poetic Edda...the story/content is epic, but so is the work as a work.

[peter]

Have to be a bit carefull here because I know one of the 'Watchers' using this forum is a first time reader (also I've never added my own spiolers before - didn't even know you could do it in fact so here goes)

Spoiler

When the Search reaches Revelstone I seem to remember that the Giants were very touched by the first sight they had of the Keep. They immediately 'saw' the message. Was this the intention of the builders of the Lords Keep - ie Did the Unhomed that built it know they would never reach Home and leave this as a message to the Search that they knew would eventually come looking for them

[Orlion]

Have to be a bit carefull here because I know one of the 'Watchers' using this forum is a first time reader (also I've never added my own spiolers before - didn't even know you could do it in fact so here goes)

Spoiler

When the Search reaches Revelstone I seem to remember that the Giants were very touched by the first sight they had of the Keep. They immediately 'saw' the message. Was this the intention of the builders of the Lords Keep - ie Did the Unhomed that built it know they would never reach Home and leave this as a message to the Search that they knew would eventually come looking for them

Spoiler

I imagine it had more to do with the Search's familiarity with Giant art when it came to Stone work.

[wayfriend]

I believe this is the only clue that we'll ever have.

Yet when he looked at his companions, saw the rapt faces of the Giants, his anger loosened slightly. The Keep had the power to entrance them. Pitchwife's mien was wide with the glee of appreciation; the First's eyes shone pride at the handi-work of her long-dead people; Mistweave gazed upward hungrily, all dismay forgotten for a time. Even Honninscrave had momentarily lost his air of doom, as though he knew intuitively that Revelstone would give him a chance to make restitution.

Conflicting passions rose in Covenant's throat. Thickly, he asked, "Can you read it? Do you know what it means? I've been here three times" — four counting the brief translation during which he had refused Mhoram's summons — "but no one's ever been able to tell me what it means."

For a moment, none of the Giants answered. They could not step back from the wonder of the Keep. They had seen Coercri in Seareach and marveled at it; but for them Revelstone was transcendent.

Swallowing heavily, Pitchwife murmured, "No words. There are none. Your scant human tongue is void —" Tears spread through the creases of his face, mapping his emotion.

But the First said for him, "All tongues, Giantfriend. All tongues lack such language. There is that in the granite glory of the world's heart which may not be uttered with words. All other expression must be dumb when the pure stone speaks. And here that speech has been made manifest. Ah, my heart!" Her voice rose as if she wanted to both sing and keen. But for her also no words were adequate. Softly, she concluded, "The Giants of the Land were taught much by their loss of Home. I am humbled before them."

This says a lot about the Unhomed Giants who wrought it, and the artistry of their work. But not the meaning.

Donaldson seems to want to let this remain an enigma.

[Vraith]

Yea, WF...[except I would have capitalized Enigma, like some religions do with Mystery, and for much the same reason]
And that is one of my favorite passages from the Chron's...emblematic of the very best of SRD...where the Idea is transcendent, but the impact pure gut and heart.

[ussusimiel]

In TPTP the Unfettered One that Triock takes the lomillialor rod to talks about the slow 'speech' of stone. It may be that the Unhomed were able to 'speed up' this speech when they wrought Revelstone so that others, especially Giants, would be able to read it.

"The Giants of the Land were taught much by their loss of Home. I am humbled before them."

What is interesting is that it is loss that allows them to learn something new about themselves. It's as if the Giants of Home have never experienced despair and so do not know themselves (or life on the world of the Land) fully. Maybe the loss of the Unhomed enables them to understand more fully the language of stone (which because of the Despiser contains many losses).

I never thought about it that deeply before, Thanks, Peter!

u.

[peter]

My pleasure U.

Thanks Wayfriend for the quotation. If I read the meaning correctly the revelation of Revelstone is, rather than a 'message' of Giantish origin imposed upon the stone, an actual expression of the Stone of the Land, the World itself - the 'Granite Glory of the Worlds Heart' speaking and being articulated in the artistry of the Giantish stonework.

[Vraith]

It just occurred to me that it is, in some ways, a mixing of Kant's Sublime and Beautiful [though Kant had a lot to say on it, and not all of it is consistent with my thought]

The sublime moves; the expression of a person experiencing the full sense of the sublime is serious, at times rigid and amazed. On the other hand, the vivid sense of the beautiful reveals itself in the shining gaiety of the eyes, by smiling and even by noisy enjoyment. The sublime, in turn, is at times accompanied by some terror or melancholia, in some cases merely by quiet admiration and in still others by the beauty which is spread over a sublime place. The first I want to call the terrible sublime, the second the noble, and the third the magnificent. Deep loneliness is sublime, but in a terrifying way.

The sublime must always be large; the beautiful may be small. The sublime must be simple; the beautiful may be decorated and adorned

[Zarathustra]

In TPTP the Unfettered One that Triock takes the lomillialor rod to talks about the slow 'speech' of stone. It may be that the Unhomed were able to 'speed up' this speech when they wrought Revelstone so that others, especially Giants, would be able to read it.

"The Giants of the Land were taught much by their loss of Home. I am humbled before them."

What is interesting is that it is loss that allows them to learn something new about themselves. It's as if the Giants of Home have never experienced despair and so do not know themselves (or life on the world of the Land) fully. Maybe the loss of the Unhomed enables them to understand more fully the language of stone (which because of the Despiser contains many losses).

I never thought about it that deeply before, Thanks, Peter!

u.

I think this is the most important insight here. Loss of home did indeed teach the Unhomed Giants, however, I don't think this realization was primarily about themselves (though maybe as a secondary lesson once they applied it to themselves--a universal truth). I think your latter point is on the money: their Loss taught them how to read the stone, to bring its latent message out and make it manifest. So their loss allowed them to connect with or empathize with the stone in such a way that they could read its message ... which means that the message must have something to do with loss. This makes sense, given that stone is the one "entity" of the earth which resists change and time more than any other. But it, too, wears down. The knowledge of wearing down possessed by the most resistant, most obdurate "entity" must indeed be a profound sense of loss. Maybe it took stone a long time to come around to this understanding, and maybe it was an understanding so foreign to its own obdurate nature, that once it accepted it and took it to heart, it understood it more profoundly than any other temporal being of lessor stature and more fleeting nature. It's like tearing down the pride of the most proud, or revealing the weakness of the most strong. It's like God realizing he's immortal. The shock must be transcendent. It's a disillusionment, a revelation of reality like a paradigm shift.

And we have evidence for this realization of the stone in ...

Spoiler

Runes of the Earth as Anele reads its slow sorrow directly and puts it into words for Linden.

It's the most profound meaning of the earth: the paradox of life and death. Even stone shares in it. It's the greatest challenge for us to grapple with on our road to authenticity as we grow up and become mature adults. Part of the existential crisis. [Thus, the stone doesn't know about loss because of the Despiser, necessarily, because loss and death are natural ... the Despiser just represents an inauthentic reaction to this realization.]

[dlbpharmd]

Can anyone tell me where this pattern is mentioned in 1st Chronicles? AFAIK, the first reference to it is in TWL.

[shadowbinding shoe]

In TPTP the Unfettered One that Triock takes the lomillialor rod to talks about the slow 'speech' of stone. It may be that the Unhomed were able to 'speed up' this speech when they wrought Revelstone so that others, especially Giants, would be able to read it.

"The Giants of the Land were taught much by their loss of Home. I am humbled before them."

What is interesting is that it is loss that allows them to learn something new about themselves. It's as if the Giants of Home have never experienced despair and so do not know themselves (or life on the world of the Land) fully. Maybe the loss of the Unhomed enables them to understand more fully the language of stone (which because of the Despiser contains many losses).

I never thought about it that deeply before, Thanks, Peter!

u.

I think this is the most important insight here. Loss of home did indeed teach the Unhomed Giants, however, I don't think this realization was primarily about themselves (though maybe as a secondary lesson once they applied it to themselves--a universal truth). I think your latter point is on the money: their Loss taught them how to read the stone, to bring its latent message out and make it manifest. So their loss allowed them to connect with or empathize with the stone in such a way that they could read its message ... which means that the message must have something to do with loss. This makes sense, given that stone is the one "entity" of the earth which resists change and time more than any other. But it, too, wears down. The knowledge of wearing down possessed by the most resistant, most obdurate "entity" must indeed be a profound sense of loss. Maybe it took stone a long time to come around to this understanding, and maybe it was an understanding so foreign to its own obdurate nature, that once it accepted it and took it to heart, it understood it more profoundly than any other temporal being of lessor stature and more fleeting nature. It's like tearing down the pride of the most proud, or revealing the weakness of the most strong. It's like God realizing he's immortal. The shock must be transcendent. It's a disillusionment, a revelation of reality like a paradigm shift.

And we have evidence for this realization of the stone in ...

Spoiler

Runes of the Earth as Anele reads its slow sorrow directly and puts it into words for Linden.

It's the most profound meaning of the earth: the paradox of life and death. Even stone shares in it. It's the greatest challenge for us to grapple with on our road to authenticity as we grow up and become mature adults. Part of the existential crisis. [Thus, the stone doesn't know about loss because of the Despiser, necessarily, because loss and death are natural ... the Despiser just represents an inauthentic reaction to this realization.]

Good post, Zarathustra.

It's interesting to compare the reaction of different races to the subject of change and loss in the world of the Chronicles. While the Elohim are immortal and obdurate just like the stone of the Land if not more, their narrative is very different. It seems like the stone of the Land takes a different stance to the wider world. Instead of the isolationist, egocentric attitude of the Elohim, the Stone tries (in vain) to help the lesser, fleeting beings of the Land and mourn their loss. This might be a reflection of the way Donaldson sees stone and what it might stand for. The stone, which is the bedrock of the Land feels a duty to support the Land that lies on it. It is strong but its strength is passive and so it cannot react to the destructive forces that ravage the Land above. It can only try and stand firm and hope that that is enough.

A comparison to Atlas might be in order. While Atlas felt wronged by his task of supporting the skies and wanted an out, the stone of the Land embraces its role. It doesn't even appear to emanate any resentment against the ever biting sea, the mining Giants or the mighty One Forest which must have been very busy dissolving it with its root-system. Maybe it's just because it is, after all, inanimate and doesn't have the same cravings as living beings but I think a better explanation might be found.

There was one time when the Land's-Stones shirked their duty: We're told that when She took her place under Mount Thunder, the Land's bedrock shuddered so much that it was rent in two, creating the cliff of Landdrop.

Of course the appearance of a fallen goddess is a mighty occurrence but might there be a deeper reason for the reaction? The role of the Stone in the Land could only be described as fatherly. It tries to support the little beings on its surface and bears no resentment toward them for the scratches and bruises they give it in their plays. It lets them have their independence even when they're not so wise in their choices.

She and her story and attitude must have been completely antithetical to this ideal the Stones hold. No wonder they reacted so badly to her appearance.


dlbpharmd - I can't give you an exact reference but I remember this subject being discussed when Covenant is in Revelstone during LFB. I think he even asks Foamfollower to tell him the message.

Beside the words of the giants in WGW shouldn't we also consider the name of the citadel? Revelstone's name hints at the joy of the Stone in hosting the Lords of the Land. It's attempt to gladden the little denizens that inhabit it with its magnificence and warmth. (The attack by the giant-raver on the spirit of Revelstone during the siege on it in tPtP might be another clue)

[Blackhawk]

well..if any of you figure out what the story of revelstone looked like...let me know... its the main reason i never tried to make it one of my images... however... i could just put some cool looking stuff up there and just say...."well..you dont understand it or the meaning because you are not a giant"

[Vraith]

Revelstone's name hints at the joy of the Stone in hosting the Lords of the Land. It's attempt to gladden the little denizens that inhabit it with its magnificence and warmth.

That of course. Funny no one really mentioned it before.
Also interesting [maybe, maybe meaningless] that it begins same as "Revelation."
[I looked to see if revel and revelation are related...they aren't. revel is, interestingly, rooted in "to rebel."]

[Zarathustra]

Yeah, I just recently reread the portion in LFB that first mentioned this. SS is correct, TC notices it on the way to Revelstone with FF for the first time.

Blackhawk, I imagine it is simply a complex array of architectural structures that certainly aren't chaotic, but at the same time never truly "symmetrical" or linked by an overall theme. I imagine somewhat haphazard arrangement (or apparently so) such that individual sections seem like well-defined units on their own, but always an underlying degree of order that is on the verge of coalescing into a whole.

I think there are perhaps other structures in the history of architecture that could guide an attempt to portray this. Actually, I think Jackson's Minas Tirith has this level of complexity without a completely symmetrical arrangement. Plenty of individual details that don't fit into an overall pattern. Arrangement that takes into account the natural shape of the mountain. Of course, Revelstone would look much different, without the concentric circular walls. But that's close to what I'm talking about in the balance between haphazard and orderly.

[wayfriend]

Also interesting [maybe, maybe meaningless] that it begins same as "Revelation."
[I looked to see if revel and revelation are related...they aren't. revel is, interestingly, rooted in "to rebel."]

Although it might have run counter to the meaning of the word "revel", my impression of the name "Revelstone" had always been that it was referring to the wonderousness of the stonework. So revel as in "to revel in" - to rejoice or celebrate something. Celebration of Stone. Or revel as in taking great pleasure or delight. Delightful Stone. I think Shadowbinding Shoe said what is closest to my thinking, when he said "the joy of the Stone".

Certainly, among the names of places you find in stories, this is an all time great.

[peter]

As a bit of an aside, or even a possible clue to the form of the message (bad word)), do we anywhere have any clues in the Chrons to the form that 'script' took in the Land or indeed the wider World as a whole. I was always a bit suprised by the use of the word 'Runes' in the title of TROTE - I never saw the Lands peoples as a 'nordic' type. I could easily visualise Revelstones coigns and balconies taking the form of that 'dot and right-angle' type script so favoured of 'alien' film set desighners rather than say Gaudi's swirls and 'eyebrows' which are much more 'Tolkeinesque' in my mind. Ideograms/pictograms (if found in the land) desighned by Giants would, one would imagine be replete with deep symbolic meaning and the failure of humans to grasp their meaning (remember - Giants could take days in the telling of a simple name) or even to be able to if an attempt at explanation was made, would not be supprising.

(Don't want to spoiler by saying where but don't I remember 'sigils' being mentioned in the works somewhere.)

[Sherman Landlearner]

For me,I always imagined it being the expressed Earthpower of the stone of the Land's heart, frozen in seeming, but standing forever to show all who could read it how the Unhomed, those few who loved everything, and lost it all, how these passionate and suffering people overcame despair and Corruption, and once more took joy. Despair is easy to achieve, and all but impossible to leave behind.