I am a tombstone... and enduring sign of deathless remembrance Seikilos Epitaph (the only surviving Ancient Greek Song) As long as you live, shine bright! Never for a moment be sad Because life is only for a bit... and time will extract its due History begins, quite literally, with Herodotus. Dubbed
the Father of History by Cicero, and the Father of Lies by more self-satisfied modern
readers, Herodotus of Halicarnissus was a man so bafflingly unique that his life's work began
a hitherto unknown discipline, that of History. It's not that there wasn't writing before him.
And it's not as if there weren't stories of the past before him, of course, think of Homer's epic
tales of the Iliad and Odyssey in his own culture. But before Herodotus no one thought
of investigating and documenting the past in order to preserve the
truth, or some version of it. This innovation had such a profound effect on
later studies of the past that, according to Schopenhauer, Once one has read Herodotus, one has
studied enough history, philosophically speaking. Principally, Herodotus was concerned with the
origins of the Greco-Persian wars, as he himself states at the outset of his magnus opus: Herodotus
of Halicarnassus, here displays his enquiries, that human achievement may be spared the ravages
of time, and that everything great and astounding, and all the glory of those exploits which served
to display the Greeks and barbarians alike to such effect, be kept alive- and additionally, and
most importantly, to give the reason they went to war.
But the histories which means the inquires,
as the notion of history did not yet exist when he wrote it is so much more than a history of
war, because fundamentally Herodotus was a man intensely curious of, perhaps obsessed by, other
cultures and their customs. Thus the historian and translator Tom Holland says of Herodotus s
Histories it is above all else, a treasure trove of wonders.
Herodotus, who famously quipped
custom is king , goes to great, often superfluous lengths to describe the customs of the many
peoples that feature in his book; their languages, their grooming habits, their food, their dress,
and most importantly, their funerary customs. Because there is perhaps no greater way to seek
insight into a foreign culture than the understand how they prepare their dead for the next stage.
Thus Herodotus tells us how the Egyptians mummify their dead, how Thracians expose their dead for 3
days, or how the Babylonians embalm their dead in honey before burial. And he even tells a story
of how a group of Greeks were mortified by the supposedly cannabalistic custom of an Indian
people, and how those same Indian people were equally horrified by the Greek practice of
cremation. Such is the defining power of the funerary rite.
The potency of these lessons has
not diminished in the slightest in the intervening 2500 years since Herotodus lived. Burial customs
remain as vivid and powerful a defining force as they once did; just think of the western morbid
fascination with the tribe in Papau New Guinea whose female members ate their dead; or the bitter
dispute between Orthodox and Catholic Christians when the Catholic Church lifted its ban on
cremation in the 1960s.
Sometimes, you can tell quite a bit about how a single culture changed
over time by their changing funerary rites. Perhaps the most famous, and quite relevant
example as we ll see later, is that of the Romans, who initially practiced pluralistic funerary
rites, then in the time of the late republic and early empire, practiced almost exclusively
cremation, and then later, for reasons unknown but possibly relating to Christianity, switched
almost entirely to inhumation that is to say, burying the dead. These shifts tells us quite a
bit about the shifting broader Roman culture. Miyazaki and his team are quite
aware of these cultural truths. Death features so prominently in his games,
it's only natural that funerary rites, and their various corruptions, play
a large role in the narrative too. Take, for example, Bloodbornes Hemwick Charnel
lane. In this one, optional, relatively minor area of the game, there is such a density of
funerary rituals that it boggles the mind, and has kept the attention of fellow Youtube
nerds like JSF and Sinclair Lore for years. Speaking of which, if you re a fan of Bloodborne
and you haven't watched Sophie nee Richard s Bloodborne Up Close series, then that is your
homework for next week's TA lecture. And Sophie, if you re listening, we expect you to continue the
Reborn version. No excuses. Ok enough flattery. In Hemwick Charnel lane the variety and
thoroughness of corpse usage is truly impressive. First corpses, or even sometimes soon
to be corpses, have their eyeballs and other precious organs extracted
for use in various chalice rites. There are even specialized eye scooping tools used
by the local hags specifically for this purpose. Then the corpse, after it's precious let's have
been extracted, is left exposed on wheels to be picked clean by carrion birds, like Zoroastrian
sky burial, the inspiration for Eileen's crow garb. The idea here being suspension on the
wheel, above the ground, to allow the carrion birds but not scavengers, like dogs, to have
access to the corpse. Scavengers break the bone with their powerful jaws, and this is to
be avoided at all costs. Finally, the cleaned skeletons are burned in custom furnaces, producing
the main export of the town, bone marrow ash. It's not corpse ash, it's bone marrow ash,
which is how you can reconcile the existence of such seemingly contradictory funerary rites
as sky burial and cremation all in one place only the bones, once picked clean of flesh
and sinew by the birds, are cremated. Miyazaki and company thought this entire
process through, from the removal of the eyes to the burning of the bones, and made sure the
forensics fit. Yes, one item description mentions that bone marrow ash comes from hemwick charnel
lane, but that's it; the rest of the story is told through through exquisite forensic detail.
The point we re making here is Miyazaki is not just obsessed with death, but he's extremely
careful with displaying it, and how different factions in his games deal with death, or lack
there of, is often their defining feature. So how could it be any different in Elden Ring,
a game so concerned with death that a mysterious force called Destined Death is the central plot
driver, and literal catacombs are the most common dungeon type in the game. The catacombs are
where the all important rite of Erdteee burial takes place, one half of the orthodox cycle of
life. Which makes it all the more puzzling, then, that the catacombs themselves do not seem built
for this purpose. Why are the catacombs at all, replete with stone sarcophagi, if you re
just going to dump the bodies at the roots? And how to possibly explain the existence, of all
things, of cremation urns in a catacombs designed explicitly for the root inhumation of bodies?
These questions, which have nagged at us since our very first playthrough, hold deep mysteries.
The catacombs are a collective microcosm of the Lands Between, and like Herodotus tells us, one
good way to understanding an ancient culture is through its funerary customs. So, we ask you
then; what culture built the catacombs? Let's begin with a proper description of the
problem. Simply put, cremation and Erdtree burial are incompatible. Although we are not
told much of the specifics of Erdtree Burial, we are shown this process taking place, which
has stagnated in recent times. In each of the catacombs throughout the lands between, there is
an inner chamber usually the boss room in fact whose sole purpose appears to be the reabsorption
of physical, fleshy bodies into the great roots. Here we find root resin, which reads The roots
of the Greattree were once linked to those of the Erdtree, or so they say, and it is for this
reason catacombs are built around Greattree roots. By the way, Roots don't secrete resin root
resin is just corpse wax by another name, because fleshy corpses are decomposing in the
roots. By now you all know our thoughts on the GreatTree/Erdtree distinction, but that
is not particularly germane here. What is important is the insight that the catacombs
were specifically built around these roots, meaning that the builders already practiced a form
of tree worship. So far, nothing surprising. And we have the spirit NPC in the tombsward catacombs,
who says, A proper death means returning to the Erdtree. Have patience. Until the time comes...and
the roots call to you. So it seems pretty clear that the rite of Erdtree burial, by which one is
returned to the Erdtree by burial at its roots, exactly we process we see in the innermost
chamber, is an opt-in system. Wandering undead must be guided to the roots to voluntarily be
reabsorbed. No doubt they are guided by Rosus, which is the diegetic explanation for why his
statues point the way to the catacombs. Indeed the dead have always been in need of guidance, or so
they say. And why else would TWLID be so reviled, but that they refuse this call? They are opting
out of Erdtree burial, a most heinous offense. So this is the current system facilitating
Erdtree burial, so far so good. But this tidy story begins to unravel
once you actually start to look around the catacombs themselves, something few people
would feel inclined to do, as they are largely copy-pasted variations with shared assets. But
that's what we re here for folks; if Tarnished Archaeology won't spend hours inspecting the
pot shards in the catacombs, who will? From the moment you step foot into the
very first catacomb, this story begins to crack. Right off the bat, there are dozens
and dozens of niches for storing bodies, clearly modeled after the Roman style. They
are catacombs, after all, so, fair enough. But what's the point of shelves for storing
bodies, much less stone sarcophagi, if they re just going to be dumped at the roots in a separate
chamber. Good question. And why are the shelves almost always empty? Another good question. To be
blunt, the purpose of a sarcophagus is to avoid biological consumption by worms and roots, not to
assist it. So something already is a bit amiss. In some of the catacombs, we can see a different,
smaller niches, again usually empty. The best example of this is in the Giants mountaintops
catacombs, but there are several other examples. Visually these seem inspired by Roman Columbaria,
impressive structures used for storing cinerary urns. And, wouldn't ya know it, in the Auriza
side tomb Auriza meaning golden roots, by the way we can see they are indeed used for exactly that
purpose, with row upon row of niches filled with urns. And though this is perhaps the most
impressive example, in fact their are cinerary urns in every catacomb, at least in some capacity, and they are quite clearly
based off the Roman style. Alas, while solving one minor mystery of the
niches, this just exposes the larger one. To be quite explicit, there is no need for cremation
urns if the predominant rite is one of inhumation. These practices are fundamentally at odds,
like Herodotus story of the cross-cultural reaction to the Greek cremation tradition, and
the mere existence of cremation urns in the catacombs speaks to a more complicated story
than the one that emerges on first glance. Why would catacombs built for the purpose
of Erdtree burial have not just shelves for sarcophagi but also cremation urns?
Well,
our fellow archaeologists, the answer is simple. The catacombs were not built by the Erdtree
faithful. They were built by a prior culture, one that practiced cremation, not just
inhumation. And whether you ve realized it or not, you likely already know this culture. A
culture which worshipped a sacred ghostflame used for burning the dead, and revered the keepers
of that flame, the Deatbirds; a culture more ancient than the Erdtree who worshipped
an outer God. The Outer God of Death. Let's get to the specifics of this cremation
process, because luckily, unlike Erdtree burial, there is substantial documentary evidence to
bear.
First, we have the Rancor Pot description, which reads In times of old, the dead were burned
with ghostflame, and from those cinders arose vengeful spirits. Confirming that that use of
cremation is an ancient, not a current tradition, again raising the question of why the catacombs
seemed designed to facilitate it. And even more explicitly, we have the Explosive ghost flame
description, which reads: In the time when there was no Erdtree, death was burned in ghostflame.
Deathbirds were the keepers of that fire. This tells us a couple of invaluable details. First,
that this practice of burning death, or cremation, indeed preceded the Erdtree. Though not everyone
is given the honor of Erdtree burial these days, as we will see, cremation is explicitly a
thing of the past, a pre-Erdtree practice. And second, the description tells us that the
Deathbirds tend to the cremation flame, which will allow us to do some proper visual analysis on this
process. Indeed we can see the Deathbirds have several attacks that generate the cold ghostflame.
Their weapon, called Death's poker, reads: The birds are graveyard fire keepers; it is said they
rake out the ashen remains of the dead from their kilns. From this we can deduce that the weapon is
a tool used for raking out the ashen remains after cremation, undoubtedly to then collect and store
them in cinerary urns. So the picture is coming together a bit. One interesting visual detail
is that the shape of the tool is such that it is clearly not designed for raking out the ashes per
se, otherwise it would be shaped like a shovel, but rather it is hooked to rake out the ashen
remains . And ashen remains, in ancient cremation, were bones. You see, in a Roman cremation, the
body was burned in a pyre, often taking up to 8 hours to burn the entire corpse. The heat was
not sufficient, and still even today with modern crematoria, to also burn away the bones, so the
bones would be removed after the cremation and placed in an urn, and then stored in a separate
location for eternity. That is precisely what appears to be happening with the Death rite
birds. These burnt bones are the ashen remains. In modern cremation, in case you were
wondering, after the bones are raked out, they are ground down into powder and
mixed in when the ash, because our culture is such that we find it discomfiting
to see the burnt bones of our loved ones. As we said before, the presence of cremation
niches in the catacombs suggests they were built before the age of the Erdtree. No surprise
then we can see ghostflame, not traditional flame, lighting the torches of the catacombs. Based on
the ghostflame torch description, which tells us the fallen hawks began to burn the bones of
their fellows, acquiring the cold ghost-flame, but sealing their fate as dwellers of the underground
for all eternity we can confirm that ghostflame is produced by burning the dead, and infer that
association with the ghostflame condemns one to a chthonic fate, quite consistent with its
use then in the catacombs in a pre-Erdtree era. Furthermore, the mere presence of the catacombs
all over the map, even in areas the Erdtree empire didn't control, like the mountaintops of
the giants, suggests as much. They were built at the roots of the GreatTree, a root system far
more ancient and widespread than just the Erdtree, but you ll have to watch our Old Tjikko video
for more on that. And finally we have the Winged Scythe description, which reads According to
pagan belief, white-winged maidens are said to be Death's gentle envoys. The game uses the
term pagan to refer to beliefs that predate the Erdtree orthodoxy, mirroring real world religious
transitions as we ve detailed in other episodes, and it's not hard to imagine these angelic
envoys of death actually being Deathbirds, vestiges of a pre-Erdtree faith.
Other features
of catacombs suggest similarly that this was a pre-Erdtree society, for example the peculiar
features of the burial watchdogs and their staff, which uses glinstone magic, not a golden order
thing, and the imps, who were crafted by the golem crafter referenced in the crystal dart
description. But most of all we must return to the original observation- the chambers full of,
and evidently purpose built for cinerary urns. Here we should address the concept and function
of spirit ashes. When Ranni gives us the spirit calling bell, she calls them ash unreturned
to the Erdtree , implicitly juxtaposing cremation with Erdtree burial; if you re
Ash, you haven't returned to the Erdtree. This would be quite straightforward if not for the
fact that some spirit ashes, for example Lhutel and Oleg, were explicitly said to have been given
the honor of Erdtree Burial. So apparently they were both cremated and then also given Erdtree
burial. The only way to reconcile this would be to say that, in a world without true death,
people may experience multiple death rites. For example if you ve seen our cycle of life trilogy,
you ll know that people are both reabsorbed by, and born from, the power of the Erdtree, a
fully self-contained arboreal circle of life. It's no great stretch to see this as a form of
rebirth, then, after your body is decomposed by the roots of the Erdtree, you are reborn, so to
speak, by the life giving power of the Erdtree. It seems to be a riff on the Buddhist cycle
of reincarnation, Samsara, a favorite theme of Miyazaki s. It's no accident that some of endings
have us escaping this cycle; so I guess in a way we achieve Nirvana by marrying Ranni. Anyway,
our point here is that, since nobody can properly die anymore, it's possible that some people
experienced both cremation and Erdtree burial. Oleg is a prime example he's a banished knight, so
he's definitely been around since before the age of the Erdtree, and only later on once he served
Morgott was he given the rite of Erdtree burial. It may actually be that those we were cremated
were still ritually buried by removing a body part before the cremation and burying that. This
was actually a known practice in, you guessed it, Rome, called os resectum, during which a
finger was cut off the corpse before cremation, and that finger was then ceremonially mounted
for a period of about a week by the family of the deceased, and then ceremonially buried.
If these rituals were not properly observed then the deceased would not be able to
pass the river styx into the underworld. So now you know the inspiration for this
whole tarnished bloody finger trope. The ancient romans used the severed finger to
represent the deceased person's soul during this period of mourning, as a kind of effigy,
as it retained a link to that person; likewise in game we apparently use the severed fingers of
tarnished to connect to other worlds. And that way across the river styx by the boat ferryman
Charon undoubtedly inspired the Tibia Mariners. Let us now take a moment to appreciate the
absolute cornucopia of death rituals present in this game.
Beneath stormveil castle there
is evidence of an ancient boat burial ritual, something seen in multiple real world
cultures but most famously by Vikings. As pointed out by SmoughTown, even the existence
of graveyards attests to aformer pluralism of funerary practices
And this is all to say nothing
of Fia and the Deathbed companion ritual, clearly based on the real world medieval Japanese Buddhist
practice of death bed purification, whereby a family member or monk was responsible for a
ritual purification of the death pollution. But most intriguingly, importantly, and
adorably, we have our friends the living jars. They appear to be from the Erdtree Era,
based on the seal imprinted on their tops They are clearly fleshy corpses, based on their
gruesome death animation and the descriptions of the living jar shards and alexander s
shard. So they re sort of any anti-cremation urn a jar burial for those who refuse cremation.
And most importantly, while we find these occasionally in select catacombs, most commonly
we find them surrounding the minor Erdtrees. Since we know from the Golden Seed description
that the Minor Erdtrees are a post-shattering phenomenon, then by implication it seems clear
that the practice of Jar Burial that is to say, taking fleshy, noncremated corpses and
stuffing them in jars for decomposition is a post-shattering (of the ER) practice. (Likewise
Avatar staff says they are post shattering)
And it would make perfect sense for this adaptation
to emerge in a world where Erdtree burial has stagnated, and the Erdtree faithful are desperate
for altnerative means of proper burial So to summarize, the catacombs were
built before the age of the Erdtree, during a time when cremation in ghostflame
was common, but overall there seemed to be a relatively pluralism of death rites, based
on the contemporary existence of shelves for both sarcophagi and cinerary urns. Only later was
Erdtree burial added and enforced. This exactly mirrors the transition that occurred in the Roman
Empire first there was a pluralism of practices, then for a few centuries cremation
was by far the most common practice, followed finally in the middle empire
by inhumation as the dominant rite. And it is this transition that can explain some of
the other oddities of the catacombs. For one, most of the shelves, sarcophagi, and niches are empty,
almost like they ve been deliberately emptied. It's possible that when Erdtree burial was
enforced, the corpses peacefully resting in their niches were dumped onto the roots, adding
more fuel to the Erdtree's fire, so to speak. Likewise the cinerary urns are often scattered and
shattered throughout, indicating at best neglect, and at worst deliberate desecration
of the more ancient practice. Also the Rosus statues in the Hero's graves
which reflect golden Erdtree light into the shape of Erdtree faith, which are of course of
the Erdtree era, appear to be later additions, which would help explain why they actual stun and
seem to harm the servants of the catacombs like imp shades and Erdtree watchdog shades. These two
groups don't appear to play well together. In much the same way that, in each of the Hero's graves
there are different banners but the architecture is the same, telling us about the original stratum
and their varied, later usage, so Rosus is an adaptor of the later Erdtree stratum, a way to get
the wandering undead to accept Erdtree burial. So, besides an emphasis on cremation
rather than inhumation, what can we say about the culture that built the catacombs?
To answer that we need to delve deeper into the the relief iconography of this stratum, a
do a little Old Fashioned Tarnished Archaeology. Join us next time, as we conclude our analysis
of the death rituals of the Lands Between, and reveal Queen Marika's role in this story.
