Could it be the reason they are viewed as traitors is that when messmer got the snake merika kept it hidden for a while, then lied about it being a traitor, and said that messmer sealed the snake in himself to ensure it would never be a threat Which could explain a little of it Or Marika lied amd said the gloom eyed queen and the serpent where working together, and messmer sealed the serpent and malikath sealed the gloom eyed queen Allowing messmer to still be apart of the lineage until he "betrayed" the golden order I wasn't able to listen to the whole video so if you already said this i apologize
For something to be shorn of light would imply that it was once OF light, or had light to be shorn of. The Abyssal Serpent may not have alwas been an abyssal one...
Something I’ve reflected on with Messmer is his possible effect as an older sibling to Rykard. While Radahn is the one mentioned directly, Rykard is the one that most attempted to emulate him. Fire, serpents and being a Praetor, leader of a company of inquisitors. Rykard understood the truth of his family’s origins and may have been raised in that same environment as Radahn was.
I think that Marika's power is life. That light, grace and Marika’s rune are all just different ways of embuing being with vigor and life. From the tarnished always coming back to life, the unkillable nature of the Demi gods and Marika’s eternal rule. It parallels the rune of death as a physical foil to Marika’s rune. They look like flipped versions of each other. So the Dark has a rune, and if the helphen steeple is to be believed, it even has it's own form of grace. A red light that we the player can never see. So: Marika's rune = Rune of Death Life = Death Grace = Light of the Helphen And what makes this even more interesting is the irises. Both irises grant grace. Occultation the total denial of light, and grace the total acceptance of light. They are opposites, but serve the same purpose. And it really makes me question Godwyn. We know that Ranni's Night of the Black knives was a scheme, a ploy, but she physically drained godwyn and herself of grace. Killing bith of them, but making them both immortal in a sense. One immortal in soul, another in body. I wonder, if Godwyn had died in both body and soul, if Ranni didn’t change the ritual, would Godwyn have just been reborn in death. A lightless being, granted a different kind of grace, just like Mesmer. Cause Mesmer is very ckearly a living death being. The stuck shed skin, and the white skin, and sores on his body. They all point to the loss of mesmer grace "killing" him in a sense, but also keeping him alive. It's weird
@notsmough So I got a few thoughts. I am going to go a little bit off the Marika and Radagon being a reverse mirror of Adam and Eve. Marika is Adam. Radagon is Eve, for he was made from Marika ~ Eve was made from Adam. The Abyssal Serpent/Eiglay/The God Devouring Serpent are all the same entity/different faces of an Outer God. This is Satan/Lucifer/The Serpent that convinces Eve to eat the fruit. The Gate of Divinity is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, it bears the Forbidden Fruit. Because there is so little text on the shed snake skin in Bonny Village and the actual betrayal of snakes I am going to go on a limb here and say context clues and environmental story telling plus the Adam and Eve mirroring is what can explain it. Eiglay comes to Radagon/Marika in Bonny Village and tells them of how to become a god and shows them the way to the Gate of Divinity ~ Lucifer as a serpent comes to Eve to cajole her to partake of the Forbidden Fruit so she can become like God. If Radagon is Eve then how does he play that part? In the story trailer of Shadow of the Erdtree, in the first 50 seconds, especially seconds 25-38, I would argue that the figure is ambiguous enough to be either Marika or Radagon in control, but I believe it is actually Radagon being in control. You could argue the color grading/the red haze makes it hard to tell (which I think was the point, Miyazaki wanted it to be ambiguous), but during the entire sequence the figure's hair is undoubtedly a variable orange ~ red. We don't get a good view of the frontside of the figure at all, but the torso could easily be argued to be more masculine than feminine. If it is indeed Radagon, then that fits perfectly with him playing the part of Eve and partaking of the fruit which in this case is the Gate of Divinity. Eiglay ~ Lucifer has ulterior motives. Covets the power of godhood. Not being able to have what they have, he tries to corrupt them and ruin their progress while putting on an act that he is doing the opposite. After trying to corrupt Adam and Eve, the next obvious target is their children. Messmer, here is where the Adam and Eve thing starts to stretch, but I think it still works very well, it does not need to be a 1 for 1 mirroring. Messmer is Cain, though I believe the part of Cain is split in two pieces in Elden Ring, Ranni is also Cain. Godwyn is Abel. Ranni plays the part of committing the "first murder" by slaying her brother for her own selfish reasons. Messmer plays the part of Cain where he becomes cursed. After Radagon/Marika becomes a god, the serpent's plan goes into motion. Either during the process or sometime after the serpent was able to influence the seed of Radagon/Marika, and being at its most influential and trusted level it would have easily been able to mess with them. It cursed their (most likely firstborn) child by injecting part of its being, its soul into their seed, perhaps this happened even before the child was conceived, during the pregnancy or after the child was born. Regardless, this was the betrayal. And the betrayal continued on eternally, the Abyssal Serpent lived on in Messmer, Eiglay corrupted Rykard and by extension may have also influenced Ranni since Rykard and Ranni were in cahoots with each other. This entire time the serpent has coveted the power of godhood granted by the gate and it has managed to some extent in stealing some of that power through the children of Radagon/Marika. Also, as an aside, it may be relevant to this whole analysis, but also can be isolated from it, there are a few things I have theorized that I don't really see a lot of people discussing or pointing out. The first, which I think is most probable is that Messmer is a bastard, the bastard of Radagon and Marika. This is a G.R.R. Martin staple. Bastards/illegitimate children is a major plot point in A Song of Ice and Fire. There being absolutely no signs or mentions of Messmer's paternal heritage in game, yet it being very obvious Radagon is his father is a strong indicator of his bastard state. The fact also that he is not counted among the demigods officially, nor is he officially recognized as a blood sibling, yet he holds equal standing with them in raw power, strength and influence, is evocative of Jon Snow or Daemon I Blackfyre, both notable bastards from A Song of Ice and Fire saga that are often compared with their trueborn family. The next thing, while a bit more questionable in probability, though I consider it to be canon, is that Messmer and Melina, same as Radagon and Marika, Miquella and Trina are a rebis. Messmer is the dominant half of the rebis and that is why I believe Melina has the line about not being born the conventional way, because it was Messmer who was in control/active when they were born. Also, like Miquella and Trina, somehow for one reason or another Messmer and Melina split.
Thank you for your comment! I have some thoughts too. I noticed that Ranni had Lucifer like connotations because she rejected the order and made her own way. She wanted each being to make their own way rather than be guided by the light of "Grace". By killing Godwyn in soul she would have been killing her other half that was associated with the sun, embracing only her dark cold moon. To me it's interesting because we are trying to figure out who we are and how we got in this world. Some seek answers through lights illumination. Some seek answers in mystery and questions, ones that don't have known answers. A balanced approach would have both. I also feel like the Erd tree is like conscious memory and the Scadutree is the subconscious. It feels like the outer gods are forces larger than us that can influence us and are yet outside our control or understanding. We are seeking self understanding and control as much as possible when faced with forces larger than our understanding and a loss of former identity. It's like the tarnished have lost their grace or order for a time. It caused a shamanic death. We resurrect with a spark of grace- a memory of who we were within that cosmic order. The light can obscure just as much as the dark can. Both can blind us to who we are, who we were and who we might be. By going on this journey we define this for ourselves. We literally get to decide who we are in this and how we choose to relate to these cosmic forces. We make our character and are the Greater Will. The character is our vassel. This game has so many meta layers. I really love diving into them. It's interesting because serpents, fire, mirrors of silver, being between life and death/ those who live in death, the primal animal within us are all ways of seeking self, wisdom and knowledge are each rejected by the Golden Order. These same symbols have been demonized by different cultures. Winged Serpents are seen also as the balance between what is above and below. I also feel lots of Sumerian mythology with Marika literally making a throne out of the Tree of Life/ Urd Tree. She first had to take the Bird in it's branches, the Owl/wind or lillitu in its trunk and the serpent at its roots. She even had a decent into the underworld-the crucible jar- and emerged a new being. Serpents and godskins are very reminiscent of transformational "death" You either are eaten by the gods or eat/ absorb the gods to become them. A cycle of self creation. We literally take our own creation into our own hands like Adam and Eve. We get to choose what forces we use to shape our lands between. Faith, intelligence, strength and so on. We get to choose what if any magic or divine we use or align ourselves with.
This video recalls a thought I've been working on a lot since even before the DLC; the Carian legendary armament is the Sword of Night and Flame, and the way its lore is phrased leads us to believe that the Carian Night was complemented by the Flame of the Fire Giants. We also know that Flame, in all its incarnations, is feared and abhorred by Marika and the Erdtree, as close to literal embodiments of Light and Life as are available in the game. Along with the many parallels and connections drawn between Death and Flame in Elden Ring- the GEQ wielding Blackflame and the Rune of Death, Ghostflame being used in Death rituals, etc.- this leads me to believe that Flame is cosmologically linked to Death and the Abyss/Night in Elden Ring in the same way lightning is said to be 'imbued with gold' (Gravel Stone Seal), something that puts off 'false light' and leads things towards Death, which has an interesting parallel with Helphen's Steeple.
Silver is also a reflection by which we gain a different perspective or understanding of how light/truth are relevant. With Carian magic it can nullify star based magic by reflecting it or taking it apart. It is similar to how the Silver of the Nox and the albinurics are a reflection of the Gold in grace that people made from their understanding of those forces. Their sin was trying to understand and make their own divinity. That would definitely have upset the order and asks some very uncomfortable questions. This is much like how we wonder if artificial intelligence developed by human hands could ever develop a soul or it's own identity or place in the universe because we created it. The Golden Order is presented as the only answer. Anything that is not covered by that answer falls outside of Grace or acknowledgement of accepted ways of being. Those who live in death are in the transition between living and dead. The beast men show of an existence older and more primal than the order, the Nox were making their own order, the omen show the pain and conflict that birthed the order. The order seems to edit from reality anything that could come before or after. Death is a transition. When those changes are removed everything stagnates. The flow of life, the sap of the Urd Tree literally dries up. With Carian magic, it is possible that an equally valid way of life could exist alongside the order. However this challenges the order being the only answer. They could not destroy the Carian rule through war so they did it through love.
I will add (idk if it really adds anything but), in the spanish translation of the game, Tarnished is translated as "Sinluz", literally "lightless". Tarnished itself doesn't have any current direct translations that I know of, perhaps "deslucido" or "deslustrado", last one meaning literally unlustered. Etymologically, both imply a lack of light; particularly that of metals, which require burnishing to remain shiny and reflective. Rusting in copper is actually called tarnishing (and also, the rust of copper is called Verdigris, but that's another matter). Interestingly, the spanish translation for Messmer's dialogue uses a different term for Tarnished, "Tiznado", which is more archaic and actually closer to tarnished in meaning, also meaning "dirty", "stained" or "obscured". This is probably because Messmer already says "lightless" in his battle. In modern spanish, "Tiznado" is used mainly as a very local way of saying someone's "reasoning is obscured", like being enraged or drunk, but the overall spanish translation of Elden Ring, like the original english, relies heavily on archaisms, so it definitely doesn't mean that.
I don't think Messmer's Abyssal Serpent is within a pocket dimension in his eye and expands when it's unsealed, but rather that it's literally a part of Messmer's soul. Grace is of gold, and gold is the color of order. Miquella's needle of unalloyed gold functions by using that order to split the self from that which harms a person, like rot or frenzy. It doesn't wholly delete those aspects, it simply re-organizes it into a form that can be cast away. Messmer's Abyssal Serpent is sealed in very much the same way, a re-ordering of his own self. Just like how sprites are held within Rauh burrows, the Abyssal Serpent's soul is kept within Marika's Seal. And just like Mogh infused with Radahn's soul, Messmer's physical being changes to reflect his metaphysical being
It's a lot like how we psychologically separate ourselves from our undesirable or harmful traits by suppressing them into the subconscious. They are still there, they are just dormant or sleeping like how Saint Trina grants a healing/ relieving sleep. Sleep is a little death. It's like a lighter form of death. I think that is how some things can be Hewn into the Erd Tree yet be forgotten as well. They are stored on a layer that few have access to. We erase some memory of the Erd Tree by setting it on fire/ illuminating and deconstructing it so we can get to the center. When at the center we have command over the perception and experience of the lands between. Isn't it interesting that the greater will needs a vassel just like we as a player need a character? The forces still always exist, we just choose which ones are dominant in the conscience expression of the lands between. Each players lands between us different because they experienced it and shaped it but is also the same because we each have the same game/ world. We are all human beings yet each human is their own human. That makes me think about the implications of player vs player combat. Who can be the best god or play their build the best?
I think the serpent skin is the Serpent God from the serpent god curve sword. If you take out all the outer gods and the old gods you just get 3 gods. Placi's missing god, the Serpent God, and Marika. One thing about that gets me about Ranni's ending is that she has to touch Marika to get the Elden Ring. I think the Serpent god had the Elden Ring and is our missing link from Placi's god to Marika. We see it on the Forge of the Giants which we know that the giants drove off the ice drakes to get that spot, meaning that it would be after the Dragon's rule. We know that the snake was around in the event that the coffin ships were used. And finally we see the snake skin in Bonny Village which matches with the Serpent God's Curve sword which states that it was worshipped on Mount Gelmir by chopping up bodies and feeding them to the snake. It seems like the snake is the bridge that would allow Marika to acquire the Elden Ring.
30:46 I made a post on reddit discussing Messmer's timeline so I will give it here in short (It still turned out to be extremely long lol)- Black knight Andreas spirit ash says 'After his flight from the erdtree.' in reference to Messmer. Flight means being chased away basically. The fire knights were also chased away as you discusssed in the video so this is a literal flight. If he was chased away then the people of the erdtree would not support him but according to the serpent crest shield item description, the crusade was commemorated. You would only commemorate something if you want to support it. Therefore it is impossible for Messmer's flight to have been the beginning of the crusade. Which means Messmer must have returned to Leyndell after the crusade started. This is further evidenced by the fact that the stone tablets in Marika's bedchambers and in the shadow keep are the exact same model. This means Messmer brought those things to his mom(personal headcannon: he did this so Marika could find a way to cure the jar innards). So now we have a question- when was Messmer sealed? The tree sentinel outside of shaman village is carrying the sentry torch which was created after the night of the black knives and the death knights of godwyn somehow made it into the shadow realm after his death(they are not weak to holy dameage which implies they are not dead therefore I dont think its some 'death bulshit'). These hints straight up suggests that Messmer was sealed after the night of the black knives. Why was Messmer scorned? We dont know for sure but I have a theory- When Messmer returned home after the night of the black knives, the base serpent was somehow able to reveal itself to the public which caused him to be scorned. Marika sealed him away as she had already lost a child and did not want to lose another. Her fear was of losing Messmer. This does fit in character as according to the blessing of Marika description, she did care for him. The crusade being criticized for violence is highly unlikely imo as it is being done against the hornsent(we all know how brutal they are) and the erdtree society is seemingly fine with omen babies being systematically butchered and we even see tortured albunaurics at Leyndell so it would not be characteristic of the erdtree people to criticize violence. Plus as we see in the story trailer the lands were veiled (not sealed i.e. you could still travel there) so its unlikely anyone saw that it was violent. With all due respect Messmer's armor saying he took the blame for the crusade is a bad take for one main reason, it says 'direct thine maledictions,thy ire and thy grief' the first two would make sense if he was addressing the erdtree people but not grief. What do the erdtree people grieve for? Not the fire knights as they chose to shun them away and definitely not the hornsent. logically its just not possible for him to address the erdtree people here. The hornsent grandam talks about cursing marika with an omen so it appears that Messmer ordered them to curse him, not Marika which seemingly did not work lol. I go in further detail here(I might sound a bit rude in the post so I apologise in advance and I did respond to several comments who were arguing against me so you can read them as well)- www.reddit.com/r/EldenRingLoreTalk/comments/1gbxidl/marika_never_abandoned_messmer/?
Bro, that's hilarious. I was the guy who made that comment about the sentry torch. AbaeHouinardB. B for Boris. Glad you actually took my thoughts and expanded upon the theory. But I actually wonder if his banishment was even a punishment at all. The great runes curropted the demi gods. Maybe marika wanted to save her eldest son. And maybe he was the original operator of the volcano manor. Torturing for the lands between. It would explain the spirals, throne and winged serpents in volcano manor
Nice said, I agree. Also, I had no idea that someone might interpret Messmer's words as if he's addressing the Erdtree people. I thought it's obvious he is talking to those he was sent to purge.
Curious to think about how Messmer and Melina are siblings and the possibility of the gloam eyed queen being a serpent as well. Both of them having a serpentine related curse and visions of fire, Messmer Flame and Black Flame respectively.
I think the meaning behind his abyssal form and connection to darkness is that he is completely forsaken and left to be forgotten. Erdtree is a collection of memories of the world with rememberances hewn, which he is cut off from - "shorn of light".
There's not much connecting this but what if there is a duality between the god eating serpent and the abyss serpent. You mentioned in Max derrat's video that Mercurius could take the form of two snakes. What if the god devouring serpent and the abyssal serpent were once one being and through Marikas godhood chemistry experiment somehow divided them. One taking hold in messmer and the other fleeing to mt. Gelmir. I have nothing else to base this on but I like the concept of both serpents embodying an emptiness (void) and a fullness (devouring/hunger)
Pretty clear there is some Plato in Elden Ring. Myself I get constant allegory of the cave vibes and Plato was the guy who spoke of man's dual nature of body and soul. Finally Plato even believed that vision itself had a funny quality whereby light was also emitted from they eyes and that vision required the interaction of external light and the light that comes from our eyes. He is believed to have believed this because some animals can see well and their eyes gleam in the dark. Animals like owls and cats.
Radagon is Marika, Radagon is the serpent and Marika is the Gloam eyed queen. Which makes sense if The gloam eyed queen's correlation with serpents through the godskins was correct. Which i believe it is. This game is gonna make me go insane.
It’s possible that Messmer has Marfan syndrome. As he is a product of Radagon and Marika and has lengthy arms and fingers. It also affects your vision which could explain his leaning towards the dark. I thought of Akhenaten. A Pharaoh who’s theorized to have had this condition and his troubles with vision is the reason why he made the sun the only deity of worship.
My belief is that Messmer chose the serpent as his sigil after he was ordered by his mother to carry out her crusade so as to better direct the ire of everyone towards him and away from Marika
Okay, personal theory time. The serpent is either the offspring or the remains of the serpent that was tricked/seduced by Marika. It would tie into the "Reverse Christian" theme with Marika's backstory, where in Christian myth, the Devil is imprisoned in chains in Hell for the sin of betrayal. Here, the serpent is locked away by Marika to HIDE her sin of betrayal. In support, the implication of the serpent being "shorn" of light means that at some point, the serpent contained light (the gold threads stolen by Marika). It would have been a simple matter for Marika to imprison one of her greatest foes inside her demigod offspring, since each of them is essentially built to contain the powers of outer Gods.
Do you ever wonder what type of beings emerge from mature pots? Like, I get that we get the malformed beings in the DLC but I wonder if filled with good parts and left to mature in the pot, do more perfect beings emerge? Beings like the demigods? To me Godefroy and Godfrey look like something that would have emerged from the pots.
Maybe the snakes became a sin because of Rykard since I think he's more recent and mesmer was a very long time ago in my opinion, so maybe back then it was alright but only few knew about the abyssal serpent but I'm sure everyone knows prietor Rykard in the golden age and how he fed himself to that serpent, but idk lol
Bruh, so you even understand what's being said in relation to the character of mesmer. Do you guys not see who mesmer is? Come on. You really don't understand the eldritch nature of mesmer as an actual deity that isn't just a fictional character. But then again you lack the eyes.
Thanks everyone for checking out this video.
The Larger original can be found here: th-cam.com/video/QE_Vx7_UgnU/w-d-xo.html
Could it be the reason they are viewed as traitors is that when messmer got the snake merika kept it hidden for a while, then lied about it being a traitor, and said that messmer sealed the snake in himself to ensure it would never be a threat
Which could explain a little of it
Or Marika lied amd said the gloom eyed queen and the serpent where working together, and messmer sealed the serpent and malikath sealed the gloom eyed queen
Allowing messmer to still be apart of the lineage until he "betrayed" the golden order
I wasn't able to listen to the whole video so if you already said this i apologize
Man, if Smough doesn't step it up I might start listening to this guy instead.
Lmao!
Oooh u sassy
Ah man you tricked me, I’m a idiot :(
Wow, small world. I was just watching your Mouthwashing videos, Strawman. They’re were great btw
@@DarthTrooper2021 Aw shucks
This new guy's videos are pretty darn good
Fr this dude just came out of no where😂
For something to be shorn of light would imply that it was once OF light, or had light to be shorn of. The Abyssal Serpent may not have alwas been an abyssal one...
Something I’ve reflected on with Messmer is his possible effect as an older sibling to Rykard. While Radahn is the one mentioned directly, Rykard is the one that most attempted to emulate him. Fire, serpents and being a Praetor, leader of a company of inquisitors. Rykard understood the truth of his family’s origins and may have been raised in that same environment as Radahn was.
Missed opportunity to call this channel OrnsteinTown
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I think that Marika's power is life. That light, grace and Marika’s rune are all just different ways of embuing being with vigor and life. From the tarnished always coming back to life, the unkillable nature of the Demi gods and Marika’s eternal rule. It parallels the rune of death as a physical foil to Marika’s rune. They look like flipped versions of each other. So the Dark has a rune, and if the helphen steeple is to be believed, it even has it's own form of grace. A red light that we the player can never see. So:
Marika's rune = Rune of Death
Life = Death
Grace = Light of the Helphen
And what makes this even more interesting is the irises. Both irises grant grace. Occultation the total denial of light, and grace the total acceptance of light. They are opposites, but serve the same purpose. And it really makes me question Godwyn. We know that Ranni's Night of the Black knives was a scheme, a ploy, but she physically drained godwyn and herself of grace. Killing bith of them, but making them both immortal in a sense. One immortal in soul, another in body. I wonder, if Godwyn had died in both body and soul, if Ranni didn’t change the ritual, would Godwyn have just been reborn in death. A lightless being, granted a different kind of grace, just like Mesmer. Cause Mesmer is very ckearly a living death being. The stuck shed skin, and the white skin, and sores on his body. They all point to the loss of mesmer grace "killing" him in a sense, but also keeping him alive. It's weird
@notsmough
So I got a few thoughts.
I am going to go a little bit off the Marika and Radagon being a reverse mirror of Adam and Eve.
Marika is Adam.
Radagon is Eve, for he was made from Marika ~ Eve was made from Adam.
The Abyssal Serpent/Eiglay/The God Devouring Serpent are all the same entity/different faces of an Outer God. This is Satan/Lucifer/The Serpent that convinces Eve to eat the fruit.
The Gate of Divinity is the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, it bears the Forbidden Fruit.
Because there is so little text on the shed snake skin in Bonny Village and the actual betrayal of snakes I am going to go on a limb here and say context clues and environmental story telling plus the Adam and Eve mirroring is what can explain it.
Eiglay comes to Radagon/Marika in Bonny Village and tells them of how to become a god and shows them the way to the Gate of Divinity ~ Lucifer as a serpent comes to Eve to cajole her to partake of the Forbidden Fruit so she can become like God. If Radagon is Eve then how does he play that part? In the story trailer of Shadow of the Erdtree, in the first 50 seconds, especially seconds 25-38, I would argue that the figure is ambiguous enough to be either Marika or Radagon in control, but I believe it is actually Radagon being in control. You could argue the color grading/the red haze makes it hard to tell (which I think was the point, Miyazaki wanted it to be ambiguous), but during the entire sequence the figure's hair is undoubtedly a variable orange ~ red. We don't get a good view of the frontside of the figure at all, but the torso could easily be argued to be more masculine than feminine. If it is indeed Radagon, then that fits perfectly with him playing the part of Eve and partaking of the fruit which in this case is the Gate of Divinity.
Eiglay ~ Lucifer has ulterior motives. Covets the power of godhood. Not being able to have what they have, he tries to corrupt them and ruin their progress while putting on an act that he is doing the opposite. After trying to corrupt Adam and Eve, the next obvious target is their children.
Messmer, here is where the Adam and Eve thing starts to stretch, but I think it still works very well, it does not need to be a 1 for 1 mirroring. Messmer is Cain, though I believe the part of Cain is split in two pieces in Elden Ring, Ranni is also Cain. Godwyn is Abel. Ranni plays the part of committing the "first murder" by slaying her brother for her own selfish reasons. Messmer plays the part of Cain where he becomes cursed.
After Radagon/Marika becomes a god, the serpent's plan goes into motion. Either during the process or sometime after the serpent was able to influence the seed of Radagon/Marika, and being at its most influential and trusted level it would have easily been able to mess with them. It cursed their (most likely firstborn) child by injecting part of its being, its soul into their seed, perhaps this happened even before the child was conceived, during the pregnancy or after the child was born. Regardless, this was the betrayal. And the betrayal continued on eternally, the Abyssal Serpent lived on in Messmer, Eiglay corrupted Rykard and by extension may have also influenced Ranni since Rykard and Ranni were in cahoots with each other. This entire time the serpent has coveted the power of godhood granted by the gate and it has managed to some extent in stealing some of that power through the children of Radagon/Marika.
Also, as an aside, it may be relevant to this whole analysis, but also can be isolated from it, there are a few things I have theorized that I don't really see a lot of people discussing or pointing out. The first, which I think is most probable is that Messmer is a bastard, the bastard of Radagon and Marika. This is a G.R.R. Martin staple. Bastards/illegitimate children is a major plot point in A Song of Ice and Fire. There being absolutely no signs or mentions of Messmer's paternal heritage in game, yet it being very obvious Radagon is his father is a strong indicator of his bastard state. The fact also that he is not counted among the demigods officially, nor is he officially recognized as a blood sibling, yet he holds equal standing with them in raw power, strength and influence, is evocative of Jon Snow or Daemon I Blackfyre, both notable bastards from A Song of Ice and Fire saga that are often compared with their trueborn family. The next thing, while a bit more questionable in probability, though I consider it to be canon, is that Messmer and Melina, same as Radagon and Marika, Miquella and Trina are a rebis. Messmer is the dominant half of the rebis and that is why I believe Melina has the line about not being born the conventional way, because it was Messmer who was in control/active when they were born. Also, like Miquella and Trina, somehow for one reason or another Messmer and Melina split.
Thank you for your comment! I have some thoughts too.
I noticed that Ranni had Lucifer like connotations because she rejected the order and made her own way. She wanted each being to make their own way rather than be guided by the light of "Grace". By killing Godwyn in soul she would have been killing her other half that was associated with the sun, embracing only her dark cold moon.
To me it's interesting because we are trying to figure out who we are and how we got in this world. Some seek answers through lights illumination. Some seek answers in mystery and questions, ones that don't have known answers. A balanced approach would have both.
I also feel like the Erd tree is like conscious memory and the Scadutree is the subconscious. It feels like the outer gods are forces larger than us that can influence us and are yet outside our control or understanding.
We are seeking self understanding and control as much as possible when faced with forces larger than our understanding and a loss of former identity. It's like the tarnished have lost their grace or order for a time. It caused a shamanic death. We resurrect with a spark of grace- a memory of who we were within that cosmic order.
The light can obscure just as much as the dark can. Both can blind us to who we are, who we were and who we might be. By going on this journey we define this for ourselves. We literally get to decide who we are in this and how we choose to relate to these cosmic forces. We make our character and are the Greater Will. The character is our vassel.
This game has so many meta layers. I really love diving into them.
It's interesting because serpents, fire, mirrors of silver, being between life and death/ those who live in death, the primal animal within us are all ways of seeking self, wisdom and knowledge are each rejected by the Golden Order. These same symbols have been demonized by different cultures.
Winged Serpents are seen also as the balance between what is above and below.
I also feel lots of Sumerian mythology with Marika literally making a throne out of the Tree of Life/ Urd Tree. She first had to take the Bird in it's branches, the Owl/wind or lillitu in its trunk and the serpent at its roots. She even had a decent into the underworld-the crucible jar- and emerged a new being.
Serpents and godskins are very reminiscent of transformational "death" You either are eaten by the gods or eat/ absorb the gods to become them.
A cycle of self creation. We literally take our own creation into our own hands like Adam and Eve.
We get to choose what forces we use to shape our lands between. Faith, intelligence, strength and so on. We get to choose what if any magic or divine we use or align ourselves with.
This video recalls a thought I've been working on a lot since even before the DLC; the Carian legendary armament is the Sword of Night and Flame, and the way its lore is phrased leads us to believe that the Carian Night was complemented by the Flame of the Fire Giants. We also know that Flame, in all its incarnations, is feared and abhorred by Marika and the Erdtree, as close to literal embodiments of Light and Life as are available in the game. Along with the many parallels and connections drawn between Death and Flame in Elden Ring- the GEQ wielding Blackflame and the Rune of Death, Ghostflame being used in Death rituals, etc.- this leads me to believe that Flame is cosmologically linked to Death and the Abyss/Night in Elden Ring in the same way lightning is said to be 'imbued with gold' (Gravel Stone Seal), something that puts off 'false light' and leads things towards Death, which has an interesting parallel with Helphen's Steeple.
Silver is also a reflection by which we gain a different perspective or understanding of how light/truth are relevant. With Carian magic it can nullify star based magic by reflecting it or taking it apart. It is similar to how the Silver of the Nox and the albinurics are a reflection of the Gold in grace that people made from their understanding of those forces. Their sin was trying to understand and make their own divinity. That would definitely have upset the order and asks some very uncomfortable questions. This is much like how we wonder if artificial intelligence developed by human hands could ever develop a soul or it's own identity or place in the universe because we created it.
The Golden Order is presented as the only answer. Anything that is not covered by that answer falls outside of Grace or acknowledgement of accepted ways of being.
Those who live in death are in the transition between living and dead. The beast men show of an existence older and more primal than the order, the Nox were making their own order, the omen show the pain and conflict that birthed the order.
The order seems to edit from reality anything that could come before or after. Death is a transition. When those changes are removed everything stagnates. The flow of life, the sap of the Urd Tree literally dries up.
With Carian magic, it is possible that an equally valid way of life could exist alongside the order. However this challenges the order being the only answer. They could not destroy the Carian rule through war so they did it through love.
I will add (idk if it really adds anything but), in the spanish translation of the game, Tarnished is translated as "Sinluz", literally "lightless".
Tarnished itself doesn't have any current direct translations that I know of, perhaps "deslucido" or "deslustrado", last one meaning literally unlustered. Etymologically, both imply a lack of light; particularly that of metals, which require burnishing to remain shiny and reflective. Rusting in copper is actually called tarnishing (and also, the rust of copper is called Verdigris, but that's another matter).
Interestingly, the spanish translation for Messmer's dialogue uses a different term for Tarnished, "Tiznado", which is more archaic and actually closer to tarnished in meaning, also meaning "dirty", "stained" or "obscured". This is probably because Messmer already says "lightless" in his battle. In modern spanish, "Tiznado" is used mainly as a very local way of saying someone's "reasoning is obscured", like being enraged or drunk, but the overall spanish translation of Elden Ring, like the original english, relies heavily on archaisms, so it definitely doesn't mean that.
Some things may get lost in translation and some things may be better understandable.
Thank you for sharing this.
I don't think Messmer's Abyssal Serpent is within a pocket dimension in his eye and expands when it's unsealed, but rather that it's literally a part of Messmer's soul. Grace is of gold, and gold is the color of order. Miquella's needle of unalloyed gold functions by using that order to split the self from that which harms a person, like rot or frenzy. It doesn't wholly delete those aspects, it simply re-organizes it into a form that can be cast away.
Messmer's Abyssal Serpent is sealed in very much the same way, a re-ordering of his own self. Just like how sprites are held within Rauh burrows, the Abyssal Serpent's soul is kept within Marika's Seal. And just like Mogh infused with Radahn's soul, Messmer's physical being changes to reflect his metaphysical being
Yeh I like that tbh
It's a lot like how we psychologically separate ourselves from our undesirable or harmful traits by suppressing them into the subconscious. They are still there, they are just dormant or sleeping like how Saint Trina grants a healing/ relieving sleep. Sleep is a little death. It's like a lighter form of death.
I think that is how some things can be Hewn into the Erd Tree yet be forgotten as well. They are stored on a layer that few have access to. We erase some memory of the Erd Tree by setting it on fire/ illuminating and deconstructing it so we can get to the center. When at the center we have command over the perception and experience of the lands between. Isn't it interesting that the greater will needs a vassel just like we as a player need a character? The forces still always exist, we just choose which ones are dominant in the conscience expression of the lands between. Each players lands between us different because they experienced it and shaped it but is also the same because we each have the same game/ world. We are all human beings yet each human is their own human. That makes me think about the implications of player vs player combat. Who can be the best god or play their build the best?
I think the serpent skin is the Serpent God from the serpent god curve sword. If you take out all the outer gods and the old gods you just get 3 gods. Placi's missing god, the Serpent God, and Marika. One thing about that gets me about Ranni's ending is that she has to touch Marika to get the Elden Ring.
I think the Serpent god had the Elden Ring and is our missing link from Placi's god to Marika. We see it on the Forge of the Giants which we know that the giants drove off the ice drakes to get that spot, meaning that it would be after the Dragon's rule. We know that the snake was around in the event that the coffin ships were used. And finally we see the snake skin in Bonny Village which matches with the Serpent God's Curve sword which states that it was worshipped on Mount Gelmir by chopping up bodies and feeding them to the snake.
It seems like the snake is the bridge that would allow Marika to acquire the Elden Ring.
Please do an updated video on the Gloam Eyed Queen, I have so many questions about her that only the goat Smough can answer.
This is not smough
THE ABYSSAL SERPENT SHAWN!
i read this exactly when he was saying it and i think i’m going to cry
I definitely stumbled upon this as the scene started and said wtf lol i hear it now 😂😂
SHORN OF LIGHT SHAWN. LETS START THEA
Man is already more consistent from Smoughtown, seems they don’t take fans for granted 🤔
eyy more lore videos?! Niiice
my headcanon is messmers snakes names are snessmer and snellana
30:46 I made a post on reddit discussing Messmer's timeline so I will give it here in short (It still turned out to be extremely long lol)-
Black knight Andreas spirit ash says 'After his flight from the erdtree.' in reference to Messmer. Flight means being chased away basically. The fire knights were also chased away as you discusssed in the video so this is a literal flight. If he was chased away then the people of the erdtree would not support him but according to the serpent crest shield item description, the crusade was commemorated. You would only commemorate something if you want to support it. Therefore it is impossible for Messmer's flight to have been the beginning of the crusade. Which means Messmer must have returned to Leyndell after the crusade started. This is further evidenced by the fact that the stone tablets in Marika's bedchambers and in the shadow keep are the exact same model. This means Messmer brought those things to his mom(personal headcannon: he did this so Marika could find a way to cure the jar innards). So now we have a question- when was Messmer sealed? The tree sentinel outside of shaman village is carrying the sentry torch which was created after the night of the black knives and the death knights of godwyn somehow made it into the shadow realm after his death(they are not weak to holy dameage which implies they are not dead therefore I dont think its some 'death bulshit'). These hints straight up suggests that Messmer was sealed after the night of the black knives. Why was Messmer scorned? We dont know for sure but I have a theory- When Messmer returned home after the night of the black knives, the base serpent was somehow able to reveal itself to the public which caused him to be scorned. Marika sealed him away as she had already lost a child and did not want to lose another. Her fear was of losing Messmer. This does fit in character as according to the blessing of Marika description, she did care for him. The crusade being criticized for violence is highly unlikely imo as it is being done against the hornsent(we all know how brutal they are) and the erdtree society is seemingly fine with omen babies being systematically butchered and we even see tortured albunaurics at Leyndell so it would not be characteristic of the erdtree people to criticize violence. Plus as we see in the story trailer the lands were veiled (not sealed i.e. you could still travel there) so its unlikely anyone saw that it was violent. With all due respect Messmer's armor saying he took the blame for the crusade is a bad take for one main reason, it says 'direct thine maledictions,thy ire and thy grief' the first two would make sense if he was addressing the erdtree people but not grief. What do the erdtree people grieve for? Not the fire knights as they chose to shun them away and definitely not the hornsent. logically its just not possible for him to address the erdtree people here. The hornsent grandam talks about cursing marika with an omen so it appears that Messmer ordered them to curse him, not Marika which seemingly did not work lol. I go in further detail here(I might sound a bit rude in the post so I apologise in advance and I did respond to several comments who were arguing against me so you can read them as well)-
www.reddit.com/r/EldenRingLoreTalk/comments/1gbxidl/marika_never_abandoned_messmer/?
Bro, that's hilarious. I was the guy who made that comment about the sentry torch. AbaeHouinardB. B for Boris. Glad you actually took my thoughts and expanded upon the theory. But I actually wonder if his banishment was even a punishment at all. The great runes curropted the demi gods. Maybe marika wanted to save her eldest son. And maybe he was the original operator of the volcano manor. Torturing for the lands between. It would explain the spirals, throne and winged serpents in volcano manor
How you were able to post a comment with a link?? Yt keeps deleting mine
Nice said, I agree.
Also, I had no idea that someone might interpret Messmer's words as if he's addressing the Erdtree people. I thought it's obvious he is talking to those he was sent to purge.
Curious to think about how Messmer and Melina are siblings and the possibility of the gloam eyed queen being a serpent as well. Both of them having a serpentine related curse and visions of fire, Messmer Flame and Black Flame respectively.
Omg you're spoiling us 🥰🥰💜💜 thanks for the hard work you do 😊😊
I think the meaning behind his abyssal form and connection to darkness is that he is completely forsaken and left to be forgotten. Erdtree is a collection of memories of the world with rememberances hewn, which he is cut off from - "shorn of light".
omg, first i thought someone did steal your content and i was really mad about it for a minute xD
Great video, thank you!
Time to listen and give it a fair shot!
Best ER loretuber out there already. Waaayyyyy better than that Smoughtown guy, he doesn’t know what he’s talking about!
Long time fan, subbed
There's not much connecting this but what if there is a duality between the god eating serpent and the abyss serpent. You mentioned in Max derrat's video that Mercurius could take the form of two snakes. What if the god devouring serpent and the abyssal serpent were once one being and through Marikas godhood chemistry experiment somehow divided them. One taking hold in messmer and the other fleeing to mt. Gelmir. I have nothing else to base this on but I like the concept of both serpents embodying an emptiness (void) and a fullness (devouring/hunger)
Pretty clear there is some Plato in Elden Ring.
Myself I get constant allegory of the cave vibes and Plato was the guy who spoke of man's dual nature of body and soul.
Finally Plato even believed that vision itself had a funny quality whereby light was also emitted from they eyes and that vision required the interaction of external light and the light that comes from our eyes. He is believed to have believed this because some animals can see well and their eyes gleam in the dark. Animals like owls and cats.
The abyssal serpent, Shaun of light.
Every soul has its dark. Got it.
Day one of asking for the channel name to be Ornsteinville
Radagon is Marika, Radagon is the serpent and Marika is the Gloam eyed queen. Which makes sense if The gloam eyed queen's correlation with serpents through the godskins was correct. Which i believe it is.
This game is gonna make me go insane.
Great content! Btw when m crushes the seal he does it with 3 fingers. It feels like its left in frame for a while on purpose. Is it a hint?
It’s possible that Messmer has Marfan syndrome. As he is a product of Radagon and Marika and has lengthy arms and fingers. It also affects your vision which could explain his leaning towards the dark.
I thought of Akhenaten. A Pharaoh who’s theorized to have had this condition and his troubles with vision is the reason why he made the sun the only deity of worship.
does anyone else blush giggle and kick their feet when u die to him
Im stoned is this smouhhtown or did i subscribe to a ...mimic??
Someone harvested Smoughs voice and made an AI out of it lol, Damned Smough!
My belief is that Messmer chose the serpent as his sigil after he was ordered by his mother to carry out her crusade so as to better direct the ire of everyone towards him and away from Marika
I guess the base of all things is the abyss, so perhaps the abyssal serpent is akin to the Norse Nidhogg. Gnawing at the roots of the Scadutree.
This channel really should have been called "Shadow of the SmoughTown".. too bad :D
15:39 I saw someone point out recently that Messmer’s hand here looks exactly like the Beloved Stardust talisman - could it mean something?
Okay, personal theory time. The serpent is either the offspring or the remains of the serpent that was tricked/seduced by Marika. It would tie into the "Reverse Christian" theme with Marika's backstory, where in Christian myth, the Devil is imprisoned in chains in Hell for the sin of betrayal. Here, the serpent is locked away by Marika to HIDE her sin of betrayal. In support, the implication of the serpent being "shorn" of light means that at some point, the serpent contained light (the gold threads stolen by Marika). It would have been a simple matter for Marika to imprison one of her greatest foes inside her demigod offspring, since each of them is essentially built to contain the powers of outer Gods.
I was so pissed you couldn’t use the serpent hunter spear against Mesmer
You forgot about the abyssal nature of the Greaterwill itself
Another one 🫡
Do you ever wonder what type of beings emerge from mature pots? Like, I get that we get the malformed beings in the DLC but I wonder if filled with good parts and left to mature in the pot, do more perfect beings emerge? Beings like the demigods?
To me Godefroy and Godfrey look like something that would have emerged from the pots.
I think they get morphed into the divine beast of kibble
Wait a minute 🤔 I recognize this voice
Maybe the snakes became a sin because of Rykard since I think he's more recent and mesmer was a very long time ago in my opinion, so maybe back then it was alright but only few knew about the abyssal serpent but I'm sure everyone knows prietor Rykard in the golden age and how he fed himself to that serpent, but idk lol
This might be a bit off topic, Smough, but what is your pfp of?
Are these all new vids or just edited reuploads?
This is way better then Smough
What about the snake hide near the Bonny village
What is that thing at 4:20?
Is this the fabled Ornstein City?
Love it when Smough feeds me 🤪🤤
I probably just missed it by why the channel?
What is the meaning of this secret channel D:
Dang, AI Voices have really come long - sounds like the real Smough!!! lol hihi
If not Smough, then Ornstein?
Messer is left handed. So is Marika. Who else?
It is pronounced "Shadow-Tree " not SKADU-Tree! Come on use your English and pronunciations please.
So confused….did Smough’s OG get banned?
No, just a second channel for a different form of content.
But why is the same video on the other channel?
Fromsoft can't resist the Dark, can they?
you should have named yourself ornsteintown
Rad Dad is gone!??? :(
does anyone think this might be A.I?
LMAO I THOUGHT THIS WAS LIEGTI STOLEN
Oh wait, I recognize that voice. I been tricked!
Hmmm, is the the famed Ornsteintown?
Day 2 of asking the channel name to be changed to oresntville
Rykard did nothing wrong
Debate me
I think this has to be mentioned, the Gloam Eyes Queen is the mother of Messmer and Radagon (aka Marika) is the father…
Voice copied name snatched but maybe this man is better?
Bruh, so you even understand what's being said in relation to the character of mesmer. Do you guys not see who mesmer is? Come on. You really don't understand the eldritch nature of mesmer as an actual deity that isn't just a fictional character. But then again you lack the eyes.
What on earth are you talking about?
Clearly stealing smoughs icon on the thumbnail ima let him know
Why does smough do this lol??