{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/1677", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 1677, "subject": "Antechamber through the Age", "messages": 2, "voices": 2, "first": "1999-06-09T16:46:09+00:00", "last": "1999-06-21T20:10:13+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Michael Andre-Driussi", "address": "mantis at sirius.com" }, "date": "1999-06-09T16:46:09+00:00", "subject": "(urth) Antechamber through the Age", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Mitchell A. Bailey wrote:\nMy take has been that the House Absolute was reclaimed as a\nresidence/command center rather early in the Monarch's Empire, several\nmillenia earlier; the painted ceiling could date from a time when that\npart of the antechamber had been an apartment for the monarch or his\nfamily or an important minister or staffer; the text clearly states that\nseveral rooms were consolidated as the antechamber grew. Wouldn't you\nthink the monarch's retinue would include a good few Doctor\nStrangeloves?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I suppose. But I'm not clear on your reference points--by \"Monarch\" of\n\"Monarch's Empire,\" are you referring to Typhon, the Man Who Would Be\nMonarch of the Second Empire, or some Monarch of the First Empire (Frog,\nfor instance)? Because you use the timeframe \"several millennia,\" well,\nI'm confused." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "...(I thought Severian saw these in the tunnels of the Citadel, =not= in\nthe House Absolute) and rows of stopped clocks are.\n\nI saw that too. This was after he returned as Autarch. One of the perks\nof office is that you get a decent flashlight to take with you down into\nthe Citadel tunnels. Apprentice Sev was in utter darkness and couldn't\nsee the signs or anything else.\n\nIt was at the door to Inire's specula chamber in the Second House that\nthe \"crimson teratoid sign\" Sev surmised to be of extraterrestrial\norigin appeared. That seems to be what we're interpreting as radioactive\nor biohazard warning symbols." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "And Jonas seems to interpret those same symbols as some form of writing; he\nseems to read the one as saying \"Urth,\" or words to that effect. FWIW." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Why is this 'spaceport' underground? Protection against the backblast of\nmore primitive chemical thrusters?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'd say =nuclear= thrusters, myself. \"NERVA to the Moon!\" \"All the way\nwith KIWI!\" Chemical thrusters are so primitive, they are a\nnon-starter--a literal evolutionary dead-end.\n\nI don't much buy the idea of HA being a spaceport. OTOH, there is another\nport, somewhere in Typhon's time, since Citadel Hill is called Old Port;\nand there is some sort of capital city that almost certainly is =not=\nNessus.\n\nI also think \"executive bunker\" more likely than missile center--the two\nare rather exclusive of each other, unless the silos are for anti-missile\nmissiles, I guess . . ." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The Navigator. ... so KLS was imprisoned for\ntrespassing or whatever it was at least 160 years ago (seven generations at\n20 years plus one more generation). If there was only one guy from a\nstarship, then it seems somewhat more likely that he himself was the\nnavigator. And he was the first prisoner, ..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Can't be; the antechamber/holding cell used as such, by your own\nchronology in Lexicon Urthus, has to be over a millenium old since it\nseems to predate the autarchs." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I guess I should have been more complete: the \"first\" prisoner, since KLS\nis designated \"first prisoner\" by the prisoners themselves.\n\n(And for clarity, I should always distinguish between the physical building\nitself (more or less like a cave) and the various hypothetical uses to\nwhich it has been put during the Ages of the Monarch and Autarch.)\n\n(\"It was a donut shop, then a record store, then a head shop . . .\")\n\n(The vincula of Thrax is rumored to have originally been a mausoleum, iirc.)\n\nThe Age of the Autarch didn't start off with all the bad stuff hitting the\nfan, and then a chiliad of that sticking in place. Things start off\nrelatively better than during the time of wars, and gradually the situation\ndeteriorates. For example, we know that the roads were closed to civilian\nuse only in relatively recent times.\n\nSo! There was a period when the antechamber was used as a temporary place,\nas per Nicarete's story. Then, over time, it changed into the situation\nthat Severian finds: where prisoners are kept for life, over generations,\nand exultant rowdies (male and female) torture them for kicks.\n\nNow then: to put all these things together, into something like this--\n\n==============\nc. 1100 PS -- Typhon moves his capital-of-many-worlds to somewhere on Urth.\nThe structure that will become the House Absolute is reopened and used for\none thing or another.\n\nc. 1000 PS -- Antechamber open for business, your host Ymar. Detainees are\ntreated to coffee. Flavor of the year: hazelhut. Cases cleared within a\nday.\n(Inire arrives and adds Second House to HA.)\n\n(c. 1000-700 PS -- the Yellow and Green Empires end their war?)\n\n(c. 690? PS -- Autarch Maxentius orders execution of Saint Katharine)\n\n(c. 350 PS -- the brown book is published.)\n\n(c. 300 PS -- Autarch Sulpicious on throne; the torturers have a guest at\ntheir feast)\n\nc. 220 PS -- KLS becomes the first lifelong prisoner (by dying, of course;\npresumably of old age, after many years in the antechamber). This is the\npoint of division; this is the line that separates detainee from\nprisoner-for-life. (Yeah, counting =only= from the \"seventh\" generation\nmeans I =ignored= the group younger than the oldest women! The children of\nthe group are something like tenth generation.)\n\n(c. 70 PS -- Autarch Maruthas closes the roads.)\n\n66 PS -- scandal in reign of Autarch Appian; Lomer sent to antechamber\n(thus, it is still being used).\n\n? PS -- Nicarete enters the antechamber voluntarily.\n\n1 PS -- Severian and Jonas are put into the antechamber; the torturers are\nwidely considered to be only a legend, even in Nessus.\n\n2 SR -- Severian has the antechamber emptied, prisoners forced out at\nspearpoint.\n===================\n\nFrom a certain standpoint there is not a lot of difference between the\nantechamber and the Well of Orchids (oh, hey--=Orchid's= place). Once the\npractice of holding exultants hostage against bad behavior is in place (and\nthat must have happened relatively early in the Age . . . but wasn't the\nWell of Orchids originally the Autarchia's section of the HA? These aren't\nexclusive of each other, of course), then it becomes easier to see the\nantechamber as a sort of mirror image (held hostage because of bad\nbehavior) for those under exultant status.\n\nOr maybe it is all just an ant chamber. \n\n=mantis=" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Mitchell A. Bailey", "address": "mab at lindau.net" }, "date": "1999-06-21T20:10:13+00:00", "subject": "Re: (urth) Antechamber through the Age", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Michael Andre-Driussi wrote:\n\nMitchell A. Bailey wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "My take has been that the House Absolute was reclaimed ... rather early in the > > Monarch's Empire, several millenia earlier; the painted ceiling could date from a > > time when that part of the antechamber had been an apartment for the monarch \n...the text clearly states that several rooms were consolidated as the antechamber > > grew...." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I suppose. But I'm not clear on your reference points--by \"Monarch\" of\n\"Monarch's Empire,\" are you referring to Typhon, the Man Who Would Be\nMonarch of the Second Empire, or some Monarch of the First Empire (Frog,\nfor instance)? Because you use the timeframe \"several millennia,\" well,\nI'm confused." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'll have to confess to a minor goof, inasmuch as I intended to stick to\nyour chronology and not try to construct one of my own. Writing from the\nseat of my pants, I momentarily forgot that the new Monarchs didn't\nreside on urth until Typhon returned. That of course, is not debatable\nsince Typhon himself stated it (and if you want to argue with Typhon...)\n\nI'm assuming it was originally probably was constructed as a command\nbunker complex and then became obsolete (as all military assets tend to\ndo) a few centuries from our time. Then, after the fall of the great\nstellar empire, it could have been rediscovered and reoccupied. OK, the\nHA was not the Monarch's residence, but it still could have been the\nresidence or headquarters of his planetary governor, and possibly before\nthat the stronghold of any number of petty ethnarchs since the fall of\nthe K3 Empire some undefined length of time ago. \nThat would tend to account for the appearance of rather decadent\npre-Commonwealth and even pre-Typhon occupation. \n..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "It was at the door to Inire's specula chamber in the Second House that\nthe \"crimson teratoid sign\" Sev surmised to be of extraterrestrial\norigin appeared. That seems to be what we're interpreting as radioactive\nor biohazard warning symbols." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "And Jonas seems to interpret those same symbols as some form of writing; he\nseems to read the one as saying \"Urth,\" or words to that effect. FWIW." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "or, he recognizes the symbol (Danger! Highly Curved Space Hazard! You\nMay Be Disintegrated or Teleported Somewhere Unpleasant!) as being\npeculiar to the Earth he remembers or has researched.\n\nInteresting, though - one would think Inire wopuld have posted that\nsign, in which case the language and content would indeed be alien (that\ndoesn't rule out Jonas knowing it). Maybe Inire followed a practice of\nposting a sign with the name of the place, to orient new arrivals, kind\nof like the place-signs you saw at railroad stations?\n\n..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I also think \"executive bunker\" more likely than missile center--the two\nare rather exclusive of each other, unless the silos are for anti-missile\nmissiles, I guess . . ." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "or spy satellites, or cruise missles, or manned rockets for various\nmissions..." } ] } ] }