# The Wall as "Well"

*The Urth list — 2 messages, 2 voices, 13 May 1998*

<https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/606>

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### m.driussi
*13 May 1998, 01:10*

Here's another curious detail to ponder in the "hard science"
department.  The Wall of Nessus is said to be leagues (plural)
tall, where each league is three miles.

That is some serious vertical terrain.  If we take as true the
PLAN[E]T ENGINEERING map suggestion that the diameter of the
circle enclosing Nessus is twenty leagues (sixty miles), and we
assume the Wall is two or three leagues high (six or nine miles),
we could determine the lattitude of Nessus by the altitude of the
presumed mossline growing on the northern wall where direct sunlight
never falls.

(Unless Nessus lies upon the tropic, and then the whole well would be
briefly lit for a short while in summer.)

The shadow of the Wall must be immense!  Just as mountain valley
communities have late sunrise and early sunset, so must Nessus
experience truncated sunlight/enhanced dawn/dusk indirect lighting.
(Is this another reason for the law forbidding buildings any closer
to the Wall [leading to the Inn of Lost Loves being a treehouse]--
that there is a twilight zone of so many leagues?)

The Sanguinary Field lies at the edge of the built up area, and their
sennet trumpet is heard when the solar disk reaches the Wall.  Well,
gee, that could be as early as three o'clock, if at all! <g>

Humans will find it hard to breath at heights greater than four miles
above sea level.  So watchers at the machicolations either have
breathing gear (necklaces of air, or what-have-you) or they aren't
standard issue humans.

=mantis=

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### Peter Westlake
*14 May 1998, 09:36 · follows m.driussi*

> At 01:10 1998-05-13 GMT, m.driussi at genie.geis.com wrote:
> Here's another curious detail to ponder in the "hard science"
> department.  The Wall of Nessus is said to be leagues (plural)
> tall, where each league is three miles.
> 
> That is some serious vertical terrain.  If we take as true the
> PLAN[E]T ENGINEERING map suggestion that the diameter of the
> circle enclosing Nessus is twenty leagues (sixty miles), and we
> assume the Wall is two or three leagues high (six or nine miles),
> we could determine the lattitude of Nessus by the altitude of the
> presumed mossline growing on the northern wall where direct sunlight
> never falls.

On the other hand, when Typhon is showing Severian the world
from the eye, Nessus is described as spreading over many
hundreds of leagues. You probably couldn't see the walls from
the middle of the city.

Peter.

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