Typhon's nature

David Stockhoff · 20 Oct 2011, 11:42 · from 2011-October.txt.gz

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From: dstockhoff at verizon.net (David Stockhoff)
Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2011 07:42:30 -0400
Subject: (urth) Typhon's nature
In-Reply-To: <6F41D1213CA440ACA0E1942FDB8410AE@Rover>
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On 10/20/2011 6:42 AM, Gerry Quinn wrote:
> *From:* Gerry Quinn <mailto:gerry at bindweed.com>
> > Fair enough,though it doesn?t really give the impression that Typhon
> > was trying to suppress knowledge. But I just found a problem:
> >
> > ?
> Their spoil was gathered into a great heap in the city of Nessus,
> > which was then newly built, to be burned.?
> >
> > Surely Nessus was built long before the reign of Typhon?
> I don?t mean to say this disproves Andrew?s theory: errors may have 
> crept into the history related by Cyriaca, or Wolfe may have nodded. 
> Certainly it?s odd that the guy should make a point about Typhon 
> bringing records to the Citadel if it wasn?t meant to be him.
> - Gerry Quinn

I suppose one could interpret that line as "newly REbuilt" ..... there 
could be some conflation of names and dates in your average Urthian's 
sense of history. The origin of Nessus itself is so confused it can't be 
used for reliable dating. But Nessus should surely precede Typhon by a 
chiliad, except for the Citadel, which I'd connect with the useless 
stump of Typhon's lost fleet as well as the library.

But recall that Alexander, a precursor to Typhon, built the Library of 
Alexandria, which later burned. Ironically, if it had not been built it 
would not have burned. Point being, a centralized library system is just 
as vulnerable and more subject to restriction than a dispersed or 
nonsystematic one. The whole story of the collection of books to burn 
them suggests this. Typhon need not embrace universal knowledge to 
collect all books and bury them below the ground where only he can 
access them.

Andrew, do you have evidence for the monarch's repentance? Is it 
possible that Typhon brought all remaining books to Nessus to save them, 
where a predecessor burned them?

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