Clandestine Echoes

As I was drafting the previous post, I happened to read through liber primus of Ovid's Metamorphoses. I wish I could understand the latin original more smoothly, but I haven't been practicing Lingua Mater very regularly over the last few weeks and poetic syntax is such a barrier to my rudimentary comprehension abilities. So for both our sakes, here is the link to an English translation.

The most interesting correlation was between the four created Wevel and the four elements of Ovid, which I never intended, but have somehow been forced into establishing. The Wevel were initially conceived as spiritual governors of the four fundamental forces, Alero - Electromagnetism, Ilvesu - Gravity, Oleri - Weak Nuclear, Uleva - Strong Nuclear. Of course, over time, they accrued a whole lot of other associations, which ranged from the emotional and temperamental to the racial and locative. Now, in writing the creation of Eldwan anew, I find myself writing in such a way that the Wevel align fairly well with the elements of Ovid's creation. This leads to an odd mish-mash of pagan ideas with biblical ideas. My more conservative side rebels against the blend of oil and water, but I have to add that Tolkien did something similar with Arda and that went brilliantly. I suppose the key is to emphasise the ultimate authority of the initial creator.

Reading Ovid's epic, the passage that leaped out to my imagination was this :

Then earth from air, and seas from earth were driv'n, 

And grosser air sunk from aetherial Heav'n. 

Thus disembroil'd, they take their proper place;

The next of kin, contiguously embrace; 

And foes are sunder'd, by a larger space. 

The force of fire ascended first on high, 

And took its dwelling in the vaulted sky: 

Then air succeeds, in lightness next to fire; 

Whose atoms from unactive earth retire. 

Earth sinks beneath, and draws a num'rous throng 

Of pondrous, thick, unwieldy seeds along. 

About her coasts, unruly waters roar; 

And rising, on a ridge, insult the shore.

I had wanted to associate each of the Wevel with a particular realm before, and perhaps one of the Aristotelian senses, but this passage cemented the elemental parallels in my imagination. I'll give the main alignments of each of the Wevel systematically.

Alero

Fundamental: Electromagnetism
Drive: Curiosity, Exploration

Regional: The High Heavens, space beyond the atmosphere

Classical Element: Fire
Sensory: Eyes, Sight

Ilvesu
Fundamental: Gravitation
Drive: Prudence, Reflection
Regional: The Deep, the seas and subterranean reaches of the earth
Classical Element: Water
Sensory: Ears, Auditory and Vestibular

Oleri
Fundamental: Weak Nuclear
Drive: Isolation, Originality
Regional: The Skies, the earth's atmosphere
Classical Element: Air
Sensory: Nose, Smell

Uleva
Fundamental: Strong Nuclear
Drive: Interaction, Cooperation
Regional: The Land, the land surfaces of the earth
Classical Element: Earth
Sensory: Tongue, Taste

It might be worth reinterpreting Metamorphoses, or its counterpart in the incorporated fabric of Eldwan, as a corrupted retelling of the associations of the Wevel and their domains, rather than as the Wevel being strictly tethered to whatever pseudoscientific associations that Empedocles' quartet has accrued. The Eldwanian Greeks are supposed to be descended from the Alarians after the Deluge, so that would also make sense. Thus the Eldwanian creation myth I published in the last post would be an odd meld such that the biblical creation and hellenistic creation myths would both be its derivatives, either embellishing as in the case of Ovid, or withholding information, as in the case of Genesis.