Bellum infinitum - some of the mythology
posted on 15 Apr 2005 under category History
As I’ve alluded to before, and you’ve no doubt heard if you’ve picked out some of the lyrics, there are things in the story of Bellum Infinitum that belong to the mythology of the world I’ve created there, but have never totally explained before. Much of this comes from D&D, so if you’ve ever played that you’ll know where some of this is coming from. First up, of course, is the Drow Elves. Now, I remember creating this Legolas character back when the “Unearthed Arcana” book had just first been published, so Drow were totally new to me, and I never kept up with any of the novels/fan fiction/etc., so there’s been a lot of stuff added to the Drow history that, for my character/world here, just doesn’t exist, or is different from the way the TSR people have made it evolve. So, I’ll just explain their history here - the Drow Elves were an offshoot of the Elfin races when there was a war in the past - some elves allied with Good/Light, and others with Evil/Darkness. Those who allied with Evil were defeated, and forced to live underground. After millennia of that, the belief is that they can no longer tolerate sunlight, and that light will kill them. So my story starts with a ‘what-if’ - What if that belief is just a belief, and not true? Also, I used that belief to create the bit about those sentenced to death being banished to the surface, to (so they believe) burn to death in the sunlight. (Of course, L__ doesn’t, but I’ll get into the details of that when describing the song “Rainbow Skies”.)
Next is the Eternal War. It’s a concept not totally unknown to our world - that good and evil are ALWAYS in conflict, and always fighting. Romans and Barbarians, Crusaders and Moslems, Knights of the Round Table vs. Mordred and his cronies, Cowboys and Indians, Cops and Robbers, Allies and Nazis, The Free World Vs. Terrorism, etc. - Always two sides, always polarized, always fighting, and one may win or the other, but then they change faces and fight again. The entire tale of Bellum Infinitum is just one iteration of the great cycle - Legolas vs. the world.
Excalibur and Untwain - Excalibur we sort of know, though I use it in a slightly different connotation. While not specifically wielded by King Arthur, here, it stands as a symbol/primary weapon/focus of the ‘good’ side of the fight. But what struck me was that nobody ever figured that there was an ‘evil’ sword to balance it. Or if there was it never got much press. Untwain (pronounced OON-twain, if you were wondering) was the name of the magical sword that Legolas found early on in my D&D games and it became his primary weapon - a two handed sword, if I remember right, or a bastard sword, with an ebony steel blade (and magic powers of course, but I won’t distract by relating them unless someone really wants to know…). So, when crafting the mythology of this world, providing a Balancer to Excalibur was natural, and that Balancer became Untwain.
Phalarei and Celaeni, the Sisters of Death - what good is a myth world that doesn’t have its own myths of even earlier, more forgotten times? These two Drow Elf sisters were from a time long before Legolas, and figure into a myth that inspired Legolas to do what he did. I’ll get into the details when describing the song “Sisters of Death”, though. I will note that this myth and these sisters were NOT part of those D&D games at all, and were created anew when I was writing the album.
I guess that’s it for now. More details will be given in the song descriptions themselves.
(Not much to add about the post itself, or about the album. However, I see that there were a lot of Xasthur albums in my playlist over this time period. That must have been in the wake of a trade with Total Holocaust Records for the BWV distro. Funny how I remember so many of these things I used to do - the memories are in isolation from each other, but they were all really happening at the same time. It kinda boggles my mind how much I was juggling here - releasing my own stuff, writing this blog, running two labels and the distro for Opyros and BW… and I had a family life as well with one child already and one on the way - though I wouldn’t know that for a few months…)