Fresh Eyes on the Tsaesci

I gave the Tsaesci creation myth a really close read today and took a lot of notes, drawing and jumping to more than a few conclusions.

I wonder if people would like to know my findings. Here they are just in case, I will try to avoid a huge wall of text, but it is a text pretty much worth going over sentence by sentence. It is not a long text, but each paragraph has so much information in it!

This is super raw, I did not do much reading of other people’s work on this yet, but I will in the coming days as I refine the idea.

I approached it by trying to find parallel events in the Anuad, and it appears that the Anuad is more detailed at some points in time, where the Tsaesci myth gives more importance to other time periods, which I think adds to the difficulty in wedding the two stories into a single plausible explanation. I also held some of what i have recently learned about Yokuda in mind, but I am less familiar with them.

There was the Striking, and the Egg was split into twelve worlds, one for each serpent who had a name, and the names of the serpents were alive and coiled into themselves and became more eggs, for names are self-maters, and the Naming went and went. According to the calculations, the random sequence learned very cunningly that fragmentation reserved itself to the left eye. Variation realms were the evidence needed.

When you read this document alongside the Annotated/Childrens Anuad, acts of violence precipitated the birth of the 12 worlds of creation. So in this instance, we can attempt to equate The Egg with Creation or Nir.

The 12 in the Tsaesci myth are serpents, which cannot help but draw our imaginations to Akatosh, but that is actually a thought for another paragraph.

Self-maters is probably referring to the asexual nature of Adaic reproduction, based more on fragmentation, or a form of mitosis, rather than conventional mortal forms of sexual reproduction.

The Calculations is referred numerous times in the text, and seems to refer to all the possibilities in the Aurbis. It fits in well with the mathematical analysis we saw this week by /u/FranklyEarnest.

The Left Eye, this one troubled me, fragmentation only occurred here, so perhaps subgradience only happened to one type of spirit? More thoughts on that in the next paragraph.

Variation realms were the evidence needed: this seems to speak to the important of the Adjacent Places, as if to create this reality, we needed alternate realities as reference points. This also points to the mathematical proofs of Frankly’s writings. It is almost like they are implying that the Aurbis we discuss is a deduction, a distillation of a number of other possible Aurbises (Aurbi?).

There was the Biting, which broke the twelve worlds and their name-eggs, and the Biters chewed new names of the lesser serpents until soon death was known to the smallest and your alphabets disappeared but ours did not. The state of rest became worthy of blame, however segmented, so heat was wasted across the right eye. And in mercy we gave to you language that was dead yet walking if you used it, which you did, though transient food-forms became problematic.

The Biting seems to imply the actions/inactions of the Void, Sithis or maybe even a lower gradient like Lorkhan or Shor, but I think it is the Tsaecsi equivalent of the actions of Sithis. It talks about breaking name-eggs, destroying identities, life forms, AEs.

The Biter is also creating new names, new AEs, until the last of the old names are consumed, similar to how Anu and Padomay bled out to create what we perceive as Aedra and Daedra.

Here I make the assumption that any references to language, words and letters in this are discussion elements of race, culture, language, ancestry, basically the building blocks of AE, our social DNA, if that makes any sense.

When they discuss alphabets disappearing, but “ours” did not, we know it is generally understood that the Tsaesci are Mannish, so “ours” is likely a reference to the Ehlnofey language, and identity.

“The state of rest became worthy of blame…”: this sentence requires me to take a bit of a longer walk. In the first paragraph, they discuss fragmentation only happening in the left eye. In this second, they are blaming “the state of rest” so fragmentation can probably be paralleled with the idea of subgradience and devolution, and state of rest probably refers to a static condition. Based on this, I would say they are either referring to the Old Ehlnofey, or even the Hist. They say “heat was wasted on the right eye” If Tsaesci identify with cold-blooded serpents, then heat would be a precious commodity, especially in this Dawn state, before Magnus formed the Sun. Regardless of whether it refers to the war against what would become the Aldmer, or the destruction of the Hist everywhere but Black Marsh, the Tsaesci seem to believe it was a waste of energy.

“Language that is dead, but walking if you use it…transient food forms are problematic.” This quote seems to imply the Ehlnofex language, that somehow the Tsaesci bequeathed this language onto Man and maybe even Mer out of some form of compassion or desire to help. It does not reveal much about their motives. Transient food-forms seems to indicate that language, culture and identity changed a lot, hampering communication between the Tsaesci and their charges.

There was the Slithering, when scales were now name-bites that moved freely, and the dead language speakers bled out into non-talk, which is egg-naming inverted, which slides into the shedding of more dead, which cannot be redeemed in the hunger quadrant, and now we could no more be detached, for the twelve-to-one only talked unsense except for us, who ate your slithering during trumpet season as the Biters poisoned the random sequence until we came and made of it music, as that is the only thing that might save the prey who wore all shapes of confusion not described yet in the calculations. Some of us discovered honor, though more found the idea of moderation, which turned into the identical selection process and we created our eating that way.

Now I may be jumping to an incorrect conclusion here, but I feel the Slithering is alluding to the actual creation of the Mortal Plane. I feel this way because of the references they make to “name bites moving freely” and the “dead language speakers bleeding out into non-talk, which is egg-naming inverted…”. To me this is referring to the Earthbones undoing their AEs in order to stabilize Nirn.

“…which cannot be redeemed in the hunger quadrant…” addressing the finality of the creation of Mundus and the death of the Earth Bones.

“…And now we could no longer be detached, for the twelve-to-one only talked unsense except to us.” So remember the twelve serpents that became one at the Striking? They all became one crazy, who did not make sense. Kind of like Akatosh, that multi-faceted Time being who is a patchwork of a bunch of different spirits and is batshit crazy.

They seem to claim to be able to understand Time and how it is broken, and it seems as if they became involved because they felt they were the only ones who could help. Why and how this is possible may yet be revealed or it may be totally unknowable.

“…Biters poisoned the random sequence until we came and made of it music…and we created our eating that way.” This quote to me is describing how the Void laced itself through all of creation, creating chaos, but then the Tsaesci apparently made it made sense, made it into music. They wanted to “save the prey” presumably other men and mer. In terms of discovering honour and moderation, this is probably how the Tsaesci themselves evolved as spirits and mortals along the way.

There was the Shedding, who inflated into a sphere of edible communications and this is how the sequence began to find proportion again. The name-eggs that had survived without also turning into calculation powder settled and became dreugh-waters, which was the first thing to finally encompass the risks attempted by the Striking. Stomach signals wrote a complex document of conditions. This was the variation map, called dai.

“The sphere of edible communication” bespeaks of Nirn and the physical, mortal world, and how in its creation, things began to make more sense. “The name eggs that survived without also turning into calculation powder settled and became the dreugh waters…” This is interesting, as it seems to describe the transkalpic nature of the Dreugh.

However, this creates and interesting question…I thought the only survivors of Creation were the Ehlnofey and the Hist. But the dreugh survived, and Vivec also claims this in his Sermons. So are the dreugh part of the Ehlnofey camp, or is this another example of Altmer bias in our lore?

I take a walk here, please tell me if you have an alternate interpretation: “Stomach signals wrote a complex document of conditions. This was the variation map, called dai.”

Tsaesci seem to think with their stomachs or eat with their minds, so apparently some kind of sentience created the dai, which in this case I am going to tentatively identify as the Kelle, the Elder Scrolls themselves. It makes sense, the Kelle contain record of all possibilities within creation. Like a variation map.

The Reaching came, where movements of dai progressed across islands of edible communication and food-forms could stockpile. One Reaching unravelled but the Coiling at its belly made a virtual star line, which made eating lucid. We slid to the imago and Named it cunningly. The waters obeyed and dead names took up their place in the random sequence. The first serpents returned to us in transmissions that answered the alphabet-virus which we then consumed at last. By the relative dai, we egg-named it and swallowed all source-information to preserve the virus and became immortal thereby. Past the star line, dead-talking continued.

The Reaching, there is not much like it in other lore, but I am not super well versed in the more obscure stuff, so please enlighten me if this parallels any other stories you know. It seems to be the process of mortal life being bound into physical bodies. In paragraph 3 (the Slithering), they discuss “…save the prey who wore all shapes of confusion not described yet in the calculations.” This prey that was saved must have found their shapes in the Reaching, as “…movements of dai progressed across islands of edible communication and food-forms could stockpile.” It seems to link the settling of mortal life into stable forms to the movements of the dai, or Elder Scrolls, which is not a function usually ascribed to them, but is it really beyond their scope, being bits of raw creatia and having all knowledge ever?

This concept of Reaching, it seems part Kalpic bounce, part creation mechanic. It seems to be a moment where the Tsaesci were able to transcend the “virtual star line”, so perhaps they descended from Aetherius? Which everything did so that is unsurprising, but they make it sound like they sought to do it. They “slid into the imago”, an imago is the final stage of insect metamorphosis, so they seemed to infiltrate creation itself, before life as we know it on Nirn burst forth after Convention. The wording seems to imply that this has not always been possible in other creation cycles, that something went awry within creation itself, around the time mortal life was bound to the plane.

They named the imago cunningly, remember before I equate a name with an identity, an AE, perhaps this was a group of Wanderers they refer to? or maybe a more primordial et’Ada who gave rise to the men of Akavir.

When they discuss the waters, I am not sure if I should interpret that as the waters of Oblivion, or the oceans of Tamriel, or both, but either way they did not seem offended by the Tsaesci arrival.

Now in this music that is apparently poison from the Biter, harnessed by the Tsaesci, there is an impression, an echo of the first twelve, and for some reason, once bound to the mortal plane, the Tsaesci are finally able to understand, or to consume that information. Perhaps in their prior state, up in Aetherius, they were unable to understand it fully. Maybe that is part of why they bound themselves to the men of Nirn.

They consumed this information, and they became immortal. “Past the star-line, dead talking continued.” Business as usual in the Universe.

Sounds a bit like CHIM, does it not? Or some other kind of transcendant apotheosis?

The Laying then happened, and we moved into forms that had been granted from the source information of the first serpents, which was gold-walking, which is pattern. The scales became intertwined in the random sequence with music that ate forever, which we fed with you. Low forms created a seeking egg but we fed it to the music, too. Then the Biter-Shedding grew sideways into the reception field and knew a Coiling and mastery was ours borne from the calculations. The final name was Tsaescence and we ate it to become it and there are no more variations.

The Laying, possibly the final stage in the binding to the Mortal plane? When the Tsaesci emerged out of the chaos of the Wandering Ehlnofey, based on the echoes of memories of previous kalpas they received from the 12 original serpents/worlds of creation, with their golden scales, as if this is the form they sometimes or always take when they manifest themselves in a creation cycle.

That original destruction wreaked by the Biting is still out there, but the Tsaesci have laced it with the essence of whoever “you” is, which seems to keep it at bay somehow.

“Low forms created a seeking egg but we fed it to the music, too”. This one is up for interpretation, but I think they are talking about Numidium or the Mantella. The egg being the foundation of creation, the first object/being that is struck into the 12 serpents. And the Numidium was intended as the foundation of a new reality for the Dwemer, and maybe more.

Interesting that a) this would be part of the Tsaesci creation myth, but we will get to that later, and b) they would take some form of credit for feeding to the music.

Then the Biter-Shedding, which is come kind of interplay between the actions of the Void/Sithis/maybeLorkhanish and the shedding which seems linked to the solidification of the material plane grows sideways into the reception field.

Perhaps the Adjacent Places are also growing as time goes on? And then there is a Coiling, which earlier in the text seems to refer to a new creation cycle.

“…and mastery was our bourne from the calculations.” As if this had been planned all along and all of creation was subtly manipulated by the Tsaesci to make this outcome the only statistical possibility.

The final name was Tsaescence and we ate it to become it and there are no more variations.

So in gaining this mastery that is apparently their due, they were able to give one final Name, identity, or AE. Which was Tsaescence, the essence of Tsaesci, and there were no more variations.

So…they mantled all of creation, using the Adjacent Places and an Elder Scroll, and achieved the Amaranth, and created their own Tsaescent dream. Fin.

laurelanthalasa’s thoughts:

How is that a creation story? It reads more like an entire history condensed into 6 paragraphs. It seems to encompass past, present and future. Well, if I am right, those things will be whatever Tsaescence wants it to be, I guess. They will be the new Dreamer.

What era was this written in?

I remember that awesome post about the Tsaesci being parasites, and my interpretation fits well with that theory if you think of them not as physical serpent parasites, but spiritual parasites, like a bit of Aetherial mistletoe on the pine of pine of your soul.

It also makes me think that maybe the Hist are not the only living creatures that can use math as a weapon. It seems to me that the Tsaesci are claiming to be able to use mathematics to stave off the destructive powers of the Void.

This point of view definitely mixes up the chronology of creation. I am going to see if there is any mention of Tsaesci before the Warp in the West or some other dragon break, because I seem to get the impression that the Tsaesci took Mannish form a bit after the others…but other times it seems they were there first of all. Very strange.

Does anyone want to share their own interpretations of their favourite or most meaningful passages from this? This is a really rough bunch of notes I made and I am open to other ideas to hone this a little (or a lot).