[Dragaera] Gah! My books are packed!

[Jon Lincicum]

Philip Hart wrote:
> On Thu, 19 Apr 2007, Jon Lincicum wrote:
>
>   
>> On a side note: I notice that Elder Sorcery here is described as being
>> the "oldest of magical arts", which would imply that it is even older
>> than witchcraft... Which I find strange, given that according to Sethra
>> Lavode, in /Issola/, Easterners came to Dragaera first, long before the
>> Greater Sea of Amorphia was ever formed (making Elder Sorcery possible).
>> I would therefore expect witchcraft to be the oldest of the magical
>> arts--though I suppose it might be that the Easterners only developed it
>> later on.
>>     
>
>
> The _TRIH_ precedent might mean (roughly) Elder Sorcery was used to create
> the universe.  Also note that witchcraft can be turned off by a god so
> I wonder if it does not come from the gods in some sense.

Sethra, again, in /Issola/, claims that it was the Jenoine who gave 
psionic abilities to the Easterners, through their experiments.

Since psionic power is fundamental to witchcraft, it would make sense 
that it would not have existed amongst the Easterners until the J's arrival.

By the same logic, however, Dragaeran Sorcery would not have existed on 
Dragaera until after the Jenoine were expelled, since it was consequent 
with the creation of the Greater Sea.

But, as you seem to say, the gods may be referring to events and dating 
the age of the magic from a time that pre-dates all of this--perhaps 
back to the creation of the universe.

Majikjon

I find this concept remarkably similar to the Science-Fiction concept of 
Vacuum Energy, which has been bandied about on shows such as Star Trek 
and Stargate SG-1, by, I suspect, writers who don't really understand 
what it means.