#tltreread

Once again, Pent and Quinn are 5 in Greek and Latin respectively, which we all know is the pattern. NOW, first names are fun! Abigail, meaning-wise is biblical. It shows up a couple times, as the name of the wife of Nabal and one of David's wives, and as the name of David's sister. Jewish Women's Archive describes Abigail (Nabal's wife) in this way

Abigail, the wife of Nabal of Carmel, is the only woman in the Hebrew Bible who is described as both intelligent and beautiful ... She is “of good sense and beautiful in looks,” while he is “hard and evil in his deeds” ... Alternatively, according to the written text he is just “like his heart” Later, the narrative recounts that “his heart died within him and he became like stone". Mean and inhospitable, he meets his fate, measure-for-measure, in the petrification of his hard heart. It accounts for Abigail’s motivation: why she intervenes secretly to provide a feast for David and his men without consulting her husband. In a subtle twist, she simultaneously saves her household and allies herself with David, eventually in matrimony when she is fortuitously widowed.

The things that feel noteworthy here are A. Abigail being very defined by having a husband (But, in this case, her husband sucks) B. Several mentions of the heart, which... they are the heart of the emperor! and C. She's widowed! Continuing down her story, we see some more stuff that feels of note

She further portends that God will establish a “sure house” for David, foreshadowing Nathan’s prophecy of an everlasting dynasty for the king. She ends her speech with a hint: “when the LORD has dealt well with my lord, then remember your handmaid”. David then praises her good sense and expresses gratitude that she restrained him from bloodshed, uttering an oath to counter the prior violent one

Every time I see the word "house" alarm bells start ringing. Anyway, an everlasting dynasty feels particularly familiar here. I mean, Abigail doesn't have all that much to do with Jod, but it still feels relevant to be drawing connections when I see them.

Based on her prescience, the Talmud identifies Abigail as one of the seven female prophets in the Hebrew Bible. More likely, she is keenly perceptive about the shifting tides of history.

Not anything extraordinary here, but the concept of Abigail being "keenly perceptive about the shifting tides of history" feels pretty accurate to our Abigail!

When Abigail returns home, she finds her husband drunk from feasting “like a king” and waits until the morning to tell him what she has done. His heart then strangely turns to stone and he dies ten days later, struck by “the Lord”. David, hearing that she has been widowed, sends for her. She obsequiously prostrates herself, calling David “lord” and herself “maidservant prepared to wash [his] servants’ feet”; though, ironically, she follows the messenger with five maids on donkeys in tow. She then becomes his wife

Feels like she's very defined by being people's wives. If anything, I feel like Magnus is the wife guy in TLT. But, again, we're seeing a whole lot of heart talk, which feels like it has to mean something. The whole point of this reread is rereading so I'm certain I'm missing things, but I never got the impression Abigail was all that zealous in her religion. I will say, I will be keeping an eye out for anything that really makes Abigail feel particularly Jod-sympathizing. In GTN, we don't really blink at people supporting the emperor outside of times where it really stands out, like the Eighth, but I do wanna watch out for Abigail mentioning the emperor at all. Just something to keep in mind.

Good old' Wikipedia describes her name as derived from the Hebrew word ab, "father", and the Hebrew root g-y-l, "to rejoice," Meaning it probably means "father's joy". Again, not all that sure how this relates to Abigail the character, but still gotta cover my bases.

Abigail's self-styling as a handmaid led to Abigail being a traditional term for a waiting-woman, for example as the waiting gentlewoman in Beaumont and Fletcher's The Scornful Lady, published in 1616

The aesthetic makes sense to me. Abigail is very gentlewoman in my eyes.

Alright, so we sure did look into that heart thing..

.. a while ago, but, always be with the knowledge that no matter how long I break for, the analysis gears go marching on. Now, if I could finish these analyses before ATN... regardless! We're gonna SOLVE Koniortos court, and then make our way to the sixth ! (hopefully, within this one day, but who knows how the wind blows.)

My good buddy, a google search ending in "meaning" garnered me

raised dust, flying dust

as a meaning for "Koniortos" and that it's deemed this within the bible so okay, boom, step one of finding what that means is done. The bigger questions is HOW it means. (<- pretend I made sense here)

So, where's dust used IN the bible?

Well, again, my friend "biblestudytools.com" comes in clutch, and we can find some results for usage there.

Dr. Miall Edwards leaves me with a handful of leads, which in turn I leave for you, my readers, to enjoy at your leisure!

The fifth, Heart of the Emperor and Watchers over the River... that means a lot more when you... A). Know anything about the Emperor

B). See the word "River" and go "Ohhhh!"

So, Heart of the Emperor! Once again, I find it interesting just the choice of words specifically. I mean, of the houses, you have "Emperor's Strength", "Emperor's Hope & Sword", "Emperor's Heart", "Emperor's Reason", "Joy of the Emperor" and then just "Keepers of the Tome/Tomb" for the Eighth and Ninth respectively. For the Fifth, heart is a peculiar choice. Of course, I had to consult my favorite method to deduce the meaning ->

But, I had a crisis. Searching for mentions of the word "Heart" in the bible gives you... less specific answers than most would like. Seems like, unless I want to slog through a billion single word mentions, I would have to really switch gears. Incredibly however, I tripped into the right answer (as I have many a time in the past). I was going to go the the Locked Tomb Wiki (that helps me with writing these posts ALL the time), but instead of typing "The Fifth House Wiki" I hit enter too early, and, incredibly, found that sometimes the easy route is the correct route. See I know my zodiac signs off the top of my head, my mom used to pull out the dusty books and explain the details, I know my birth chart, hell, I've READ Homestuck! So, I don't know how it escaped me so long, but I really REALLY should've been going down THAT house route. For those who don't take an idle interest in the goings on of Zodiacs, and also don't have incredibly well read zodiac-believing family members, you might not know that, among other things, the Zodiac signs have bodily associations. Of these, the one we should be interested in is Leo

Okay, Mouth of the Emperor has always been interesting to me. It doesn't align as cleanly as the other titles for other houses usually do, but I'd guess it has something to do with either the fact that they're a super gossipy house on the surface level, OR … their cannibalism habit. Now, I'm not saying that this might have to do with John's whole Cannibalizing-The-Earth-To-Achieve-Lyctorhood deal but I'm not NOT saying that. Anyway, "The Procession" is a fun one. This is a REAL symbol heavy one, so keep all your hands and feet inside the ride. First and foremost, this (X) article held my hand through this whole infodump, so read it if you wanna see where I'm drawing my stuff from. So, I googled "The Procession", and was immediately graced with the title "PROCESSIONS, TRINITARIAN" which, putting a word that has to do with the number 3 in the same title as the thing I am researching for the third house is.... pretty good, honestly. Anyway, unlike other houses, the third house is REALLY really into the 3 thing. Like, okay, third house has 3 members show up, cool, not on the nose at all. In the bible, you have the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, which as far as I'm aware don't really map onto the third house members, but they DO tie into the running theme of three with the Processions. Likewise, "the Holy Spirit is depicted not only as a divine power but also as a divine "person" speaking though the mouths of the apostles" also has to do with the "Mouth of the Emperor" thing (Double Plus, it ties into why the sewn tongue was between a ninth house member, being the house of the sewn tongue, AND a third house member, mouth of the emperor! not to mention the tie between the ninth house is also pretty interesting when you think about how even numerically, nine is three, three times. Just saying) The article also brings up another running trinity theme

triadic formulas that entail both distinction and equality among the three divine persons (e.g., Mt 28:19; 2 Cor 13:13; Eph 2:18; 3:14–17; 4:4–6; 5:18–20; Rom 8:14–17, etc.)

The article generally talks about the theological debate that comes about having your one true god being 3 gods in a trench coat, and what that has to do with monotheism, which I'm sure someone could tie into the locked tomb but I'm looking more into exactly what's up with this whole "Procession" thing, and we have not yet gotten there. We will continue to not get there, because of course, there has to be something else I spot. Of course, it's minor this time. "The Legacy of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Scholastic Theology." Okay, interesting. Augustine isn't even third house, but just a funny detour to have spotted. He always felt more Third house to me than Fifth house, but sure. Augustine pitches an interesting theory. Firstly, "the Lover, the Loved, and the Love" is really interesting and I would love to deep-dive on that, but I really feel like the "mens, intellectus, and voluntas" is the key thing here. I feel like you can map this onto Nona in a lot of ways, and not to get two books ahead of myself but the third is pretty prominent in NTN, just sayiiinggg....

Anyway, here we see something something procession all the way at the bottom. What's up with that, can we see finally what I was supposed to be researching this whole time? well...

I'm killing my brain with paragraphs of religious theory, but generally the procession ties into the concept of origination. It's separated into Transient Procession, a term existing outside what proceeds it (E.g. baker and his cookies) and Immanent (E.g. that story you want to tell that exists only in the confines of your brain). Now this is used to explain that the trinity is just products of the whole, that being the one god. I actually think there's a strong case to be made that this parallels Nona, Alecto, and possibly the Earth. All different states of the same being, in this case. I think you can probably tie in the resurrection beasts into this concept a lot too. We can also stretch this to mean the Third house is, in a way, either representative or tangibly an extension of the Emperor. And, this actually does have some substance when you think about the titles. All of the houses are SOMETHING of the emperors. Tangibly, they're his resurrected planets, but title-wise, they're his Strength, Mouth, Hope & Sword (curious that 4th house gets two and both the ninth house and eight house get none), Heart, Reason, and Joy. Of all of these, Fifth house and Third house are parts of him, his mouth and his heart. We also have the HANDS of the emperor, his lyctors. Everything else is either an emotional piece of the emperor, like his hope or strength, or they serve a physical purpose, being his sword or shield, or in the case of the Eighth and Ninth, both "keepers" (When we get to the Eighth, I'll circle back to this one) So it's possible we could specifically be seeing them as the Transient Extensions of "God" or John, as opposed to his Immanent Processions. Okay, procession other meaning is a lot simpler.

Now, we don't really see the third as a very orderly place, but it's entirely possible that they serve a purpose in order via a ceremonial force. They're probably the most amorphous in their necessity to John. We know he needs soldiers, we know he needs scholars, we know he needs warm bodies for the war, and we know he needs a spot to put his barbie vessel. But what really is the third to him? They aren't the masterminds of the sixth, but they're exceptional at blackmail, and information gathering. In this way, unlike any of the other houses, they're exceptionally skilled at keeping things IN line. This isn't the most conclusive answer, but it's the best I got. I'm sure there's a lot more here, but this is my surface level stuff! help me out here, drop your thoughts!

OKAY! So, firstly, cool titles we're getting here. first off, Hope of the Emperor is sort of darkly ironic, seeing as these are the children of the houses getting sent off to the war mill. Nice hope for the future you have here, John. The Emperor's sword feels pretty apt as well. Now, Baron of Tisis and Knight of Tisis are real interesting... Baron means lord, which makes sense, and knight also makes sense in relation to Isaac being a baron here, but I will also make mention that as someone who has ALSO read Homestuck (at this point, that's essential reading for the Locked Tomb) the usage of Knight is just pinging things for me... not saying this means anything, just making my theory spider-sense tingle. "Isaac is named for Isaac, the biblical character who foreshadows the death of Jesus by bringing wood up the mountain for his own sacrifice." is straight out of the authors mouth, and it brings up some interesting parallels. I mean, foreshadowing the death of Jesus is pretty poignant. I mean Isaac dies from a ton of bone teeth spearing through him, and Gideon dies speared through the heart from a fence. They both left their (cav/necro responsively) partner distraught ... despite the fact that the clearer parallel would've been necro+necro and cav+cav, but y'know we LOVE to make stretches here o7. Tettares just means 4 Jeannemary means “God is gracious” for Jeanne plus "bitter” or “wished for child.” for Mary. Chatur, as per google. means “a person who has studied all four (chatur) Vedas and therefore is learned or smart". So, clearly a four thing, and also very depressing, seeing as "God is gracious" definitely isn't true in the context of this book, at least. Tisis is the one that stumped me, it's obviously the name of their planet but unlike Rhodes or Ida, it was a lot less google-able for me. I mean, Tisis is a place in Austria, it means Tuberculousis, it's also a moth... all of which means very little to me. But, of course, we all know my style of theorizing (throwing EVERYTHING at the wall, seeing what sticks, seeing what would be cool, and inevitably seeing everything I missed), so at the end of my rope I asked my very Greek Tia at the table who said "oh, translate that from Greek and you'll probably find something" and I was like shit... obviously the book that often uses Greek myth would be utilizing Greek words, so I immediately turned gears into THAT track - which was a good idea because wiktionary gave me ->

Ah yes, the very normal sounding and not at all scary title of necrolord prime. Although, if everyone's a necromancer, nobody is gonna bat an eye, I guess. Everything in this bio checks out, he's the first necromancer and he's the strongest, so Necromancer Divine. King of the Nine Renewals + our Resurrector tracks, since he resurrected all nine planets (nine since Pluto's still included. I guess John was salty about having to relearn the mnemonic). Necrolord Prime also follows, although man way to be humble about yourself. And, we know my ideas about him being called the Emperor, as per my last post. His Lyctors are there, and I will mention when I was scrolling through the Vestal Virgin wikipedia page and exclaimed loudly immediately when I read this on there.

Firstly... haha "penus" secondly lictoral JUMPSCARE. The phrasing around "could be lawfully killed on the spot" is pretty funny. Again, more wildly interesting wikipedia screenshotting, this feels interesting to me. In the name of not getting wildly off track, i'll leave this one to the bigger blogs to analyze, assuming they haven't already which is improbable.

Alright! Emperor's Strength. I assume that's just cause they're the army, so, Emperor's Strength. House of the Crimson Shield... Okay, I'm assuming we're not talking about either the video game, book, or highschool reunion event. This one I'm a little stumped on, since I can't seem to find anything conclusive under the same name. I mean, shields have to do with war, and the Second House has a red color scheme so... case closed? I'm not sure. We'll see. Centurion's House is interesting to me. We've got a running pattern of "Self Explanatory Title" followed by "Vague Title" followed by "Title that makes me pull up 12 more wikipedia links." Anyway, Centurion's house... what's up with that one?

So, okay, Rome again. I'm starting to spot a pattern here. Commander of a Century (A century being a group of 100 soldiers) also follows the same logic of everything else, however!

Now, this is interesting.

Healing the centurion's servant is one of the miracles performed by Jesus of Nazareth as related in the Gospel of Matthew[1] and the Gospel of Luke[2] (both part of the Christian biblical canon). The story is not recounted in the Gospels of either John or Mark.

Okay, so firstly NOT in gospels of John. That's pretty interesting, but doesn't necessarily implicate anything. I WILL say, bringing up Jesus almost always means something in the context of the locked tomb.

This is REALLY interesting. Judith and Marta could be ascribed as the Centurion and Servant in this case. Obviously, it's not one to one, but we can see...