#penas lucis caelum

[ertrunkenerwassergeist]

Hi! I love your fan kings of yore and would love to know more - any specific thoughts behind certain names, titles, etc?

Hello friend! :)

Since you didn’t ask for anyone specific, I’m just going to pick a few off the list, if you don’t mind. *pulls out notes*

Let’s start with Mendax. He is Somnus’ eldest son and he was around three when Ardyn was declared Adagium. I headcanon that Somnus is around 8 years younger than Ardyn and so he was 25 when that happened.

So he has the half-formed impression that there was a person with red hair once, looking after him from time to time, but he doesn’t remember Ardyn. Doesn’t remember that he has an uncle who loves him. Somnus forbid his children from ever knowing that he had a brother and the people follow that law in fear and shame.

In Latin his name means “lie” (or rather the adjective thereof), but I headcanon that it is an old Solheimr name that means something like “the Enlightened”. His title “the True” was chosen by Bahamut (since I headcanon that it is usually him that decides on the individual titles) to make clear that Mendax is really, really, really the true heir to the throne. And nothing fishy is going on, no not at all.

The Conqueror I named Pugnus, which means “fist”. I wanted something that implies violence, but isn’t that obvious.

The Wanderer is Penas, which means “revenge”, “punishment” or “retribution”. He wandered all over Eos in search for retribution for the death of his children. Only one survived and became his heir. It was an assassination and Penas spent years hunting down the perpetrators. He chose the name Penas as a reminder and a warning to his enemies. His birth name is Virtus.

Fabricas is the Architect. Her name means “workshop” or “design”. She is the one who planned and started the building process of the physical outer wall surrounding Insomnia. It wasn’t completed in her lifetime. Or in that of her son. (Who doesn’t have a name or a title yet, so he isn’t on the list for now). She started the project because piracy was becoming a Very Big Thing and the city needed protection. And she wanted to give the city room to grow and be more or less self sufficient. Everybody thought it was an idiotic idea to build a wall that big. She did it anyway.

Now, I’m sure you noticed all those people named Lucius, Lucianus or Lucia? All of their names are based on the Latin word for “light”, which is “lux”. It was a generational trend at the time to name your child either something very patriotic or after light. You can see which one the Lucis Caelums chose. For all those Kings (Lucia the only woman in that group) this era is called “the light years”.

The first Lucius was titled the Teacher because he founded public schools all over Lucis where the poor could learn to read. After his death the initiative died pretty quickly because his son, titled the Preserver, wanted to preserve how things were. No new thinking nonsense.

For the Late, think Walder Frey and you have a pretty good idea why that is his title.

Lucianus developed a method for black mages to craft potions and ethers. That’s why he’s called the Witcher. People who crafted them without being black mages were called witches. Most of them had at least some affinty towards green magic.

The last Lucius is called the Coward. He did everything in his power to avoid fighting, including running away and leaving people behind to die. He was a very unpopular King and assassinated by his daughter Lucia.

She is called the Scholar because she pushed the sciences forward. Especially astronomy, geology, mathematics and ethics.

I’m going to stop here for now. Ideas and suggestions are always welcome.