#they established a monarchy after all that?

[fullscoreshenanigans]

Hi🥰. I have this tpn theory for months now, so I would like to know what you think about it 🥰.

Could be 'Him' (Demon God) be a member of the Evil blood clan?

I was flicking through the pages of the Artbook because of the BTAD Zine and found these two pages next to each other.

This could be just a lucky placing of course, but I began to think. Mujika's and the One's design looks similar (or maybe I just overthink it lol)

But what if the royal demons made up the tradition of Tifari to get themselves more food?

They do look pretty similar with their horn placements! Though the demon god's always remain larger in proportion to his mask whereas hers are more dainty.

(Chapter 181 | 158 | 49 | 176 | 140)

They also have similar body shapes when he's in his preferred smaller child form.

(Mystic Code Book Chapter 5)

And while not directly related as parent and child, there's the aesthetics of having a singular god (even dubbed "The One" when they had to decide on a name when adapting the anime) and Mujika acting as a fairly solid parallel to Jesus. (Kei Toda gets into this more in her book, Reading The Promised Neverland with a British/American Literature Scholar, which can be found here.)

Shirai doesn't have any interest in divulging the demon god's origins prior to the original promise, so all we have to go on is this:

(Mystic Code Book Chapter 6 Q&A)

With another parallel of both being shunned due to being considered a threat to the greater social order of the demon world.

I'm of a similar mind to Shirai in that I don't think it's necessary to have a concrete origin for the demon god beyond his role as a profoundly powerful entity in the narrative that the demon aristocracy use as a means to justify their rule over the general populace. This extends to the arbitrary creation of Tifari, though why it falls on/around November 10th of the Gregorian calendar (introduced in 1582, roughly 500 years after the original promise) could have been due to other demon world customs or historical events besides it being the time of year the original promise was made. But if you wanted to expand upon these origins in a fanfic, all the more power to you.

But what if the royal demons made up the tradition of Tifari to get themselves more food?

They sort of did, depending on what you mean by get more.

(Chapter 142)

Again, Tifari is arbitrary in that the demon god doesn't actually need the highest grade meat for sustenance. He's evolved beyond that centuries before the demon nobility find out about the evil blood. He just wants it because he knows it's what the demon king and later Legravalima covet the most, and under the monarchy they've established they'd normally be the ones receiving the best meat (by their metrics).

It's possible more offerings than what we see at the 2047 Tifari were demanded in the past, and that surplus was siphoned off by the upper echelons.

(Chapter 146)

But for simplicity's sake, it's probably been the three highest grade since the beginning for how it mirrors the significance paid to the full score trio being the first time in Grace Field's recorded history there's ever been three children of that caliber at a house at the same time.

(Chapter 1 | 76 | 80 | 152 | 156 | 159)

There's also the three marks on the demon god's mask to keep the trinity/trio visuals going.

(Chapter 142)

So it didn't get them more food in the sense of increasing the amount of meat they hoarded for themselves. Like we see 700 years prior when the demon world was experiencing a famine, they would have finagled some reasoning for why they should have more to maintain their level of comfort and security.

(Chapter 147)

It did, however, continue to justify why they received the larger share of high quality meat. By ensconcing Tifari as a tradition and holding festivities for it every year to ostensibly appease The One that all the citizenry participates in, it legitimatizes their claim to rule and the system by which they maintain their authority, so it did get them more food in the sense of maintaining uncontested access as opposed to the citizens staging a mass uprising across the kingdom.

[mistymandalas]

Listen. Listen.

Wind waker is a game about saying goodbye to the old world.

But it’s not just a goodbye.

When the king in wind waker sees a boy clad in green and a girl with the blood of wisdom in her veins, he ties them to their roles.

He says “this will work, this must work, this is how it must go”

He takes a girl with autonomy, with promise and power and drive, and he puts her right where her ancestors stood, where they watched the history go down without them

When two children take Gannons life, watch the blood from his head seep into the stones of his castle, it is an angry, bittersweet, nessesary farewell.

It’s a visceral, cathartic cutting of ties. It is a “Goodbye world I never knew. You limit me, you define me, you

The difference between wind waker and most other Loz games is that the hero has always lived the world that has to die. Most Zelda games are about new worlds, new beginnings, new chapters.

In skyward, they create Hyrule together. They leave behind the sky and the clouds. In the ruined timeline, they start rebuilding. They leave behind the ruins and the violence and the hunting of the hero.

Botw is closer to wind waker in the sense that they leave a world behind, start a new one. But botw has a tenderness, a care for the world 100 years ago that wind waker doesn’t lack, per se, but differs. Botw link did live in that world once.

But wind waker. There’s a reverence for the old world, a respect, but not a relevance. The old world is not embedded and entwined with the new like in botw.

The castle under the ocean, unveiled at long last. See it with a milky haze, a frozen air, a tone of voice that demands respect.

Link stands under the statue of his predecessor and has to feel small, lesser, weaker.

He has to feel that smallness more and more each time an elder compares him to the hero of time. He has to feel the pressure to be great as he was, to live up to his name, to be the Hero of Time Reborn.

Am I making sense. Do you understand.

I’m saying all of this crap about angsty, angry goodbyes, but wind waker is also about hope.

Also about the worlds that spread after the death, about a young hero that loves to smile, to laugh, to help people and get in trouble and play silly games like sploosh-kaboom.

He dosent have to feel small at the end. Tetra doesn’t have to wear the dress, doesn’t have to sit in the time-out cube. They can be silly and happy, they can make their own story.

[forgaeven1]

i'm tweaking these information at one point, but i'm thinking about old money wealth of both the longbottoms and zabinis and their respective origins, and i'm leaning towards longbottoms having quite a start in the mass wand productions across britain and scotland as far back as the 14th century, and the zabinis simply owning a lot of lands from italy to england.

[casterlypriderock]

being anti targaryen is sooo weird to me especially now with hotd, a story explicitly about the tragedy of house targaryen, well into its second season

[agoodflyting]

Why Aziraphale is completely ridiculous in the Bastille scene (and I love him so much for it)

A while ago I posted a comparison of Aziraphale and Crowley's costumes in the 1793 flashback in Good Omens and I wanted to add these little tidbits. (Because they haunt me.)

I feel like most people know this but IF YOU DON'T, Paris in 1793 is right in the middle of something called La Terreur.

HISTORY LESSON If you didn't learn this in school the French Revolution was when, after years of escalating social tension, a coalition representing the working classes of France revolted against the monarchy, violently overthrew King Louis XVI, and declared France to be a republic.

The new National Convention governing France ruled that King Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette were traitors to the people of France because of how they had spent ridiculous amounts of money on luxuries for themselves while vast numbers of the lower classes were literally starving to death. (keep the bold in mind - wealth and class disparities were one of the key causes of the whole-ass revolution)

In 1793 (year of the flashback) both the King and Queen were executed by guillotine for their crimes.

This kicks of something called The Reign of Terror (La Terreur if you want to be French about it). A multi-year-long period in which the National Convention goes on a bloody witch hunt for any and every member of the middle or upper classes who could even possibly be considered a traitor by those same standards.

If you A) had money or privilege, and B) had ever used your money or privilege to treat yourself, you were getting executed. Over 25,000 people died during the Reign of Terror, half of them by guillotine. In fact, the iconic guillotine was used because it was physically impossible to keep up with the sheer number of people they were executing in Paris every single day.

Some things that could get you killed (actually and completely seriously) during the Reign of Terror:

Implying in any way you were sympathetic to the monarchy

Having a noble title

Having expensive things

Wearing expensive, luxurious clothes (*cough* AZIRAPHALE)

helping or sympathizing with anyone who did any of the above

a working-class person saying you were mean to them once

And then there's this bitch...

I AM NOBILITY PLEASE KILL ME So we have established that Paris in 1793 is in the middle of a frenzied, state-sanctioned bloodbath in which the working classes are massacring everyone even remotely nobility-adjacent. And in the middle of this frenzy, Aziraphale proceeds to roll up in Paris in this outfit:

How will this outfit get him killed? Let me count the ways...

First off- at this point everyone with even the tiniest shred of self- preservation is hiding the fact that they are in any way associated with the monarchy. The wealthy are straight-up abandoning mansions. The middle-class are plastering over decorations to make their house look 'poor'. The only people dressed remotely decent are the guys leading the National Convention and that's just because nobody can stop them. Everyone else is in 24/7 peasant cosplay or else they are covering themselves in cockades and sashes on to show they're pro-Republic.

Aziraphale is basically a giant shiny white sign saying I AM NOBILITY PLEASE KILL ME.

First off the lace jabot and lace cuffs are both associated with the old-school wealthy in the 1790's.

His coat is also decorated in gold braid and silver buttons, which are both marks of wealth and luxury.

He basically looks like he works for Louis XIV - not just rich, but old school rich.

We know it's his natural hair color, but hair powdering (with clay and starch) had been a big trend with the rich all throughout the 18th century to get that clean white venerable look . To someone who doesn't know it's natural, it would very much look like he's wearing hair powder.

He's wearing shades of cream and white, which are very hard to keep clean and clearly states that the wearer is rich and can afford the upkeep necessary to keep an outfit like that stain-free.

He's wearing white knee-breeches and stockings, also called culottes. See above about laundry and how rich you had to be to wear white, but also working-class men wore long pants like this:

A large faction involved in the Revolution were the Sans-Culottes (no-culottes aka we wear long pants LIKE GOOD OLD WORKING MEN). Culottes are specifically associated with everything the revolution hated. That's right - Aziraphale is literally wearing The Fanciest of Fancy Pants in a city where a group called The Men Against Fancy Pants are running around murdering people.

And then there are his shoes.

Oh god his shoes

I could do a whole post about Aziraphale's blessed little white satin pumps and how ridiculous they are.

Actually I might just do that because this is getting so long and I still have to talk about the brioche.

So I can't remember if it's in the script book or if it's from Neil Gaiman's tumblr, but it's apparently canon (?) that Aziraphale was going around in that outfit asking people where he could get crepes and brioche when he was arrested.

The Affair of the Brioches

So... uh... we've all heard the line attributed to Marie Antoinette- how when she was told that her people were starving because there was no bread left in Paris, she famously said...

It's morphed into 'let them eat cake', but the line is first recorded as, "Then let them eat brioches."

While it's unlikely she ever actually said it, the important thing is that... people in 1793 would have thought she said it. It was used as political smear to show how arrogant and out of touch the monarchy was. Marie Antoinette in particular was reviled by the people of France, who thought she was the main cause of their economic problems. That's why she was executed too.

Bread and brioche and the lines between poverty and privilege were a big thing in Revolutionary France. There was a lot of political connotation to what you ate. The French Revolution came about because of decades of suffering among the lower classes of France. It wasn't something that some dudes just decided to do. The people of Paris have been through years of the absolute worst, most oppressive poverty and starvation you can imagine, all while watching the rich throw money around crazy.

So let us recap.

Aziraphale is dressed so ridiculously posh that he looks like a joke parody of a nobleman... and he is bumbling around Paris during the Reign of Terror. Asking people. For brioche. How I imagine everyone looked at him:

It is so astoundingly tone deaf and tactless. He is basically cosplaying as Marie Antoinette and then going around asking the poor for cake.

I just.... Aziraphale. babygirl. no. oh no. You're lucky they even bothered to take you to prison. I am amazed Crowley ever let him live that down.

I have no conclusion other than this. Aziraphale is ridiculous and I love him so much.

YES YOU REALLY SHOULD SIR.

[inky-duchess]

Fantasy Guide to Ambassadors

How do different kingdoms negotiate when there aren't any phones or Microsoft Teams available? How can one government let another government how they feel? How can one monarch deliver an insult or compliment to another? Ambassadors, of course.

The Role of Ambassadors

Ambassadors are representatives of a government or monarchy who live in another country and communicates with their host nation on behalf of their own country. Ambassadors are there to make sure that their country's needs are met and that their host nation remains a friend - or at least they are there to remind the host nation of why it's a good idea to be friends.

Ambassadors tend to act as eyes and ears of their government/monarch, reporting back on all the goings on in the country they have been assigned. They can tell their boss the local tea, what the political climate of their host nation, who meets with the head of state and who doesn't. The Ambassador is there to pass on messages from their master and receive messages directly from the opposing head of state.

How to Ambassador Successfully & Not Start a War

The Ambassador must at all times be respectful toward their host nation. They must abide by their customs, behave themselves, act always in a professional manner and guard the information they handle with care and their lives. Ambassadors are welcomed into the country with a private audience with the head of state, wherein their references are accepted and their role is formally acknowledged. After this, they may only approach the government or monarch by appointment or after being summoned. Their boss would communicate their wishes and words to them and it would be up to the Ambassador to pass these things along, albeit more skillfully and more diplomatically.

The Perks of Being an Ambassador

Ambassadors can live at an official residence called an embassy like today or they can reside at court. They can take their families with them if they choose and are usually paid to establish a good sized household. Ambassadors are usually rewarded with honours and titles, if they are successful in their post or after a long posting. Ambassadors can also be awarded orders and honours by their host, along with places of honour for their family if they reside within them.

Ambassadors are usually welcomed and treated with great respect (if their country is an enemy, they are still treated well in hopes that things don't esculate). Ambassadors are invited to most important gatherings, included in the celebrations at court and spend much of their time at society events (i.e. intelligence gathering). Ambassadors can also get rich on their work, they could sell out their country's secrets to their host nation or even accept bribes to pass on false information to the boss.

The Downsides of Being an Ambassador

Ambassadors do have to leave their homeland for their job, this can mean a long posting away from family and from their own people. Ambassadors can be blamed for rifts or bungled international relations. They may even be accused of taking bribes or being corrupted. Ambassadors could also face being spied on, particularly in a nation that is hostile to their nation. Ambassadors can also be the target of violence from their country's enemies or the focus of emnity by the host nation itself. Very often in times of war of political turmoil, an Ambassador can be expelled from the country. When you're the symbol of a nation and you're in reach of enemies, you are in considerable danger (though it's not recommended to kill an ambassador, it's sort of against the rules).

Who can be an Ambassador?

Ambassadors are usually found amongst the nobility or within government. They are usually chosen by:

Pedigree: The better kind of person you send would mean a bigger compliment to the people the country want to make an ally. Sending a Duke would be a great compliment while sending a simple government official might be seen as an insult. To offer somebody high-ranking is to signal you trust the nation.

Skills: Communication skills are key. Knowledge of the languages and customs of the nation are required. Any ability for espionage, good social skills and a likeabilty would be recommended too.

Political Affiliation: Ambassadors are mouthpieces for their masters. It is generally smart to chose somebody who shares or endorses your view on politics. For example, you wouldn't send an Ambassador hungry for war to a nation you want to make peace with.

Loyalty and Uncorruptability: If you're picking somebody to speak for you and handle very sensitive information, you will chose somebody loyal to you and somebody you trust not to be led astray by the other nation or spies.

[loriache]

World Map Notes: the Elven Northern & Southern Central Continents

These nations are where all the elves in the story except Marcille and Thistle are from. This post collects all the information I could find about these two nations, and included a bit of analysis based on that information.

TL;DR (includes both fact and my speculation):

The Northern Central Continent is a feudal monarchy with a strong class system, as well as strict borders, & could probably be considered an ethnostate. It's deeply hierarchical, and the queen is a traditionalist - so it's probably very structurally biased against non-elves and half-elves.

Elves in the NCC practice cannibalism in some rural areas!

The Southern Central Continent is more diverse, with a large tallman population on its South Coast.

To elves, "Court Magicians" exclusively refer to those serving the elven queen - a prestigious role that seems likely to be only open to nobles.

The SCC may not be a monarchy, though it's not clear what kind of leadership or societal structure it does have.

The NCC will habitually take anyone involved in ancient magic as a criminal to prosecute on their terms, regardless of jurisdiction, but this depends on their political influence and ability to pressure local leaders to agree to extradite the criminal.

Elves VS Dwarves and Gnomes may have been at war around the time of the Golden Kingdom being sealed. This conflict also may be one of the factors pushing the kingdom to be sealed in the first place.

The "Central Region" might be the origin of the "Common Tongue" that our characters speak.

Northern Central Continent

The Adventurer's Bible | p. 132

For this place to have a high quality of life, and also a declining population - especially when it's so close to the Western Continent, which is stated to have poor quality of life - there must be strictly maintained borders and a strong anti-immigration policy. Based on the attitude of the elves, I wouldn't be surprised if it was very difficult to move there unless you are also an elf.

It could probably be considered an ethnostate - and while in these kinds of fantasy worlds, that's pretty common. Take Rivendell, or Moria, in LOTR - they take for granted that these kinds of different fantasy races will live in separate communities.

But that isn't actually realistic, and I think Kui has considered it as more of a politically established status quo rather than an obvious natural result of having magically distinct "races". Which, even in Dunmeshi, I think is a difficult and not-terribly-accurate way to represent politics - racism does not emerge from actual, physical differences between races, after all.

But Dunmeshi's presentation of this idea is interesting, because of the recognition that if there is an "elven nation" which prioritises the interests and rights of elves over other races, that is because there's a deliberate, concerted effort to keep it that way.

But there's a small section of the NCC with a high tallman population - I wonder what kind of community they have, and how they fit into the strict elven hierarchy?

The Adventurer's Bible | pp. 134 & 136

Kabru and Rin, and other kids like them, who are adopted or taken as adopted children(rarely - the way Milsiril treats Kabru is not perfect, but she's deliberately attempting to be better than other elves.... meaning other elves are usually worse)/pets/objects by elven nobles, as well as accomplished or notable individuals who earn the elves' favour/are "invited" to stay (such as they try with Laios at the end of the story) would be an exception.

Other long-lived races could probably (...?) visit, but given the historical conflict between elves, dwarves, and gnomes, I think they'd also be pretty hostile to many of them coming to live on the NCC, even if they see them as more like equals.

Social Structure & Nobility

The Northern Central Continent is an absolute monarchy under a 372 year old queen, Heimeya (IDK what the official romanisation of her name will be).

...With extended "nobility", which are the group that the canaries' guards draw from. We don't get much clarification of what sort of structure their nobility has, what titles there are, and where our characters who are nobles fall into it.

Pattadol (House of Vari), Mithrun (House of Kerensil), and Milsiril (House of Tol) are nobles.

Mithrun's noble house, Kerensil, is apparently a well-known family of investors! I wonder what sorts of businesses they invest in & what the elven economy is like?

Milsiril's house, on the other hand, is a well-known military family. I wonder if Kabru could claim the surname "of the House of Tol". He did go to family gatherings after all. But if he was comfortable doing so and it would be accepted, I would assume he'd have done so when introducing himself to the canaries.

Flamela is a distant relative of the queen, who has additional status due to exhibiting the genetic trait associated with their queens, extremely dark skin.

The queen is a "staunch traditionalist" who wouldn't even acknowledge a half-elf like Marcille. Nice! I really feel bad for Kabru and Rin growing up as tallmen in this sort of culture.

Court Magicians

While generally this is a term for any magic user who serves in a royal court, in the Northern Central Continent it seems to carry a lot of esteem; even just as the daughter of one, Pattadol assumes Marcille has the right to boss her around and to handle highly secret, highly illegal ancient magic secrets.

That makes sense, as in the society of the Northern Central Continent, you'd be directly serving the elven queen. But also, she has enough Court Magicians that Pattadol would not expect to know Marcille's mother's name, but few enough that it would be a big deal and Cithis would know about it if one had a half-elf child.

I don't think it's remotely unlikely based on that to assume that this role is only available to nobles.

A "Court Magician" who doesn't serve the NCC Queen isn't a "real" Court Magician in the eyes of NCC elves. Those short-lived monarchs would be happy just to have an elf around regardless of whether they were actually any good at magic.... according to Cithis.

Magic seems very important to the society of the NCC elves. The queen communicates with her subordinates via familar, and the birds we see surrounding her seem like they are some kind of magic - perhaps not familiars since we see her familiar, but some other kind of scrying?

Also, based on the fact Pattadol assumes a Court Magician would be serving the Queen of the NCC, we can theorise that perhaps whatever structure the SCC has, it isn't a monarchy....? Heimeya is "the queen of the elves", after all - that doesn't sound like there's another elven monarch competing for the title just next door.

Ordinary People

Apparently the NCC is a safe place and life is easy -- but given the strict class system, I kind of expect that varies a lot depending on the family you're born into.

The only elves we meet who are not nobles are the convicted criminal canaries, so it's hard to get a sense of what life is like for them from that. Cithis was apparently a wealthy fortune teller with "an intense jealousy for those born noble or wealthy." So I assume she was not born into comfort.

Apparently "There are also primitive villages deep in the woods and underground, and in some regions cannibalism is still practiced." Which is awesome. Based on her videogame elves art I think Kui's probably making a little nod to Divinity: Original Sin elves, who can absorb memories through eating the flesh of others. Elves in dungeon meshi don't have this trait, but I wonder if there is a magical ritual or some kind of cultural practice with a similar intention.

Cuisine

Marcille's mother didn't think much of the elven cuisine.

Liricmumwarel is fancy candy given out by the elven queen the shape of which conveys blessings.

Elf Cake is a crumbly dry cake that Kabru and Thistle don't think much of. I've heard someone discuss what it's likely to be made of, but I am afraid I don't recall.

Southern Central Continent

The Adventurer's Bible | p. 132

It seems like the Southern Central Continent gets a lot more immigration and has a more diverse population, especially along the south coast (near the Western Continent). That south coast has a high tallman population.

Fleki and Lycion are from the Southern Central Continent. Fleki got into ancient magic for the money, so you can assume there's probably class disparity there too; things are noted by Kui to be more "disorganised" than the NCC. Not a bad thing at all - the NCC is definitely too "organised" in my books. But that does potentially also mean there's less, e.g., bureaucracy, central organisation, less of a social safety net. But then again, in the NCC I doubt that whatever "safety net" there is, is available to everyone.

We can't extrapolate much from Fleki & Lycion's personalities, because they clearly aren't in the most stable societal position, and I get the sense that they're the countercultural type - they probably don't represent the type of person typical to the SCC. Also, our NCC characters are all either nobles or used to navigating high society (Cithis, Kabru to an extent) so they aren't exactly a typical "ordinary NCC person" as a basis for comparison either. However, there's less of a "strict set of social rules" type of feel to the SCC characters, fitting with my suggestion that the SCC may not be a society with a strong feudal element.

Geopolitics & Conflict

The fact that, despite their being from the SCC, Fleki and Lycion are in the Canaries, who work directly under the NCC's Queen, implies that the the NCC feel entitled to process and prosecute people who commit ancient magic-related crimes regardless of any notion of "jurisdiction". This is backed up by the way that they were going to take Marcille - but that is something that the governor of the Island had to give permission for, which Laios is able to withdraw. So I assume that the NCC elves apply pressure on various world leaders to extradite criminals involved in ancient magic.

The SCC would cooperate with this, since they're allies, even if they don't have a great relationship (according to the World Guide).

The NCC are also clearly able to take half-foots without trouble, as we see by Chilchuck saying he's known half-foots who got involved with "black magic" (ancient magic) and were disappeared by the elves. But I doubt gnomes or dwarves are giving people up easily - though that probably doesn't go for dwarves like Senshi and Namari, without strong community ties.

Long before the current times, elves fought dwarves & gnomes. There might have been more than one of these conflicts...? While long ago, this war isn't "ancient" (like the ancients who sealed the demon into dungeons, before their world was mostly destroyed by it).

Thistle, Delgal, and the Golden Kingdom were (I believe) caught up in one of these conflicts, which used Melini as a staging ground - thus why Thistle was pushed to seal the entire kingdom in the dungeon.

To do this, Thistle unseals a dungeon created by the "ancient people". These could be the "ancients" who created the dungeons, before the apocalypse. Or they could be another, still extinct, society.

Regardless, at least one of these conflicts seems to have taken place after the golden kingdom was sealed - so, within the last 1000 years.

Though, this could refer to a different, more localised conflict between the Golden Kingdom and their dwarven neighbours.

The order of events is that the Golden Kingdom was sealed (1000 years ago or so) > Dwarves took over > Elves stole the land from the Dwarves ("long ago" by the Island Lord, a tallman's, standards) > Elves gave the land to a local lord, who was either an ancestor of the Island Lord, or the Island Lord himself. The Island Lord is himself a descendant of the lord who poisoned Delgal's father, as is noted in the World Guide. However, it isn't impossible for there to be large gaps of time between these events, which could put the elf / dwarf wars at a more recent date.

The fact we know that the elves stole the land from the dwarves, and then granted it to a political actor who was relevant during the events of the Golden Kingdom flashbacks we see suggests to me that the events were roughly contemporaneous. If they were, that puts at least one of these conflicts at roughly 1000 years ago.

So, the elf/dwarf & gnome conflict is "long ago" by short-lived standards, but would be considered "modern" by the long-lived races, if you ask me. At least, the equivalent of the World Wars for us - recent history, even if we weren't alive.

I'm guessing the "Elf King" from the below panel in fact was a word that's more gender-neutral in Japanese, since the "Western Elves" definitely have a queen.

Language

When Kabru says the "Central region" I expect he means the region where the NCC and SCC is.

The fact that he observes that the lack of any accent means he's from the Central Region is really interesting. It could mean two things;

either they switched to speaking in the language spoken on those continents, which Kabru would naturally know, having grown up there. It's 100 percent possible, but I think this would be noted in the story.

or, the language that gets called "the common tongue", the one that all our principle characters speak for most of the story, originated from the elves in the Central Continent. Or at least it's the same one that the elves use, and their political influence is great enough that their accent gets to be considered not an accent at all. The fact they were "granting" land in this area to tall-man lords suggests a large enough historical influence in the area that this is quite plausible to me.

Mithrun absolutely does have an accent - nobody speaks without an accent. His accent is just politically and socioculturally normalised to the point of being considered the "default/proper" way to speak - like received pronounciation in English.

The common tongue isn't ubiquitous everywhere - not just Kuro, but Kiki and Kaka are also noted to be studying the common tongue. The Tansus were born on the Eastern Continent, so probably gnome communities there speak their own language - Kiki and Kaka grew up primarily surrounded by gnomes after all.

It's also quite likely that Kabru, specifically, because of where he grew up, would consider Mithrun's way of talking to be the default "not an accent" accent. His adoptive mother surely has the same upper-class NCC accent. I expect that other characters might experience it as more "marked".

This isn't a world where everyone speaks the same language everywhere; the common tongue is called that, but there are many different languages. Kabru and Chilchuck are two characters who are adept with many of them - Kabru speaks the language of the kobold, and probably lots more. Chilchuck works as an interpreter as part of his union stuff - I can tell you from experience that that's a hugely valuable skillset in that context, as many of the people who most need union representation are people who don't speak the dominant language, or at least not fluently.

If you got all the way to the end of this post.... thank you for reading, I love you. Check out my other World Map Notes under that tag on my blog; I've made a few so far and there will almost certainly be more. Next I'm thinking the dwarven nations...? But I could be persuaded if someone had a preference.

Also, anyone got any speculation on what, exactly, is the previous time that Heimeya ate a person/monster/chimera that this panel implies:

We really don't have anything to go on whatsoever, but I think it's a fun tidbit.

[mac-ann-cheese]

Some 19th century rusameamerus hcs!! (⁠゜⁠o⁠゜⁠;) and a little comic (⁠◕⁠ᴗ⁠◕⁠✿⁠)

Today, I will skip over the entire revolutionary war+whatever happened in the world in 1812, and we are nearing the 1820s. Um, no, actually over 1825... Cause in 1822 there is Monroe's doctrine with the whole "you don't mess with my stuff, I don't mess with yours,” a hands-off policy in South America, as a reaction to plans of the Holy Alliance (Austria, Prussia, Russia) to discuss matters at the Congress of Verona on the Spanish question. Like they wanted to restore Spanish rule over Latin American colonies that had declared their independence. AnOpinions of the former 13 colonies were not asked. The USA might have plans for LatAme, how could they??????!!!!!

Okay, I'll stop with the historical stuff. I got sidetracked. Sometimes I start to act like Philomena Cunk…

The portraits are in the appropriate style of grand manner for 18/19 century. Highly referenced Joshua Reynolds. They're unfinished cause I got bored. Sorry! (⁠˘⁠･⁠_⁠･⁠˘⁠)

Anywho

Al and Ivan knew each other in the first half of the 19th century. They met and interacted; some points of friendship were gained. This is established, at least in my interpretation. After many times of proving his independence, Alfred is still being isolated by the Old World. Like they're aware of his existence and literally don't give a fuck about it. Many other things are happening on the continent; no time for new acquaintances. However, America wants to be included and to have friends!! So he is still stuck with his "sort of not fully an ally in independence war cause yknow we don't want the british to consider us as enemies too, so here are two ships if the shit hits the fan - use them" Ivan. A close neighbour from the north who started doing... something? in the icy part of the land (expansion, colonial adventure in Alaska). A BIG imperial monarchy with a good position in the Concert of Europe. Someone who probably knows a lot about diplomacy and other things on how to exist as a whole country. On the other hand, Russia isn't reluctant to have a nosy and too energetic creature around; of course, he is excited about a new friend. They see benefits in each other—"the whole world will open for me/I won't feel so lonely with him". Almost compatible with problems. This was probably curiosity at first sight. Major "why is that with him this way and not the other?" factor.

A hot new bombshell has entered the villa

The next bit might come across as too metaphorical and OOC. You've been warned.

Ivan sees Alfred (at least until the 1850s) as too nice, too innocent, and an overall pure being. A boy is so full of wonder and love for everything that it feels almost impossible. Ivan doesn't want that to change and is actually afraid of it happening, he tries to hold back Alfred from seeing the other harsh side of reality; nevertheless, Al wants to experience all - dirt, bliss, the world as whole. He doesn't want to be brought back to life, isolated from others.

After the 1850s, the situation changed. Ivan really appreciated Alfred's benevolent neutrality with the mess the Crimean War was; there is no secret in that. As a way of showing gratitude for it, he started inviting Alfred more frequently to his place. For tea, for hunts or even without a proper reason [yeah, it takes like a month to sail from one continent to another, inconvenient!]. And Alfred crushed. Real hard (regular oh, italicized oh). No other nation was treating him like that—"humanly". Everyone wanted something from him and wished for him to somehow change in a direction that was more beneficial for them. For Ivan, Alfred, as he was, was more than enough. America knew that he appreciated Ivan way before, but didn't give much thought to his feelings. He was capable of some sort of controlling it. However, now [as in the second half of the 19th century] Alfred cannot. He sighs too loud, looks too long, and smiles too much. Everything feels too much for him to handle. He tries to distract himself and pays attention to making new friends (cough the opening of Japan in 1853-1855 cough), but is still drawn to Ivan. However, the latter doesn't understand why America is suddenly more jumpy, more uneasy with him, and why his laughs are more strained. Although Alfred insists that everything is just peachy (he doesn't want to ruin this friendship with his weird feelings), Ivan's suspicion grows. He wants to know why but can't come up with a solution.

Their already interesting liaison transforms into more confusion.

And I consider hetamyu canon (cause musicals fill in all the missing plot points in manga, for me at least), sooo according to the second one, there was something peculiar between them (the infamous kiss scene).

Although I headcanon, at least for half of the 19th century, their friendship was childlike and mostly naïve. Ivan and Alfred are tall kids in diff ways. And I can absolutely imagine them playing tag or hide and seek. Though, this could have happened in any century.

In 1861-1865 they couldn't physically see each other (Alfred had to crawl in trenches), so their usual correspondence intensified (that sort of "absolutely not gay in any way" messages, like "my heart aches at the thought of your suffering, my dearest friend")...

Except for the late autumn of 1863 [the visit of the Russian fleet during the fall-winter of 1863-1864*]. Ivan paid for the first time in a while for a visit to New York (I like to think that Alfred stayed a lot of times in Saint Petersburg; however, Ivan wasn't that fond of travelling). Alfred was tired and pretty much beaten from fighting with himself; however, some obsessed excitement brought back his optimism for one night. At the ball they, as expected, danced a bit, and escaped to a more enclosed space from people and noise. Not much talking happened there; soothing silence at that time was needed. Of course Alfred was stressed because your own family literally wants to dismember you (don't know if I need to put a historical reference, but still—at the outset of the war, England and France supported the South. Napoleon III, with colonial designs on Mexico [Second Franco-Mexican War, 1861-1867], looked longingly on a divided United States, and British shipping interests were seriously affected by Lincoln's blockade of southern US ports, which led to the recognition of the Confederate states as belligerents. Russia supported the Union).

*I wanted to add here an actual fun historical fact! This “gesture” was interpreted by Americans as sympathetical move and overall a sign of “secret agreement” and Russia's protection of US Government (you can read about it further here: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25156012)

Not long after that, Ivan started viewing Alfred as more mature than he was before (Ame literally got torn apart in the Civil War, of course he boosted in character development).

I'll stop here (⁠◡⁠ ⁠ω⁠ ⁠◡⁠)

(They were literally bros before hoes....................)

I'll think about making other additions to this long list of headcanons about the start of the 19th century and, of course, the whole selling Alaska event.

For finishing reading this scientific paper-sized post, you'll get old sketches of Al (and Matt!!! Woah!!) in Victorian clothing.

trench coat buttoned to the TOP.

[the-badger-mole]

What is your NUMBER ONE headcannon for each person in the Gaang (Katara, Zuko, Aang, Toph, Sokka, Suki [and Appa and Momo if you feel so inclined])

Katara: After the war, she goes back to the NWT to train with Yugoda and becomes a master healer as well as a master of the NWT fighting style. From there, she goes back to the Foggy Swamp Tribe and masters their bending style, too. With the help of Sokka, Zuko, and (in some headcanons) Hama, she also rediscovers SWT waterbending and not only masters it, but teaches it to the new benders in the SWT. By the time she leaves the SWT, there has been a school established where all bending styles are available for study. She's one of the few who actually has mastered them all, though.

Sokka: He is eager to return home after the war. He throws himself into infrastructure and policy revamps, and he almost singlehandedly staves off the soft colonization attempts of the NWT. Under his efforts, the SWT rebuilds and reestablishes parts of its culture that had been lost during the war. With the discovery of oil on SWT land, he is also instrumental in establishing eco minded extraction techniques, and in trade ties with the rest of the world (although he is very much helped by his sister's deep ties with the Fire Lord). It's a surprise to no one when he's chosen to lead the SWT after Hakoda retires.

Toph: She does not become a cop. Instead, she goes back home and takes over the Earth Rumble, taking it from an underground even to a world wide phenomenon. She eventually allows benders of other elements to join, and the Earth Rumble becomes pro bending. She does also establish a metal bending school. In the end, she is wealthier than her parents, but because she couldn't really care less about money, she keeps enough to live at the standard she wants, and gives the rest away to causes that interest her...like the guy who wanted to set the record for the biggest bao bun ever, and needed funding for an oven big enough to cook it. She also establishes a halfway house for runaway teens.

Zuko: During his tenure as Fire Lord, he establishes a robust social services program that includes subsidized healthcare, education, and housing for the lowest income families. Under his reign, the Fire Nation becomes home to some of the earliest pioneers of mental health. At his wife's advice, he also makes paid maternity leave standard across the nation, and includes several programs to help single parents stay afloat. Taking inspiration from the SWT, Zuko makes some changes to how his advisory staff is selected. Instead of choosing from among the nobility, Zuko has the different provinces elect a representative to speak on their behalf. A lot of the nobles hate this, blaming his wife's influence, but the people adore their monarchs and despite their best efforts, there's little the nobles can do except start campaigning in their home provinces. It's not a perfect system, but it does open the door for the Fire Nation to end the monarchy within a couple of generations.

Suki: She continues to lead the Kyoshi Warriors for a few years after the war. She also helps train troops around the world as they pivot from active war service to more local work. She helps establish something like the coast guards for several different countries. Eventually she retires from that to help her husband run the SWT. She and Sokka make a wonderful team as he handles the domestic policies and she handles foreign affairs. She often jokes with her sister in law, Fire Lady Katara that they ended up with the same job.

Aang: I'll go with my most optimistic headcanon for him. He's an okay Avatar. Not great. Not the worst. After the war, he tries to take part in rebuilding efforts around the world, but he finds his help isn't needed much. He turns his attention back to salvaging what's left of the Air Nomad legacy, and discovers that there are actually airbenders still around. A few of them are even interested in learning to live like the Air Nomads. Many of them aren't, though, and after learning how to actually use their powers, they go off and do their own thing. To Aang's shock and dismay, eating meat has no effect on the strength of their bending, He does learn to deal with it and enjoy his time with the air benders who embrace the Air Nomad culture. He does go on to have kids, and he still favors the benders over the nonbenders. Ultimately, his legacy as Avatar boils down to taking Ozai's bending, and that's it.

[tiaramania]

Tiaras of the future Queen Mary

I love a good list and @duchessofostergotlands requested one of the tiaras that Mary will wear as queen. As usual I had a lot to say.

Crown Jewels

Queen Caroline Amelie's Emerald Tiara

Denmark is unusual among modern monarchies in that they still have wearable jewelry in their crown jewels. There is a diamond set, a pearl and ruby set, and of course the beautiful emerald parure. This tiara cannot be taken outside of Denmark and is only worn by the queen. I really hope Mary wears it for her first official portrait as queen.

Major Tiaras: Non-Restricted

Princess Louise's Pearl Poiré Tiara

This tiara has only been worn by Queen Margrethe during her reign but previously was worn by crown princesses and princesses. It is a very important tiara but I wouldn't mind Queen Mary loaning this one occasionally to other people like Christian's future wife.

Queen Désirée's Ruby Parure Tiara

Queen Ingrid kept this tiara even after her husband passed and then left it to Crown Prince Frederik for his future wife so it was never worn by Queen Margrethe. I expect Crown Princes Mary will continue wearing this tiara for now as the parure was extensively remodeled to suit her. When Christian marries, she may decide to pass it on to his wife establishing it as the de facto crown princess tiara, keep wearing it herself, or ideally keep wearing it while also loaning it the future crown princess.

Minor Tiaras

We don't yet know how Queen Margrethe will handle passing on her jewelry. In other countries with recent abdications, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands still attends tiara events but Queen Paola of Belgium and Queen Sofia of Spain do not. If Margrethe decides to keep attending them she may hold on to some of these for a while.

Grand Duchess Louise of Baden's Palmette Tiara

This isn't my favorite tiara in the Danish vault because of the way it ends so abruptly instead of tapering off. Queen Mary's going to have to pull off some great tiara hair to cover that up.

Crown Princess Margaret's Turquoise Daisy Tiara

Queen Mary looks good in turquoise but I'm really looking forward to seeing this tiara on Princess Isabella and Princess Josephine.

Queen Ingrid's Floral Aigrette Tiara

I've loved the way Queen Margrethe played around with this tiara but I am looking forward to Queen Mary putting it back on a tiara frame like Queen Ingrid wore it.

Queen Margrethe's Naasut Tiara

Queen Margrethe was given this tiara by Greenland in 2012 and I have been waiting for day it is worn by Queen Mary. I think the delicate gold flowers are really going to look great against her dark hair.

Personal Tiaras

Wedding Tiara

Queen Margrethe gave this tiara to Crown Princess Mary as a wedding gift and Mary later had optional pearls added.

Ruby & Spinel Necklace Tiara

Mary bought herself this tiara at an auction and debuted it 2015. I think it was a very smart move because it was only 8050 EUR (probably less than some of her gowns) and it will be a great piece for her children to wear in the future.

Every country and monarch handles jewelry a little differently. Queen Margrethe gave each of her daughters-in-law a tiara but did not share any of her tiaras with them. She did share with her nieces (the daughters of her two sisters) when her sisters didn't have enough tiaras to loan them for events. I would like to see the future King Frederik X and Queen Mary change how the jewelry is dispersed.

First of all they need to stop giving away jewelry. The mainline has already lost the Queen Alexandrine's Diamond Drop Tiara to the Countess of Frederiksborg and Princess Dagmar's Diamond Floral Tiara to Princess Marie. Those are both beautiful, versatile tiaras that would have served the family well in the future. In the previous generation, Princess Benedikte was given Queen Sofia's Star & Pearl Tiara and her Floral Birthday Tiara made from other jewelry and Queen Anne Marie was given Crown Princess Margaret's Khedive Tiara and her Antique Corsage Tiara made from other jewelry. There's no reason to give away tiaras anymore to people whose descendants will have little reason to wear them.

Then to make up for not giving away any jewelry there needs to be more sharing! I don't want to see the same person wear the same tiara to every event. Queen Mary will have the Emerald Tiara exclusively and then may choose to keep the Pearl Poiré Tiara and Ruby Parure Tiara to herself but everything else should be shared among her daughters, daughters-in-law, and other members of the extended Danish Royal Family. It would make things so much more interesting.

[nordickies]

Eeeeee! I'm so glad you're back. I always end up down loading your drawings just so I can save them and be happy!

Also, please tell us more/draw poor sick kalmar union Noway if you'd like? No pressure, ofc, I just love historical hetalia stuff. <3

Heyy! Please, go ahead, I'm glad to hear my art makes you happy. And sure, I can share some ideas I have about Norway during that time! But I didn't know what to draw for this prompt, will you forgive me?

A little history lesson is probably in place. Norway was a mighty kingdom during the Middle Ages; having overseas territories and the mainland extending all the way to the Kola Peninsula and parts of modern-day Sweden. But by the 14th century, the Scandinavian royal families were extremely intermingled. After the Fairhair dynasty's male lineage died out in 1319, the throne of Norway passed to Magnus VII, who in the same year became elected as king of Sweden as well, merging the two kingdoms into a personal union briefly - until Magnus' sons inherited their separate kingdoms. Magnus' younger son, Haakon VI, inherited Norway as his realm and ended up marrying the Danish princess Margaret, who'd eventually unite all the Scandinavian kingdoms under one crown and form the Kalmar Union in 1397.

However, earlier in 1349, the Black Death arrived in Norway through trading ports and hit the country devastatingly, killing over 60% of the population. Notably, the plague hit all classes of society, even the nobility and clergy. As a result, many powerful Norwegian noble families died out, straining Norway's position among the European powers. But perhaps more devastatingly to the nobles, farmsteads, if not entire villages, around the kingdom died out as a result of the plague, weakening rent and tax revenue. All of this left the Norwegian monarchy weakened in terms of manpower, noble support, defense, and economic power.

Though Norwegians rebelled a few times against the Danish-favored policies during the Kalmar Union, the Norwegian population and the Council of State were still too weak to secede from it. Sweden left the union in 1521, but the Norwegians couldn't do the same, due to their military inferiority to Denmark at the time. During the reformation battles, King Christian III orchestrated an invasion of Norway in 1537 and incorporated the country as a puppet kingdom under Denmark.

"The diminished Norwegian nobility was not able to protect the political rights of Norway in the Kalmar Union and the military power was lost to Denmark who used mercenaries from Germany; the Norwegian merchant class lost their power of the Norwegian economy to the German merchants of the Hanseatic League who established themselves in Bergen; and the dead Norwegian officials were replaced by German and Danish officials appointed to administer Norway for Denmark; all of which has been described as the decline of Norway under the Danish dominance of the Kalmar Union." [x]

And on that note...

I think all of this historical context about the country could be reflected in Sigurd's (Norway) character. His horrible health condition could explain his role shifting in the family, which left him in Magnus' (Denmark) and Björn's (Sweden) shadow for centuries to come.

Due to his poor health, Sigurd could not attend meetings, which led to decisions being made without his presence. Also due to his health, many of his former roles and responsibilities were given to other people, cutting his purpose in the union. He also couldn't work a job to sustain himself, so he had to rely on other people to keep him afloat, which only worsened his situation and made him financially dependent on others. All of a sudden his attendance or opinion didn't matter because his opinion could be outvoted by others in (and out) of the union. He was probably also unaware of agreements and plans that were not formally discussed, giving him reason to believe he was lied to or purposely kept in the dark about things that also concerned him.

While Magnus had found his place among other Nations, maintaining relations and seemingly enjoying his position, Sigurd couldn't do the same. Being bedridden and weak made maintaining friendships beyond the household practically impossible. Crashing down from his peak, and not being able to meet the expectations he once was meeting, would certainly affect Sigurd's mindset and self-image negatively. He was embarrassed and hid, sheltering himself basically. While Sigurd and Björn had grievances certainly even back then, I feel like they could still relate to one another, if not through their circumstances then through perspectives, which made them extremely close. They both had a harder time adapting to change, at least when compared to Magnus.

[whereserpentswalk]

A lonely planet drifts throughout the void, it is dry and small by human standards but it is filled with life. For the first time one of the nations on that planet has established democratic elections, and it is one of the larger and more powerful nations at that. The calander had to be changed as to not follow the line of queens, marking this year as zero, and the first election day as the new New Years. Because most members of the species still can't read it is decided that over the name of a candidate will be a statue of their head, and that votes will be cast by placing a small orb below their statue.

The year is marked as 55 though in earth years has been 113 years since the year zero. Statues with orbs placed below them are now a universal symbol of democracy on that small and dry planet. It's useally used to represent democracy just as the axe was used as a symbol of monarchy and the crossed bones was used as a symbol of theocracy. Occasionally the statues need to be redesigned as there are now places where the plurality of the species who have multiple heads are allowed to vote and/or run for office. For the first time a country has given the vote to males of the species, and though there hasn't been a male candidate yet, people joke about how a male head would look as an election bust. As printing is now more common a technology political cartoons are made and distributed of male heads as busts, some find it very fun, others really don't.

The year is marked as 129. War has broken out. The largest armies that small, dry, planet has ever seen fight with ever advancing weapons. Flying machines are invented for the war effort. Then great Armored vehicles. Then chemical and nuclear weapons of mass destruction. As the death toll climbs more and more recourses are allocated, and rationing becomes quite common. However, the brass busts are never replaced with a cheaper alternative, even when they could aid the war effort. No nation would deface its symbol of democracy for such a small advantage, even when small advantages matter.

The year is 211. Only one nation retains modern technology and infrastructure, but it's technology has now far surpassed that of the days before the war. It is the last democracy on the planet, every New Years every single headed adult female of sound mind us required to go to their city or town center to vote. Though it's handled by computers on a technical level, the physical act is unchanged, as they are required to place and orb below to bust of their chosen candidate as it was before the war. There are only two parties now, and for most their vote is determined by their boss and landlord, but still, it is far more then most have in these days, if that means anything at all.

The year is 340. One nation, one nation that survived the war without regressing, has conquered a small and dry planet, and sent its first ships to the colonies. Parades are held for the empress in jade, the creature considered responsible for this new age, or at least the heir to the conquerors who did. Every new year each citizen prostrates themselves before a brass statue of her and places an orb below it to show their loyalty to their state and empress, very few still remember what such an act once meant, other then that it is a declaration of loyalty. Occasionally someone will refuse out of protest, but they are delt with swiftly, the empress does not have mercy for traitors, and that is what the ritual of the statue and the orb means.

The year is 419. A cult practices a ritual in secret, the day after new years, members ritually give an orb to a statue of their goddess as they would to a statue of the empress. The message is clear, that even if they openly belong to the state, in truth they belong to their goddess. They worship their goddess as the only one, calling the detites of the empire mere devils, breaking statues of the fertility god and the warroir queen goddess that mark the empire's rule. The cults goddess is a goddess of the void of space, and the cult claims she damns her enemies to a eternity within a stars fire after their deaths, while a loyal few live with her forever in a cool and calm paradise. The cult only tells these myths to senior members, and only exists openly at all outside of the homeworld. The cults members forgo intoxication, meat consumption, or premarital relationships, and their males are not allowed to leave their homes without being shaporoned. After they all give orbs to a statue of the void goddess their most senior member is sacrificed, and everyone cheers.

The year is 501. The newest jade empress gives an orb to a statue of the void goddess, as every adult female in the capital city will after her to mark the new year, and their loyalty to the cult of the void. Every other city in the empire will follow her, spanning an entire star system. Even the diaspora will follow suit, those living within the realms of alien races are still egar to partake in the festival. After every citizen has given an orb to the statue of a goddess, the eldest amoung them is sacrificed. For the diaspora living in places where the sacrifice of sentient species is outlawed, the eldest gives a speech and then an animal is sacrificed, a few progressive cities follow suit but that alternative practice is hated in most of the empire. The idea of giving orbs to a statue without sacrificing their eldest member seems so very strange, it just doesn't feel right to most people, it's how it's always been done, it's what giving orbs to a statue always meant.

The year is 643. The rebellion has now taken the entire star system, with the small dry homeworld that served as a capital finally falling. For the first new years anyone can remember, no orbs are given to statues, and no eldests are to give speeches before an animal is sacrificed. While the leaders of the rebellion assure everyone that citizens are free to worship the void goddess if they want to the rebellion wants to establish a secular government, and the practice of giving orbs has always been a symbol of the joint power of church and state under the empire. The statues will be taken down, or remain without orbs, whatever the individual cities choose. As a new democratic system is established, the leaders of the rebellion wonder what the voting system will be, as unlike more spread out races, nobody of their species has experienced democracy within living memory. They have only the ancients to turn to.

[raayllum]

What Does 6x09 Actually Tell Us About Aaravos?

Now that we know a fair bit more about Aaravos and his motivations in canon rather than interviews or TDP short stories, and because 6x09 confirmed some juicy pieces of speculation I've had for a while (staff, Sol Regem, and First Elf—Archdragon relations I'm looking at you), I thought it'd be a useful overview of what we can glean from everything we get about Aaravos — and Leola — in 6x09. So let's get into it:

First Elves and the Archdragons

I talked about the potential peer-adjacent relationship the First Elves might've had with the Archdragons in contrast to the First / Star Elves and primal elves a few months before S6 aired. This was largely due to things such as Zubeia saying things like "In the name of the dragons of the First Elves" (4x03) and the fact that primal elves are seen routinely in subservience to the dragons, specifically Archdragons (the Dragonguard, the draconic monarchy at all, bringing gifts to Rex Igneous, etc). There were also lines where Zubeia was spoken of in a similar manner as Aaravos that felt indicative of something:

EZRAN: Zubeia, Queen of the Dragons, your heavenly majesty... (4x03) ZUBEIA: Our adversary was literally a being from the heavens. (4x04)

This is of course entirely literal when it comes to Aaravos, and hyperbolic praise towards Zubeia, but the parallel imagery / association stuck out to me, as well as Ancient Draconic specifically being the language of primal magic (already theorized in said meta to have been a gift from the First Elves to 'primal' elves and/or dragons). Given all this, I'd posited that "Archdragons at least once upon a time had been contemporaries of the First Elves if not peers".

Now thanks to 6x09, we can say it seems that this was true.

Sol Regem — or as he was going by then in his youth, Anak Araw — was a contemporary of not just the First Elves in general, but presumably their highest court in the Cosmic Council. He was the sole witness in Leola's trial, and there to oversee her arrest.

We also know that this point that the Cosmic Council / Order was involved enough that they dictated what merited the 'Order' and that they'd intervene to punish those who broke it, however well intentioned, so we know that the Draconic monarchy must've existed with their blessing, if not created by their hand for there to already be a hierarchy and trust established.

We don't know if the other Archdragons we're familiar with were around, such as Zubeia or Avizandum, but I'd be willing to wager that Luna Tenebris was at least, given that we know she's presumably not much younger than Sol Regem as she was the immediate Dragon monarch after him as far as we know. So it seems right now the hierarchy was as follows:

The Cosmic Council, maintaining their Order

Aaravos? Plus other First Elves who aren't council members?

The Draconic Royal Family

The Archdragons

The primal elves

Other misc Xadian creatures (rock creatures, mushroom guys, etc)

Humans

which was the hierarchy that was supposed to be maintained, but then humans were given/shown primal magic by Leola, and this led to the great upset by presumably putting them on 'the same level' as ordinary primal elves.

Speaking of which, let's talk about humans, specifically Aaravos' view on them.

Aaravos' view on humans

Aaravos shares very little about his view on humans in 6x09 directly. We see his views filtered through Claudia in 4x07 ("Aaravos believed in us when all other elves and dragons thought we were worthless, stupid, dirty animals. Aaravos believed we could be better. So he gave us magic!") but given how much what she says parrots what Ziard says ("When humans starved and struggled, helpless and pathetic?" / "We were starving and wretched and helpless"), how much that perspective holds up is of course debatable.

All that said, Aaravos' view on humans then is very much not, it seems, what his initial view on humans were through his dynamic with Leola. We know this in a few ways:

1) Aaravos' home with Leola was on Earth. This is presumably a decision made by Aaravos before she came into his life, which indicates a fondness or fascination with mortals / Earth his kind didn't typically have. Alternatively, it was a decision made because of Leola's fascination once she was a bit older, but one he was wholeheartedly supportive of.

2) Regardless, both options in 1. take us to the same place, which is that it is unlikely that Leola would've been able to form the friendships she did without her father's support and approval, both of which were readily given. Aaravos is happy and unsurprised to see her playing with a human girl, which would mean having a positive to neutral view on humanity.

3) The Cosmic Order was broken, and Leola punished, for the "crime" of sharing primal magic with humans. This was a law Aaravos was familiar with ahead of time, as he immediately understands during the trial that it would've been an issue.

4) Therefore, the most straight forward way for Aaravos to sow discord/chaos and further what Leola died over was to continue teaching humans primal magic. This may be what he eventually did with the Key and the book, and was possibly his original plan, despite the 'chaos' it would lead to.

(Side note: this line makes me think that Aaravos, as well as the other First Elves, are all basically timeblind by default.)

Basically: there's a definite piece of the story we're missing about how Aaravos went from witnessing humans having primal magic to actively cultivating dark magic with them. We also know he presumably stole a staff from the Starscraper, took its gemstone out (Laurelion's necklace that Claudia wears?) and replaced it with a stolen quasar diamond, using moon magic to hide the theft of the stone but not the staff. This transition of "humans are okay / I'll help them" (especially considering he reaffirms that Leola loved this world and all its creatures) to "I'll ruin everything and it doesn't matter what the collateral damage is" was always what I think we as a fandom expected to have happened, but it's still nice to have confirmation.

Speaking of which, time to finally talk about

Aaravos and Sol Regem

I'd speculated since Oct 2022 that Sol Regem and Aaravos had a potential personal beef between them, given Sol Regem's rage only really comes out in his confrontation with Ziard (3x01) after it's conveyed that the staff was a "gift from one of the Great Ones".

(It also was a chance to provide stronger characterization for both of them than if there hadn't been a connection in a series that already has very limited time, but I digress).

However, it seems that Aaravos and Sol Regem's issues go even further back than just "Sol Regem snitched on Leola and was instrumental in her execution" given that the second Aaravos hears about the golden dragon, his face changes from confusion/fear to anger:

Like he knows that if Anak Araw is involved in anything, it can't be good. This makes me lean towards Aaravos having a more positive view of humanity before everything, with this being the root of the issue that caused Sol "you are lesser beings" Regem to have their initial disagreement, and it all spiralled from there.

Conclusion: What did 6x09 Teach Us?

Confirmation on:

Aaravos had a positive view of humans and at some point during his revenge scheme, this changed

Sol Regem and Aaravos have a long, personal, and treacherous history with each other ("Tell me, betrayer")

Aaravos stole the staff and a quasar diamond

The First Elves and dragons / Archdragons were peers with one another and worked in collaboration

New questions it asks:

What caused Sol Regem and Aaravos to initially have problems with one another?

Are the First Elves aware that Aaravos game humans dark magic?

If they are, why wasn't that known by more Xadians at the time?

Why did Sol Regem testify against Leola?

Guess we'll have to see what answers S7 gives!

[aemonhightower]

I see so many people saying that if you're team Green, then you're either sexist or you condone Aegon's actions. This simply isn’t the case.

Hot take: you don’t have to project modern-day values onto a fantasy show. In fact, if you look at it from the perspective of a lord or even the smallfolk in Westeros, you'll find that supporting team Green is a logical stance.

This is a society, like any medieval one (yes, it’s fantasy), that is deeply rooted in two things above all—tradition and faith. Aegon has both tradition and faith on his side. The Faith of the Seven, even if we set aside that their base is in Oldtown during the Dance, primarily supports men. Tradition, likewise, favours male rulers. This is further affirmed by the Great Council, which established a clear precedent. Aegon, therefore, has three pillars supporting his claim: tradition, faith, and precedent—these are the very foundations of any medieval society.

Yes, you can argue that Viserys named his daughter as his heir and that "the king’s word is law," but Westeros does not function as an absolute monarchy. It’s a feudal society, meaning the king’s power comes from his lords and vassals—the same vassals who follow the Faith of the Seven and supported male-preferred precedence at the Great Council. Moreover, time and again, we see that a king’s word after his death holds very little weight in Westeros. When a king dies, society doesn’t rely on the will of a corpse—it leans on its supporting pillars. I’d argue that these three pillars offer a far more stable future for Westeros than the frail argument that "the previous king, who was chosen over a woman and set the precedent that upholds these pillars, said a woman should now rule over a man."

[phoenixyfriend]

Can you explain the Iran-Israel situation please?

Alright, let's get to it. Please note that I'm writing this on mobile during my lunch break, so I can't include reference/source links as much as I'd like. Thankfully, most of what I'm going to be telling you should be easily located by searching for an article on one of the following: APNews, Reuters, BBC Global News Podcast, Democracy Now!, NPR, or The New York Times. Long-term background is probably best found in videos by the YouTube channels Real Life Lore or tldr global news, or on Wikipedia if you prefer text.

The short version: Israel attacked Iran's consulate in Syria to get at some of the military commanders that were there, which is legally equivalent to attacking Iran itself. Iran responded by sending about 300 bombs at Israel, most of which were shot down in transit. Given that they still called it a success, even though it seems only one person was even hurt, my understanding is that it's very likely that they only intended the rockets to be a show of force, rather than an actual escalation, because Iran can't afford a war right now.

To support my blogging so I can move out of my parents’ house, I do have a ko-fi. Alternately, you can donate to one of the charities I list in this post OR this post.

The long version:

Okay, let's start with some background on Israel, then Iran. This is... a lot, so if you already know the broad strokes skip down to 2023.

Israel was established following WWII by the English and French, following borders the two countries had secretly drawn up decades earlier in the Sykes-Picot agreement. The intent was to give the Jewish people a place to go... or, depending on who you ask, a place to send them. Their ancestral homeland was viewed as the best choice, sort of like a deportation millennia after a diaspora. Given that WWII had just ended by the time Sykes-Picot was actually put into effect, 'getting out of Europe' was something a lot of Jews were given to agree with.

The Arab world was not happy, as that land had belonged to the Ottomans for centuries, and had long since 'naturalized' to being Arab. I'm not going to pretend to know the nuances to when people do or do not consider Palestine to have been its own nation; it was an Ottoman state until WWI, at which point it came under British control for just under three decades, and that period is known as the British Mandate of Palestine; it ended after WWII, with the creation of Israel. Palestine's land and people have sort of just been punted around from one colonizer to another for centuries.

Iran is the current form of what was once Persia. They were an empire for a very long time, and were a unitary monarchy up until the early 20th century; in 1925, Iran elected a Prime Minister who was then declared the monarch. The following several decades had Iran's monarchy slowly weakened, and occasionally beset by foreign interventions, including a covert coup by the US and UK in 1953. The country also became more corrupt throughout the 1970s due to economic policy failing to control inflation in the face of rising oil prices.

In 1979, there was a revolution that overthrew the monarchy and the elected government, replacing the system with a theocracy and declaring Iran to be an Islamic Republic, with the head of state being a religious authority, rather than an elected one. This was not popular with... most countries. 1980 saw the closure of all universities (reopened in 1983 with government-approved curriculums), as well as the taking of over fifty American hostages from the US Embassy in Iran. You may have heard about that in the context of Ronald Reagan encouraging Iran to keep the hostages until the end of Carter's term in order to force the election.

So, the West didn't like having an Islamic state because it claims to like democracy, and also because the Islamic state was explicitly anti-American and this has some Bad Effects on oil prices. The Soviets didn't like having an Islamic State because a theocracy goes directly against a lot of communist values (or at least the values they claim to have), and weakened any influence their supposedly secular union could have on Iran and the wider middle east. The other countries in the Arab world, many of them still monarchies, didn't like the Islamic republic because if the revolution spread, then it was possible their monarchies would be overthrown as well.

(Except Oman, which is not worried, but that's the exception, not the rule.)

This is not a baseless worry, because Iran has stated that this is its goal for the Arab world. Overthrow the monarchies, overthrow the elected governments, Islamic Rule for everyone. That is the purpose of its proxies, like Hezbollah (Lebanon), the Houthis (Yemen), and Hamas (Palestine), along with less well-known groups like the Salafi Jihadists in Mali, who are formally under the umbrella of al-Quaeda, which Iran denies having any relation to but is suspected of funding. In areas where these proxy groups have gained power, they are liable to enact hard Shari'a law such as has happened in Northern Mali and other parts of the Sahel region.

While other conflicts have occurred in these countries, I think the above is most relevant.

Israel has repeatedly attacked, or been attacked by, other nations in the middle east, as they are viewed as having taken over land that is not theirs, and as being a puppet of the US government. The biggest conflicts have been 1947-1948, 1968/1973, and 2014.

And then, of course, 2023.

Now, Iran, more than any other nation in the Middle East, hates Israel. They have for a very long time, viewing them as an affront to the goal of spreading Islam across the whole of the middle east, and as being a front and a staging ground for the United States and other Western powers. Two common refrains in the slogans of Iran and its proxies are "Death to America" and "Death to Israel."

Due to Iran's military power and virulence towards Israel, the United States has been funneling money to Israel for decades. It has more generally been to defend itself against the Arab world at large, but it has narrowed over the decades to being about Iran and its proxies as relations have normalized with other nations like Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Cue October 7th, 2023. Hamas invades Israeli towns, kills some people, and takes others as hostage. Israel retaliates, and the conflict ramps up into what is by now tens of thousands of dead, some half of which are children.

In this time, Hamas's allies are, by definition, Iran and the other proxy forces. Hezbollah, being in Lebanon, share a border with Israel's north. They have been trading rocket fire across the border in waves for most of the past six months. The Houthis, down in Yemen, claim to be attacking the passing cargo ships in order to support Palestine. Given that the attacks often seem indiscriminate, and that the Houthi's control over their portion of Yemen is waning in the face of their poor governance, this is... debatable. It's their official reason, but given that "let's attack passing ships, claiming that we only attack Israeli or American ships and that it is to support Palestine" is rallying support domestically for their regime, it does seem to be more of a political move to garner support at home than about supporting Palestine.

Iran, however, has not attacked Israel. They've spoken out about it, yes, but they haven't done anything because nobody wants a regional war. Nobody can afford it right now. Iran is dealing with a domestic crisis due to oil subsidies bleeding the states' coffers dry, and the aging Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the leader of Iran, refusing to pick a successor. They are looking at both an economic crisis and succession crisis, and a regional war would fuck up both situations further. Iran funds most of its proxies, and they can't do that, and fight a war on top of it, while their economy is in its current state. Pure self preservation says they don't want a war, especially with the ongoing unrest that's been going on for... well, basically since the revolution, but especially since the death of Mahsa Amini.

Meanwhile, in Israel, Netanyahu has been looking at corruption charges and legal issues since before the Hamas attack. It's generally agreed that if Israel were to hold new elections right now, he would lose and be replaced, and also immediately taken to court. Netanyahu wants to stay in power, and as long as the war on Hamas lasts, he is unlikely to get voted out. A change in leadership in the middle of a war is rarely a good idea for any country, and he's banking on that.

However, the war on Hamas rests on the shoulders of American money and supplies. Without that military support, Israel cannot fight this war, and America... is losing patience.

Officially, America and most of the western world have been telling Israel to not fucking escalate for the majority of the war.

There have been implied threats, more or less since Schumer's big speech about how Israel needs a new election, of American legislators putting conditions on any future aid. There have even been rumblings of aid being retracted entirely if Israel follows through on invading Raffah.

So...

American aid to Israel has, for a very long time, been given in the name of defending Israel against Iran and its proxies.

Israel has been fighting this war against Hamas for six months, killing what is by now innumerable civilians, on the power of US military aid.

Netanyahu benefits from the continued war due to domestic troubles.

Iran does not want a regional war, or really any big war, due to its own domestic troubles.

The US is, in theory, losing patience with Israel and threatening to pull the plug on unconditional support. It's very "we gave you this to fight Iran. Stop attacking civilians. If you keep attacking civilians, then you're going to have to rely on what we already gave you to fight off Iran so that you won't keep wasting it on civilians."

Israel... attacks Iran, prompting a response, and is now talking about escalating with Iran.

I am not explicitly saying that it looks to me like Israel, which is already fighting a war on two physical fronts and even more political/economic ones, has picked a fight with Iran so that America feels less like it is able to withdraw support.

I just... am finding it hard to understand why Israel, which is in fact fighting both Hamas and Hezbollah, would attack the Iranian consulate in Syria otherwise. They can't actually afford to fight this war, escalating to a full regional conflict, on a third front.

Not without pressuring American into keeping the faucet of military funding open at full blast.

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[hollowed-theory-hall]

do you think it’s strange that the uk monarchy is, as far as i remember, never mentioned in the books? it seems so weird to me since, for better or worse, it’s such an integral part of the concept of “britishness” - even if wizarding society seems pretty removed from muggle society, the monarchy has such a long history that it seems weird for the two societies to not intermingle in it. has wizarding society cut ties with it after the issue of the statute of secrecy? how many of the crown jewels are actually magical items? how *noble* is the house of black, really? were there ever kings or queens who were wizards?

there’s so many questions i have about this! such a world building plot hole!

Ok, so there are a lot of questions here and I'll try to answer them to the best of my ability. I will note there are a bunch of my own headcanons in this post. They are based on what we know about Wizarding History and what I know about irl UK history but they are still headcanons.

So, we know the Ministry of Magic was founded in 1707 after the Statue of Secrecy was enacted in 1692. The ministry was an immediate response to said statute since wizards needed a more uniform government to enforce their secrecy and cover up any slip ups. This means that before the Statue of Secrecy, the muggle government or monarchy earlier was the governing force for wizards as well as muggles. Yes, the Wizengamot already existed, but it seemed to behave differently from how it does in the modern ministry.

I wrote about the Wizengamot and how I believe it works along with some of its history here although I learned more UK history since, so this post is more accurate on the history front.

Now, I hope you won't mind me going into some medieval history of the UK in general, since the monarchy has changed over time, and in the early Middle Ages, the UK was comprised of multiple smaller kingdoms. Wales had 3 big kingdoms, but also a bunch of smaller ones (there were also warlords that took over abandoned Roman fortresses after the Romans left Britain in eastern Wales), England had the Anglo-Saxons settling in after the Romans left and creating multiple Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (like Wessex and Marcia). Scotland and Ireland were similarly divided. There were the biking invasions and a whole Viking kingdom in north-east England that's referred to as "The Dane Law". England did unite under King Aethelstan eventually, but with all these fractured kingdoms and warlords, I'm sure there were some wizards among them. Then, of course, there is the Norman monarchy and nobility established after the Norman conquests, which officially settled in 1066.

My point with all of this history is that like muggle society, wizarding society changed and evolved and that the monarchy in Britain wasn't the same throughout the entirety of history. So, the status of wizards and wizard nobility changed based on the specific time period we are discussing. But let's look at post-normans pre-Statue of Secrecy wizarding high society, and for that the Pottermore article about the Malfoy family is incredibly helpful:

Like many other progenitors of noble English families, the wizard Armand Malfoy arrived in Britain with William the Conqueror as part of the invading Norman army. Having rendered unknown, shady (and almost certainly magical) services to King William I, Malfoy was given a prime piece of land in Wiltshire, seized from local landowners, upon which his descendants have lived for ten consecutive centuries.

(from Pottermore)

Most nobility in England after the conquest were normans close to William who arrived with him and were given muggle noble titles, lands, and status. irl, the first Peverell in England, William Peverell was similarly given lands as he was said to be a son of William the Conqueror. That being said, some Anglo-Saxon nobility (mostly from the south of England since the northern Anglo-Saxon nobility were mostly killed after their rebellion) were kept in place by William as long as they swore fealty to him. Families like the Blacks and Longbottoms (both having Anglo-Saxon surnames) are likely among this leftover Anglo-Saxon nobility.

Now besides the muggle nobility, which is very much aware of wizards and even includes wizards (like the Malfoys, Peverells, Lestranges, and the Gaunts) we have the Wizangamot. The Wizaengamot, which I wrote more about in the post I linked, have likely been around and acted as a council of wizard nobility alongside the muggle one before the Norman invasion since around when Hogwarts was founded (around 990). The Blacks and Longbottoms (and the Notts who also have a Germanic name dating to the Dane Law I referenced earlier and King Knut who ruled that portion of England) were probably in this council.

We also know the Malfoys aren't in the Wizengamot in the books, meaning the circles of nobility for each council were different. This is easily explained by the Wizengamot being there earlier and being Anglo-Saxon rather than Norman. The name Wizangamot is, in itself, from old English which supports this speculation.

Since the Wizengamot continued existing after the conquest, I assume William the Conquerer left it as it is, wanting to ally himself with the local wizarding community rather than going to war with them. Wizards are, after all, really fucking useful, and irl he did keep some of the Anglo-Saxon nobility, so that's in character.

I think, after the conquest the Wizengamot either grew in the number of families there or that the families that opposed William were replaced with Norman wizard nobles that William trusted to represent him in the magical community.

The same Pottermore article about the Malfoy family also notes:

Historically, the Malfoys drew a sharp distinction between poor Muggles and those with wealth and authority. Until the imposition of the Statute of Secrecy in 1692, the Malfoy family was active within high-born Muggle circles, and it is said that their fervent opposition to the imposition of the Statute was due, in part, to the fact that they would have to withdraw from this enjoyable sphere of social life. Though hotly denied by subsequent generations, there is ample evidence to suggest that the first Lucius Malfoy was an unsuccessful aspirant to the hand of Elizabeth I, and some wizarding historians allege that the Queen’s subsequent opposition to marriage was due to a jinx placed upon her by the thwarted Malfoy.

(from Pottermore)

This means the monarchy throughout history was well aware of wizards and that the magical nobility was also muggle nobility and allowed in the same circles, but not vice versa. It seems to me, that the Malfoys had a muggle noble title from William I, and once the Statue of Secrecy was enacted they lost their title since they weren't also Wizarding nobility (Wizengamot members). (The Malfoys did keep all their money though).

Considering what Pottermore implies, it seems to me, there is a high chance of some crown jewels being magical. I mean, Lucius Malfoy I proposed to Queen Elizabeth I, and in my headcanon the aforementioned Willaim Peverell is the father of the three brothers of the Deathly Hallows, and in this headcanon, William Peverell is a half-blood wizard. Point is, yeah, the monarchy was well aware of wizards and seemed to have been in an alliance with the Wizengamot and the magical community. Although, I'm sure attitudes changed over time and differed from monarch to monarch with some being closer to the Wizarding community than others, but in general the Wizengamot and the wizarding community as a whole were under the governance of the muggle monarch.

It's actually possible there were a few wizards who ruled the UK (or any of the earlier kingdoms that eventually united) across the Isles's history. I think it's even likely if we're being honest. Egbert the Egregious, for example, might've been a king of Kent or Wessex (two of the older kingdoms before England united) as kings of the same name are recorded in both.

Once the Statue of Secrecy was enacted the wizards drew away from muggle society and wizards who held muggle noble titles likely lost them. But we know some muggles are aware of wizards' existence. We see at the beginning of HBP that the muggle Prime Minister is informed of wizards' existence and obliviated when they leave office. If I had to bet, the monarch (and perhaps more in the royal family) are similarly aware that wizards exist but aren't really involved. Like, the monarch probably knows but is only informed when something in the Wizarding World spills out to the muggle one. So, the monarch knows wizards exist, but not much more than that.

As for how noble the House of Black really was, I mentioned I believe they were nobles of the Wizengamot and Anglo-Saxon nobility before the Normans. I think all magical families in the Wizengamot that were around before the Normans would be considered: "Noble and Ancient". We see the Blacks being referred to as "The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black" compared to the Gaunts who are just: "House of Gaunt" which is how wizard nobility from after the conquest would be titled in my headcanon.

The name Gaunt is one that arrived in Britain with the Normans as stated in a survey of England's land done by William after the conquest (this survey is known as the "Doomsday Book" and it essentially details which land belongs to which lord. The book names both Norman lords and Anglo-Saxon ones and is a super useful historical document. It occasionally even mentions which Anglo-Saxon lord was deposed for the sake of a new Norman one). Gilbert de Ghent (standardized spelling wasn't a thing yet), named in said survey was the nephew of King William I's wife and as such received lands. A lot of them, actually:

"Few among the Conqueror's companions of arms were so splendidly rewarded as Gilbert de Ghent, who held one hundred and seventy-two English manors."

(Manors refers to actual manors, but also the land surrounding them. Basically, it refers to a family seat)

As the Gaunts were so favored, it's likely William I placed his nephew's family (who I headcanon at least some are wizards) in the Wizengamot. I believe the Slytherins married into the Gaunt family around the same time to add legitimacy to the Gaunts' status in the wizarding community.

The Malfoy Family that doesn't have a magical noble title and lost their muggle one is just referred to as: "Malfoy Family" and never "House of Malfoy" which again, to me, suggests this is how these titles work.

The aforementioned Doomsday Book does mention a William Black with 5 manors in Devon. William Peverell, as a son of King William I is mentioned to have 153 manors given to him and another 75 to Ranulf Peverell (not sure of the familial relationship). Reginald Cnut (older spelling of Nott) is also mentioned in the Doomsday Book to have 26 manors. Malfoy is a name JKR made up and isn't mentioned in the Doomsday Book or any other survey of UK landowners done in the Middle Ages. I did read a legend about one Guy Le Strange who participated in a tournament at Castle Peverell around 1083 and won the hand of Mellette, the niece of William Peverell. Although the Lestranges are not mentioned in the Doomsday Book and this legend likely dates from the 13th century a good 200 years after the supposed events it details.

So, to summarise, wizards don't seem to have or ever had a royal family of their own but there were most likely wizard royals throughout the various kingdoms that existed in history. Some wizards do have a noble status that I headcanon/speculate is connected to their status as members of the Wizengamot. These Wizengamot titles were also muggle titles and there were wizards with muggle titles that weren't part of the Wizengamot. These wizards probably interacted very closely with the muggle nobility and even shared family trees and were all probably considered half-blooded if you asked a Death Eater. After the Statue of Secrecy, the muggle titles became irrelevant and stopped being used leaving only the Wizarding titles behind (I headcanon "Ancient and Noble houses" refers to Anglo-Saxon nobility, and just "noble houses" refers to Norman nobility among wizards). The UK monarch likely is informed about the wizarding world to a similar degree as we see the muggle prime minister is informed. Blood purity probably only became relevant after the Statue of Secrecy as before that we see intermarriages with muggle royalty and nobility being practiced (I talked a bit about the timing of the witch hunts and the Statue of Secrecy here).

Sorry for the nerdy history talk, but, I answered this after a few weeks of medieval UK research and I have so many thoughts about medieval wizarding society in Britain.