Lanfear is formed of root words meaning daughter (of the) night, and this compound word itself appears to be a poetic name for the Moon in the OT. That's most likely not the common name for "moon".
There's nothing pejorative in the name itself, it's not a scron name, Mierin made it up herself.
There's nothing pejorative in the name itself, it's not a scron name, Mierin made it up herself.
She's such a drama queen
What's especially hilarious about Lanfear is that even serving the Shadow, she managed to find a way to be in the spotlight. In all the concepts of darkness, shadow, night etc. she chose one of the two things luminous (stars and moon) and settled from the biggest brightest one of the two (she wouldn't settle for small distant lights!). The whole irony is that unlike the small stars, the Moon has no light of her own to cast, she only reflects the sun's - and I'm pretty sure that didn't occur to Lanfear when she chose the name.
Lanfear's sigil shows the Moon as the Queen among the smaller stars. They're also between the pincers of the crescent, as if she controls them and can crush them. Of course, as the moon waxes, those stars would disappear.
She sure has a high opinion of herself. She sees herself as the Light coming out of darkness. In truth, she just reflects the daylight from the sun on the other side of the earth. When the sun's not around, she's complete darkness.
It's also funny how the lunar cycle reflects well her "I love LTT/I hate LTT" phases.
I have a suspicion that if "twice dawns the day" involve an eclipse, the scene with Rand during this eclipse will likely involve Cyndane somehow as well (or else Egwene... Egwene sort of became the moon after Lanfear fell.. she too is heavily Moon Goddess based, going back and forth between warrior/maiden/queen as Amyrlin/Accepted-novice/damane and even lunar berserker shooting stuff out of the night sky as in TGS ) .
I'm not sure this went through her mind, or would go through anyone's mind really. When she decided to go over to the Shadow she probably decided to invest heavily in her Talent for TAR, and thus chose the moon and stars as a sigil. The moon looks bigger to the human eye, so it makes sense its bigger on her sigil.
For someone who caused such horror through the world of dreams, I can't think of anything more appropriate than a woman called 'Daughter of the Night' with a moon and stars sigil.
Sure she terrorized common people in TAR, like the Freddy Kruger of the AoL, but overall she was much less impressive than Graendal, Semirhage, Ishamael, Demandred or Sammael IMO. No evidence that she did anything the others didn't in TAR.
We certainly saw Ishamael do far more in TAR early in the series than anything we've seen Lanfear do ... in fact, I don't recall seeing Lanfear do anything particularly impressive in TAR other and simply claiming it as "her world".
Face it, like everything else about her, this too was a carefully calculated move to make her seem more impressive than she really was. Lanfear was pretty much an OP strength powerhouse and little else.
Maybe now that she's a slave she'll show us something more impressive
There's no point trying to diminish Lanfear. Nothing in the series ever suggested that she was anything less than one of the most proficient Forsaken during the War of Power. RJ included her in his list of the top Forsaken. The BWB says that TAR was her domain, and goes into details regarding her atrocities.
I also don't agree that Lanfear is merely a powerhouse. I think she's a highly intelligent villain. Rahvin said she was a notorious and dangerous backstabber, and even Semirhage said she caused devastation wherever she went and meddled in others plans. She snared Asmodean, and was on the verge of possibly killing Sammael and perhaps Rahvin and Graendal in her little plot to capture Rand. Of course then she fell to her flaw, and met Rand at the Docks.
See my response to Etzle above. I think you guys have created a whole myth around what Lanfear was, but if RJ wanted her to be truly impressive we'd see more of Cyndane getting herself free.
A lot of Lanfear was a myth, but you place undue credit on other Forsaken like Graendal and Semirhage. Both of those Forsaken have amounted to nothing either. The Lady of Pain turned out to be an impotent villain, who in the whole third Age, only managed to break one Cabriana Mecandes.
Wheel of Time board admin
Fan of Lanfear
Fan of Lanfear
Forsaken translations
17/06/2010 09:16:36 AM
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Yeah...
17/06/2010 09:31:15 AM
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Semirhage is named as "The Lady of Pain" in KoD, by Rand...
17/06/2010 11:14:56 AM
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Do Semirhage & Bel'al actually mean those things or are they other nicknames?
17/06/2010 11:38:18 AM
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Nice ideas!
17/06/2010 02:10:43 PM
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The beauty of a re-read is that there are so many little gems I'd forgotten
17/06/2010 02:48:19 PM
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Re: The beauty of a re-read is that there are so many little gems I'd forgotten
17/06/2010 04:43:48 PM
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Gai'shain = those sworn to peace in battle
17/06/2010 09:22:02 PM
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Gaidin = Brother to Battle ... which is what I think the OP meant to use
17/06/2010 09:32:20 PM
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I always thought Lanfear probably translated to something closer to a Moon translation
17/06/2010 02:43:04 PM
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it's the other way around...
17/06/2010 02:58:33 PM
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good point
17/06/2010 03:13:17 PM
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Re: good point
17/06/2010 04:05:50 PM
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Not to mention she STILL hasn't earned a 3rd (or in 4th) name
17/06/2010 04:16:57 PM
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What about Cyndane
17/06/2010 04:48:03 PM
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It must be her favorite one, since it's the only one she actually earned *NM*
17/06/2010 05:43:41 PM
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Well she earned Mierin *NM*
17/06/2010 08:27:05 PM
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how so? I figured mom and dad gave that one too her *NM*
17/06/2010 08:36:24 PM
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she earned it by being born... ha! gotcha *NM*
17/06/2010 08:39:10 PM
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HA! But technically I think her mother earned that *NM*
17/06/2010 08:58:30 PM
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Re: good point
17/06/2010 04:47:01 PM
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Again, a self-proclaimed ownership aimed at making her seem more impressive
17/06/2010 05:55:12 PM
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I disagree
17/06/2010 06:20:08 PM
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Personally I think that order was off the cuff
17/06/2010 08:55:28 PM
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Re: Personally I think that order was off the cuff
17/06/2010 09:02:06 PM
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Disagree
17/06/2010 09:28:51 PM
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Re: Disagree
17/06/2010 09:41:23 PM
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I'm not being very clear
17/06/2010 10:14:10 PM
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Re: I'm not being very clear
18/06/2010 08:06:56 AM
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Re: I'm not being very clear
18/06/2010 03:33:12 PM
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Re: I'm not being very clear
18/06/2010 04:35:12 PM
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The point isn't if Lanfear has the skill, it's that it was poorly shown.
18/06/2010 05:31:11 PM
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The statement makes clear that those 6 were all quite impressive
17/06/2010 10:51:49 PM
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I don't see that bearing out in the text at all
17/06/2010 10:57:36 PM
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Like Etzel I don't agree
17/06/2010 08:30:37 PM
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I think she's a weak villain
17/06/2010 08:58:01 PM
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Re: I think she's a weak villain
17/06/2010 09:03:47 PM
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and slaughter the Seanchan empress on her own throne thowing the empire into chaos
17/06/2010 09:30:27 PM
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Semirhage has done more than anyone since Ishy destroyed the Ten Nations
18/06/2010 02:06:30 AM
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Regarding "Demandred" ...
17/06/2010 04:51:43 PM
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I always thought it was a coincidence
17/06/2010 08:32:39 PM
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Lan/Lanfear isn't a coincidence...
18/06/2010 12:19:58 AM
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Re: Lan/Lanfear isn't a coincidence...
20/06/2010 07:01:55 PM
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Perhaps Lan-fear meaning Night-Daughter would make more sense
17/06/2010 06:00:35 PM
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Re: Perhaps Lan-fear meaning Night-Daughter would make more sense
18/06/2010 04:23:38 PM
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And Dragon translations...
17/06/2010 10:53:02 PM
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Re: And Dragon translations...
17/06/2010 11:01:25 PM
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Why would they call themselves "Spears of the fictional creature"?
18/06/2010 12:29:49 AM
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It was meant as a joke, but really it could be some generic term rather than meaning
18/06/2010 06:00:36 AM
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Except that they don't know what a 'Dragon' is, except as it relates to Lews Therin/Rand
18/06/2010 05:11:30 PM
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like I said, I was just making a joke of it ... you are quite right with "Rand's Spears"
18/06/2010 05:32:42 PM
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But of course the NT word for Dragon isn't Dragon
18/06/2010 05:45:34 PM
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If "aman" is the Old Tongue name for Dragon, maybe "DEMANdred" contains a reference to Dragon too...
20/06/2010 08:13:35 PM
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"Dragon Wannabe" *NM*
20/06/2010 09:23:09 PM
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Lizard? *NM*
20/06/2010 10:04:21 PM
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"Scaled Worm"... though I doubt he'd take that name up in pride . *NM*
22/06/2010 01:23:03 AM
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It's probably too much to attempt to guess at the meanings of words...
17/06/2010 10:58:06 PM
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