The Third City

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"No-one talks much about the cities that preceded London. The Third City seems to have been acquired a thousand years ago. It had five wells, they say. And the weather was better."[1]

"...The third taught us hunger..."[2]

The Third City was Mayan, and dates back to roughly the 9th-10th century CE.[3][4] The majority of the Tomb-Colonies are built upon Third City architecture and mythology.

The Third Fall[edit | edit source]

"Beasts slaughtered, feasts spread on the floor. [...] We chew. [...] we devour the dead until our hungers have been fed. Feed us. Feed us more than the dead."[5]

An obsidian knife.

Before it fell, the Third City was ruled by three priest-kings who relentlessly hunted any creature they could to sate their hunger.[6]

Meanwhile, the Masters of the Bazaar had recently escaped from the Second City after being trapped there for centuries.[7] The priest-kings were aware of the Masters' nature, and contacted them to strike a dangerous bargain.[8] The bargain was simple: the Masters were to feed the priest-kings a new meat, a form of transcendent flesh. To the Masters, this price was surprisingly manageable, as they had someone in mind.[9] That "someone" was none other than Mr Candles,[10] the weakest of the Masters.[11] Candles, believing only a small part of himself would be required, consented to the deal, but Mr Veils knew better, and led Candles to his doom.[12]

The priest-kings struck before dawn,[13] snaring Candles on a hook, pinning him in place, and carving out pieces of his flesh to eat using obsidian knives.[14] Candles was alive through the whole process, even when they were greedily consumed his flesh,[15] even as the bats rose from beneath the ground, even as the world opened up and the Third City fell,[16] and was still alive when they threw what remained of him to drown in lacre.[17]

Thus the Third City was claimed by the Bazaar. The process of its Fall was clumsy and perhaps a bit rushed; Mr Fires, tasked with guiding its descent, blundered and caused a ziggurat to strike Hell, forcing the Masters into feverish negotiations with the Devils to settle the matter.[18]

After the Fall[edit | edit source]

"[...] Beneath you is the Third City, as it was just after its fall. It hums and bustles, citizens scurry like beetles from a disturbed log – it seems Londoners were not the only people to swiftly adapt to the Neath."

"[...] There is an organised rhythm to the movement of the people here: they attend their tasks with practised timing. Perhaps such routine was their response to the disruption of the fall."[19]

After their infamous feast, the God-Eaters were able to incorporate parts of Mr Candles into themselves,[20] allowing them to ascend the Great Chain of Being and gain immortality and great power.[21] They would go on to rule the Third City in the Neath, acting as living gods and ruling through possession of hidden knowledge and rituals rather than by pure force.[22] The citizens of the Third City, for their part, adapted quickly to their new circumstances,[23] though not without lingering shell-shock.[24] During this age, the Masters styled themselves as Lords,[25][26] and were worshipped alongside the God-Eaters as divine.[27]

A statue from the Third City.

The Third had many within it that both feared and resented the God-Eaters, who were referred to as demon-kings.[28] A number of nobles tried to curry favor with their superiors,[29] but met disastrous ends, perhaps after being suspected of betrayal.[30][31] There was also resistance from revolutionaries who wished to escape the Neath's strange rules around death and searched desperately for alternate means;[32] fifty-five dissidents established a new community in one of the Tomb-Colonies, where they pioneered the process of Emergence.[33] For this defiance, they were assassinated,[34] and their corpses condemned to be forgotten in the Cave of the Nadir.[35] However, their comrades managed to carry on the work and have successfully maintained the Republic of Tanah-Chook to this day.

Despite the College of Mortality's aversion to the Third City,[36] the Third's leaders made frequent diplomatic overtures,[37] most often with the Presbyterate kingdom of Ixander.[38] They referred to the Elder Continent as the "lands of the Night Sun."[39] A Third City revolutionary who disagreed with the College's monopoly on death also managed to steal maps from under the noses of the Gracious.[40]

As the Third City gradually fell into ruin, the God-Eaters abandoned it, retreating to a tomb-colony that would come to be known as Xibalba.[41] They were followed by the Broken Men (about which nothing else is known).[42] With the departure of its dread rulers, stewardship of the city fell solely to the Masters. Of all the Fallen Cities, the Third had the shortest lifespan, lasting approximately three centuries before it was replaced by the Fourth.

Culture[edit | edit source]

"On the Surface, the Third City took many of its customs from the land, the sun and stars. A beautiful geometry. [...] Their Fall created a void. A void the Priest-Kings filled with black smoke."[43]

When it still stood upon the Surface, the Third City drew its customs from the land, the sun, and the stars. Its people possessed an advanced knowledge of astronomy and geometry.[44] Their language was a script of logograms: fanged faces, curling hands, and jungle beasts rendered in rounded, almost playful strokes.[45] Their music was performed with ocarinas[46] and pipes,[47] which the Manager still remembers fondly.[48] Priests practiced ritual bloodletting, allowing the blood to soak into bark paper before burning the paper as an offering.[49]

A Third City ziggurat.

At the time of its Fall, the Third City was dominated by a colossal ziggurat that cast its shadow over markets and homes clustered at its base. The wealthier quarters boasted intricate carvings and statuary.[50] Colorful murals adorned the city's stone walls; its doorways were designed after the mouths of monsters, and its columns were engraved with a variety of animal logograms. Its stones contain memories of celebration, sun-baked earth, humid air, and the flourishing of life.[51] After it Fell, the city's builders were forced to work with the stone of the Neath, resulting in a visible change in material, but construction, rebuilding, and renewal continued all the same.[52]

Legacy[edit | edit source]

"The Tomb-Colonies are not solely a sanctuary for the disgraced scions of London socialites. In the Grand Sanatorium we can trace the colonies' history back to the Priest-Kings of the Third City – the ones they call the 'God-Eaters'."[53]

The Third City left its legacy in the Neath through the Tomb-Colonies;[54] most of its survivors are now withered and ancient tomb-colonists.[55] The God-Eaters also survived, trapped within their cavern out of time, and continued to exert their influence over both the colonies and the Neath entire. Their servants, the Copper, once held considerable sway in the Fourth City, and echoes of their power remain scattered along the shores of the western Unterzee.[56]

Records of the Third City are scarce.[57] Those not lost to time or deliberate ruin[58] survive chiefly in the libraries of the Grand Sanatoria[59] in Venderbight, which dates back to the Third City period.[60]

  • The Withered Celebrant
    The Withered Celebrant
  • The Whispering Duellist
    The Whispering Duellist
  • The Ebullient Undertaker, leader of Tanah-Chook
    The Ebullient Undertaker, leader of Tanah-Chook
  • The Lace-Wrapped Emissary, member of the Copper
    The Lace-Wrapped Emissary, member of the Copper

Historical Inspirations[edit | edit source]

While it may be tempting to assume that the Third City was Aztec given the rampant human sacrifice, it is quickly evident that it was Maya instead. The Aztecs were not a prominent culture until centuries after the Fall of the Third City. The Maya did practice human sacrifice as well, though not to the scale of the Aztecs, and it has become a more consistent direction over the years to reference Mayan mythology when discussing Third City beliefs.[61] Xibalba is the Maya underworld[62] (the Aztec equivalent was Mictlan), and a writer at Failbetter confirmed that the Popol Vuh, the creation epic of the K'iche' Maya, was a major reference point.[63]

There are also historical clues involved. A drought year is specifically mentioned in connection with the Third City;[64] severe droughts wracked the Maya during the Terminal Classic period (871-1021 CE), with the longest lasting thirteen consecutive years between 929 and 942 CE. These catastrophic dry spells are now thought to have played a central role in the collapse of Maya cities and the widespread upheavals that followed.

However, we do not know which city served as the model for the Third. Given that an early sidebar snippet references an Inca method of record-keeping,[65] the decision to blend multiple disparate cultures and civilizations in earlier writing likely muddied the waters. Furthermore, there is a scarcity of reliable historical sources;[66] Spanish priests and colonizers, condemning Maya religion as "pagan," deliberately destroyed countless hieroglyphic texts and artifacts. Only four codices have survived to the modern day.

All this, however, has not dissuaded community theories. Three main candidates recur in fan speculation:

  • Chichen Itza is the perennial favorite, in part due to its relative fame. There are a few possible translations of Itzá, but Chichén means "at the mouth of the well;" the city had four visible cenotes (natural pits/sinkholes that served as wells), including Cenote Sagrado (Spanish for "sacred/holy cenote"), where offerings and human sacrifices were cast into the depths. Chichén Itzá was also not ruled by a single king, leaving room for three hypothetical priest-kings, though we know little of its actual government.
  • Tikal was one of the most powerful Maya cities, dominating the southern lowlands for centuries. However, its decline preceded the droughts of the Terminal Classic period.
  • The city now called Calakmul was a rival superpower to Tikal, which was located near the modern town of Hopelchén. This town's name means "place of five wells" in Yucatec, a finding that led fans to suggest Calakmul.

References[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ Sidebar Snippets: What was the Third City?, Fallen London
  2. ↑ Bask in the light, Fallen London
  3. ↑ Cancel your appointments and investigate the ideogram, Fallen London "It's a clumsy combination of two Correspondence signs: 'a day that lasts a thousand years' and 'a generous gift of murder'. [...]" [Editor's Note: 1800 - 1000 = 800]
  4. ↑ Smash it, Fallen London "It shatters, and you hear the giants scream across eight hundred years. The Fidgeting Writer collapses. When he recovers, he's different. He rarely dreams of giants, now. He takes a job in a tallow factory and never lifts a pen again. It's no worse than many lives." [Editor's Note: 1800 - 800 = 1000]
  5. ↑ My Kingdom for a Pig, Fallen London
  6. ↑ My Kingdom for a Pig, Fallen London "Beasts slaughtered, feasts spread on the floor. [...] We chew. [...] we devour the dead until our hungers have been fed. Feed us. Feed us more than the dead."
  7. ↑ Homecoming, Fallen London "Tricked by creatures as low as you. Led into a trap. Imprisoned for aeons. [...] Forced to sacrifice—"
  8. ↑ Capture Third City Veils, Fallen London "THE OLD PRIEST-KINGS KNEW OUR KIND. WE WERE ALL GODS TO THEM. WE ALL ENTERED INTO THEIR BARGAIN."
  9. ↑ My Kingdom for a Pig, Fallen London "It isn't really much to pay. [...] [...] someone else can take the fall to feed them, feed them something more. Just sign here."
  10. ↑ Accept the Name!, Fallen London "The light on the edge of sleep was mine. I was Mr Candles. I will not be again."
  11. ↑ Enter the lighthouse., Fallen London "But it is clear that he was aware of his deficiency [...]"
  12. ↑ The price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, the price, Fallen London "They said – they called me by my name – I need only go up and the priests would take a little. The gratitude in their song! We embraced before I rose. You of cloth and shadow, you enemy, you proud-singer, you led the way. I will poison you with airs."
  13. ↑ SEVEN OF WORDS, Fallen London "In the hours before dawn, when he was drowned, you dream that you come to your door and knock on it."
  14. ↑ Pervert your studies, Fallen London "He came up [...] to offer a little. They hooked him [...] like a fish. Their knives [...] were dark and sharp as the Mountain's daughter. He screamed then [...] and they opened their mouths, red and white and rich with treasure."
  15. ↑ Pervert your studies, Fallen London "They hooked him [...] Their knives [...] were dark and sharp [...] He screamed then [...] and they opened their mouths [...]"
  16. ↑ Look into the water 0, Fallen London "Men draped in fabrics bright with geometric patterns and dark with blood. They gnaw on something. Their mouths are smeared. Bats cry out: they look up, and return to their feast. Their faces are rapt. Ripples consume them."
  17. ↑ Pervert your studies, Fallen London "[...] O but the feast was too short [...] all with that old redolence [...] of a certain ammonia. He breathed [...] until his vents were stifled with tears. [...]"
  18. ↑ Variable Interactions: The News, Mask of the Rose "Mr Pages: London is unduly distressed by the Fall. Most of it reached us intact. Fires made such a malfeasance of the abstraction of the Third... A ziggurat hit Hell. There was ferverish diplomacy."
  19. ↑ The Season of Ruins, Fallen London
  20. ↑ You have rejected wine and song, Fallen London "[…] the flesh and blood of the Twelve is intoxicating and transcendent. If you consume something greater, then you may incorporate it: unless it incorporates you. […] This is the lesson of Couriers. This is the lesson of the knives and the pool."
  21. ↑ Look into the water 1, Fallen London "A celebration! The God-Eaters lick their fingers, not to waste a scrap. They will live forever now. Much good will it do them."
  22. ↑ Ask her what a Tomb Colonist would say about this, Fallen London "[...] the rulers who led more by ritual and hidden knowledge than by control. The saying that their gods lived among them [...]"
  23. ↑ The Season of Ruins, Fallen London "[...] Beneath you is the Third City, as it was just after its fall. It hums and bustles, citizens scurry like beetles from a disturbed log – it seems Londoners were not the only people to swiftly adapt to the Neath."
  24. ↑ The Season of Ruins, Fallen London "[...] There is an organised rhythm to the movement of the people here: they attend their tasks with practised timing. Perhaps such routine was their response to the disruption of the fall."
  25. ↑ Ask him who he is, Fallen London "I was very old then. Lived too long, bored out of my gourd. I went to one of the Lords: the Lord of Blood, [...] I beseeched it. Begged it to give me my heart's desire. The Lords, who had themselves grown restless, devised the game: the Marvellous. They found six others, as afflicted as I was. I imagine it was not difficult to do so."
  26. ↑ Speak to the woman on the right, Fallen London "I long for far Irem. The Red Bird has taken all I knew. There was a chant that fell from the sky that will fill me with flame. I will cross the sea as a bird crosses the sky. My love awaits me. The Honey-Lord promised me."
  27. ↑ Prepare a weapon of vengeance, Fallen London "Veils of the Third City is a fragment of the Vake once worshipped as a deity, a fragment that belongs to a particular date in the long count of years. Something happened then, something so important that it has remained an identity of Veils ever since."
  28. ↑ Plunder the Grand Sanatorium for information, Fallen London "In memory of those whose light survived our demon-kings, only to walk into the jaguar's maw."
  29. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "Whoever these people were, they were not poor. There is jade and cinnabar and hammered gold here, ear-plugs and torcs bearing the likenesses of Third City deities."
  30. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "They are human bones, undoubtedly. Even so bleached and cracked and time-worn, the shapes that hide beneath human skin are familiar. Many still bear the remains of earthly riches – rings hang loosely around yellowing phalanges and pendants dangle into the empty hollows of ribs."
  31. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "Some say that the Priest-Kings feared betrayal, and slaughtered those they suspected before their plots could materialise. [...] Others say that they were nourished by betrayal. That betrayal was the light in which they basked and grew. That to be their friend was to be only a sweeter kind of prey."
  32. ↑ Totentanz, Fallen London "It is hard, [...] to hate something your comrades want so badly. I cannot begrudge them for fearing death in the Neath. I'm certain that – with enough time – I can discover something better. For myself, as well as the tomb-colonies. The priest-kings and Masters were never going to do any more than this half-measure. They are not affected – why would they?"
  33. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "Those revolutionaries before me arranged the process of Emergence. They went against the order of things. We could hatch into moths."
  34. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "I went from fresh recruit to leader in three days – I had to, as our old leaders just disappeared. [...]"
  35. ↑ Rebels who will not rise, Fallen London "The revolutionaries of the Third City sleep here, fifty-five of them. They would have made their republics in the tomb-colonies. It was not permitted. Their enemies must have hated them, to lay them here to rest where they would never be remembered."
  36. ↑ Study the diplomatic overtures of cities past, Fallen London "It is a catalogue of failure. The College of Mortality had no opinion on the First, a deep distaste for the Second, a strong desire not to be anywhere involved in the Third, and a singular hatred for the Fourth. Their opinions on the Fifth are not yet recorded anywhere, and must therefore be concluded to be unspeakable."
  37. ↑ Study the diplomatic overtures of cities past, Fallen London "A Third City ambassador – of uncertain diplomatic standing given changes in the City's governance – entreated the Banded Prince for assistance. He brought with him a jaguar, the noble and puissant beast. Unfortunately, the Prince mistook the situation and reversed the positions of owner and pet. The last record of the ambassador is of him being taken on forcible pilgrimage to Arbor over the roads of thirty nations."
  38. ↑ Consult the texts of the Grand Sanatoria, Fallen London "The Withered Illuminator guards her texts closely, until you slip her a third gin. Then, dozing, you are at liberty to read. The Third City, it seemed, had frequent contact with a place known as Ixander, which is now no longer recorded."
  39. ↑ Search for very particular entries, Fallen London "All the elements are present: striped ambassadors from the lands of the Night Sun; a tournament of blood and wits; a prize beneath, promising freedom from the city's yoke. The diary's owner watched it all. The ball games; the crowds; the ceremonies of gold and jade. Only when the air was thick with smoke did she turn her face away, so that the city's rulers would not notice her."
  40. ↑ Contemplate False Globes, Fallen London "The Gracious keep their counsel close, but to police a continent one requires a knowledge of its boundaries. A record, taken (or stolen) some centuries ago by an enterprising Third City radical who resented the monopoly on death, reveals an overlap between the Presbyterate of then and that of now. An overlap, but not an entirely continuous one."
  41. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "Once it was just another tomb-colony. But after the Third fell into ruin and disrepair, the Priest-Kings took it for their own. [...] After that, the people called it Xibalba – 'the place of fright'. [...] It's lost, now. Hidden from the Neath by the arts of the Priest-Kings, a dark haven for them and their faithful."
  42. ↑ Study ancient bestiaries, Fallen London "Texts on the Broken Men of the Third City, who apparently took to zee in a raft seeking Xibalba, reveal curious psychosomatic properties in the eye of the beholder."
  43. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London
  44. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "On the Surface, the Third City took many of its customs from the land, the sun and stars. A beautiful geometry. [...] Their Fall created a void. A void the Priest-Kings filled with black smoke."
  45. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "[...] Its limestone surface is covered in a grid of tiny drawings – fanged faces and curling hands and jungle beasts depicted in round, cartoonish sweeps. You recognise the script, although it is rare to find in London – the logograms of the Third City."
  46. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "There are small prizes for victories, donated by the frequent players. The tomb-colonists are more interested in improving their game than in collecting the relics. The relics vary wildly – from an instrument resembling an ocarina to a head carved out of jade."
  47. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "A small band playing pipes and whistles stands half way up the main staircase. The fluting draws tomb-colonists from every room in the building. All listen attentively, a few even sway to the beat. But at the back, more agile than the rest, a pair dance. [...]"
  48. ↑ The Season of Ruins, Fallen London "As your ribbon crosses with the Manager's, he calls to you. "A beautiful place. Very skilled pipers. I'm still fond of their music." His momentum carries him out of earshot."
  49. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "On the Surface, priests of the Third City engaged in ritual bloodletting. The body was pierced – with ravenglass knives, or shark teeth, or stingray spines – and the blood collected on amate, then burned into smoke. This way, their blood could nourish their deities."
  50. ↑ The Season of Ruins, Fallen London "A ziggurat dominates the landscape, dwarfing the stalls and homes built around it. The wealthier looking dwellings are decorated with intricate carvings and statues. [...]"
  51. ↑ Follow your feet, Fallen London "Beneath your palm, the stone is warm [...] There are images on the cut-stone blocks, lively scenes in stucco and faded paint [...] Here, a door framed as the mouth of a monster, recurve fangs above the lintel, watching entrants with spiral-hooked eyes. There, curved logograms in columns two blocks wide [...] There is a memory here, contained within the stone, of fecundity and celebration, baked earth and flourishment and rain-thick air. Echoes of a city-that-was, before its internment in the darkness below."
  52. ↑ Follow your feet, Fallen London "The stepped and shallow pyramid [...] is constructed from Neath-stone, built in the darker times after the Third City's fall [...] There are traces of older structures beneath the worn bricks, smaller pyramids lending their crumbling height to the larger."
  53. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London
  54. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "The Third City tomb colonists have trained regularly for centuries, and it shows. The bandages are wound tight to their bodies – maintaining the integrity of limbs, but also revealing muscles that have taken centuries to hone. And their endurance! These athletes might be slow, but they are relentless."
  55. ↑ All Things Must End, Fallen London "The citizens of Tanah-Chook are among the more ancient tomb-colonists. They ensure they remain well-preserved through a combination of careful, consistent exercise, excellent diets, and ferocious willpower."
  56. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "What do you know of the Copper? [...] Servants of the Priest-Kings. They persisted long after the Third. Even had prominence, for a time, in the Fourth City. Their scattered remnants survive in the colonies. Disciples of the knives and the well. Black glass and blood."
  57. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "Many of the records of the Third City are lost. [...] Sometimes, I think that may be a good thing. The Third City... changed after it Fell."
  58. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "Many of our records have been destroyed, by time or the Priest-Kings' agents. [...]"
  59. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "In our archives at the Sanatoria, there are records. [..]"
  60. ↑ The Path of Blood and Smoke, Fallen London "The Tomb-Colonies are not solely a sanctuary for the disgraced scions of London socialites. In the Grand Sanatorium we can trace the colonies' history back to the Priest-Kings of the Third City – the ones they call the 'God-Eaters'."
  61. ↑ Ask her what a Tomb Colonist would say about this, Fallen London "[...] the rulers who led more by ritual and hidden knowledge than by control. The saying that their gods lived among them, and that the gods had made and discarded two sorts of human before; that a servant of the sun resembled a lizard; that when a hero died, they put his head in the cleft of a tree in Xibalba. [...]" [Editor's Note: Those who have read the Popol Vuh may notice familiar details]
  62. ↑ Ask her what a Tomb Colonist would say about this, Fallen London "When she is not otherwise occupied, she writes down a few of the glyphs for you, and explains their meanings: Bat Demon, Sweepings Demon, the Demon that causes Coughing." [Editor's Note: The demons are all Lords of Xibalba: Bat Demon is Xic ("Wing"); Sweepings Demon is Ahalmez; the Demon that causes Coughing is Patan ("Packstrap")]
  63. ↑ Luke van den Barselaar, Discord "People interested in the symbolism and encounters in this one might have a good time with the Popul Vuh, a collection of creation myths from the K'iche' Maya peoples, which I borrowed from heavily."
  64. ↑ Consult the Priests of the Red Bird, Fallen London "The drought year"
  65. ↑ Sidebar Snippets: What is the Correspondence?, Fallen London "They say it's the last accounts of the last days of the Third City, strung in beads on cord in a code no-one living understands..." [Editor's note: Inca quipu were made of knotted string, not beads, but there are no comparable analogues elsewhere.]
  66. ↑ Luke van den Barselaar, Discord "Truly blows that some of the only sources we have on that culture in that period are the freaky travellogues written by the conquistadors who otherwise erased as many of the primary sources as they could" [Editor's note: This was the response given to a player asking if there even was a historical counterpart to the Third City.]
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