(urth) Patera Incus

James Wynn crushtv at gmail.com
Sat Aug 14 12:34:36 PDT 2010


  1. Why Patera Inucus is a woman...

1.1 The Letters to Fulmar
In Lake of the Long Sun, Incus is attempting to say something to "My 
Dear Friend Fulmar". The Patera is trying to express something to him 
but doesn't quite no how. Unfortunately, Incus recognizes that Fulmar is 
not especially perceptive as reflected by his name, meaning a type of 
gull which in Vironese thieves cant is a simpleton.

1.1.1 First attempt.
Incus writes a note to explain why he can't come to the Black Mechanics 
meeting. The letter has two parts italicized (probably underlined in 
Incus's actual letter):
_a woman_ and _myself_"
Incus thinks, "_Myself_ standing for _I_, as even that fool Fulmar could 
not help but understand"
However, Incus decides that this is too obvious. Remora might find the 
letter. It was to risky.

1.1.2 Second Attempt. This time Incus disguises his handwriting.
"You know, my friend, yet it might be more thoughtully be said that you 
cannot know, how much I have been looking forward to a _plain firsthand 
account_ of the marvelous adventures of our mutual acquaintance Bee. Bee 
himself.

Incus thinks, "No, it would not do. Fulmar would be utterly thrown off 
the scent by _the male pronoun_." [emphasis mine]

Question how does the male pronoun throw Fulmar "off the scent"? Off the 
scent of what?

Answer: Off the scent of the name _Bee_. The order for bees is 
"_hymen_optera. And of course, a hymen is a female anatomy. It also 
might be an identity that Incus is otherwise known to Fulmar. Because, 
she tells Gulo regarding the name "Hy":
"Her full name would be  "Hymenocallis", I expect....Very pretty, I've 
used it a time or two myself."

What Incus was trying to get Fulmar to clue to was that  "Bee 
(hymen=woman), himself" meant "woman myself". Too subtle? Yes. Incus 
ultimately agreed.

1.1.3 Finally, Incus decides to go to Fulmar's house in person and 
deliver "a clear, straightforward message" (compare to the message in 
1.1.2). Additionally the text says:
"Nor would the trouble and loss of time go entirely unrecompensed; _he, 
Incus_, [compare to the letter in 1.1.1, emphasis mine] would at least 
have the satisfaction of..."

It is not clear that Incus ever got around to delivering that letter. 
Probably not. By the time "he" returned to Prolocutor's Palace, Incus 
_was_ the Prolocutor annointed by Scylla (sort of).

1.2 Auk's Failed Attempt to Sacrifice Hyacinth

Auk kidnaps Hy to sacrifice her to Tartaros. But during the sacrifice 
the god tells him to let her go. It's a weird scene and deriving an 
unambivalent understanding from the text alone of what is going on is 
simply not possible. Fortunately, Wolfe has explained it on this very 
list during the famous Q&A:

Q. Why did Auk ... kidnap Hyacinth, and why, subsequently, did he let 
her go?

A. Because Tartaros had told him to bring a woman. He released her as he 
recovered from his brain injury, was able to think more clearly, and 
realized that _Hyacinth was not the woman he should bring_. (Putting it 
another way, he released her because Tartaros told him to. These answers 
are not as disparate as they may appear.)

Okay. Hyacinth was likely an unsuitable sacrifice because she wasn't a 
virgin. Additionally, we learn at Mint and Sand's sacrifice that 
*presenting* the woman is all that is needed. I think Hy was unsuitable 
for other reasons too, but that's another can of worms. The question 
before us is what woman SHOULD he have brought? More to the point, what 
woman DID he bring?

Well, Incus was there in front of the Sacred Window. And even her name 
(or one of them) means "virgin".

1.3 Thematic Evidences

Although the previous evidences seem sufficient to me now, they are not 
the reasons I first realized that Incus was a woman. They only presented 
themselves afterwards. The realization came to me first when I 
discovered that Wolfe was working mythology into the characters of Silk 
and Auk. And in every instance in which Incus took part in that "working 
in", the patera played the part of a female.

1.3.1 Aristeas

When reading Nightside, I saw that there were ways Silk seemed to be 
connected to Apollo. So I got out Robert Graves' "The Greek Myths" and 
checked the index to review every myth in which the god took part. Also, 
noted that Graves said rosemary, mint, and myrtle were used in funerary 
rites. Ah so! Silk's sybs are named after the plants of used in funerary 
rites. Where else does myrtle come from? Well, the poet/prophet/priest 
Aristaeus, who was written about by Pindar, the Theban poet who appears 
in "Soldier of the Mist", who was a SON of Apollo, was raised by the 
Myrtle Nymphs. So I started paying attention to Graves's description of 
Aristaeus' bio while reading the rest of the Book of the Long Sun. And 
*to my pleasure* the novel and Graves' rendition mapped perfectly from 
beginning to end.

Incidentally, story of Horn story in The Book of the Short Sun maps 
nicely for him as the son of Aristaeus, Actaeon. But that's another can 
of worms.

What surprised me however was the sacrifice of the bullocks and heifers. 
Wolfe does this twice and in both circumstance Incus was counted among 
the heifers.

1.3.2 Hesphaestus

Silk and Auk divide the works of Hesphaestus between them. They actually 
divide other myths between them as well. But for Hesphaestus, Silk 
performs all his deeds on Mt Olympus (including being thrown off the 
mountain by Hera and lamed). Auk performs those deeds off of Olympus 
when he was banished from the mountain and worked below the sea with 
Thetis and Eurynome.

Now Hesphaestus's workshop was an interesting place. It had "mechanical 
women" who aided him.

In Exodus of the Long Sun, when Auk, under Tartaros's divine influence, 
begins repairing Sand, performing the deeds of Hesphaestus as smith, he 
is assisted directly by Incus who hands him his tools and holds the 
light. Incus is of course a "black mechanic" and "a woman"--a mechanical 
woman.


2. Does Incus Appear as a Woman anywhere in the story?

Yes and no. Not on stage, per se.

But Incus has those large, yellow teeth. And the "incus" is a bone in 
the ear. So, I presume that Incus is the enigmatic Maytera Corn (ear of 
corn) who instructs the chem Olivine while she is living Prolocutor 
Incus's house (Return to the Whorl).


u+16b9




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