So that's what it means to have forbidden knowledge
There's just not enough aspirin in the world.
tl;dr inbound! Summary at the end.
Ok the Dirge of Bilqis World Quest is over and done with and it's taken me until now to sift through all of that information (separating it out from all the Jeht stuff) and then stop myself from becoming a "village keeper" in the process.
Ahem- what's up guys! It's your friendly Genshin overthinker Inotia King. As always before we begin I just want to make sure new readers have checked out my first topic which is the basis for all my theories. So if you haven't checked that out yet please click here.
A while ago I found a bunch of stuff on the new world boss the Setekh Wenut and I thought the correlations were amusing. Something I realized that I brushed off was that it's the whole desert region and not just the boss that's referred to as Setekh after Set who is the Egyptian god that represents the desert.
But thanks to having that swimming around in my brain the Bilqis quest really did a number on me. So let's start this story off at the beginning. If you've clicked on that "click here" link above this will make much more sense. In that topic you'll find a picture of Paimon and the Sustainer of Heavenly Principles with a link under it to a video theory. The short version is that I think Paimon is one of the shining shades of Phanes and representative of the classical planet Mercury. (Click here for further details on that.) Further down on that "click here" topic you'll find my pinned comment and if you click on the Archon 101 link you'll read about my thoughts on Venti's relation to Istaroth the known shining shade of Phanes and God of Time.
This is the set up you guys need here. So let's continue.
Archon 102
The first time I caught a whiff of a possible appearance by Paimon in the region was a mention about someone called Hermanubis. Hermanubis is a syncretization of Greece's Hermes with the Egyptian god Anubis. This happened plenty of times in these old religions. In fact most of Greece's pantheon is derived from Babylon's pantheon either directly or through other civilizations like Phoenicia. Ok so again click on the links to understand why this even means anything.
I've seen people suggest that Hermanubis refers to Deshret himself which I couldn't really make heads or tails of back then. Now yeah I think this works out but for so many more crazy reasons. First there's this idea that because Deshret's a son of the sky that he was a direct creation of Celestia. I think there's a little more nuance to that though so we'll have to jump over to Venti now. So Venti has Story 3 where it says he used to be a thread of the "thousand winds" which theories have suggested to mean that Istaroth - who is sometimes called the thousand winds - created him. With all that taken together it might be that once upon a time Paimon created Deshret and with her position as another shining shade Deshret would be a son of the sky and could be known as Hermanubis as a reference to his creator.
O you guys thought that was it? Buckle up.
Classical Conundrum
The Bilqis quest has now named the Goddess of Flowers. Her name is Nabu Malikata. Malikata just means queen and this name came from her people the jinni so it makes sense she'd be given the title of queen if not just for the fact that Deshret is also king and the two were an item. So the important part of the name is Nabu and now we go back to Babylon where the name comes from. Nabu is surprise surprise the Babylonian equivalent of Mercury. So if Paimon is who I theorize her to be and that means she made Deshret like Istaroth made Venti then so too did Paimon make Nabu.
But that's not all. Back when I was linking the Babylonian concept of the classical planets with the shining shades I ran into a road block. There are seven planets but Phanes only created four shades. Including itself that only accounts for five planets. Which two would be left out? I believed that since Phanes acts as a ruler then we go with the Greek myth merging Phanes with Zeus. Zeus is Jupiter while Phanes would represent the Sun. But I could only speculate on the other one which I whittled down to being between Saturn and the Moon. I had chosen Saturn before because Saturn would be Cronus the father of Zeus. In my other other theory that would then relate Saturn to the Imaginary Tree.
But now I think we have another contender. Nabu while meant to be the planet of Mercury is also related to the Moon and wouldn't you know it so is the Goddess of Flowers. Ay-Khanoum the city she ruled together with the other two gods means "Lady Moon" in Persian and was likely named in her honor by Deshret. On the other hand based on my other other other theory maybe the name derives from the conflict that killed the moon sisters after the sister that sided with them. We do have other regions named after the moon too after all ie: Mondstadt, Liyue. But what relates Nabu more closely to the Moon is that both the Babylonian Nabu and Greek Hermes are related to the Egyptian Thoth the God of the Moon. You know how the Eremites are descended from the people of Gurabad and how Gurabad is the human kingdom that was created after Ay-Khanoum's fall? In the Golden Slumber World Quest that precedes Dirge of Bilqis we follow around the Eremite group Thutmose. Thutmose means children of Thoth.
Interlude
^(aka the) ^("in case I lost anybody further up in this topic here's a few minor details for you to calm down with") ^(lol)
So now we have Nabu, Hermes, Hermanubis aka Anubis and Thoth. Did you guys know Nabu and Thoth are both Gods of Wisdom? You know like how "God of Wisdom" in Sumeru seems to just apply to whoever is in charge whether it's Deshret, Rukkhadevata, Scara in his gundam or finally Nahida. And while Hermes himself isn't a God of Wisdom he's got something called an epithet that is: Hermes Trismegistis.
We'll get back to that.
Lay of Al-Ahmar. In this story we had advisors to Deshret who suggested things to him following Nabu's death. These were the Crocodile and Goat Kings and also there was the Ibis King. Guess how Thoth is depicted?
We'll get back to the Ibis King too.
Now let's put Anubis back into the picture. I previously talked about how the Egyptian beliefs happened to line up with miHoYo's rivalry between the Imaginary Tree and the Sea of Quanta. The sea wants to reabsorb the tree back into itself. That relates to the Egyptian Nun the God of the Primeval Waters and Ma'at the Goddess of Order whose death would lead to Nun reabsorbing creation back into itself. So most of us likely know Anubis is the Egyptian God of the Underworld who weighs the hearts of the dead to see if they pass on into the afterlife right? Anubis weighs the heart on the scale of Ma'at and then its Thoth who records the result.
I previously commented on another story that Thoth and Ma'at appear in, The Journey of Ra. They stand guard over his solar barque as it passed through the underworld.
I'll get to the important part now so we won't have to come back to this later. The reason I bring up the Journey of Ra is because at this point you might be pining to be one of those village keepers or you might be raising up some local village pitchforks at me for making a confusing thing more confusing. After all Genshin's already thrown tons of titles and names at us that refer to the same thing. Deshret himself is a great example since we were first introduced to him as the Scarlet King but then the books call him Al-Ahmar and then we got Deshret. On top of that there's again those theories suggesting he's Hermanubis. But that's actually a common theme in old religions and thematically Egypt's religion. So The Journey of Ra: It starts at dawn where Ra is also Khepri who is an aspect of him. His eye is synonymous with Horus as well where sometimes the Eyes of Horus represent the Sun and Moon but because his right eye is the sun it gets merged with the Eye of Ra which is also the sun. At midday Ra returns to being just Ra but then at sunset he's now Atem aka Yami Yugi. Then he goes into the underworld where he's suddenly dead and merges with Osiris as ruler of the dead. Then late into the night we reach the Apopis arc of our tale and that's where Horus helps Isis defeat Apopis. But sometimes Horus is actually Set in disguise and other times Set is just Set and Horus is not there. (And remember how Horus is also sometimes Ra? Yeah....) Also also Nun is the God of Chaos right? Ma'at dies he comes and destroys the world to reabsorb it back into the primeval waters? Well Apopis is also a God of Chaos and if it kills Ra the same thing happens.
Side Note: The Apopis myth might actually be an allegory to complications of childbirth. Apopis is written in hieroglyphs as a coiling snake and it's said it was born from Ra's umbilical cord. The journey is the death and rebirth of Ra so Apopis is the final obstacle Ra faces before he's reborn something like how complications in a pregnancy can lead to an infant being strangled by his/her own umbilical cord. ♫♪The More You Know♩♬
Ahem- Going back to the previous section you know how I said maybe the omitted classical planet will be the Moon because it and Mercury are represented by the same shining shade based on how they're related in real world lore? Or maybe it's Saturn that isn't included because as Cronus to Zeus it would be the parent of Phanes which would be Ananke? Yeah well Nabu is also related to Saturn. In this case Saturn would be the Babylonian God Ninurta and I quote: *"*Mercury whose name is Ninurta travels the path the Moon travels." This comes from the MUL.APIN compendium of Babylonian astrology which is where the concept of the classical planets comes from. So now Nabu is Hermes is Mercury is Thoth is the Moon is Ninurta is Saturn.
Thankfully we won't come back to this or I'm going to need to chug more aspirin.
Forbidden Knowledge and the Breaking of Shackles
Alright now we're actually at the meat of this topic. So again Nabu, Thoth and Hermes Trismegistus are Gods of Wisdom. And wouldn't you know it so is Ars Goetia Paimon. (Minus the god part. Demon of Wisdom?) Paimon teaches humanity science and specifically "the secret things." He knows "all the affairs of the world." Likewise Hermes Trismegistus teaches the "secret arts" of Babylonian astrology and alchemy. And what was Deshret trying to do again?
Well we actually know exactly what he was trying to do, how he attempted to do it the first time, how Nabu helped and how that all turned out. In short Deshret was trying to overthrow the Heavenly Principles by learning of all the secrets Phanes had previously locked away when it attacked with its Divine Nails. This was simultaneously Nabu's own desire so she helped him and died in the process. And because of that Ay-Khanoum was destroyed.
That was Deshret's first attempt to override the principles. In grief he listened to one of his advisors the Ibis King aka Thoth.
The divine punishment of a thousand years past brought the downfall of wisdom and history. For a better future, Your Majesty, you should take control of the past. The present oases hold the wisdom of the 'present', but if we are to seize the 'past', we must act swiftly.
And that's how we got the Eternal Oasis a moment frozen in time for all of eternity which as we know from the previous time somebody tried that eternity stuff it's a bad idea. In the end while the oasis did freeze a moment in time it couldn't bring Nabu back nor could it perpetually maintain the happy moments of the Archon trio.
So then he went even more crazy and listened to the advice of the Crocodile King:
If we are to recall the lost lives and welcome lost opportunities and dreams back into the fold, then this is our final chance. The greater the authority, the greater the emptiness. The greater the wisdom, the greater the sorrow. Forget the delusions of the Void. Only resurrection and life eternal can fill the endless pit of regret.
Which led him to try using "greater wisdom" to unmake the world and recreate it to resurrect and perpetuate the world he wanted. His state of mind is recorded in Cyno and Candace's weapon.
That would be the fate we first learn about in the book the Lay of Al-Ahmar and then at the end of Act IV of the Archon Quest. Basically Deshret used the forbidden knowledge Nabu had helped him obtain to create the Golden Slumber and set up a super computer complex that would house the consciousnesses of all of his people. Instead of fighting the Heavenly Principles to rewrite the world he retreated inward to create a different world within his power to control. And that's the Eternal Dreamland that we actually see in action during the Golden Slumber World Quest. Samail digitizes his mind and becomes one with the collective while Jeht's father Jebrael enters it to shut down the interface and seal Khaj-Nisut.
Side Note: Btw khaj-nisut is a real thing. It's the first step in the Egyptian coronation of a pharaoh the "arrival of the King of Upper Egypt." Deshret is named after the crown of Lower Egypt so the king representing Upper Egypt could be Nabu.
So disaster after disaster but just like my theory about the Eighth Element pointed out it's very hard to get it right. Now let's rewind way back because remember all of this started in this theory of mine because of Paimon?
You're your own worst critic
Again this makes more sense after watching the video but essentially Paimon is an aspect of Phanes like the other shades are as well and originally they all acted in accordance to its will. But just like Istaroth, eventually Paimon also had her own experiences and they ran contrary to Phanes too.
If we adapt the Venti model then Istaroth created him to defeat Decarabian and free his people trapped in Old Mondstadt. In that case I think Paimon might have created Nabu and Deshret to continue the work of the Second Who Came. Unfortunately her plans and what Nabu and Deshret unconsciously followed fell short of what was necessary to actually free the people of Teyvat from Firmament. (Why was Paimon's plan so much loftier than Istaroth's? For that you can check out my Ars Goetia Ranking theory.) In short the greater the loyalty the more painful the betrayal.
So how did we end up with our Paimon? Well we may have been given clues as far back as Moonchase. Guoba as it turned out is the god Marchosius. So our Paimon being diminutive herself might also be something like a reduced god. But the why I think is hinted at through Bilqis. In the quest we find Liloupar the jinn that brought down Gurabad. As punishment for her cruelty Deshret pulled her essence apart and stored them in separate places weakening her and also removing her memories with each piece. While Paimon is our guide and claims to know what's going on in Teyvat, if we pay attention her memory is spotty at best. Sure it's probably for game progression but notice how she had been the one to tell us everything about Mondstadt but once we got to Sumeru she knew next to nothing about the region. I also like to use Kazuha's Character Quest to illustrate this. When we find out Kagotsurube Isshin is possessing people Paimon is surprised and asks if swords can really do that. But all the way back in v1.2 we had the Albedo event Festering Desire where the sword Festering Desire was possessing people. You feeling ok Paimon?
If I had to guess at a continuity I'd say that after Phanes punished Gurabad with the Withering for Deshret's forbidden knowledge he also punished Paimon for instigating it by reducing her and taking away most of her memories. She retained her basic understanding of Teyvat but without any knowledge about its underlying systems and dealings. Phanes might even have been the one to toss her into the lake our MC fished her out of. This may have even happened to Istaroth after she saved the Enkanomiyans since Phanes likely wanted them dead after burying them under the sea with the vishaps.
To Summarize:
- Paimon is a shining shade of Phanes who created Deshret like Istaroth created Venti
- She also made the Goddess of Flowers Nabu Malikata
- (You'll need some background on the Babylonian Seven Classical Planets for this one) Paimon relates to the planet Mercury > Hermes > Nabu > Moon > Thoth > Thutmose Eremites
- But also Nabu > Mercury > Ninurta > Saturn
- Nabu is Thoth is Hermes Trismegistus is the God of Wisdom is Paimon the Ars Goetia Demon of Wisdom
- Take all of the above together maybe Paimon created Nabu and Deshret to help humanity. In this case Paimon wanted to free humanity from the fake sky.
- This failed. Phanes punished Paimon by diminishing her into the Paimon we know today. She has memories of what Teyvat's like but none about all the deeper lore.
-deep breath- Ok everybody make it out in one piece? So what do you guys think?
Posted Feb 5, 2023, 8:40 PM UTC
I feel like I just listened to an old man in a retirement home telling me the most whack story ever.
Anyways, this theory is nice but we don't have too much info on Paimon so I don't really think that this "creator" should be Paimon but rather an unknown identity. There are many wise demons in the Ars Goetia so I don't think Paimon should be special or exclusive in this theory. It's cooler if this creator is unknown ngl
Also we really strayed far from the forbidden knowledge part and delved deeper into just Paimon.
Paimon is the wildest wild card that I have a hard time believing any theory that relates to her.
Haha I did say this theory would turn some people into village keepers.