Just Dave wrote:I like the general idea and I'm all for creating fluff, however I think some things are best left alone and the 2 missing chapters are one of those things IMHO.

Th3ee Legged Dog wrote:It is an interesting idea actually.

A lot of possibilities for sure.

VikingScott wrote:I can't see 100 odd people agreeing exactly on fluff.
There will be debates.

Just Dave wrote:To be honest, I'm not sure a name is the best place to start (as you said), maybe several different themes such as specialisation, Primarch, colours etc. could help develop a name?

I think it's a difficult place to start as you have an almost completely blank canvas...


(I'm getting a lot more involved then I said I would aren't I? )

Just Dave wrote:Btw, I heard that brainstorm was seen by some as 'politically incorrect' and should be replaced with 'thought shower'! it's true!

revackey wrote:

Just Dave wrote:Btw, I heard that brainstorm was seen by some as 'politically incorrect' and should be replaced with 'thought shower'! it's true!

I like brain rain! But thats besides the point..

I think that we should get some volunteers to think up around 10-15 if Dakka Dakka really wants to do this.

Commander Endova wrote:Obviously the lost Legion is the Venus Blades.

Their Primarch, Minervian was the only female primarch, and commanded the only all female legion, as the Emperor would not want to waste he potential of humanity's womenfolk to be Astartes. As such he created a separate set of Space Marine organs designed to work with female hormones, though otherwise identical to their testoserone-keyed counterparts.

The Emperor, fearing the unending wailing of the fluff nazis, had their records expunged.

*Disclaimer: The Venus Blades and associated fluff above is satirical. Still my idea, still something I want to actually do one of these days.*

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors... (was saving these for the create a chapter comp )

Also, speaking of the Create a Chapter Competition (apologies Bane ) Would you all please be kind enough to vote, the link is in my signature. Thank You!

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors...

kravus master of Horus wrote:Anyway are we sticking with Khorne or will we go with a diferrent god or make them undivided?

Æscholt wrote:

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors...

It'd probably behove us to come up with a theme, and possibly name, before we decide upon a colour scheme. No sense putting the cart before the horse. In any case, to me the bone 'n' black looks a bit too similar to the Luna Wolves colours.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Anyway are we sticking with Khorne or will we go with a diferrent god or make them undivided?

There is actually already a legion devoted to Khorne. You might have heard of them, they're called the World Eaters. As for a different god, have we actually decided that they'd definitely be Chaos worshippers? We seem to be still in the ideas phase.


Seems to me that the first thing is to do is sort out what we already know about the missing Legions, then decide upon a theme for the one we're making. The hardest part is likely to be working out why all the records of them were destroyed. I mean, the Traitor Legions worshipped Chaos and rose up against the Emperor, but the records of them weren't deleted.

But still, What We Know:
     • The Primarchs were scattered through the galaxy, and were raised on various human worlds.
     • They were each found by the Emperor, and lead their Legions in the Great Crusade.
     • 2E's Codex Imperialis comments that "Some [Primarchs] had other powers which do not survive amongst the Space Marines at all, such as flight and invisibility." Assuming that this fluff is still valid, it might further be assumed that Sanguinius is the Primarch with the power of flight, which leaves one of the unknown Primarchs with the power of invisibility. "Invisibility" might also be interpreted as being a psychic null, as such an individual would be undetectable via psychic abilities.
     • The two Primarchs, and their legions, were already lost by the time of the Heresy. In Mechanicum Malcador says that "They are lost to us forever.", and in The Lightning Tower we learn that statues of the missing Primarchs had been removed some time ago, and the "separate tragedies" of the "absent brothers" "had seemed like aberrations". Dorn muses that they might have been warnings, which were unheeded.
     • At one stage, it was possible (if not perhaps probable) that Sigmar, from the WHFB world, was a Primarch. His arrival was preceded by a ball of flame in the sky, and he quickly rose to power and united the warring tribes. After a number of years reigning over the Empire, hung up his crown and walked off, never to be seen again. However, GW has moved away from the tenuous links between the two settings, so this is likely no longer the case.

If anyone else can quote something I missed regarding the missing legions, please do so. Best we get all the canon stuff out of the way early so we can start making up our own stuff.

As an aside, I'm fairly fond of /tg/'s Lost Primarch, Rachnus Rageous (although I was disappointed with how a couple of things went, like why the records were eventually removed). You can read of his exploits here.

Æscholt wrote:

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors...

It'd probably behove us to come up with a theme, and possibly name, before we decide upon a colour scheme. No sense putting the cart before the horse. In any case, to me the bone 'n' black looks a bit too similar to the Luna Wolves colours.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Anyway are we sticking with Khorne or will we go with a diferrent god or make them undivided?

There is actually already a legion devoted to Khorne. You might have heard of them, they're called the World Eaters. As for a different god, have we actually decided that they'd definitely be Chaos worshippers? We seem to be still in the ideas phase.


Seems to me that the first thing is to do is sort out what we already know about the missing Legions, then decide upon a theme for the one we're making. The hardest part is likely to be working out why all the records of them were destroyed. I mean, the Traitor Legions worshipped Chaos and rose up against the Emperor, but the records of them weren't deleted.

But still, What We Know:
     • The Primarchs were scattered through the galaxy, and were raised on various human worlds.
     • They were each found by the Emperor, and lead their Legions in the Great Crusade.
     • 2E's Codex Imperialis comments that "Some [Primarchs] had other powers which do not survive amongst the Space Marines at all, such as flight and invisibility." Assuming that this fluff is still valid, it might further be assumed that Sanguinius is the Primarch with the power of flight, which leaves one of the unknown Primarchs with the power of invisibility. "Invisibility" might also be interpreted as being a psychic null, as such an individual would be undetectable via psychic abilities.
     • The two Primarchs, and their legions, were already lost by the time of the Heresy. In Mechanicum Malcador says that "They are lost to us forever.", and in The Lightning Tower we learn that statues of the missing Primarchs had been removed some time ago, and the "separate tragedies" of the "absent brothers" "had seemed like aberrations". Dorn muses that they might have been warnings, which were unheeded.
     • At one stage, it was possible (if not perhaps probable) that Sigmar, from the WHFB world, was a Primarch. His arrival was preceded by a ball of flame in the sky, and he quickly rose to power and united the warring tribes. After a number of years reigning over the Empire, hung up his crown and walked off, never to be seen again. However, GW has moved away from the tenuous links between the two settings, so this is likely no longer the case.

If anyone else can quote something I missed regarding the missing legions, please do so. Best we get all the canon stuff out of the way early so we can start making up our own stuff.

As an aside, I'm fairly fond of /tg/'s Lost Primarch, Rachnus Rageous (although I was disappointed with how a couple of things went, like why the records were eventually removed). You can read of his exploits here.

idget wrote:

Æscholt wrote:

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors...

It'd probably behove us to come up with a theme, and possibly name, before we decide upon a colour scheme. No sense putting the cart before the horse. In any case, to me the bone 'n' black looks a bit too similar to the Luna Wolves colours.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Anyway are we sticking with Khorne or will we go with a diferrent god or make them undivided?

There is actually already a legion devoted to Khorne. You might have heard of them, they're called the World Eaters. As for a different god, have we actually decided that they'd definitely be Chaos worshippers? We seem to be still in the ideas phase.


Seems to me that the first thing is to do is sort out what we already know about the missing Legions, then decide upon a theme for the one we're making. The hardest part is likely to be working out why all the records of them were destroyed. I mean, the Traitor Legions worshipped Chaos and rose up against the Emperor, but the records of them weren't deleted.

But still, What We Know:
     • The Primarchs were scattered through the galaxy, and were raised on various human worlds.
     • They were each found by the Emperor, and lead their Legions in the Great Crusade.
     • 2E's Codex Imperialis comments that "Some [Primarchs] had other powers which do not survive amongst the Space Marines at all, such as flight and invisibility." Assuming that this fluff is still valid, it might further be assumed that Sanguinius is the Primarch with the power of flight, which leaves one of the unknown Primarchs with the power of invisibility. "Invisibility" might also be interpreted as being a psychic null, as such an individual would be undetectable via psychic abilities.
     • The two Primarchs, and their legions, were already lost by the time of the Heresy. In Mechanicum Malcador says that "They are lost to us forever.", and in The Lightning Tower we learn that statues of the missing Primarchs had been removed some time ago, and the "separate tragedies" of the "absent brothers" "had seemed like aberrations". Dorn muses that they might have been warnings, which were unheeded.
     • At one stage, it was possible (if not perhaps probable) that Sigmar, from the WHFB world, was a Primarch. His arrival was preceded by a ball of flame in the sky, and he quickly rose to power and united the warring tribes. After a number of years reigning over the Empire, hung up his crown and walked off, never to be seen again. However, GW has moved away from the tenuous links between the two settings, so this is likely no longer the case.

If anyone else can quote something I missed regarding the missing legions, please do so. Best we get all the canon stuff out of the way early so we can start making up our own stuff.

As an aside, I'm fairly fond of /tg/'s Lost Primarch, Rachnus Rageous (although I was disappointed with how a couple of things went, like why the records were eventually removed). You can read of his exploits here.

Corax is the invisible guy according to Raven's Flight (Which was not written by C.S Goto so its believable)
And if we are going Chaos why not make them follow Malal? That would mean that both the Imperium and other Chaotic worshiper would be attempting to kill them.

kravus master of Horus wrote:

idget wrote:

Æscholt wrote:

Inquisitor Lord Bane wrote:I bring you...colors...

It'd probably behove us to come up with a theme, and possibly name, before we decide upon a colour scheme. No sense putting the cart before the horse. In any case, to me the bone 'n' black looks a bit too similar to the Luna Wolves colours.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Anyway are we sticking with Khorne or will we go with a diferrent god or make them undivided?

There is actually already a legion devoted to Khorne. You might have heard of them, they're called the World Eaters. As for a different god, have we actually decided that they'd definitely be Chaos worshippers? We seem to be still in the ideas phase.


Seems to me that the first thing is to do is sort out what we already know about the missing Legions, then decide upon a theme for the one we're making. The hardest part is likely to be working out why all the records of them were destroyed. I mean, the Traitor Legions worshipped Chaos and rose up against the Emperor, but the records of them weren't deleted.

But still, What We Know:
     • The Primarchs were scattered through the galaxy, and were raised on various human worlds.
     • They were each found by the Emperor, and lead their Legions in the Great Crusade.
     • 2E's Codex Imperialis comments that "Some [Primarchs] had other powers which do not survive amongst the Space Marines at all, such as flight and invisibility." Assuming that this fluff is still valid, it might further be assumed that Sanguinius is the Primarch with the power of flight, which leaves one of the unknown Primarchs with the power of invisibility. "Invisibility" might also be interpreted as being a psychic null, as such an individual would be undetectable via psychic abilities.
     • The two Primarchs, and their legions, were already lost by the time of the Heresy. In Mechanicum Malcador says that "They are lost to us forever.", and in The Lightning Tower we learn that statues of the missing Primarchs had been removed some time ago, and the "separate tragedies" of the "absent brothers" "had seemed like aberrations". Dorn muses that they might have been warnings, which were unheeded.
     • At one stage, it was possible (if not perhaps probable) that Sigmar, from the WHFB world, was a Primarch. His arrival was preceded by a ball of flame in the sky, and he quickly rose to power and united the warring tribes. After a number of years reigning over the Empire, hung up his crown and walked off, never to be seen again. However, GW has moved away from the tenuous links between the two settings, so this is likely no longer the case.

If anyone else can quote something I missed regarding the missing legions, please do so. Best we get all the canon stuff out of the way early so we can start making up our own stuff.

As an aside, I'm fairly fond of /tg/'s Lost Primarch, Rachnus Rageous (although I was disappointed with how a couple of things went, like why the records were eventually removed). You can read of his exploits here.

Corax is the invisible guy according to Raven's Flight (Which was not written by C.S Goto so its believable)
And if we are going Chaos why not make them follow Malal? That would mean that both the Imperium and other Chaotic worshiper would be attempting to kill them.

Well we could go with Malal but is he cool? I dont know anything about Malal But we could try it.

KmoH

AlexHolker wrote:My two cents:

Reasons for not existing in the records:
Neither of the lost Primarchs can have fallen to chaos. Them doing so would cheapen the Horus Heresy.

Options that work better, in my opinion, are for the Primarch to never have been found (as in the case of the Sigmar-as-Primarch theory) or for him to have died protecting his homeworld from the Emperor's "invasion" instead of meeting him and swearing fealty, with the legion created from his gene-seed but never reunited with their "father".

Specialisation:
Let's see... we've got Jump pack specialists, bike specialists, flame specialists, plasma specialists, siege specialists, berserkers, infiltration specialists... how about aerospace or wet navy specialists?

idget wrote:Corax is the invisible guy according to Raven's Flight (Which was not written by C.S Goto so its believable)

idget wrote:And if we are going Chaos why not make them follow Malal? That would mean that both the Imperium and other Chaotic worshiper would be attempting to kill them.

AlexHolker wrote:Neither of the lost Primarchs can have fallen to chaos. Them doing so would cheapen the Horus Heresy.

AlexHolker wrote:Options that work better, in my opinion, are for the Primarch to never have been found (as in the case of the Sigmar-as-Primarch theory) or for him to have died protecting his homeworld from the Emperor's "invasion" instead of meeting him and swearing fealty, with the legion created from his gene-seed but never reunited with their "father".

AlexHolker wrote:Specialisation:
Let's see... we've got Jump pack specialists, bike specialists, flame specialists, plasma specialists, siege specialists, berserkers, infiltration specialists... how about aerospace or wet navy specialists?

idget wrote:Or Perhaps they were blanks and the Emperor learnt the origin of this gene, destroying the legion in order to attempt to hide the threat of the Necrons from the Adeptus Mechanicus who may have the Void Dragon imprisoned on Mars

idget wrote:Malal could still be used though The sons of Malice are just a chapter which follows them.There are many chapters who follow Tzeentch who aren't just the 1k Sons.

idget wrote:Also Corax isn't truly invisible, he just has the ability to not be seen. IIRC motion sensors were still able to pick him up.

Gathering Storm wrote:Try and enlist the help of the guy who wrote this. It has brilliant fluff and stories. I really wish he would start writing again, I was an avid follower of the thread.

Ir would aslo be a good idea to take a look at how he went about writting the fluff.

kravus master of Horus wrote:I really like that fluff Corennus! I think we should go for something like that! I've wanted to submit my own chapter but it's basically just the Soul Drinkers fluff but if we could work on it who knows? It could become alot better! So if you guys would like to use it as a starting point then go ahead:


Children of Eden

Name: Children of Eden
Founding: First Founding
Chapter Master: Allister Khaine
Home world: Eden Prime
Fortress-Monastery: Destiny’s Ascension
Main colours: Black, Red, Gold and Silver
Battle Cry: We have no beginning. We have no end. We are infinite, years after your civilization has been eradicated and forgotten, we will endure.
Response: We are legion. The time of our return is coming. Our numbers will darken the sky of every world.

History
The Children of Eden do not fit the standard template of Excommunicate Traitoris. Unlike most Renegade chapters they have developed an ideology that states that the Imperium has betrayed everything the Emperor has stood for. Some within the Chapter think that the Imperium should be destroyed for the good of mankind.
It began with an operation to obtain one of the Chapter's lost relics, the great Soulsword, a weapon used by Allister Khaine during the Great Crusade, from a criminal organization that had come to possess it. Just as the 800 Children of Eden had taken the orbital defense platform where the relic was being held, and were about to reclaim the Sword, supporting Adeptus Mechanicus forces teleported into the vault it was stored in and made off with the Sword before the Children of Eden could react. The Children of Eden then fortified the platform and demanded the return of their relic, but it had already been passed along to another vessel that was en route to a Forge World. The Mechanicus then revealed a great siege cannon from their starship, and forced the Children of Eden to board and destroy the Mechanicus weapon before it could be used against them, slaying thousands of Tech-Guard in the process before fleeing aboard their two Strike Cruisers.
The Inquisition, caring not for the reasons why, saw only that the Children of Eden had attacked another Imperial institution and demanded they surrender themselves. After Allister's refusal, the entire Chapter was declared Excommunicate Traitoris. Soon after, the rest of the Children of Eden and their fleet arrived to extract the two beleaguered Cruisers that they might answer for their actions to the Chapter Master, Gorgoleon.
1st Chapter War
Gorgoleon was obstinate, and saw the Children of Eden of Allister Khaine at fault, and fought him for the fate of the Chapter. Allister Khaine emerged victorious, sparking a war within the Chapter. Most of the Novices refused to follow Allister Khaine, and took up arms and barricaded themselves throughout the fleet. It took Allister Khaine and his forces, who counted most of the Chapter's specialists amongst them, several months to root them out and kill them all.

Under the Sway of a Daemon Prince
Disillusioned by the Imperium, and unknowingly under the influence of a Khorne Daemon Prince in the desguise of an aspect of the Emperor, Allister Khaine opted to keep his Chapter renegade, scuttled the Children of Eden fleet, and resettled the Chapter into a Space Hulk they dubbed Destinys Ascention. Soon after, the Daemon Prince Abraxes mislead the Children of Eden into attacking one of his rivals, the Nurgle Daemon Prince Ve'Meth. After slaying Ve'Meth, who took the form of a virus infesting several hundred ordinary people, Abraxes revealed his true nature. He handed Allister Khaine the Soulsword and offered the Children of Eden the chance to serve as his personal retinue of Chaos Space Marines. Allister Khaine considered his options, he accepted the offer, secretly plotting to turn on the daemon prince.
The Empire of Teturact
The heretic Teturact, a life-form produced by Adeptus Mechanicus experiments in Human mutations on desolate Stratix Luminae, was carving a vast empire out of the Imperium of Man. His ability to project noxious, mind-controlling viruses and even raise the dead with them won him godhood in the eyes of those he infected. He was able to claim several important Imperial worlds, including the Hives of Stratix, the Forge World Salshan Anterior, and several others including agri-worlds and other strategic targets. One of these worlds was Stratix Luminae, a world where the old Children of Eden had once fought, granting Allister Khaine a knowledge of the experiments carried out there. The Children of Eden sought out the surviving Mechanicus personnel from Stratix Luminae across several of the worlds under Teturact's sway, all the while dodging the efforts of the Inquisitorial Taskforce Thaddeus to track them down and bring them to justice, before finally collecting all the pieces of the puzzle that sent them to Stratix Luminae itself. Teturact intervened personally, intentionally breaking up his flag-battleship in orbit to rain debris and his followers down on the Children of Eden.


Dealing with Saren
After the defeat of the heretic Teturact, the Children of Eden were forced to flee Stratix Luminae, leaving several assault squads, who were under Saren's command, behind.
Chapter Master Allister Khaine quickly caught wind of this heresy by his battle-brother and tracked Saren to Entymion IV, an Imperial world held by a mysterious alliance of Dark Eldar and Slaaneshi Cultists. The Imperial Guard, with the assistance of the Crimson Fists, were at that moment trying to liberate the world.
The Crimson Fists force was initially small, serving as a spearhead for the array of Imperial Guard regiments attempting to retake the capital city of Gravenhold. However, they quickly fell afoul of Saren's Children of Eden, clashing indecisively as the Fists took up overwatch positions in a cathedral. In the aftermath, recognizing the rune emblem and believing the entire Children of Eden Chapter present, Crimson Fists Commander Reinez sent word of the Children of Eden presence to Rynn's World, who responded with the Fists 2nd Company under Chaplain Inhuaca, placing himself and the Company under Reinez's command with orders to destroy the Children of Eden and bring back Allister Khaine's head.
Upon their arrival on Entymion IV, Allister Khaine's Children of Eden immediately began investigating the situation. Their method of infiltrating the world, hijacking a pair of landers from the Imperial Navy, quickly alerted the Crimson Fists as to their location. After securing the assistance of the Armoured Fist units of the Fornux Lix Fire Drakes Regiment, the Crimson Fists dove deep into the city and fought the Children of Eden in a brutal brawl within the city's Mercantile Chamber. The Children of Eden pulled back after capturing the Fists Company Standard and killing the company Librarian.
Throughout this fight, the Dark Eldar present on the world observed the Children of Eden fighting against the loyalist forces. The intervention of the brainwashed slave army of the Dark Eldar deterred Fists pursuit as the Children of Eden retreated beneath the city. They were quickly approached by the Dark Eldar- who, offered Allister an Alliance, which Allister accepted.
Interested in nothing save finding Saren, Allister split the Children of Eden into two parts to blunt the Imperial Guard for the Dark Eldar, all the while the Children of Eden Scouts sought out Saren in the city. The Scouts soon located Saren and his retinue as they butchered through a Guard regiment, and Chaplain Iktinos and his flock were able to hold them in place long enough for Allister to arrive and defeat Saren, collapsing a span bridge on top of him. The Dark Eldar still benefited from this, buying time for a secret army of mutated human slaves to fully awaken beneath the city and begin a slaughter so great it would propel Entymion IV to the status of Daemon World, one ruled by the Dark Eldar as a second Commorragh. The Crimson Fists were slaughtered and the Children of Eden had made their fist allies, the Dark Eldar.

2nd Chapter War
The Children of Eden found another Chapter War brewing between Allister, and the new Sergent Eumenes, taken from a planet that hated the Imperium, to restock the Chapter. Eumenes felt that the fight should be taken directly to the Emperor. He wanted to take out the Astronomican, and blot out the light that guides the Emperor's ships through the warp to start the Imperium over.Allister, however, struck a new course for the Chapter after being given advice from Chaplain Iktinos that a planet called Vanqualis was under attack from a horde of Orks and needed their protection. Afterwords, the Children of Eden would be able to benefit by taking on supplies for their new home, Eden Prime. Allister led the Children of Eden through the jungles of Vanqualis to battle the Orks, but in his absence Eumenes took control of their ship Destiny’s Ascention and started a coup that included a great deal of the forces on the planet. After consolidating, Allisters Children of Eden set out to take an old fortress from the rebels. Once there, Librarian Gresk warned Allister to leave. He did, before Eumenes bombarded the land surrounding the fortress from Destiny’s Ascention.
The Howling Griffons Chapter had sent three Companies under Lord-Librarian Mercaeno to the world to honor an old debt the Chapter owed Vanqualis. The Griffons had also allowed Inquisitor Thaddeus, now disfavored within the Inquisition, to tag along on the suspicions of the Children of Eden involvement. Though he realized that Mercaeno didn't comprehend what the Children of Eden really were, he could not convince him of this fact. Thaddeus tried to leave the Strike Cruiser and warn Allister of the Griffons, but had to kill one of the Griffins in a close-quarters firefight before he could escape. Mercaeno and his Griffons landed shortly thereafter, and did battle with Allisters group while the traitors watched bemusedly from the sidelines. It was during this that Mercaeno killed Thaddeus for killing his battle-brother.


Aftermath
Allister led the loyal Children of Eden to Techmarine Lygris, loyal to Allister, but was stuck on Destiny’s Assention until Eumenes let him shuttle Allister and his forces back to their ship in time to repel a boarding attack from the Howling Griffins. Allister and Mercaeno engaged in a titanic duel, tiring each other out until Eumenes struck down Mercaeno from behind and throwing Allister in the brig. Allister then attacked psyker-latent Scout Scamandar in Destiny’s Assention’s brig, incapacitating him. Allister then made his way to the bridge, where he dueled Eumenes. Though Eumenes had both the Soulsword Mercaeno's force axe, Allister impaled him with his power fist and won the battle.


Necrons
While fleeing from a Adeptus Mechanicus task force, the Children of Eden Space Hulk was severely damaged and low on fuel. Forced to run, the Children of Eden went deep into the veiled regions in search of fuel. They ran into the Necrons on many worlds, all with signs of previous human settlement, but now infested with the undying xenos. Eventually they discovered the last of the human worlds that the Necrons were still in the process of cleansing, and the Children of Eden made a deal with the survivors. They allowed the human's time to retreat to their space-craft while they held the Necron forces off, in exchange for the Children of Eden receiving fuel.
The Children of Eden held out aganist the Necrons, and the human population reached their spaceport but a Necron fleet arrived in-system, preventing them from leaving. The Adeptus Mechanicus fleet arrived shortly after, and the two fleets began fighting against each other. It was immediately obvious that the imperial forces would be destroyed, so they began a complex pattern of manoeuvers to delay the inevitable.
When the Children of Eden realized they could not beat the approaching Necron force on the ground, and the Mechanicus would lose in space, Allister offered an alliance with the Mechanicus. Chaplain Iktinos and his "flock" remained behind to help defend the spaceport and the surviving humans. It was revealed that his "flock" was loyal to his secret master as well, and no longer considered themselves Children of Eden.
Accepting the alliance the Mechanicus and Children of Eden set off for the main Necron hub, planning to destroy the Necron Lord and leave the rest of the enemy forces leaderless.
Arriving at the Tomb World, the Mechanicus crashed their ship into the planet and deployed alongside the Children of Eden. A long bloody battle began as they raced to kill the Necron lord, before the Necrons superior numbers began to change the odds. Finally they arrived at the Necron Lord's location and Allister duelled with it and won. However in typical Necron fashion it got back up, and began crushing him to death. Only by the sacrifice of Techmarine Lygis was the lord defeated.
Gathering his forces Allister lead his remaining troops towards the crashed Adeptus Mechanicus ship, where their promised transports were to be awaiting them. Instead three Imperial Fists thunderhawk gunships deployed upon the surface, while twenty terminator armoured elites teleported onto the planet, lead by First Captain Lysander. He ordered the Children of Eden to surrender or be destroyed. Alliister replied with the challenge of a personal duel. Allister defeated Lysander but did not kill him out of honour. He left with his men, victorious.

<3 KmoH

AlexHolker wrote:Reasons for not existing in the records:
Neither of the lost Primarchs can have fallen to chaos. Them doing so would cheapen the Horus Heresy.

Options that work better, in my opinion, are for the Primarch to never have been found (as in the case of the Sigmar-as-Primarch theory) or for him to have died protecting his homeworld from the Emperor's "invasion" instead of meeting him and swearing fealty, with the legion created from his gene-seed but never reunited with their "father".

Constantine wrote:And what if this legions have left imperium because they have foreseen the failure of emperor.

Constantine wrote:And what if this legions have left imperium because they have foreseen the failure of emperor.

Crantor wrote:My theories:
One of them is the progenitor of the Grey Knights. He's in the warp doing battle against Chaos.
One of them is Omegon, Alpharius' twin.

kravus master of Horus wrote:

Constantine wrote:And what if this legions have left imperium because they have foreseen the failure of emperor.

My god your a genious! The primarch has the power to see into the future yet only negative things like death! But still you then have to keep in mind that the future is subjective, what if he didnt know that it was him and his legion that would be the ones bringing down the emperor!

Henners91 wrote:How about, during the Horus Heresy there weren't just two factions?

Henners91 wrote:I assume an Inqusitior could've done it as late as m38?

Æscholt wrote:

Crantor wrote:My theories:
One of them is the progenitor of the Grey Knights. He's in the warp doing battle against Chaos.
One of them is Omegon, Alpharius' twin.

The Grey Knights are a Second Founding chapter, and are speculated to use gene-seed created from the flesh of the Emperor. There is also a possibility that the initial Grey Knights were loyalist Death Guard. But the Grey Knights are not the scions of one of the missing Legions.
Alpharius Omegon is a often counted single Primarch. The 20th Primarch to be found was either Alpharius or Omegon, and together they lead the XX Legion. Omegon was 'revealed' in Legion, before then he didn't exist in the background, so wouldn't have been the 2nd or 11th Primarch.

Henners91 wrote:How about, during the Horus Heresy there weren't just two factions?

What if a third faction had arisen, opposing the Emperor but also rejecting Chaos? Space Marine supremacists perhaps? Or Marines opposed to the idea of the Emperor single-handedly ruling the Galaxy? Perhaps a Primarch was raised on Planet Liberal?

Leaving the ideology behind, I think the idea of a third, weaker faction which two close Primarchs formed, that was small enough that the Imperium could effectively delete it from history is a compelling idea.

Henners91 wrote:As for a name for a third-party that abhorred the Imperium and Chaos jointly... The Sons of Reason? Obviously that'd be a title they'd craft after their rebellion rather than beforehand... Think of characteristics much like Roboute Gulliman's but perhaps with more hope, optimism and principles?

kravus master of Horus wrote:

Children of Eden

Name: Children of Eden
Founding: First Founding
Chapter Master: Allister Khaine
Home world: Eden Prime
Fortress-Monastery: Destiny’s Ascension
Main colours: Black, Red, Gold and Silver
Battle Cry: We have no beginning. We have no end. We are infinite, years after your civilization has been eradicated and forgotten, we will endure.
Response: We are legion. The time of our return is coming. Our numbers will darken the sky of every world.

ZoomDakkaDakka wrote:Well, once we decide the really large ideas, that'll be the framework for smaller details. The way we've already been going though, it's doubtful we could do just 1 legion now. I also do think that them trying to replace the Emperor is a little silly, but I can't think of them doing anything else in their situation, nor can I think of another way they would be "banished".
I think it'd be kinda cool if the stronger legion could operate almost like the eldar, by sensing where trouble will start before it does, and it fits with the idea of Primarch1 having visions of the future.
Gathering Storm, we've decided not to take an almost complete idea and then build on it, but the oriental theme could be cool for the stronger legion. Is there any kind of chinese mythology or religious significance based around seeing the future?

Just Dave wrote:I think that chinese/foresight idea is very good. Most of the Legions have a theme and that would work well...
It could also provide a good basis for many to head down?

kravus master of Horus wrote:I actually had an idea of the strongers primarchs mother being an eldar, so if you wanted we could use that idea.

ph34r wrote:The two missing legions are the Iron Hearts and the Desert Lions. Though they may not have later received much recognition, in the old fluff they were Legions. Really really old fluff.

Yggdrasil wrote:I know this goes into other directions, but I think they could make sense... Or do they?

AlexHolker wrote:

Yggdrasil wrote:I know this goes into other directions, but I think they could make sense... Or do they?

The second one would definitely need work. "He knew <it was an absolutely stupid idea> but had to do it nevertheless," translates to "The author needed conflict, so he was handed an Idiot Ball and did it anyway." This action is only justified if the Emperor didn't think it was a pointless suicide mission into the void of intergalactic space.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:Horus and his Legions TURNED AGAINST the Imperium of Man, slaughtered billions, nearly killed the Emperor and did irreparable damage to countless worlds, but they are still in Imperial Records.

The Two "Missing" Legions are expunged from records entirely. So therefore they either,
A) They did something FAR worse than the above
B) Were expunged for some other reason (a la Yggdrasil)
C) Were long lost before the record were written
or
D) Could have been an attempt to cover up the first heretics. The heresy wasn't deleted because it was too BIG to cover up and wanted to be used as an example.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:
Another important detail to consider is how they are spoken of in the Horus Heresy books. Malcador referred to them as "Lost to us forever". This could be literally lost, or figuratively lost, like a "You are no brother of mine!" scenario.

Also, in False Gods, when horus sees the growth tanks of one of the two lost primarchs,
"He stopped by the tank with XI stenciled upon it and placed his hand against the smooth steel, feeling the untapped glories that might have lain ahead for what grew within, but knowing that they would never come to pass."

Clearly the Primarchs knew the fate of their brothers, and it was a very sore subject for them, and a subject of great sadness.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:
I do agree with Alex that Yggdrasil's idea needs work, however the Emperor, as people seem to forget, was a man. Not a god. Despite his apparent prescience, he could not foresee his sons' treachery, and he grew openly hostile toward Magnus for suggesting his sons would turn against him.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:
It is entirely possible that after finding his first sons, in his hubris, he sent one of them beyond the known galaxy, and the "Warp Void" of the Tyranids consumed them. The Tyranids are an extra-galactic threat, the Emperor would not know what they were, only feel a vast, gaping emptiness consuming the warp-signature of his beloved sons. This also explains how the Tyranids became attuned to the Astronomican and are therefore drawn to this galaxy.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:
I don't know if this helps at all for creating fluff for a legion, but if we do decide to go this route, there obviously was a reason the Emperor would pick this primarch instead of, say Perturabo, who's ability to destroy enemy strongholds would be invaluable. So they could have been extremely intuitive when it comes to understanding xenos. Surprisingly, all of the Primarchs thus far have exclusively lived on human worlds. It is entirely possible that, say Eldar or Impreiex, or even something like the Tau before their empire(and of course this would prompt their near-destruction by the Imperium, if my timeline is correct), therefore, this primarch could have had some limited prescience, a "knack" or empathic bond with xenos, and therefore could unmake them easier

Gathering Storm wrote: This act of betrayal shakes the Emperor and he now believs that because all of his sons were raised on human worlds (to an extent) that they can be trusted and that the Alien should be feared even more.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote: it was the Chaplains like Erebus who spread the "Abor the Xenos, hate the xenos" creed. .

ZoomDakkaDakka wrote:Guys remember that this is dedicated to making up new chapters. This does not include speculation (unless related), submitting of single-person ideas in their entirety or submitting that we drastically change what has already been reached as a concensus.

ZoomDakkaDakka wrote: And don't forget that the part where Horus sees the broken pod was in a vision produced by the chaos gods.

insaniak wrote:

ph34r wrote:The two missing legions are the Iron Hearts and the Desert Lions. Though they may not have later received much recognition, in the old fluff they were Legions. Really really old fluff.

If true, (can't recall having seen it before) it would be fluff that pre-dates the current Codex Astartes Legion break-up. So they would have been legions in the same way as all the other Chapters were originally Legions... in a time when Space Marines were little more than regular guys in armour, and Imperial Guardsmen could be promoted to Space Marine-hood.

ph34r wrote:

insaniak wrote:

ph34r wrote:The two missing legions are the Iron Hearts and the Desert Lions. Though they may not have later received much recognition, in the old fluff they were Legions. Really really old fluff.

If true, (can't recall having seen it before) it would be fluff that pre-dates the current Codex Astartes Legion break-up. So they would have been legions in the same way as all the other Chapters were originally Legions... in a time when Space Marines were little more than regular guys in armour, and Imperial Guardsmen could be promoted to Space Marine-hood.

Yeah, the fluff is so old that is should basically be ignored, but they are the two old distinct space marine organizations that were referred to as legions and never mentioned again. In my mind, though it is definitely not official, they are the two missing Legions. Why they are missing is still a total mystery to me.

Æscholt wrote:

ph34r wrote:Yeah, the fluff is so old that is should basically be ignored, but they are the two old distinct space marine organizations that were referred to as legions and never mentioned again. In my mind, though it is definitely not official, they are the two missing Legions. Why they are missing is still a total mystery to me.

Do you recall where they were referred to as Legions? As far as I can tell the Desert Lions were only mentioned in Chapter Approved: Imperial Robots, which (in the reprint in the 40K Compendium at least) describes them as "the Desert Lions Chapter", while the Iron Hearts (who appeared in Hell in a Bottle, part of Into the Maelstrom and Let the Galaxy Burn) are similarly described.
Of course, Hell in a Bottle also makes mention of "Primarch Rubinek", but it seems quite a stretch that GW would have revealed one of the missing Primarchs in a throwaway sentence in a Black Library short story. It seems more likely to me that "Primarch" is perhaps a title the Iron Hearts give their Chapter Master, although I think the most likely case is that the author simply made a mistake.

Gathering Storm wrote:It could have even been a sort of 'Tactical Error' where the Legion became lost in the Warp or (something just hit me) the Primarch of one of the Legions actually died.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Yes for the weaker legion it would work out, obviously you cant make them super weak but basically 7 feet tall IG

Yggdrasil wrote:- Theory 2 : the WH40k setting is the Galaxy, which is tremendously huge, but we know it's not the only one in the whole Universe. The Milky Way is but one of many more galaxies in our universe. Alos, in some Tyranid fluff, it is said that Tyranids most probably came from another galaxy... Maybe during the Age of Technology, Mankind most probably tried to imagine what laid in those galaxies...
So we could think that maybe, the Emperor decided to "sacrifice" one of his Legion to go further than the edge of the galaxy in an attempt to reach the closest one. He knew he was sending them to their deaths in the empty void of space, but had to do it nevertheless.
Stricken with shame and disgust at his death-sentence-like order to his "sons", he could no longer bear waiting for any information about them, and staring at their names, emblems, portraits & statues of his missing Legion, constantly reminded him of the glory they wouldn't earn in the Great Crusade.
So, he selfishly and guiltily decided that all records from the selfless Legion were to be deleted, and no mention whatsoever of them should ever be pronounced.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:Hmm...I kinda like it. Did we come to a consensus on the stronger legion? Also, for legion two's theme, I do not think there are any Russian cossak inspired Space Marines, perhaps we could go that route? (This is coming from an ENORMOUS vostroyan and valhallan fan)

idget wrote:If they are going to be brothers then how can one be chinese and the other be russian? Were they found on different areas of land or something?

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:Because there totally can't be Russians and Chinese people on one planet. That would be silly

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:Genetically speaking, all Primarchs are "Brothers", so they could just both be from different planets but have a closer bond, like Ferrus Manus and Fulgrim.

Because there totally can't be Russians and Chinese people on one planet. That would be silly

idget wrote:Lol, what I meant was all the planets that are in the 40k universe tend to be somewhat one dimensional with only one real culture.
Anyway, most of the Primarchs are modelled on a real life person like Genghis Khan and so on. Who would we have? Stalin lol?

Asherian Command wrote:either that or a Templar Theme. As that is missing O.o

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:If we wanted to play the genetic flaw angle, we could go wihth the last Tsar of Russia, Nicolas the Second: his son had anemia and he relied more and more upon the counsel and advice of his apothecary(The famous Rasputin) and this led to a mutually ill fate. Almost like a Erebus-Horus relationship. Perhaps this "healer and counselor" could be his brother, or a chaos god? Just thinking outside the box

Although I concur that an Ivan the Terrible Primarch would be pretty sweet.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Sorry I havent been on my internet broke

idget wrote:Ok, if we were to use Lenin then that would be good for the weaker Primarch, he could have been driven out of his homeworld by a Stalinesque character and met the other primarch. Lenin was always a weaker leader when compared to Stalin but also commanded the military shaving a strong tactical mind so he could quite easilly be a primarch.

kravus master of Horus wrote:Im not too sure about the oriental theme now with the Russian theme for the weaker legion, I'd much prefere a templar angle, something with alot of grace and nobility. The oriental theme was good at the time but considering how much this thread has evolved I think we should go for something else, for instance alot things have been based around really old things like Romans and Vikings. What if we made the stronger legion more futuristic give them more of an Eldar sense of style.

kravus master of Horus wrote:You might if misunderstood me,
I said that there was already a roman and viking legion and they're all based on old things so what if this legion was more futuristic.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:I'm not so sold on the eldar idea... lets focus on the Russian Legion first. What are their:

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:@Storm: YES! Arctic tigers sounds wicked. Although the story you wrote sounds eerily like Superman: Red Son lol.

Samus_aran115 wrote:Hey guys. Make a chapter that reveres giraffes and zebras.

BluntmanDC wrote:
Or that on a high tech world protected from the rest of the imperium by warp storms he was raised to lead them, with the world having a near identical rise to glory as Terra minus the Emperor but with this primarch filling in and now that the storms have subsided they set of to unify humanity only to find it already unified and being persicuted for not worshipping the Emperor

kravus master of Horus wrote:

BluntmanDC wrote:
Or that on a high tech world protected from the rest of the imperium by warp storms he was raised to lead them, with the world having a near identical rise to glory as Terra minus the Emperor but with this primarch filling in and now that the storms have subsided they set of to unify humanity only to find it already unified and being persicuted for not worshipping the Emperor

I like this!

BluntmanDC wrote:

kravus master of Horus wrote:

BluntmanDC wrote:
Or that on a high tech world protected from the rest of the imperium by warp storms he was raised to lead them, with the world having a near identical rise to glory as Terra minus the Emperor but with this primarch filling in and now that the storms have subsided they set of to unify humanity only to find it already unified and being persicuted for not worshipping the Emperor

I like this!

giggling like a child due to the praise, maybe have super soldiers in iron man esque armour, or were every 'space marine' has anti grav generators, the 'what if...' possibilities are endless just lots of convertions

Necanor wrote:How about the second legion, the Knights of Damnation and their primarch Necanor.

BluntmanDC wrote:I'm a late comer to the thread, but i always imagined that the reason the 2 primarchs/legions were expunged was because they were well and truelly destroyed, either by a genetic melt down or that by the time the Emperor found them they were living like mini chaos gods ruling over the worlds they fell on.

I like the idea that either one of the lost landed on a chaos world and was nurtured into the perfect 'child' by one of the gods,

Or that on a high tech world protected from the rest of the imperium by warp storms he was raised to lead them, with the world having a near identical rise to glory as Terra minus the Emperor but with this primarch filling in and now that the storms have subsided they set of to unify humanity only to find it already unified and being persicuted for not worshipping the Emperor

kravus master of Horus wrote:try and stick with what we already have contribute your ideas not your legion please.

idget wrote:I also do like the idea but it does bot explain the reason for deletion particularly well and also does not quite fit the points we have already chosen to follow.
It is a very interesting idea though. Also this primarch cannot create space marines as the emperor already formed his legion and has all the geneseed.

Necanor wrote:

BluntmanDC wrote:I'm a late comer to the thread, but i always imagined that the reason the 2 primarchs/legions were expunged was because they were well and truelly destroyed, either by a genetic melt down or that by the time the Emperor found them they were living like mini chaos gods ruling over the worlds they fell on.

I like the idea that either one of the lost landed on a chaos world and was nurtured into the perfect 'child' by one of the gods,

Or that on a high tech world protected from the rest of the imperium by warp storms he was raised to lead them, with the world having a near identical rise to glory as Terra minus the Emperor but with this primarch filling in and now that the storms have subsided they set of to unify humanity only to find it already unified and being persicuted for not worshipping the Emperor

It's said in "Mechanicum" that the two legions were NOT destroyed.

Asherian Command wrote:Back from school. I am here to help.
Necanor. Good job. We need some background information.

Yggdrasil wrote:Agreed with Gathering Storm : that's really inspiring & uniting towards a common goal...

I'm in!

croggy wrote:to be completely struck from the records what they have done must be even more terrible then turning to chaos

so maybe they were never propperly brought into compliance in the first place

maybe they were even fakes?

thought to be a son of the emporer and their return celebrated and a chapter raised in their name only to be found imposters maybe even the killer of the original primarch , or just simply mistaken identity.

only discovered after their constant abuse of power and wanten waste of human life to achieve their own egotistic and greedy goals


sorry if this has already been suggested as my brain freezes if i read all of this stuff so i skimmed it and did my best to absorb it all in

Asherian Command wrote:Sorry to revive this thread.
But here
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/224898.page
Its a lost legion that one of our dakkites made.

Archmagos_Amadeus wrote:

Sorry if this post treads on your toes Crantor. I recall you mentioning that it would be interesting to pose this as a series of communiques between Inquisitors, and I fuly intend to not steal your glory, and instead present theories and information of my own. Feel free to disregard it in your next post if you prefer, they're brilliant enough as is. Just out of curiosity, where did you find all this information on the "Doom Legion"? Did you make this up or divine it from long forgotten Index Astartes?

Also, sorry about the unimaginative name, its the name of my Inquisitor DM from our Dark Heresy Campaign

kravus master of Horus wrote:Some work to do? Like????

royal house wrote:I thought the two missing chapters where never made they just didn't find the primarch in which case their wouldn't be any space marines. Because in the horus heresy it said horus gather 8 chapter about him while the other remain loyal to the emperor.Therefore no other chapters.

kravus master of Horus wrote:We've waffled on for 3 pages, now lets get back on the horse. Storm, or anyone else, can you PM the other members that have stop posting and ask them to join again? So what do we have on both Legions, scan over the last couple of pages. See what people have agreed on so far and compile them into a list then we will start brainstorming from there.

demonicjapsel wrote:I don't think its right to have space marines with hats made of fur. Maybe more something in their ideals thats russian or something thats leans more toward marxism or perhaps stalism.
It's just a suggestion if you don't like it don't use it

Asherian Command wrote:

demonicjapsel wrote:I don't think its right to have space marines with hats made of fur. Maybe more something in their ideals thats russian or something thats leans more toward marxism or perhaps stalism.
It's just a suggestion if you don't like it don't use it

no.
Do ancient Russians. Like swordsmen knight stuff. Current russian history is bland and evil

kravus master of Horus wrote:

Asherian Command wrote:

demonicjapsel wrote:I don't think its right to have space marines with hats made of fur. Maybe more something in their ideals thats russian or something thats leans more toward marxism or perhaps stalism.
It's just a suggestion if you don't like it don't use it

no.
Do ancient Russians. Like swordsmen knight stuff. Current russian history is bland and evil

I second this idea, do ou think you could post up some history about ancient Russia?

A Brief History of Medieval Russia

[From William Richard Morfill, History of Russia, in Willaim Richard Morfill and Charles Edmound Frye, Russia and Poland (New York P. F. Collier & Son, 1913), pp. 3-15].

A casual glance at the map of Europe and Asia will reveal quite clearly certain of the physical conditions under which Russia has developed. Compared with England, France, or Spain in point of size, what a vast extent of territory is embraced by a single state: running east and west, from the Baltic to the Sea of Kamchatka; and north and south, from the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea, the Caspian, and, as it may some day appear, the waters of the Indian Ocean. A heritage truly imperial, and offering a greater expanse of continuous land than any other empire. Examined more closely, other features in contrast to the states of western Europe begin to appear. The mountains of Continental Europe lie for the most part in the western and southern quarters. But easterly from the Carpathians, the Continent broadens out into a huge monotonous plain, watered by rivers of considerable length. And were the Ural Mountains correctly appreciatedÑtheir blackness on the ordinary map making them seem much more formidable than they really are, being for the most part only hillsÑit would appear that this vast plain extends almost uninterruptedly from shore to shore of the several bodies of water mentioned above. Scarcely within this enormous expanse of level country is there to be found any one feature which offers itself as a natural frontier or boundary line. The essential unity of the whole, physically, seems to have contributed in no small measure to the political unity which is now fast being achieved.

Glancing at the map from north to south, it will be seen that Russia embraces more degrees of latitude than any other European state, stretching with one arm into the very regions of the Arctic; with the other, into the deserts of central Asia; and changing, by degrees, from the frozen bogs and marshes of the north, through the wooded district of the center, to the steppes of the south. Yet, despite its great size, this territory, in the early history of Christendom, was practically isolated from the rest of Europe. For, when we consider the general commerce and travel of Europe, more particularly in the Middle Ages, it will be seen to what a degree Russia lay outside the established sphere of trade and commercial exchange. Indeed, by the fifteenth century western Europe had grown almost oblivious of the existence of a Slavic state on the Volga; so much so in fact, that in the era of exploration at the close of the fifteenth century, Muscovy underwent a " discovery," and travelers published descriptions of the country with a minuteness appropriate only to a region hitherto unknown.

Turning again to the map for the internal features of the country, it will be seen that, aside from the absence of hills and a " natural " frontier, aside from the vast extent of plain, the most striking thing is a system of rivers, which, with their tributaries, form a complicated network, and allow an easy and almost continuous means of passage throughout the entire country.

It is in connection with one of these waterways that the national history opens. In their original extent, as distinct from the Germans and the Celts, the Slavs occupied portions of the valleys drained by the Elbe, the Oder, the Vistula with some smaller rivers farther east flowing into the Baltic, and the Dnieper flowing into the Black Sea. In the expansion of Germany eastward, after the era of Charlemagne, the Slavs of the Elbe and the Oder fell under German sway and became more or less Germanized. Those of the Vistula, approximately, kept their political independence, and under the name of Poland, formed an integral part of western Christendom. For the Slavs still farther east, along the waterway formed by the Dnieper with the Dwina or the Niemen, a different fate was in store. The waterway was almost continuous from the Baltic to the Black Sea, and afforded passage for traders and Norse adventurers from the different parts of Scandinavia to Constantinople and the Eastern Empire. The Slavs settled in this region were grouped into tribes, and the existence of such trading posts as Novgorod bespoke other pursuits aside from primitive agriculture. It may be assumed that before the ninth century the Norsemen had evinced a design not only to plunder, but also to subjugate the Slavic tribes nearest the Baltic. But if tradition may be relied upon, these early raids svere invariably repulsed. The Slavs refused to pay tribute to the Norse chiefs, and maintained their independence.

Toward the middle of the ninth century the resistance began to weaken, owing perhaps to internal dissension. At last in the year 862, a Norse chief, with his followers, was " invited " to assume the duties of government. His name was Rurik, of the tribe of Russ, and he took up his station in the city of Novgorod. He is the legendary founder of the long line of princes, the Rurikovitches, who governed Russia until the accession of the Romanovs in the seventeenth century.

This early Slavic community over which the Norsemen, or Varangians, came to rule, embraced on the south the upper valley of the Dnieper and its tributaries, with the important cities of Kiev, Chernigov, and Smolensk On the north, it touched Lake Ladoga, and counted among its cities the ancient republic of Novgorod at the head of Lake Ilmen. On the east, it touched the headwaters of the Volga, a fact of political importance, for it was along the Volga valley, by a process of gradual colonization, that the Great Russian, as distinguished from the Little Russian, branch was to develop. To the west, it touched the headwaters of the Dwina, on which stood the city of Polotsk, and the Niemen, both of which rivers in their main streams drained Lithuanian territory. In extent, the whole region was considerably larger than modern Germany, a comparison worth bearing in mind as showing, in view of the later expansion of Russia, the really very large territory with Which the empire started. The absence of any natural frontier inevitably placed the early Slavs in immediate contact with their neighbors. In regard to the latter, it is essential to note the many variations of ethnical type, for in the process of expansion these have been to some degree assimilated, though not without a reciprocal influence upon the Slavic type itself. To the north and east lay a thinly scattered population of Finns; to the south and east, tribes of Turkish origin; to the west, the Lithuanians and also those Slavs whose political adhesion lay with Poland. Had all of these neighbors been a match for the early Russians, the latter might possibly have found themselves confined, early in their history, within limits prescribed by a conventionally settled political frontier. In the case of the Turkish tribes to the south and east, frontier questions did indeed lie between contestants of more or less equal strength, for the ferocity and relentlessness of these warlike nomads, such as the Khazars and the Petcheneks, became proverbial. But between Russian and Finn was a marked inequality of which the Russians took a natural advantage. Under such circumstances the frontier line could not be stationary. It moved constantly at the expense of the Finns, and thus inclined the energies of the early state toward expansion rather than toward cohesion and consolidation.

Political conditions within this gradually expanding community can be classed under no single principle. A primitive form of democracy, in which the precedence of authority was generally conceded to age, may be accepted as a Slavic tradition. This appears not only in the small agricultural communities; but also in such city governments as Novgorod, wherein prevailed a sensitive jealousy of popular rights, guarded by the vetche or republican assembly. The acceptance of a regime of princes signalized by the legendary calling of Rurik, did not mean an acquiescence in irresponsible government. The vetches served as checks to the princes, the undefined relations between the two leading to frequent conflicts. The position of the princes was still further discounted by a pernicious principle of succession, primogeniture not yet being recognized. There developed a system which, to borrow an ecclesiastical phrase, considered the country as divided into so many dioceses, the " see " of Kiev being reserved for the grand prince. In case of the death of a grand prince, the dignity fell, not to the eldest son, but to the " eldest " of the family, to an uncle or a brother as the case might be. It added to the confusion of this system that the death of a grand prince necessarily altered the position of the surviving members of the family, by changing the number of degrees in which each stood from the eldest. As the same principle of succession applied to each of the separate divisions, the result was a more or less continuous shifting from one division or seat to another. A time came when there were four or five times as many princes as principalities to be filled, a condition which was not without its influence probably in prompting the more adventurous and aggressive of the unprovided princes to found new principalities of their own by acquiring land at the expense of the Finns.

The work of the princes was conspicuous chiefly on its military side. A band of armed warriors, called a drujina, grouped itself around each prince to follow the fortunes of war. Personal loyalty seems to have played little part in this relation. Each warrior felt himself free to change from one master to another according to circumstances. This principle, coupled with the tradition of political decentralization, may partly explain the chaos of internal strife presented by the annals of the period. Lack of union and subordination, unless counteracted by the personal influence of some great prince, led to weakness even in the face of the enemy. But the military undertakings of the period are full of interest. In the ninth and tenth centuries a series of expeditions carried the Russians to the very walls of Constantinople itself. The eastern emperors were glad to disarm the hostility of these invaders by grants of trading privileges, by bribes of money, and by employment as mercenaries against the Bulgarians. More urgent, however, was the situation nearer home. Particularly with the Turkish plainsmen, the Polovtsi and Khazars, to the southeast, relations were invariably hostile, and marked by continual border warfare. Raid was met by counterraid, nor were the advantages always with the Russians. But to the northeast conditions seem to have been more favorable, for the Russians began slowly to make their way down the Volga valley.

The armed expeditions to ConstantinopleÑan ominous precedent for later history perhapsÑwere incidental to more subtle relations between the Byzantines and the Russians. Constantinople became the fountain head of the religion, art, and literature which brought Russia within the pale of civilization. It is worth noting, in this connection, that in point of time, the adoption of Christianity by the new state came comparatively late, for whereas the spiritual foundations of western Christendom had long been fixed, it was not till the very close of the tenth century that the Grand Prince Vladimir at Kiev demolished the images of the heathen gods and ordered the population of the city into the stream of the Dnieper to receive baptism at the hands of the Byzantine missionaries. Novgorod and other cities following suit, in a short time the Greek faith was professed by the whole nation. Further, the adoption of the Byzantine communion insured an almost total separation from the spiritual and intellectual life of western Christendom, a separation for which the geographical situation of early Russia was primarily responsible. Following in the footsteps of her Byzantine teachers Russia grew farther and farther apart from the West, remaining a stranger to all the virility of the movement which expressed itself in the manifold phases of chivalry, Gothic art, and municipal independence. The nation fell under the more or less sterile influence of Byzantine tradition: an unfortunate equipment, indeed, with which to face the blight of later political subserviency to the Tatars.

In the confused political system, noted above, the city of Kiev on the Dnieper retained its prestige as the seat of the grand prince for about four centuries. Its fortunes were at their height during the eleventh century under Yaroslav the Great (10I61054), but began to decline after Vladimir Monomachus (11131125). In the meantime, on the upper Volga, there developed from the gradual extension of the frontier through military colonization, a population of frontiersmen who knew not the traditions of Kiev and Novgorod. Frontier life was much to the advantage of the princes. The advance of the Russians up the Volga went on at the expense of the Finns, and this necessitated an armed occupation of each new strip of land acquired. The initiative lay with the princes who, with their drujinas, or armed bands, wrested the land from the original inhabitants, and protected the settlers, to whom they granted the privilege of occupation. Thus the conditions under which these new principalities were created tended to exalt the position of the prince and fostered the assumption of an autocratic power which has flourished with varying degrees of vigor ever since. But frontier life along the Volga did more than further autocracy; by the mixture of Russian and Finn it promoted the development of a new ethnical type. The assimilation of the Finns brought to the Russian settlers certain mental characteristics such as steadfastness, and fatalism, perhaps, which slowly differentiated them from the original type on the Dnieper. The Volga became the cradle of a new type of Slav, known historically as the Great Russian, in distinction from the Little Russian of Kiev. New Russia, the country of the upper Volga, thus stood in contrast to the old Russia of Kiev and Novgorod.

Eventually the two were brought into conflict. The time came vhen the succession to the dignity of grand prince fell to the Prince of Suzdal. Rather than take up his residence in Kiev, the new grand prince preferred to remain in his own principality on the Volga. This defiance of all tradition was nowhere more resented than in Kiev itself. It required an army from the north to bring the " Mother City " to terms. Henceforth the title of grand prince, no longer associated with Kiev, begins to lose its old meaning. It is even assumed by two or three princes at a time, indicating a still greater degree of political chaos, which the stern conditions of life on the Volga did little either to soften or to simplify.

To what extent the pushing forward of the frontier and the creation of new principalities might have gone on in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries will always be a matter of conjecture. With the thirteenth century there begins a fateful period. Geographicallya Russia happened to lie directly in the line of advance of other states whose expansion in these two centuries brought to the immediate frontier enemies with which a group of principalities loosely held together, could scarcely cope on equal terms.

This was a very warlike period and, according to the Russian historian M.S.Solovjev, Russia was involved in over 300 conflicts between 1228 and 1462, resulting in 85 full-scale battles. Two hundred of these conflicts involved external enemies - Tatar-Mongols, Lithuanians, Swedes or Teutonic Knights - resulting in 60 battles. If we add at least 150 attacks on fortresses and more than 80 sieges of Russian towns, it becomes clear that there was no prolonged period of peace during these two and a half centuries. Although Russian trade, handicrafts and culture survived, more than 200 years of more or less continual bloody conflict inevitably left their mark on the Russian character. While vast territories were harassed by the Mongols, Russia's military culture continued to develop rapidly, while there was also considerable external influence. During the mid-13th century, for example, the south-western principality of Galich-Volhynia experienced a notable increase in military power. From c.1240 infantry became more prominent and started to participate in combat on an equal footing with cavalry. The Ipatjev Chronicles for 1249, 1251 and 1253 showed that infantry often decided the outcome of such clashes. Furthermore, this southern Russian army now included people from more varied social backgrounds, including townsmen and peasants. Instead of the old term druzina (military detachment), troops tended to be called merely 'riders', peshtsi or foot soldiers, or simply vois - 'warriors' - while the supporting mounted archers were called streltsi.

Asherian Command