Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Let me start by saying I am very much a casual hobbyist and, as much as I would like to get stuck in to the lore, I really struggle to find the time. So I apologise in advance if this is a silly question:

The two 'missing' legions 'disappeared' during the early part of the crusade, if I recall, and there are references to the surviving primarchs saying that they can never speak of what happened, even amongst themselves.

I believe the legionnaires from the two missing legions were then folded in to the remaining 18.

My question is: whilst the primarchs would not even mention the names of their missing two brothers, surely the endless masses of imperial citizenry- including hundreds of thousands of Astartes- would?

As in, 'Hey, Bob, do you remember that second legion, the Trouser Snakes? Whatever happened to them?'

Or one Astartes turning to another and saying, 'Hi, new guy. Looks like you've shipped in from another Legion?'

'Oh yeah, I'm from the banished XXI and my name is Derek. Want to know what happened?'

Am I missing something obvious? My question isn't significant but I guess the timeline just irks me. Like, surely a hundred thousand mysterious Astartes suddenly swell your ranks and you don't question it? Surely the two legions must have been active for some time and so many, many people would remember them?

To summarise: if in 1942, two of the Allied countries of WW2 were suddenly censured, then for three years the entire world would have been aware of them in the conflict... and nobody would ever mention them again or know what happened to their thousands of soldiers?

Those Legionaries that are believed to have been sent to other Legions would have been mind-wiped and had their memories replaced so they wouldn't remember their former Legion.

As for Imperial citizens, when you get bombarded daily with propaganda about the 18 Legions, there are only 18 Legions. Collective knowledge is easy to control when a government has complete control over who says what and when. Anyone who says otherwise is clearly looney and shouldn't be listened to. Propaganda also wouldn't have been that specific seeing as it was only after the Heresy that the Primarchs really entered into common knowledge as Saints of the Imperial Cult. Before that people would know that the Legions existed and they might know a numeric designation or name but information isn't nearly as accessible in the Imperium as it is today and exact knowledge would be kept to those in power.
People in positions of power who experienced them would likewise have been mindwiped or disappeared.

Also, it likely wouldn't have been hundreds of thousands of Astartes getting dispersed.
One of the leading theories is that one of the Legions was largely destroyed in the Rangdan Xenocides along with their Primarch, and the small remnant was folded in the XIIIth (Ultramarines) secretly.

The Imperium, even then, is both a totalitarian state and spread over a mind bogglingly large area:

1) well informed people know the legions existed (Astartes and Primarchs discuss them on quite a few occasions) they just don’t know what happened to them being getting purged. Anyone that digs too deep (or isn’t important enough) will probably themselves get purged (or fear they might be, which will dissuade many from trying)

2) because of the size of the Imperium most people in the various battle groups aren’t in communication with each other (only the leaders, and even then not with every other fleet). Even the legions have sub-units going off on their own. If* the marines from the lost legions were integrated into other then (post mind wipe) they likely would just have been disguised as a random company/chapter that was off doing other things and has just come back (and those important enough to be able to prove otherwise would likely have had their memory altered (as the primarchs did).

*this is not actually confirmed, the first place it came from was a rumour in universe from an incredibly biased source

The outside meta-answer was back in the early days, GW made 2 of the Primarch's backgrounds intentionally vague so people could "homebrew" a loyalist and a traitor legion.

In lore, some people know about them- Horus makes a snide remark referencing them, and Malcaldor is basically like: "Shut it!!" But nothing has been concrete. There's also the theory one Primarch had to be slain by Leman Russ- since he's known as the Emperor's executioner.. But before the heresy, what was there to execute as a priority? Any marine could take a non-astartes human, and though Xenos are tough, there wasn't the big 'Nids.

My headcannon (Now proved wrong, thanks James Orkshop) was that one lost Primarch was on the WHFB world and was Sigmar. Twin-tailed comet= spacecraft. Big, bulky guy coming out of nowhere, uniting all Human tribes and disappearing suddenly? Sounds like Primarch..

There were horrors worse than the Tyranids during the time of the Crusade, the Rangda were the big one and the Xenocides against them killed entire Legions worth of Astartes.

The 3rd Rangdan Xenocide was so cataclysmic that records of the entire conflict were erased with only the smallest of details remaining.

That's where the idea that one of the Primarchs died in the Xenocides crops up.

Or was sympathetic to the Xenos that were being wiped out and the emperor found this unacceptable.

There is a quote somewhere that indicates that the space wolves had been set on another legion prior to their attack on the 1000 Sons homeworld.

most of us don’t have an accurate understanding of the events of last century. Even if there were people who had a living memory of the missing legions if the empires didn’t maintain their memory they would easily be forgotten across 10k years and the galaxy. Especially as the imperium works very hard to wipeout heretical writings.

Even in the current setting, the stories of the HH and the heroics of the loyalists are consigned to myth and legends. Well it was the case until they brought back RG. But many imperial citizens in 41k won’t think of Astartes as anything more than children’s stories. Assuming they have even heard of them

Out of Universe?

The missing legions were originally there to allow hobbyists space to make up their own Legion.

And that was how it was until the Horus Heresy novel series kicked off…well….let’s just “far longer ago than I’m willing to admit to myself, because in my head I’m still in my early twenties, and certainly not 43”

As to why the remaining Primarchs won’t even speak the name of their fallen siblings*? Keep in mind at his near peak, The Emperor psychically impelled an entire legion to kneel in deference to him. Including, I think, Lorgar**

It certainly seems well within The Emperor’s powers to force such a blank. To leave his remaining Primarchs with the knowledge they used to have two more siblings***, but to erase the name and other important details. And even implant false details.

*Yes siblings. Gender neutral because see ***

**Because it was the Word Bearers, who I think were all present on that world?

***if the wrong’un factor happened to be two female Primarchs and for whatever reason the genescience went horribly wrong, forcing your remaining creations to recall them as brothers is a solid way to avoid the same happening amongst the Astartes themselves, or anyone even trying it.

Rick Priestly set the record straight on the intent of the two missing legions some time back:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL39MSbwTOg

Comment from Rick:

"Interesting piece and lot's of interesting and credible theories there! I have no more idea than anyone else what the truth of the matter is, of course. The backstory has certainly evolved and acquired some mass of detail since I first drew up that list of Space Marine Chapters and their Primarchs. I'm not really familiar with a lot of that material either, but it's nice to know that the spirit of the thing has been preserved and even nurtured. I will make just one observation - and it's about the intent of the missing legions - where I think GW have perhaps taken a slightly different tack than I had in mind. Not that this matters of course, and I appreciate that in creating a series of books about the Heresy a lot of things I always intended to be unknowable or semi-mythical had to be addressed directly; something I could never have foreseen when I wrote Rogue Trader. The intent is this: that the removal of records and obliteration of the memory of these Lost Legions was not a punishment but a reward - rather than being purged they were being absolved - and this was based on the assumption they had done something utterly terrible (naturally!) but then done something equally positive to earn redemption. Or think of it as a stain that cannot be erased except by extinction. The Chaos Chapters are unforgiven - out and out bad guys - but the Lost Legions, whatever their deeds, have been forgiven and the stain upon their reputation erased with their memory. At least that was the idea... but times change don't they "

Also, Rick has said elsewhere that it was a falsehood that the two missing legions were there to give room for players to create their own: https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/9nvch7/my_extended_interview_with_rick_priestley/

"BIFFORD: A popular belief among fans is that you left those two Legions blank so that players of Horus Heresy games could invent their own Legions. Is this true?
PRIESTLEY: I left them blank before Horus Heresy games were conceived! I left them blank because I wanted to give the story some kind of deep background - unknowable ten thousand year old mysteries - stuff that begs questions for which there could be no answer. Mind you all that got ruined when some bright spark decided to use the Heresy setting - which rather spoiled the unknowable side of things - but there you go!

BIFFORD: Ah, this is going to amaze a lot of people on Reddit
PRIESTLEY: Is it? :smile.:

BIFFORD: Yep, everyone there thinks you left two Legions blank for players to fill in.
PRIESTLEY: Well - I created a thousand Chapters - of which we only gave details of a dozen or so - so there were nine hundred odd Chapters left blank for people to fill in. In the original 40K that is! The Horus Heresy stemmed from a short piece of narrative text I wrote - I think it was in Chapter Approved: The Book of the Astronomican - but I never imagined it would be used for a game setting. The trouble with the Heresy as envisaged by GW is it just feels like 40K - it doesn't have the feel of a genuinely different society that ten thousand years separation would give you. Whenever I wrote anything that referenced back to those times I always wrote in a legendary, non-literal style. It's as if you were dealing with something like the Iliad rather than literal history - and there you're only talking three thousand years - ten thousand years - that takes us back to the end of the last ice-age... and I don't get any sense of understanding about 'deep time' when I look at anything GW have set in the 40K 'past'."

To add to chaos0xega’s excellent post:

There is an old 40k Radio phone interview. Link was here (it 404s now, but if you can find it please let me know). I transcribed the relevant bit below (years ago on a Dakka post, which I’ll post again below). Parts are garbled and unintelligible. If you can make it out or correct what I have written, please do so.

Rick Priestly interview with 40k radio (The relevant discussion begins around 1:22:00)
"The Space Marine chapters are all based on the Roman legions. Because I've always been interested in history and asian history. When I could--I got my degree in ancient history and archaeology. So a lot of the ideas that went into 40k stand a little bit from that kind of background. The Roman legion were the model for the Space Marine chapters. The idea of a legion which were historied and never refounded as it happened is quite a strong one. And then the other idea was that Roman emperors who were damned [unintelligible]. The Egyptian pharaohs, the same thing happened to them, and all their pictures would be cut out, replaced by [unintelligible]. And I thought it was quite nice. And I carried it to two Space Marine chapters whose [unintelligible]. Why? I had never decided. It was along the lines of they had done some bad and then made up for it. And their reward for their redemption was to be removed. So the terrible bad things they did would be forgotten. And their redemption would be forgotten."
Q: Was there ever any plans to ultimately reveal or give history--
"No."

Priestley continues to discuss the benefits of leaving it a mystery. I'm not transcribing the whole thing, but here is a relevant bit:
"If you leave them, who knows who these two are, you can always go back and decide, but the moment you decide you leave the mystery out of it."
"Once you revisit it, you've almost spoiled it in some way."

Priestly continues to discuss the Dark Angels. In the beginning, the Dark Angels past was a secret. Something bad had happened and they were trying to make up for it. He expresses regret that GW developed that secret and said the resulting story of the unforgiven was a bit "shallow." Some quotes:
"So long as that was a mystery, it could've been anything, which gave it some character. Once it became described, it became a shame. I felt that the betrayal of splitting into two rival factions was a little shallow. It should've been something with a little more depth and character to it."

 TheChrispyOne wrote:
There's also the theory one Primarch had to be slain by Leman Russ- since he's known as the Emperor's executioner.

No, he is known as gloating about being one (with all his brothers rolling their eyes in background). Russ even states while fighting Magnus that he has no idea if Primarchs could die, which pretty much destroys that claim on the spot.

Also, for "executioner" Russ pretty much Worfs all the fights he had in Heresy and is soundly trashed in each one, including not being able mentally to kill Horus with lucky sucker punch during their duel when he finally manages to best someone making said claim even more laughable.

mrFickle wrote:
There is a quote somewhere that indicates that the space wolves had been set on another legion prior to their attack on the 1000 Sons homeworld.

That was Russ drunken brawl with Angron, where "executioner" had his butt kicked and had to resort to empty threats "if you kill me, my men will totally kill you in return" with implication that was just vain gesture (and indeed, given how easily Angron dispatches bigger groups of SM than what Russ had on hand later it's pretty much confirmed, too) and if Angron didn't already made his point and left Russ would be the first to die.

I don't get any sense of understanding about 'deep time' when I look at anything GW have set in the 40K 'past'

You know, I kinda like what he had tried to do here but the whole concept of deep time not only falls flat on its face when you consider Imperium had computer records by then, with the events preserved as holy book of literal religion, but there are also thousands if not tens of thousands of people alive who were actually born in that era. Imagine some random third dynasty Pharaoh was still around today - the concept of deep time would be instantly gone and the Ancient Egypt would be one of the best studied/known periods in human history...