This is a research project that I did in 11th grade. I based this report on the world of Magic: the Gathering. You may borrow ideas but please do not plagiarize. You know it is bad when your opponent plays a Plagiarize against you.
When
you think about myths, there are generalizations that spring into your mind:
dragons, quests, heroes, motifs, power, and good versus evil (Guin, 79). One
such system of myths is the world of Magic: the Gathering. Released in 1992, its
influence has spread throughout the world in a continuous stream of cards,
comics, novels, collectibles, and apparel. Richard Garfield was the brainchild
of this extraordinary fantasy world. He created a world of spellcasting and
creatures into his own distinct universe. Today, it is now the highest-selling
card games in the gaming market. It also has a continuous story line full of
action and surprises. The stories in Magic: the Gathering always integrate the
universe itself: the land, the people, and the beliefs. However, Magic is not a
completely new concept of ideas. Magic: the Gathering borrows some of its basic
elements from conventional myths.
As a whole, the Magic universe is considered a multiverse (Abbey, 3). As
the name implies, the multiverse consists of countless planes that are tenuously
linked (Wizards). Dominia is the name given to this vast multiverse. The planes
within Dominia are their own separate worlds. Like layers of a sandwich, each
plane is different from another; they contain different ingredients. Each plane
is separate from another; nevertheless, they combine to support the structure of
the multiverse. What all the planes have in common is their ability to produce
mana. Mana is a term uncommonly used by various belief systems as a form of
energy. Chinese myth incorporated mana (spelled manna) in a way that manna
springs gave those who consumed it immortal vitality (Christie, 37). The Magic
universe uses mana in a similar way. Mana in the Magic universe comes from the
land (Wizards). Sorcerers draw mana from the lands of the planes and use it to
cast spells. Mana is like the electricity that powers them. In the Magic
universe, there are six different kinds of mana. Five of them come from the five
colors of Magic. The colors are black, blue, green, red, and white. Each color
represents a different aspect of Dominia, drawn from different kinds of lands.
Black mana comes from the swamps, blue mana comes from islands, green mana comes
from the forests, red mana comes from the mountains, and white mana comes from
the plains (Play Guide, 35-40). Black is the element of death and decay. Three
colors; Blue, and Red, control the five elements; earth, heaven, water, fire,
and thunder and lightning. The significance of the red and blue colors in Magic
is that they are adversaries to each other because they control opposing
elements. The elements are reoccurring in Chinese mythology (Christie, 45).
Since there are five colors, they form a pentagram sequence when they form a
circle. Upon looking at the back of Magic cards, one can see that the order is,
clockwise from top, white, blue, black, red, and green. In addition, each color
has two allies and two enemies. The way the gathering circle in the back of the
cards are arranged so that each color has an ally on either side of it and its
enemies are nearly opposite if it. If you take each color and draw a line to its
enemy colors, you would get a pentagram. A famous Greek mathematician, Euclid,
believed the pentagram contained some protective properties. The pentagram was a
symbol of good luck and security. The colors of Magic also created a natural
balance in the universe because each color has an opposing force that it faces.
This is similar to the Tao yin-yang concept of harmony in opposites (Christie,
21). The opposing colors create a stable force that gives the multiverse of
Dominia its power to prevent itself from collapse. Each of the planes in the
multiverse has a different balance in mana. Some planes have more mana of a
certain color than other planes. These elements form the basis of existence in
Dominia.
One
plane worthy of notice is the dark world of Phyrexia. Phyrexia in essence, is
the underworld of Dominia. It is composed of black mana. The central leader of
this plane, named Yowgmoth, is possibly a planeswalker, who is a person who can
travel between planes. The plane is full of death and suffering. Demons and
priests reside in this plane, monitoring slavers such as gremlins, diggers and
newts. When any animate beings fail to continue working, they are processed and
recycled to create other workers. There is no happiness in this plane, for the
inhabitants only listen and obey the
higher powers. The important aspect of this plane, other than the obvious fact
that it is evil, is that there are nine spheres all contained within the First
Sphere. The Ineffable, who is Yowgmoth, lies in Phrexia's core in the Ninth
Sphere. Anyone familiar with knowledge of Chinese mythical beliefs can make out
similarities between Phyrexia and Hell. According to the myths, Chinese Hell
consists of between 10 to 14 levels, similar to Phyrexia’s spheres (Christie,
53). The bottommost level is the most diabolical of all. Each of the spheres in
Phyrexia and the levels of Hell specialize in different activities. Not
surprisingly, Phyrexia and Hell share some properties in corresponding spheres.
For example, in Phrexia’s Seventh Sphere, newts (workers) dig and excavate the
ground and the demons supervise. In the Seventh Hell, grave diggers and flesh
eaters are abundant. Thus, there is parallelism between this particular plane in
Magic and a universe from another culture.
Certain
beliefs exist in the Dominian multiverse that influences the creatures’ lives.
Each culture and race has a different religion, as in real life. In Greek and
Roman mythology, Gaea (or Gaia) united with the heaven to create the earth. Gaea
gave birth to nature and life, allowing it to survive and prosper (Hamilton,
331). Gaea was a profound influence on ancient cultures. In Dominia, the
inhabitants know of Gaea quite well. Elvish tribes in Magic have always referred
to Gaea as their creator, and most of the elves worship Gaea. Gaea often makes
her presence known in the forest by unleashing powerful forces such as
elementals, lieges, and fighters. She is the protector of the forest, and has
all the power to command the living forces of nature. Some human beings also
worship Gaea to receive her blessings, so they can have the strength to fight
and survive. Titania, on the other hand, is a god limited to only elves. The
name Titania itself means many things. To the Dominian elves, Titania is their
god-like queen. Titania is a revered ruler who possesses the power to influence
the elves. This Titania acts almost exactly like Shakespeare’s Titania in A
Midsummer’s Night Dream. Titania keeps order among the Dominian elves. In A
Midsummer’s Night Dream, Titania is the queen of fairies (Dyer, 2).
Moreover, the connection between The Titania in Magic and the Titania in
Shakespeare lies in the definition of fairies and elves. According to Dundes’s
description of fairy in the World Book Encyclopedia, a fairy can be any
kind of small mythical creature such as pixies, goblins, trolls, and yes, elves.
This is because different parts of Europe name their little creatures
differently. In that sense, Titania rules over the same kind of beings in both
Dominian and Shakespearean stories.
Several magical members of the human race appear in the Magic multiverse.
The most common types of people who possess some power are wizards. Wizards are
also known as spellcasters, sorcerers, and sorceresses. These people use mana to
cast spells. Their powers come from many years of training, and control spells
with their minds. A subdivision of wizards is the task mages, who are sorcerers
who do a specific job. Task mages often are specialized, but limited in magic.
Witches possess magical powers like wizards, but they are generally evil and
thus use black mana to employ their magic. Shakespearean folklore depicts
witches are malevolent, evil creatures (Dyer, 28). Another perhaps magical
person is the cleric. Clerics are mostly white mana based creatures. They
specialize in healing and change. However, black mana clerics perform ghastly
rituals. The black mana clerics often perform sacrifices to show their devotion
to their beliefs. One group of people in Magic is less illusionary and more
natural: the druids. The druids seclude themselves deep in the forests of the
planes. All of the Dominian druids use the green mana from the forests. Thus,
they can manipulate nature instead of creating spells artificially. Druids in
Magic and in history performed rituals in naturally sacred places (Green,107).
These grounds are often difficult to find. Druids in European history were also
suspected of using magic in their medicine (Green, 46). Though real druids
differ to Magic druids in the case that real druids focus on humanity and Magic
druids focus on plants and animals, they both infuse the qualities of healing,
life, and rebirth. The vast majority of general myths often contain people who
have magical properties.
In the realm of fantasy, some entities appear in our own image. That is,
the creatures are humanoid, though not exactly human. Magic: the Gathering takes
the idea of these humanoid creatures and projects them as creature spells on
cards. Virtually all the creatures in Magic: the Gathering spawn from other
famous myths from the past, with a few exceptions (in which I would rather not
note to avoid confusion to the reader). There are many examples of these
“borrowed” ideas. Minotaurs, for example, come from Greek myths. The
Minotaur, with the head of a bull and the torso of a man, thrived in a network
of endless mazes called a labyrinth (Hamilton, 157). Some Dominian minotaurs
also live in labyrinths. In fact, there is a Magic card called Labyrith
Minotaur. Another Greek creature is the centaur, which has the upper body of a
man and a lower body of a horse. These creatures are belligerent and fierce,
they always want to start fights (Hamilton, 159). In the Magic cards, most of
the centaurs have a stronger offense and defense, which is associated with their
fighting spirits. Most people familiar with Greek myths should be familiar with
the gorgon Medusa. Medusa had wings, snake-hair, and any man who looked at their
faces were turned to stone (Hamilton, 144). As for Dominian medusas, they
destroy other people rather than freezing them. What made Medusa the most famous
of the gorgons was that she was the only one who could be killed, which the hero
Perseus decapitated Medusa in the popular myth (Hamilton, 144). This sign of
mortality gave Medusa the adequate role of a Magic creature card, since all
Magic creatures are mortal, but very old. In relation to Greek mythology, there
is also the cyclops. The cyclopses were fearless, big, and stupid (Hamilton,
85). Cyclopes of Dominia are likewise because they are generally large and
medium creatures that have restrictions on their abilities, which proves true to
their counterparts in Greece. Also,
there are sea creatures, commonly known as mermaids and mermen in traditional
folklore. However, Dominia combines the two genders and calls the entire race
the merfolk. One type of Magic merfolk, called the seasingers, is similar to the
Sirens in The Odyssey. The Sirens sang alluring songs that drove seamen
crazy. Those who heard the song of a Siren would jump off their boat and swim to
the Siren’s island and led their deaths (Hamilton, 223). The Sirens gained
control over others much like seasingers in Magic. On another note, a humanoid
creature that is always evil is the demon. Demons come from a wide-range of
myths from Europe and Asia. Basically, demons are considered to be evil spirits.
Their origins range from restless souls to minions of Hell (Dyer, 55, Christie,
53). Magic’s Demons are somewhere between. They are large, powerful creatures
who have destructive capabilities, which draw their power from black mana.
Another kind of restless spirit is the ghost. Ghosts are dead people who have
died a sudden, violent death. Thus, their spirits roam the living world in
search of a home. Ghosts make few appearances as creature cards and ore often
weak In Magic: the Gathering. Ghosts are also shy in both worlds of Dominia and
mythology (Dyer, 43). Lastly, one of the largest categories is consists of the
fairy. In Magic: the Gathering, the spelling used for this specie is faerie,
a name possibly taken from old English texts such as Spenser’s The Faerie
Queen. Faeries divide into different categories. England calls them
brownies, bucos, and pixies; France calls them goblins; Germany calls them
kobolds and nixes; and Scandinavian countries call them elves and trolls (Dundes,
10). Except for bucos and nixes, the rest of the faerie-related creatures appear
as Magic cards in the multiverse. Shakespeare makes many references to fairies
in his works like A Midsummer’s Night Dream
as well as Chaucer’s Merchant’s Tale. Will o’-the-wisps from
the Merchant’s Tale are
mischievous faerie pranksters, and the same is true to Magic’s Will
o’-the-wisps. Other kinds of little creatures are banshees and leprechauns,
which come from Scotland and Ireland respectively. All the faerie creatures are
small and child-like (Dyer, 1). Thus, it is not surprising that they are small
creatures with low power/toughness on Magic cards. Other sources to compare
faeries to are the numerous fairy tales of Mother Goose and Grimm. Most of those
tales involve fairies in on form or another. Of all the creatures in Magic, this
category of humanoid creatures is the largest.
Dominia also has many mythical beasts that come from other sources. The
hydra, for instance, is a multi-headed creature that grow more heads every time
one becomes severed off (Hamilton, 171). Dominian hydras work the same way. They
“grow” heads by activating their special abilities. Another kind beast in
Magic is the kraken. The krakens are, in essence, giant octopuses (Ley, 202). In
the famous story written by Jules Verne, 2,000 Leagues Under the Sea, a
kraken is the beast responsible for attacking Captain Nemo’s ship (Ley, 209).
Krakens are very massive sea creatures in Magic as well as mythology, which can
grow as big as, or bigger than, whales (Ley, 204). Another kind of undersea
creature is the sea serpent. Sea serpents are blue mana creatures because they
live in the oceans like the kraken. The sea serpent probably derives from Greek
and Roman, as well as Norse mythology. The God of the Sea, Poseidon (Neptune in
Roman), commands sea serpents to harm his enemies. The sea serpents capabilities
are limited to the waters and the shores, since they cannot fly or crawl. Norse
fishermen in the past saw sea serpents as a bad omen (Ley, 211). Before the
Colombian Era, European mapmakers drew sea serpents and dragons lurking in
uncharted territory (Compton). They believed that serpents attacked the ships
and ate the crewmen (Ley, 213). Magic sea serpents are mostly restricted to the
sea, and thus cannot move far inland. As fearsome as the serpents may be, it is
the dragons that are among of the most fearsome creatures to exist in Chinese
and European mythology. Their legends spread in Northern Europe during Middle
Ages (Compton). Likewise, Dominian dragons are most imposing in the multiverse.
They are the largest of the flying creatures in Magic and wreck havoc on the
towns. Dragons have “bat-like wings” and from their nostrils bring “clouds
of smoke and flame that brought death” (Compton). In fact, all dragons in art
have wings (Ley, 41). Dragons are also called “kites”, which is German for
dragon. Drakes are smaller versions of dragons. The name of dragons and drakes
derive from the word “draco”, meaning keen eyes (Ley, 38). Another related
creature is the wurm, which is a certain wingless dragon in Magic. The word
“lindwurm” is a German word, with “lint” meaning snake (Ley, 38). In
fact, Lindwurm also happens a German Craw Wurm card in Magic. They are long,
serpentine land creatures that create devastation in their path. The king of
dragons is called the basilisk (Ley, 41). A basilisk is usually green and has
the appearance of a big lizard or iguana. In 1480, Pieter von Leu published Dialous
Creaturarum in the Netherlands and stated, “ There is a kind of lizard
that is called the basilisk in Greek…Even serpents flee the basilisk because
of its breath and appearance.” According to legend, a basilisk can kill with
its venomous breath or by simply looking at it (Ley, 43). In Dominia, the
basilisk does the same thing: they use venom to kill other creatures after
combat. Basilisks do not fly like dragons, however, but they are just as deadly.
On the other hand, some peaceful beasts roam the multiverse. The unicorn and
Pegasus are horse hybrids that are often helpful to people. The Pegasus in Greek
Mythology helped Bellerophon in his many quests (Hamilton, 140). The beasts in
historical myths and Dominia share the same qualities; they just appear in a
different form.
There are more parallel elements between Magic: the Gathering and traditional mythology yet to be discovered. So far, the multiverse of Dominia borrows much of its details from ancient folklore. A possible reason it does this is so that its readers can relate to the Magic storyline. The famous science fiction writer Ursula K. Le Guin once said that, by creating familiar images in stories, the readers can relate to the myths (Guin, 80). Thus, it is how people can relate to myths is what makes Magic: the Gathering, as well as other stories, some of the greatest epic adventures read today.
Exploratory
Sources
Abbey,
Lynn. Planeswalker, Wizards of the Coast: Renton, WA, 1998.
Christie,
Anthony. Chinese Mythology. Peter Bendric Books: New York, 1985.
Dundes,
Alan. “Fairy.” The World Book, 1987. Vol 7, p 10-11.
Dyer,
Rev. T.F. Thistelton. The Folklore of Shakespeare. Dover Publications,
Inc.: NewYork, 1966.
Green,
Miranda. The World of the Druids. Thames and Hudson: London, 1997.
Guin,
Ursula K. Le. The Language of the Night. G.P. Putnam’s Sons: New York,
1979.
Hamilton,
Edith. Mythology. Penguin Books: New York, 1969.
Ley,
Willy. Exotic Zoology. The Viking Press: New York, 1955.
Priest,
Harold M. PhD. Spenser’s The Faerie Queen. Cliff’s Notes Inc.:
Lincoln, NB,
1997.
(No
author) Compton’s Home Library. (1997). Compton’s Interactive Encyclopedia
(1997 ed.). [CD-ROM]. TLC
Properties. Available: The Learning Company.
(No
author) “Storyline.” Wizards of the Coast. [Online]. Available:
www.wizards.com/magic/genre/storyline/wom-intro.asp.
[April 21, 2000].
(No
author) “ The Magic World.” Magic: the Gathering Starter Play Guide.
1999.
P 35-40.