Next Article
Article List
History page
Timeline
Agree? Disagree? Tell me using...
The form
Message Board
The opinions on this page are those of the Mariner. Do not use any of this unless you get permission from him.
11 - 06 - 00
First of all, I shall prove that these sages did in fact exist. Since these sages were not like the sages from OoT, I am defining the original sages as a group of people with exstensive knowledge of the Triforce and a certain amount of power. In OoT, the sages had to be awakened. In other words, they did not know they were sages until Link met up with them as an adult. Some type of spell had to heve been cast in order for this to happen. Who would have cast a spell to awaken people to protect the Triforce than the original protectors of the Triforce: the sages? Next proof: the Book of Mudora. In all the games, Link starts out with virtually no knowledge of what the Triforce is like. This must be the state of knowledge of the common folk. In other words, the Book of Mudora had to have been written by someone with inside knowledge of the Triforce, perhaps by someone in the royal family. But if that were so, wouldn't the book remain with the royal family instead of being found in a library? Thus, someone with extensive knowledge of the Triforce through outside means must have written the book. There are other reasons as well (Kaepora Greabora was a reincarnated sage, the Temple of Time, etc.) but you get the point.
When did these people live? Are they in a time period that we know nothing about, or is there some connection to another event alluded to in the games? The only past event we have is the Legend of Zelda (the sleeping Zelda story). And the story fits rather well with the sages. The king used the Triforce. Yet it seems obvious that only a very few number of people have that power. Thus, the idea of a long series of kings using the Triforce is bad (see article 3). In other words, that king had to have found the Triforce. He wouldn't have stumbled across the Sacred Realm alone. Perhaps others did and told the king. In any case, no king would enter such a strange land alone. Others were with him. Those others might have been his advisors, or other people close to him. They were almost certainly skilled in wizardry in order to find the Sacred Realm. And the king was not motivated by greed, so he would not have gotten rid of his companions after recieving the Triforce. In fact, he would have kept them close to him, to advise him and study this power. These people were the sages.
One should note that there was no official meaning to sage, and the title sage might not have even existed. There was no "awakening" process, and no appointing to the position. The role of the sage was probably completely informal. They took to studying the Triforce and learning everything they could about it. This is the time period when most, if not all, of the Triforce legends came about. The sages learned about these legends, like the Cataclysm, perhaps from the Triforce itself. They wrote everything down in one volume, the Book of Mudora. The king may have participated in this; there is no way of knowing.
We can even make some speculations as to whom some of these sages are. I will list them from order of certainty. In other words, the first one us almost definitely a sage while the last one has a remote possibility of being a sage.
Kaepora Greabora: the stone said he is a reincarnated sage. I believe there was only one group of sages before OoT. There is our answer.
Rauru: Somewhere in his speech after you wake up after 7 years, he refers to the original sages as "we." Does he mean "we" as sages in general or in a more personal overtone? Plus, was Rauru living in the Sacred Realm? How would he have gotten there unless he was from a time before the seal?
The king: This all depends on how you define the sages. He may be considered a sage, he might not.
The wizard who made Zelda sleep: There is no law saying that sages must be good. Perhaps greed overcame his decency. He was close to the king, as all sages probably were, and he had enough power that a single Triforce piece could not overcome it. If that is so, then he must have had some knowledge of the Triforce beforehand. I may write an article about this.
Mudora: The book was written at this time. Maybe Mudora refers to the author? It is a possibility, albeit a small one.
Anyway, what else did they do? Not much until the death of the king. After the king died, the Triforce split, for his son could not control it. His search for the missing pieces ended when Zelda fell asleep. He was grief stricken and had lost all lust for this power. He realized it was too much and asked that it be sealed away. The sages, as possibly the only people alive with knowledge of the Triforce, took this task. They sealed it within the Sacred Realm. But not permanently, obviously. They forged the Master Sword, built the Temples of Time and Light, and created the Ocarina of Time and the spiritual stones. These were the keys to opening the Sacred Realm (quothe Rauru: "The Master Sword was the last key to the Sacred Realm"). They also cast a spell to awaken a group of sages to aid the bearer of the Triforce if the seal was ever opened. They probably transferred all of their power to the sages when they would awake, and all the knowledge of the Triforce as well. Kaepora Greabora continually reincarnated himself in order to watch over Hyrule and look for one who might yield the Triforcce. Rauru stayed in the Sacred Realm and gaurded it from within. Because the Triforce was not present in Hyrule after the seal, there was no point in having sages. Thus, the idea of sages died until OoT.