![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The ages of the world are accounted from the shining of the first star, from whom all other stars ultimately sprang. Before the first star shone was the time before the ages.
The First Age
The first age began with the shining of the first star. In this age, stars began to spread through the heavens, but they could speak only with their neighbours, since the language of light did not yet exist. At first this was little problem, because all stars were only a few steps from the first mother star.[1] Humans and elves were not yet awake on the earth.
The Second Age
The second age began with the invention of the language of light, and for the first time stars could communicate directly with far off stars.[2] In this age the stars continued to spread through the heavens.
The Third Age
The second age ended and the third age began with the death of the father star. In this age the stars finished populating all the heavens.
The Fourth Age
The fourth age began with the waking of elves and humans upon the earth. The elves woke first, and humans slightly later - unless it was that the stars noticed the elves first since they were more active at night. In this age the elves and humans knew nothing of each other's lands, and there was no traffic between the two.
The Fifth Age
This age began when elves first found a way to humanland, and traffic between elves and humans began. Over the course of this age the interactions between elves and humans worsened.
The Sixth Age.
The sixth age was a troubled age in humanland. It began with the founding of the first elven tyranny in humanland, and in it, tyrannies of elves came to dominate much of humanland.
The Seventh Age.
The seventh age began with the destruction of the elven tyrannies in humanland.
---
I don't know about the ages past this. I worry a bit that after the beginning of the Fifth Age, the definitions of ages are too humanland-focused. (I'm not too worried about definitions being based on events on earth rather than events in the heavens among the stars, since one of the major things stars do is observe earth. But they observe both sides of the earth equally.) One thing that should be included in the account but I don't know yet where it goes is mention of when communication is established between stars and elves, and when it is established between stars and humans.
[1] Stars, reproducing by asexual reproduction, have neither sex nor gender. When they communicate with earthlings using encodings of spoken languages, they refer to themselves with masculine and feminine terms interchangeably and apparently randomly, using both masculine and feminine terms to refer to the same star.
[2] It begins to seem as though mind-to-mind root-communication is the native communication system of stars, while the language of light is something learned secondarily - similar to reading and writing for humans.
The First Age
The first age began with the shining of the first star. In this age, stars began to spread through the heavens, but they could speak only with their neighbours, since the language of light did not yet exist. At first this was little problem, because all stars were only a few steps from the first mother star.[1] Humans and elves were not yet awake on the earth.
The Second Age
The second age began with the invention of the language of light, and for the first time stars could communicate directly with far off stars.[2] In this age the stars continued to spread through the heavens.
The Third Age
The second age ended and the third age began with the death of the father star. In this age the stars finished populating all the heavens.
The Fourth Age
The fourth age began with the waking of elves and humans upon the earth. The elves woke first, and humans slightly later - unless it was that the stars noticed the elves first since they were more active at night. In this age the elves and humans knew nothing of each other's lands, and there was no traffic between the two.
The Fifth Age
This age began when elves first found a way to humanland, and traffic between elves and humans began. Over the course of this age the interactions between elves and humans worsened.
The Sixth Age.
The sixth age was a troubled age in humanland. It began with the founding of the first elven tyranny in humanland, and in it, tyrannies of elves came to dominate much of humanland.
The Seventh Age.
The seventh age began with the destruction of the elven tyrannies in humanland.
---
I don't know about the ages past this. I worry a bit that after the beginning of the Fifth Age, the definitions of ages are too humanland-focused. (I'm not too worried about definitions being based on events on earth rather than events in the heavens among the stars, since one of the major things stars do is observe earth. But they observe both sides of the earth equally.) One thing that should be included in the account but I don't know yet where it goes is mention of when communication is established between stars and elves, and when it is established between stars and humans.
[1] Stars, reproducing by asexual reproduction, have neither sex nor gender. When they communicate with earthlings using encodings of spoken languages, they refer to themselves with masculine and feminine terms interchangeably and apparently randomly, using both masculine and feminine terms to refer to the same star.
[2] It begins to seem as though mind-to-mind root-communication is the native communication system of stars, while the language of light is something learned secondarily - similar to reading and writing for humans.