Fall of the Eldar

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Words can never express the true horrors that our people have suffered, the bloody scourge that we brought down upon ourselves. Instead, dear foes, let us show you with deeds.

The Proclamation of Woe delivered by the Harlequin sorrowsinger prior to the ‘The Fall of the Eldar’[6]


The Fall of the Eldar occurred in M31[12] and ended the Eldar's supremacy in the Galaxy. Before the Fall, the Eldar were at the height of their empire and held sway over the vast majority of the galaxy; their worlds were paradises and full of peace and cultural achievement, and then it was all but destroyed.[2] It is said that trillions of Eldar died in the cataclysm, and all who remained were the Dark Eldar and Harlequins within the Webway, the Craftworld Eldar aboard thier Craftworlds, the Exodites on their maiden worlds.[12] Despite what contemporary Harlequin stories say, the death of their empire occurred in slow and agonising stages, not all at once.[13]

History

The Fall of the Eldar, juxtaposed with the violence of the Harlequins[10]

Children of the Stars

Main article: Eldar Empire

Even before this time, it had been feared that the Eldar would fall. The Old Ones warned the Eldar about it, but their predictions and warnings were forgotten and ignored over time. The Eldar came to believe that all races were below them, even so far as calling them barbarians. This proud and arrogant ideal seemed proven by their advanced technology and control of the Webway. The Eldar created many beautiful things and lived long lives and when they died, their spirits returned to the Warp.[1] It was a golden age, lasting millennia.[7]

Slowly, the pride of the Eldar overcame their caution and they became ever more proud and arrogant. They had long since outgrown the need for physical labour as their society provided all, leaving them with only their own desires to satisfy. Even military conquest was waged by their machine creations, and many found themselves without purpose.[1]

Descent into Depravity

As the millennia passed, the magnificence of the Eldar Empire gave way to complacency, corruption, indolence, and spiritual decay as many gave in to hedonistic desires.[7] Pleasure cults sprang up over the Eldar lands, and the pantheon of Eldar Gods was gradually abandoned in favour of personal deification through insane excess – the Aeldar would not become gods, however.[7]

In these new cults, dedicated to the different aspects of arcane knowledge and sensual excesses, people became more and more corrupt, delving into vicious practices, verging on sadism. Sadistic killers prowled the streets in search of victims, attempting to find new ways to satisfy their needs. It became harder and harder to satisfy their decadent desires, so these acts became more violent. Soon the streets were running with blood and the bestial roar of the crowds could be heard throughout the Eldar empire.[1] For long dark years the Eldar turned upon themselves, sinking to sickening depths: torturing and killing their own kind, eating their own dead, and mutilating their once-great civilisation.[11] Law and order broke down and some Eldar left their worlds as refugees, seeking a more peaceful existence.[1]

However, the degeneration of the Eldar did not go without resistance. Harlequins continued to perform the ancient dances and mythic cycles, seeking to remind the Eldar of all they were abandoning.[7] Some among the Eldar, derided as fanatics obsessed with self-denial and suffering by their hedonistic brethren, fled their homeworlds in a great Exodus. These Exodites would settle untamed worlds far from the core of the Eldar Empire, leading difficult lives at the fringes of the galaxy.[4] Yet others remained, only fleeing when doom seemed certain aboard Craftworlds.[2]

Birth of a Dark God

The gestalt psychic outpouring from the Aeldari descent into perverted madness nurtured a new deity in the warp[7] and as a direct result of their foul depravity, a new Chaos God was spawned: Slaanesh, formed mainly by the Eldar's lusts and desires. For years before, the Eldar race had been plagued with the images of the sleeping entity. The Eldar slew each other and feasted on the corpses of their fellow kin, while the worlds around them burned. As Slaanesh was born, there was not a single Eldar who did not feel the pain. With a psionic cry, Slaanesh assaulted the universe and the spirits of the Eldar were drawn from their bodies and sucked into the warp. No other creature of the Warp had such a violent birth as Slaanesh, or was as powerful or monstrous.[3b]

The Dying

Eldar Crone World after the Dying.[10]

Slaanesh entered existence with a hungry howl[7], a psychic implosion the epicentre of which laid within the heart of the Eldar homeworlds where the Eldar population was concentrated, tearing Realspace asunder leaving the malignant wound known as the Eye of Terror.[4] The overwhelming majority of the Eldar spread across thousands of light years died, their spirits sucked into the warp to be devoured by Slaanesh, even fleeing Craftworlds were overtaken.[2] The ancient worlds of the Eldar are now Crone Worlds - now home to Daemon Princes[3b], and tombs of the greatest Eldar artefacts.[4]

The Murdered Pantheon

Main article: Fall of the Gods

Slaanesh slew the Eldar Gods viciously — Lileath, Asuryan, even the old, blind Morai-Heg were murdered by Slaanesh. Khaine, the mightiest warrior of the gods did battle with Slaanesh in the Warp and was cast down, eventually shattered into a million pieces that became his Avatars.[3a]

Aftermath

Far from Eldar space, many of the Exodite worlds survived the Fall[4] as did many craftworlds, their wraithbone ships protecting against Slaanesh's howl.[2] Already outside of realspace, the pleasure cults of the mercantile city of Commoragh survived as the Dark Eldar.[9] Small numbers of renegade Chaotic Eldar survived within the Eye of Terror, to the rest of their race they were forever lost.[8] The Eldar were now a scattered race, to be hunted by the Great Enemy for the rest of eternity.[3b]

The eruption of psychic energy blew away the warp storms that had made interstellar travel impossible for thousands of years[4], allowing the Emperor to launch the Great Crusade which would create the Imperium.[5]

Sources

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