This article collects all quotes made by, or about, the Aeldari Harlequins. The quotes themselves are organised in Alphabetical order using the speaker's name.
Attributed
Texts
| Tome
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| From the Tale of Cegorach's Song
|
The Laughing God looked upon the field of war and saw there shining all the steps of a dance that had yet to be. And as he saw, so too did his harlequins, and so they began the whirling steps that drew their unwilling partners to their deaths.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg 34
|
| Extract from the Teachings of Cegorach
|
Strike not where your enemy expects your blade to fall, nor even where logic dictates. Strike instead where your blow will have the greatest meaning. Leave your lesson writ large in blood upon the field of battle.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg 54
|
A
F
C
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Ceghallan of Ulthwé
|
One moment we were all but overrun by screaming zealots. The next, the Harlequins were amongst them. I almost felt pity for our enemies that day...
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 23
|
| Charoquake, Master of the Calamity Trail
|
Ours is the stage of calamity, on which we deliver the dance of death.
|
Wrath & Glory - Aeldari - Inheritance of Embers, pg. 50
|
| High Inquisitor Bronislaw Czevak, Letters to the Casophilians.
|
The Harlequins, as you may or may not know, are a faction of the Eldar race to whom the responsibility of remembrance falls. They travel from Craftworld to Craftworld, keeping the legends and ancient history of the Eldar race alive through their dance, drama and martial performance. The Harlequins are both servants of the Laughing God - the only deity of their race to survive the mighty Fall - and custodians of the hallowed Black Library of Chaos.
For the Harlequins there is no distinction between art and war; they are the archetypal warrior poets, travelling the labyrinthine expanses of the Webway, bringing enlightenment to their audiences and certain death to the servants of darkness.
|
Atlas Infernal (Novel), Foreword
|
D
D
G
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Farseer Gaeloch of Craftworld Iybraesil
|
The Harlequins fight alongside us, that much is certain. But do they fight with us? For us? That, I have less faith in. Whatever they once were is gone, subsumed by their masks, their saedath, their Laughing God and his enigmatic agenda. So must I wonder; are we aught more than tools to them? Or do the servants of Cegorach use us and our Drukhari and Exodite cousins just as we manipulate and direct the younger races of this troubled galaxy? If so, to what ends? Their strength is welcome, but their intentions trouble me deeply.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 68
|
| Sergeant Gastor, Cadian 654th
|
There were so few of them. No tanks, no artillery, just this...handful...of xenos. We expected an easy fight. Then the madness started to spread, men began to scream, to turn upon one another. The things I saw... Even now I cannot trust my own mind. Execute me, I beg you. Maybe that will finally wipe away the nightmares.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 57
|
| The Gaunt Princeling, Death Jester of the Frozen Stars
|
Do you believe that your actions are your own? That it is free will that guides your hand? You are but puppets, dancing upon strings held in death’s cold claw. So come, dance for me upon the stage of battle. Fight for me. Scream for me.
Die for me...
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 46
|
H
K
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| The Knight of Faolchú
|
We are one with our steeds. We are the Weaver Serpents, and they us, fractured facets of a fractured whole. As the Skyweaver writhed and swarmed and danced upon the aetheric gale, so do we dance through the skies upon the hot winds of war. As his bite was fire and blades, so too is ours
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 61
|
L
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Private Records of Farseer Lanriel Taranlys of Ul-Khari
|
Your people say Cegorach the Laughing God is a deity of deceit and trickery: one not to be trusted. And perhaps they’re right! But the Asuryani see only the face Cegorach shows them. He is so much more if you truly listen to his laughter. You walked the Path of the Banshee before you left Ul-Khari, yes? Then you know. Whether you dance upon the stage or across blood-soaked fields, you’ve seen how ridiculous it all is. Is grief not always with you, deep in your soul? No matter how far you run, no matter how many foes you slay, sorrow will always find you. Yet still we persevere despite how hopeless it seems. Laughing is the only sensible choice, don’t you see?
That is Cegorach: to take comfort in the absurdity of existence, to laugh in the face of despair. I fear the Asuryani have forgotten how to laugh. They see Cegorach as a trickster and a fool, but they forget it was that sardonic regard for our ancestors’ decadence that gave him warning enough to flee before Slaanesh stirred. Is that so different from the Asuryani’s exodus?
|
Wrath & Glory - Aeldari - Inheritance of Embers, pg. 146
|
| Leman Russ in A Book of A Admonitions for the Legiones Astartes
|
Harden your soul against decadence. But do not despise it, for the soft appearance of the decadent may be deceptive. One need only consider the Harlequin dancers of the Eldar to see the truth of this proposition.
|
White Dwarf 106 (UK), pg. 13,18
|
M
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Seer Menlas Fueran, Ul-Khari
|
The servants of the Laughing God adhere to none of the Asuryani’s doctrines of patience, discipline, and moderation. I have wondered many times, over many years, what I’d see behind their snarling smiles; behind their masks. Would I recognise anything about them? Is there anything behind the masks at all, or are they so immersed in the roles they dance that nothing remains of the Aeldari they were? Do they lose themselves to the roles on purpose, feeling staged, scripted emotions instead of their own? Is that how he protects them, their sly, clever god? Hiding them behind the faces of long-dead heroes. Hiding is how he saved himself, after all.
|
Wrath & Glory - Aeldari - Inheritance of Embers, pg. 136
|
P
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| The Piebald Prince, Troupe Master of the Penumbral Masque
|
The time for battle has come, and these Humans seem eager to take to the stage. So let them come. Let them ready their guns and bellow their war cries. Let them pray to their dead god for protection. When the curtain of dusk falls upon this place, they will have played their role in this tragedy and, when their screams, given our saedath the approbation of its due
|
Codex: Aeldari (10th Edition), pg. 160
|
Q
S
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Aelythagh Starsigh, warrior-poet of Craftworld Yme-Loc
|
We are a people damned by the actions of our forebears. We are brought into existence already doomed, paying a price unending for deeds committed millennia before our birth. The younger races of the galaxy believe that they endure terrible struggles, but what do they know of hardship? What can they possibly claim to understand of struggle, loss, suffering? They who live for an eye-blink amidst teeming empires of souls unnumbered? But we know. We remember, for the Harlequins will never let us forget what our people did, what we so catastrophically wrought, what we must fight to our last, dying breath.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 9
|
T
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Autarch Antelyth Thyllian of Craftworld Saim-Hann
|
They come masked and clad in motley, performers and acrobats and fools. Yet the true fools are they who judge the Harlequins at face value, who underestimate their murderous malice and utter, ruthless dedication to their cause. Show me one who mocks the Harlequins as clowns, and I shall show you a corpse in the making.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 6
|
W
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| The White Ghoul's Mirth
|
See them dance as the toxins take hold! Watch the clumsy mon-keigh twirl and lumber! Aim for their guts, double them up, make them bow before their final slumber!
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 20
|
Y
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Shadowseer Ylraith the Dread, to Archon Sekereax shortly before the Archon was driven irrevocably mad.
|
The more you resist me, the more you give way to my will. The harder you struggle, the deeper I twist the knife. Y our perceptions are mine now to do with as I choose, so step aside and drop your blades or I shall drive you down into a pit of nightmares whence you shall never, ever escape.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 73
|
Z
| Speaker
|
Quote
|
Source
|
| Magos Explorator Zabos-Rhi Tal
|
We were deep in the wilds, surveying a xenos ruin amidst the jungle when it struck. It moved so swiftly, veiled behind some variety of heretical technology, that I could cogitate neither its nature nor its attack pattern. It tore the heads from my robots. It butchered my Corpuscarii before they could summon the motive force. Why it left me alive, I do not know, but its visage is seared forever into my memory banks. Omnissiah save me.
|
Codex: Harlequins (8th Edition), pg. 38
|
Unattributed
See also
