Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-24640703-20140419210003/@comment-2A02:C7D:B437:D700:987D:50C3:1E11:100-20170909061340

I guess I read it a bit differently.

I thought Sermon 22 suggested that Vivec started the brotherhood.

Vivec took Mephala's place as a god, right?

So I see the story being that the sword was being kept from Vivec because they considered him lesser than Mephala.

The whole 'give me back what is barren from my marriage' thing could be Vivec saying that since he took Mephala's place he has lost many of her followers, including the assassins, and wants them back. The 'marriage' being him joining the pantheon of gods.

Vivec demonstrates his power by kissing the stones and saying he is 'master evermore', which I guess is his way of saying 'I am your god'.

He recruited 'mothers of morag tong', which i think means the most senior women in the organisation, and made them his 'wives'. These morag tong leaders then recruited 'murderous sons'. This seems like a metaphor for the first Night Mothers and first Listeners, Speakers, etc. Essentially, he creates the dark brotherhood families. Also, considering that the Night Mother is apparently the bride of Sithis, if we consider Sithis and Vivec as the same person, this makes sense.

Then again, maybe Vivec is just a mass-rapist who forced hundreds of women to sleep with him and had thousands of children. However, how that leads to the Assassin King giving him the blade isn't clear...

Following the success of what Vivec did by restructuring the Morag Tong as The Brotherhood, the Assassin King acknowledges that Vivec is right. He presents Vivec with the sword to show that he accepts him over Mephala. Even 'House Mora' has become 'fond of' Vivec, suggesting that Vivec became unchallenged in his attempts to take over the assassins.

In summary, Vivec as Sithis has demonstrated to the assassins that he is a legitimate heir to Mephala and has recruited 'mothers' and a number of followers. The assassins who believed in Vivec as the new Mephala became Dark Brotherhood memebers, those who did not believe that Vivec had succeeded Mephala remained as Morag Tong or were murdered.

I accept that this is pretty out-there for a theory but I am sure that I read somewhere (probably on this website) that as a result of succeeding Mephala, Vivec found himself drawn to sexual and murderous desires, which would link nicely.

Of course, Vivec has disappeared now and Mephala has returned to her place in the pantheon - so modern Night Mothers would be 'wed' to Mephala.

It's worth noting that both Mephala and Vivec are said to have no fixed gender and can choose to appear as male or female.