Terran Recruitment

[Thornblood]

Hey all! I was wondering where all the Terran Astartes recruits came from. Some seem to have a specific area in mind, other legions seem to have other prerequisites... I was hoping for your advice and expertize in filling in the gaps :) Also making out the contorted names of places on earth would be great. Also also Im throwing in the original Legion names. In the comments following the legions names, there will be SPOLIERS if your not following the Heresy book series.

1: Dark Angels/ Angels Tenebraium*; yep all very secretive
2:
3: Emperors Children; Nobles of Europa- upper class Europeans.
4: Iron Warriors/ "Corpse Grinders"- informal nickname; First founded at the "Auto Plateau of Sek Amrak", 7
5: White Scars ; Apparently a very wide recruitment of different areas
6: Space Wolves; Trefoil secrets
7: Imperial Fists; Possibly from other aspirants like the War Hounds- in this case taciturn nature was the desirable quality
8: Night Lords; Partially from 'Old Albia'- Britain, entirely fro prisons, largely from those born in lightless subterranean prisons, born in darness (ala a terran legion of Bane). We can assume 'Old Alba' had a big subterranean prison. The prisons seem to be located beneath hab-hives.
9:Blood Angels
10: Iron Hands/ Storm Walkers/ The Iron Tenth; Partially from 'Old Albia'- Britain, Qavatine Plate cities, Solus Stellax (a defeated enemy during unification wars), and 'all over ancient Terra'.
11:
12: World Eaters/War Hounds; Kharn remembers mountains, and has a caribbean accent??? Angron has a russian accent?? Kharn is arabic for betrayer, so arabic name...? Screening used and the most aggressive aspirants transferred to the War Hounds. (From other Legions aspirants).
13: Ultramarines
14: Death Guard/ Dusk Raiders; Exclusively from 'Old Albia' Britain.
15: Thousand Sons; Psychically gifted apiriants came from the Achaemenid Empire, which the Emperor had ruled for a century before the Legions began to look for Aspirants.
16: Sons of Horus/ Luna Wolves; "Jutigran Bowl" Hunter Clans and others from "Samsatian sub-plate slums"
17: Word Bearers/ Imperial Heralds/ Iconoclasts (informal); possibly those who had recanted old beliefs and were willing to fight redeemed in the light of Imperial atheist beliefs.
18: Salamanders/ The Fearless (informal); Trefoil secrets
19: Raven Guard/ Pale Nomads/ Dust Clad (informal); "Central Asiatic Dustfields"
20: Alpha Legion/ 747 other names (732+ 15, see below); Its a secret! (Trefoil)

Tenebraium; Tenebrae is Latin for 'shadows' or'Darkness', also it is theevening service in formal Christian traditions on Holy week- the week leading up to easter, before the gethsemene incident and betrayals. Theres alot you can read into that.

The Trefoil; The Salamanders, Space Wolves and Alpha Legion were created separately to the other Legions, and the Emperor kept their origins and purpose a mystery. We can guess the space wolves secrets are the 'executioners' theme, the especially divergent gene seed, the horrible 'there are no wolves on Fenris' 'mystery', and generic chaos-resistance. Spoiler here; Salamanders could be Vulkan being a perpetual. Whereas Alpha legion are all about the secrets. Which lends credence to the double agent idea, or the idea that they are doing what they do best; insurgency and rebellion within the chaos ranks.

20: Alpha Legion; The Ghost Legion and The Harrowing seem to be the most well known cognomens, HH Book 3 lists 15, and refers that there are another 732 other names archived. Knowing the Alpha Legion, that probably means there are many many more.

Edit; Have changed 'Old Albia' to Britain.

[jodrell]

I'd be very surprised of "Old Albia" wasn't actually intended to be Britain, as "Albion" in WFB is clearly a joking reference to the British Isles and is another name for the island of Great Britain, going back to the ancient Greeks.

[completeHook]

from http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Albia#.VCV-n_ldWSo

Albia

Albia, sometimes called Old Albia, was a region of Terra during the Age of Strife. Bordering Northern Atlan and known for its ancient warlike Clans, the regions of Albia consisted of towering soot-blackened castram-cities. Albia is known to have clashed frequently with the Panpacific Empire under the rule of the Unspeakable King and were aided by the forces of the Emperor. However the Albians refused to kneel before the Emperor and met his Thunder Warriors with their own proto-dreadnoughts and armored ironside soldiers. In battle after battle, the Albians managed to hold back the Emperor's forces but only at staggering cost for the defenders.[1]
Admitting the martial temper and indomitable spirit of his foe, the Emperor called a ceasefire and sought a diplomatic solution. The Emperor appeared before the Albian Clan Lords unarmed and clothed in white and crimson, speaking of his vision of a unified mankind. He offered them glory among the stars and redemption. To the shock of many, the warlords of Albia, seeing the Emperor as different from past tyrants, accepted terms and soon became one of the most zealous supporters of unification.[1]
Working with the Emperor, the Ironside Clans of Albia provided some of the original recruits to the Death Guard, Night Lords, and Iron Hands.[1]


Yep, that sounds like my lot.

[Thornblood]

Albyon was Albion (Britain). Which shares no borders with the Panpacific Empire, but was ruled over by Uilleam the Red (probably a pop at Prince William). (Source Outcast Dead), lexicanum link here; http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Albyon#.VCWUT2ddVAg

They may be the same and just Alan Bligh and Graham McNeil not speaking to each other. 40k Wikia however thinks Albia is Southwestern Europe; http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Dusk_Raiders

[completeHook]

Bordering Northern Atlan

That was bit that sold it for me, however


and in the case of the XIV Legion the main bulk of the gene-recruits used were drawn from the ancient and warlike clans of Old Albia, situated in the area of southwestern Europe, and in ancient times was known as Albania.

It does say it quite unambiguously in that entry from lexicanum you linked to, Albia is Albania. :D

[Scion_of_Terra]

Is there anywhere that has a comprehensive list of Dark Age Terran nations? Off the top of my head, I can think of a number:
-Merika (also possibly Mercia?): Obvious
-Hy Braesil: Brazil, South America
-Panpacific: the Pacific basin, its waters evaporated by nuclear fire
-Yndonesia: The islands of SE Asia, now highlands on account of the oceans being evaporated
-Albia/Albion: Britain
-Gallia: France
-Talia: Italy
-Jermani: Germany
-Achaemenid Empire: Middle East, especially Persia
-Ursh: Central Asia, Russia

[Haighus]

That was bit that sold it for me, however



It does say it quite unambiguously in that entry from lexicanum you linked to, Albia is Albania. :D
Lexicanum seems to be better sourced than 40k Wikia, so I'm going to go with Lexi on this one, and bordering the Atlantic? Sounds like Blighty to me ;) Albyon could just be another region within Britain, controlled by a different faction. Judging by how hard the Albians resisted the Emperor, it is entirely possible one of their warlords didn't like the idea of just giving in like the the rest and then split off with his own territory.

[Thornblood]

So, I was kind of hoping to fill in the blank areas on the chart, if anyone has any ideas as to the original Terran recruitment for the different legions, and ideas are fine because otherwise most legions have nothing.

Also, I think there's a lack of consistency with pre-imperial Terra between the writers. Admiteddly 40k wikia has no source for Albia being Albania. However different writers have named different pieces differently.

I think an interesting point is that Legions tend to adopt styles and cultures of their primarchs homeworld. Leaving the Terran element of a legion as outsiders, often with a contrasting culture. Thousand sons for instance are from around turkey, not Egypt. Its Prospero thats Egypt themed. If Ultramar is roman/greek themed what about the recruits from Terra?

However in contrast Night Lords from Terra are recruited from underground prisons, complimentary to Nostramo's perpetual light. Also theres room for some criminal based drama here.

[Haighus]

I'm afraid I've started uni a week ago, and don't have any of my HH stuff to hand (didn't want to risk bringing something so valuable at first) so I won't be much use in filling in the blanks. The Raven Guard area is near to the Yndonesic bloc though (Book 3), so I thought it was Australia given the style of the tribal markings. Book 3 also states which tribes they were from, can't recall the names exactly.

Yeah, some of the Legions had little or no change in character after being reunited, probably the strongest example is the Imperial Fists, where the planet a Legionary is recruited from means very little within the Legion, even with their very wide variety of recruitment centres.
Imperial Fists also have the Pillar of Bone on Terra. This is the remains of one of their Terran Fortress monasteries in the Great Crusade, and is still used to recruit the Fists Terran members. No idea whereabouts on Earth it is actually based though, but possibly near to the Imperial Palace, so possibly the Himalayas and south Asia?
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Pillar_of_Bone

[Haighus]

Also, I would say that Ultramarines are Roman based, but not Greek based (in so far as anything Roman can be called not-Greek based...)
The Greek based Legion is actually the Iron Warriors IMO, they even come from Olympia, which is a planet of warring city states. Many of the Iron Warriors unit names and vehicle names are also Greek sounding, if not actually Greek ( I don't know enough Greek to know if they are actually Greek). This is post Purturabo oc.

[Thornblood]

True, Iron Warriors are very Greek in places, which adds to the mystery of the Minotaurs gene seed (but that story is for another day).

However The realm of Ultramar is pretty mixed. Whilst in the Roman corner we have plenty, but it could be attributed to the way the Legion Astartes was made up (The 1st three heresy books have some pretty roman looking luna wolves/sons of horus on the cover). However 'Prandium' is certainly a latinized name. So is 'Tarantus' but it suggests its named after a person, rather than being a name in its own right. I feel Guillimans strategy of Theory/Practical would compliment the way roman's innovated so much.

In the Greek corner sits The Fortress of Hera, The gas giant Circe, and most notably, the city of Corinth. Obviously these are not exhaustive lists.

However, there is no reason it cant be both, as both cultures have a strong pre historic link and origin (Homer's The Iliad and the much later ret-con of Virgil's the Aenead). However, I think its a culture developed within the realm of Ultramar, rather than one coming from Terra. 'The Unremembered Empire' gives us a glimpse of Macragge and to be honest the culture is closer a modern 1st world city than the greek/roman feel.

Terran's from Greece and Italy may have ended up in the Ultramarines. However- not the upper classes as they went to Fulgrim, not the violent or gladiators as they went to Angron, and not those who may be kept in underground prisons, as they went to Curze. Not leaving alot left to play with, unless an author particularly wants to play with that.

A really exciting theory (pure speculation) could be that the Ultramarines were Greek themed, but they defeated and absorbed one of the lost legions, and they were Roman themed. Perhaps it was the similarity between the Legion cultures that made the Ultramarines such good 'hosts'.

[Phaedros]

Well, the Ultramarines are all but certain to have absorbed one of the lost legions accounting for the swelling of the numbers in the Great Crusade (though I wonder if it was just the Terran born or both that were absorbed), Russ and the wolves of Fenris presumbly exterminated the other lost legion as a warm-up for Prospero down the road.

Honestly I love the smurfs, more specifically I love their not so dogmatic successors who somehow actually understand what Guilliman was getting at with the Codex Astartes without really knowing it, though it is mentioned in the lastest Codex Ultra... err... Space Marines, that many, many amendments and additions have been added to the Codex itself.