The Ages of the Mortal Realms, also called the Great Epochs, is the term for the primary periods into which the entire history of the Mortal Realms is organised by mortal scholars.
The Great Epochs are divided into three main periods or "ages" that define the history of the realms and the period before the start of the first age, the Age of Myth.
Dating
The reader will note that there are no dates listed for the events described in the chronology below. This was done deliberately by the lore writers at Games Workshop for two reasons.
The in-world reason is that with years and seasons varying from realm to realm, and mortal civilisation only just being re-established in the Age of Sigmar, there would be little common frame of reference to act as a foundation for specific dates to make sense between the peoples of the different realms. The real-world reason is that in the past Games Workshop found hard and fast dates can be restrictive in creating new stories, and breaking those restrictions can lead to many a quandary. Instead, they now prefer to measure time in looser terms like centuries and generations.
This gives the writers more wiggle room for manoeuvre, and it lends more of an epic feel than a scientific one to a high fantasy setting like Warhammer Age of Sigmar.
Before the Ages
In the time before the Age of Myth, known as the period Before the Ages, the World-That-Was was destroyed by the victory of the forces of Chaos during the End Times and its core, Mallus, was launched into the deepest Aetheric Void. The Ascended god Sigmar, who had returned to the World-That-Was in its time of direst need but had been unable to ultimately save it, clung unconscious in his borrowed mortal body to its sigmarite core for millennia untold.
Elsewhere, as the aeons passed, the magical winds which had once flowed across the World-That-Was from the Realm of Chaos and eventually had destroyed it, coalesced from the magical energies of the Realm of Chaos that bled into the Cosmos Arcane. These eight "Winds of Magic" combined with the matter of nebulae, cosmic dust and the remaining debris of the former world and its solar system to form eight new realities called the Mortal Realms.
In time, intelligent life -- humans, aelves, duardin and many other species -- once more began to flourish on these Eight Realms, with each realm's environment shaped by the nature of the different lore of magic that had created it.
This period ended when the Godbeast Dracothion noticed the core of the World-That-Was careening through the void. He chased it, looking to capture it to admire its beauty for all time. The Godbeast then noticed Sigmar, reviving him with a warming breath and allowing him to ride upon his back.
Dracothion elevated the core of the World-That-Was to the firmament of the Realm of Heavens and showed Sigmar the bridges and passages that led to the realities of the Eight Realms in return for gifts of sigmarite jewellery carved from Mallus.
Age of Myth
The Age of Myth is the Great Epoch of relative peace and civilisation that existed long ago when Sigmar, the god of civilisation and progress, ruled over the Mortal Realms. This age started when Sigmar discovered the existence of the Mortal Realms born from the magical energies and physical matter unleashed by the destruction of the World-That-Was and ended when Sigmar's alliance with the other gods of the Pantheon of Order was fractured. The great powers of Chaos then assaulted the Mortal Realms, eager to again gain control over the mortal plane, and the destruction that resulted led to the birth of a new epoch, the Age of Chaos.
In this age, the various intelligent mortal races of the realms lived in civilised harmony. It was in this time that Sigmar first raised up to civilisation the primitive men he found already living among the realms, much as he had once done on the World-That-Was.
The foundations of the Age of Myth were laid with the death of another world -- the breaking of the World-That-Was, the Great Victory of the Chaos Gods, the End Times -- that forgotten epoch has many names.
Only the gods of yore and the inhuman Slann now remember it vividly, and the truth of that ancient world's demise is buried in the dust of history. Yet there are those who still abide from that time, their essence or spirit having survived the cataclysm that swallowed their world, or been resurrected by the magical powers bound to their soul at the time of that world's ending.
The ancient God-King Sigmar is foremost amongst them. His original world was shattered, its core, Mallus, hurtling through the Aetheric Void, but he clung onto it still for long ages, and was eventually borne toward the Mortal Realms. In them he found a set of realities crystallised from the physical remnants of his lost home and the scattered magical energies that had once composed and later unmade his world.
It is said Sigmar was awakened from his aeons-long slumber in the void by the Great Drake, Dracothion. Introduced by that zodiacal beast to the Eight Realms, the God-King embarked upon many great voyages of discovery, exploring each new realm in turn.
He journeyed long and far, finding enclaves of natives and overcoming the monstrous beasts that preyed upon them. Sigmar taught the scattered tribes of mankind many things, and soon they worshipped him as a deity above all others, just as they had once before in the World-That-Was.
The light of civilisation was conjured from the stuff of the lands. Over the course of a few generations, nomads with flint-tipped weapons ceased their wanderings and instead learned to build.
At first their efforts produced just rough huts, but as the centuries slid past, they built townships, cities and teeming metropolises. Trade flourished, and spires pierced the skies in every Mortal Realm.
Guided by inner knowledge and fate itself, Sigmar located and awakened other gods -- those he recognised from his former life -- with mixed consequences. Using strength as much as wisdom he formed a new Pantheon of Order around himself.
Amongst its ranks were the duardin gods Grungni, the Great Maker, and Grimnir the Furious. They were joined by darker presences -- Malerion the Shadow King, and even Nagash, the Great Necromancer, for they too desired worlds of order and progress over which to rule.
Alarielle the Everqueen saw the hope of new life in Sigmar, and the twin-headed brute Gorkamorka was won over to the God-King's cause after a duel that flattened mountains.
Each gave unto Sigmar a godly gift in return for giving them new life, and Azyr, the realm the God-King had chosen as his own, thrived like no other.
But so disparate were these gods that their common causes did not bind them for long. Over time, the fractious alliances of the Pantheon of Order faltered and broke apart. Worse still, another, far darker pantheon had set their covetous eyes upon these fertile lands.
Slowly, insidiously, the whispers and promises of these fell powers, the Chaos Gods, so eager to spread their corruption to new worlds, sowed division and treachery throughout the lands until they were ripe for conquest.
Sigmar, bearing the light of civilisation ever on, did not see many of the dangers that coiled in its shadow until it was too late. Though that light can still be seen whenever some relic or crumbled architecture is uncovered, the secrets of such splendours have since been crushed beneath the heel of Chaos oppression -- or else hidden away by the gods themselves.
Age of Chaos
The Age of Chaos, also known as the "Black Years," the "Reaving Time" and the "Great Slaughter," is one of the three Great Epochs of the Mortal Realms, preceded by the Age of Myth and succeeded by the Age of Sigmar.
The Age of Chaos began when the forces of Chaos exploited the spiritual weaknesses and ethical failures of mortals, eventually creating cracks in the foundation of reality that opened a pathway into the Eight Realms for the Chaos Gods and their daemonic servants.
But it truly came to a climax with the end of Sigmar's great alliance among the deities of the Pantheon of Order and the dominion of Chaos over the Mortal Realms following the victory of the forces of Chaos and their master Archaon the Everchosen at the Battle of Burning Skies in the Realm of Aqshy.
Even in the Age of Myth, the Pantheon of Order led by Sigmar had shown signs of strain. Nagash, god of death, sought to rule all the realms alone, creating strife and even open war between the living and the dead.
Gorkamorka's warrior spirit drew him away from Sigmar's sage counsel, forever driving a blade of conflict between the savage and the enlightened.
Tyrion, god of light and war and Malerion, god of shadow, abandoned their duties in order to capture the Dark Prince Slaanesh whilst the Chaos God was still glutted with the aelven souls of the World-That-Was it had devoured.
Elsewhere, stout Grimnir, god of war and fire, battled the godbeast Vulcatrix, the Mother of Salamanders, until both god and monster were torn apart.
From beyond the haunted Aetheric Void, the Dark Gods of Chaos looked upon the discord of the Mortal Realms. In the peoples given civilisation by their ancient enemy Sigmar, they saw fresh prey. Their whispered promises and insidious curses turned men against one another, and in that strife they found their way in.
At their command the Realm of Chaos spat forth its daemon legions once more into the Cosmos Arcane in such numbers that all other hosts seemed trivial. Despite the great valour of Sigmar's and the rest of the Pantheon's followers, his civilisations were soon beset. So began the Age of Chaos -- a time of death and deceit.
Though his enemies grew in power, and strife consumed the lands, the God-King still managed to reforge old alliances and win many battles. But ultimately it was not enough. United in conquest, the Chaos Gods had already proved far too strong.
Sigmar was forced to lead a great exodus of the Free Peoples to Azyr, the Celestial Realm, the last place of safety under the stars. The Gates of Azyr were closed behind him, and the seven realms that remained were left to their fate.
Life in the Mortal Realms then became a living hell. All hope of peace was ripped away. Every race, people and settlement bled under the bite of the Chaos axe, their lands dominated by skull-clad fortresses and blasphemous temples. Even the realms themselves began to change, twist and fall away, in places corrupted beyond recovery.
Though the mortal descendants of the World-That-Was clung to hope as best they could, only those that embraced the ways of their Chaos overlords survived for long.
Honest men fought to the death in blood-pits for the amusement of their conquerors. Priests of dead gods turned their unheeded prayers towards viler powers. Wretches scraped what meat they could from the carcasses of the fallen. The spectres of betrayal and desperation turned brother against brother and father against son.
The Chaos Gods laughed in triumph, sure in the knowledge that there existed no force mighty enough to challenge them. And yet, on the horizon, storm clouds slowly gathered...
This epoch lasted for approximately five hundred years with the forces of the Dark Gods overrunning the Mortal Realms with the exception of the Realm of Azyr. Many spike-ridden fortresses were built to drain the realms' magical essence and spill forth the baleful energies of Chaos.
After Sigmar's retreat and sealing off of Azyr, the God-King began taking the mightiest of humanity's warriors from the battlefields of the other Mortal Realms to the Azyrian city of Sigmaron to be reforged into Stormcast Eternals.
The epoch ended when the Stormcast Eternals of the Hammers of Sigmar Stormhost were sent to the Brimstone Peninsula to open the Gate of Azyr called the Whispering Gate located there and begin the Realmgate Wars to retake the Eight Realms.
Age of Sigmar
The Age of Sigmar is the name of the Great Epoch that marks the current historical era of the Mortal Realms.
Early in the Age of Chaos, Sigmar was forced to retreat from the Mortal Realms and seal off Azyr following the loss of the forces of Order at the Battle of Burning Skies to the ascendant Chaos armies of Archaon.
But Sigmar did not take this loss easily. The God-King began magically transporting the mightiest of humanity's champions from the battlefields of the other Mortal Realms at the moment of their death to the Azyrian city of Sigmaron to be Reforged into the superhuman warriors known as the Stormcast Eternals.
The Age of Sigmar began when the Stormcast Eternals of the Hammers of Sigmar Stormhost were sent to the Brimstone Peninsula of Aqshy to open the Gate of Azyr called the Whispering Gate located there and begin the Realmgate Wars to retake the Eight Realms.
Sigmar was determined to use the Stormcast Eternals as the tip of a spear that would reclaim portions of the Mortal Realms for Order, whereupon other mortals drawn from Sigmar's empire in Azyr and the liberated lands themselves would found new cities and nations to reclaim reality from the grip of the Dark Gods.
In this way, Sigmar hoped to eventually restore the realms to the peace and glory their civilisations had known during the Age of Myth, though as ever the forces of the Ruinous Powers would not surrender their hold on reality without a fight.
See Also
Sources
- Gates of Azyr (Novel) by Chris Wraight, Introduction
- White Dwarf 458 (November 2020), "Worlds of Warhammer" by Phil Kelly, pp. 10-13
- White Dwarf 459 (December 2020), "Worlds of Warhammer" by Phil Kelly, pg. 10
- Warhammer Age of Sigmar Core Book (2nd Edition), pp. 16-74
| Ages of the Mortal Realms |
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| Age of Myth | Age of Chaos | Age of Sigmar |