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TP Theory -Arbiter's Grounds

PapilioTempesta

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I am looking a lot on Twilight Princess these days, looking for references and anything that may come handy to write my fanfic; and so I keep noticing things.

Just now I was running through Arbeiter's Grounds, and into the Mirror Chamber. the first time we go there, there is a statue of a woman that made me think...

...What if Arbeiter's Grounds is in fact the Sand Temple from OoT?

Both buildings have quite a lot in common: they are great and lonely buildings at the far edge of the desert (true, geography changed a lot between those two games, but this still is the desert Ganondorf comes from), they both have great statues of a woman (the goddess of the sand in OoT, and someone who could be the very same goddess in TP), they have the same dungeon-like structure (which AG shouldn't have, being in fact a prison); and they are far away from everything.

What I think is that the Royal Family attacked the Gerudo after discovering Ganondorf's plot in OoT, conquered their Valley and desert, and claimed the temple to turn it into a prison for the worst criminals. Then they moved the Mirror there (it is supposed to exist during OoT, but it's never shown. maybe it was stored in Hyrule Castle, maybe in the ToT...). Way later they decided it was too expensive to maintain a prison so far away, and they abandoned it, sealing the valley's access and letting the desert sands invade it.

What do you think?
 

BoxTar

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Its an interesting theory. I find only one flaw:

I would think that the Royal Family would respect the Spirit Temple. By this, I mean that the Temples are spiritual places, respected by many and protected by sages. I don't think Hylians would think of transforming such a spiritual and powerful place into a prison for evil beings. Temples are made to protect the sages, and putting a bunch of evil criminals inside of them wouldn't make much sense. Think of it like turning the Vatican into a high security prison. Its just overall a bad idea.

But there's a lot of good ideas in this. Other than that one flaw, I believe that it could have been completely possible.
 
Joined
Jul 7, 2012
i can kinda see that happening. they invaded the gurudo territory during the war when Ganondorf invaded, but Hyrule was prepared and over time they won the war probably by invading and takeing over the desert. now seeing that the land had no true value they made it into a prison for the worst criminals and soon discovered the secret of the mirror. they probably made the gurudo fortress into their main HQ, were the guards could sleep and turned the temple into the prison. then well like you sead over time they abandoned it probably due to ether by costs or that its haunted.
 

Justac00lguy

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I've seen many people make this theory before and I can see why, similar locations, similar themes and a very similar statue that seems to resemble the Goddess of Sand.

SPOILER However one thing disproves this theory in my opinion, in Twilight Princess we saw a cut scene with the Ancient Sages. In this scene they attempt to execute Ganondorf, in Hyrule Historia it reveals that these events happen several years after Ocarina of Time when the Hero of Time had proof of Ganondorf's intentions to take over Hyrule. Now this scene happens in the same place as the present Arbiter's Grounds which if it was previously the Spirit Temple then we would have seen a different setting altogether.

It also seems that the Arbiter's Grounds are a renowned through history, look at this quote;
[ilquote=Auru] There's a story I heard once, long ago... It was when I worked for the royal family, educating the young princess Zelda...The Gerudo Desert once held a prison built to hold the worst criminals this land has ever known...[/ilquote]

This would seem to point that the Arbiter's Grounds are actually ancient, now the Spirit Temple was more of a place of worship than an actual prison of sorts. So taking all this into account I see these two places as being completely separate, nice to see more theories from you though. :yes:
 
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Beauts

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I think the Arbiter's Grounds is in a different part of the desert (perhaps a part controlled by the royal family, as the Gerudo part is not- it has it's own King, Ganondorf himself). OoT Link is unaware of it because he doesn't need to go there- also, he only visits the desert as an adult, after Ganondorf takes over. He is there to rid the Spirit Temple of evil. The Arbiter's Grounds is an executioners workplace!. Sure, both have depictions of the Goddess of the Sand, but I believe that's just a reference to Gerudo culture and beliefs in general. But I think this distinction in purpose is essential and gives explanation enough for why they must be separate places... in my opinion anyway.
 

PapilioTempesta

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You all have a point: let me sum up:

- Firstly, given the great respect all deities, spirits and guardians get in Hyrule, probably the Royal family wouldn't dare to turn a Temple into a prison, even if it's the temple of the goddess worshiped by their enemies. Arbiter's Grounds has some similar architecture style than the Sand temple, but maybe that can be said of any Gerudo old/important building (their fortress had more military proposes), and don't need to be the same.

- Maybe AG did exist already, either as a prison or something else the gerudo used it for (the word Zoo comes to mind... if only because of the great animal that died in its top floor and turned into the fossil boss). There are a lot of undead there, but this can either be Gerudo's enemies or later prisoners. AG could easily exist in OoT, because Link must cross the desert only in one direction to get the temple and is unable to see what is around; AG could have been there all the time.

- This leads me to think about the geography. I uphold my theory that the Hylians invaded the Valley and desert after the war, claimed AB to make a prison out of it and eventually abandoned the desert and the valley. The entrance to the valley was then blocked either by the Hylians or just by natural causes. The access to the valley could still exist in TP:

(from a former thread)
When you cross Hylia lake from the castle side, after passing under the huge tree, you cross another little wooden bridge before reaching ground. I first paid no attention to it, but later on I wondered what was below it. As I could not see it from there (bloody fences), I went down to the lake, close to the place where you howl for the bird to come carry you. From there it's easy to see a gorge under the wooden bridge that leads to some east-ward place... such as the Gerudo Desert!

That's what I think: back to the time when Hyrule Realm was rich and powerful (they look more like decrepit and lazy these days...), there used to be a path that connected the Castle to the Lake -maybe a road that, once destroyed, was partly used to build the cookoo jumping business-, and from the lake to the Desert through that gorge. Back then, when the kingdom was enough powerful to maintain all its great infrastructures, including the prison in the desert, which surely was operational and needed carts to bring food and prisoners to them.

- In TP, we get to the desert via cannon, which leads us directly to the area of AG, quite far from the Temple and the old fortress.

So far, so good. However, I still don't know how to fit in the Mirror and the sages. One would think they should go together, so they can look over it; but I think the sages were in the Temple of light (or the sacred realm?, ah, what's that place they all are in OoT?), so back to OoT, the mirror should be with them -no-one ever said the mirror couldn't be moved from one place to the other.
We know for sure both the sages and the mirror were in AB when Ganondorf was executed, but that was several years after his false alliance treaty, time enough to have a war, exterminate the Gerudo and placing the mirror in AB.
 

Justac00lguy

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PapilioTempesta said:
This leads me to think about the geography. I uphold my theory that the Hylians invaded the Valley and desert after the war, claimed AB to make a prison out of it and eventually abandoned the desert and the valley. The entrance to the valley was then blocked either by the Hylians or just by natural causes.*
However I think it's more the other way round, the Grounds itself seem to be more of a Hylian construction not a construction of the Gerudos who, in Ocarina of Time , were against the Hylians at that current time.

Look at this picture...

TthvdTi.jpg


This is the prime symbol of the Triforce and the Hylians, it's used on the likes of the Hylian Shield and armour etc. This symbol is also present at the top of the Grounds where the Ancient Sages reside as seen below:
d3M9QnP.jpg

This makes me believe that the structure was firmly built by the Hylians and through time it became abandoned, maybe this could have been at the death of the water sage when Ganondorf escaped but I guess we will leave this down to assumption.
 

PapilioTempesta

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Yes, there are a lot of symbols of the Hylians, but notice they are only on the outside; the details in the inside suggest the building was the Gerudo's doing (sand goddess' statues, whole Gerudo-like architecture...), and that the Hylians, once defeating them, conquered it and added their own symbols to the place. All the triforces and Hyrule symbols outside AB look rather showy, as if saying "this place is ours now." It would be something like the triumphal arch, to show the might of the Hylians.
 

Justac00lguy

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Yes, there are a lot of symbols of the Hylians, but notice they are only on the outside; the details in the inside suggest the building was the Gerudo's doing (sand goddess' statues, whole Gerudo-like architecture...), and that the Hylians, once defeating them, conquered it and added their own symbols to the place. All the triforces and Hyrule symbols outside AB look rather showy, as if saying "this place is ours now." It would be something like the triumphal arch, to show the might of the Hylians.
Ahh yes but the tall features on the top of the grounds look very much apart of the inner structure, if you look at this picture you can see that pole like structures that contain the triforce symbol are very much not an outer structure.
320px-Arbiter's_Grounds.jpg
 

PapilioTempesta

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This may be pulling the theory too far, but that high features may still be a show of Hylian's power: they look pretty much like roman war banners.

Banderes romanes.jpg

They could have been brought by the soldiers during the war, or maybe later when they changed the building into a prison. I believe they didn't execute Ganondorf right away, they had a few years, time enough to make changes in AG. Plus, the high features represent the power of the sages; it isn't strange to think they were put in the highest place -maybe the columns were already there, maybe they used to hold Gerudo banners (if they had any...)
 
S

Saga Dragmire

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What about the fact that the Spirit Temple from OoT was in a mountain? Maybe, as stated before, the hylians thought that the sages finished their job and decided to dig out, and redo the temple. And since the sages were gone, they started to use it a dungeon.
 

Beauts

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What about the fact that the Spirit Temple from OoT was in a mountain? Maybe, as stated before, the hylians thought that the sages finished their job and decided to dig out, and redo the temple. And since the sages were gone, they started to use it a dungeon.

1) The Spirit Temple is in a mountain? I was under the impression it is it's own building considering mountains don't usually pop up too much in the middle of deserts
2) It is clearly not the Arbiters Ground. It's possible of course that the Ground is located in the Desert Colossus but that the Spirit Temple no longer existed during the execution (maybe demolished in an attempt to kill Twinrova?) But they wouldn't use the Temple 'as' the ground because the execution takes place outside, and the Spirit Temple is a building.
 
S

Saga Dragmire

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It seems as if it was under a mountain, but you might be right. What if Twinrova destroyed the temple and the hylians/gerudos rebuilt it, using it as a prison instead of an actual temple
 

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