Artemisia and the QM theory

[Marky Tee]

maybe she just spent too much time on her knees?

[The Crystal]

Or "maybe" she doesn't have any accent in the original/japanese version, but the translators of the american version decided to give her one. :rolleyes2

That's what I'm talking about.

[Sword]

The words on the paintings are Latin, not Greek.

None of what you said makes any sense anyway. WTF is "griever on the moon" about?

[BardTard]

Or "maybe" she doesn't have any accent in the original/japanese version, but the translators of the american version decided to give her one. :rolleyes2

That's what I'm talking about.

She talks like that cus she's Jewish. She's speaking Hebrew. They meant to put the emphasis on the K sound.

[Serapy]

VIII is not clear cause it was written poorly. It lacks a defined world structure and bounces from one unrelated plot element to the next leaving players to piece together its scattered plot. I still feel its pretty good but definetly poor in its presentation and execution.

I feel the lack of meaningful story ties is enough to justify R does not = U actually. If it was relevant (and I think we can all agree that R=U is a big deal storywise) then I feel the game would have been a little more blunt about it instead of hiding it behind minor background information that can easily be taken out of context. Granted, I feel Nojima is a pretty terrible writer so I could actually see him doing this but thats all I will give in defense of the R=U camp.

Well, I'm inclined to believe that the "poorly plot" explanation is based on your opinion. In my opinion, the "poorly plot" term is not right to use at this point, because it's more like a complex plot, which doesn't make the plot poorly. What I mean is that this specific plot is missing something but that doesn't make it poorly written, because it was meant to be like that.

Poorly explained plots doesn't mean "possiblities are endless." It means the plot was written poorly. R=/U doesn't has plot-holes, because the game has plot-holes. R=U has little supporting evidence, is usually based on other theories, and takes on many of the plot-holes already in the game, sometimes making it worse with ill-supported theories.

Like what I said to WK: it's your opinion for calling the plot poorly written.

Let's consider this: if the plot is genuinely poor, shouldn't the Ultimania Guide be having more details to polish the plot? In fact, it has only mentioned crucial information such as the Human Life Span, which isn't good enough because there are much more than just that that need to be explained. Also, why didn't the writers make announcements to tell the whole world something like "Hey guys, we are here to make [clarifications] about the FF8 plot" ?

Or would this increase the chance of them re-making FF8 for the sake of the plot? As far as I can see, they have no plans about re-making FF8.

So, judging by these, you can tell that the plot is working as intended by the writers.

I'm going to address these theories seperately.

Why Artemisia has very little/no relevance to Final Fantasy 8

If Square-Enix were going to base someone on a mythological Greek character, and considering the high quality of translations throughout VIII, one would think that they would give them the correct name when translating it to English.

It doesn't matter if they didn't translate it into Artemisia in the English version, because they already did it in the Japanese version. I think the Japanese version is the most important version of all other versions because it was the first version to be made.

Why did they name it Ultimecia in the English version? I really don't know but I'm guessing:

1) Final Fantasy. Most of the FF games are based on many things in real life history, but usually the names of specific things in FF are different.

2) In risk of having lawsuits? For example: if FF8 actually renamed the main villian to "God". I can bet that Square would either get sued or create a bad reputation for naming the main villian "God". So they just re-named it to Ultimecia just to be safe.

Anyway, her name isn't the only thing to prove something, but also Ultimecia has similarities as Artemisia. Like what I said in the first post, the messages of the paintings in Ultimecia's castle are based on Greek. If Ultimecia wasn't Artemisia or interested in Greek or whatever else then why did she have them in her castle? Why does her castle exist? Why the greek stuff in her castle? At least, this theory kind of fit all the patterns together to me.

Also, of interest about Artemisia is that her husband, Maussolus, was her brother. Squall & Rinoa are not brother and sister. And one cannot say that Artemisia was in fact mad. I went looking for the ash drinking reference you made, and could only find it in Wikipedia, at this link: Artemisia II of Caria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
where it states:
She is said to have mixed his ashes in her daily drink, and to have gradually pined away during the two years that she survived him.

Now, "She is said to have" from an article on Wikipedia is definitely not a substantiated truth, especially when what is said to have happened does not have any citation. Who is this person who said this? Seeing that I could not find any other article that referred to this ash drinking, I would think this is usual Wikipedia nonsense. Also, considering the way she tactically outclassed and defeated the Rhodians, I would think that her mental facilities were operating quite well, thank you very much.

Excuse me? I actually got this information from:

Artemisia II of Caria

Consisted of:

Ancient Greek Science and Technology

Created by Michael Lahanas (he also has demonstrated many other greek stuff), speaks Greek and he was born in Greece. Do you honestly think that he has made all this up? No, I don't think so.

As for Artemisia being Mausolus's sister, I'm aware of that. But FF8 is a fantasy game and the FF series (including FF8) has represented so many metaphors based on the real life history. Not all the elements represented in FF are correct, that's what Final Fantasy is for.

It doesn't matter if they are real brother/sister, because in a sense, Artemisia loved Mausolus, just like Rinoa loved Squall, since FF8 is kind of based on a love theme.

The Mausoleum of Maussollos was not started by Artemisia, but by Maussolus. This is substantiated out of Wikipedia by articles such as this: Maussolus
There are differing versions on how far along the Mausoleum was when Maussolus' died. One article said that it had just begun, some said that it was almost completed, and some say that Artemisia just commissioned the artists to do the decoration. However, this is irrelevant. The key is that Maussolus, not Artemisia, started the idea.

Just like Squall started the idea of Griever, alias Lion. It's very possible that Squall has died in prior to the future of Ultimecia's existence. Ultimecia has decided to finish building the castle. Why else did she make the castle for? The castle also has Lion statues.

The lion on the coin was quite interesting. But take a look at this article: Caria
On the bottom left hand corner are some pictures of Carian coins, circa 200. And, one is a lion. This is after Maussolus' time. Also, according to this article: Silver Lion Coinage of Mylasa in Caria (Ancient Coins of Miletos)
the Carians stole the lion coin idea from their neighbour, and it first appeared in the time of Maussolus' father.

Indeed, when Mausolus died, his Lion statues and coins as well as his castle show up. Just like after Squall's time, his Lion statues show up. His love between Rinoa were expressed and represented in the game. The coin has a star symbol as Rinoa pointing at the star. Quite hard to reject that comparison, don't you think?

The Mausoleum has a greater resemblance to Edea's house, with the pillars surrounding it. The paintings in Ultimecia's castle are on canvas, and canvas painting only occured much after (like 1400 AD) the building of the Mausoleum. There are also carpets, wooden stairs, etc. which gives Ultimecia's castle a resemblance to a Renaissance era castle, not an ancient Greek castle.

Yes, but remember that there's a reason why Edea's house existed: it's used as an orphanage.

We don't know the reason why Ultimecia's castle existed. That's why, with this theory, it gives you clues to think of how Ultimecia's castle existence start in the first place. Think about it, Ultimecia is a very powerful being, she has had so many options to do. For instance, Ultimecia can fly through the whole universe through her magic, so why does she need a castle for? Usually, most things represented in games have meanings. If a thing in a game has no meaning, that thing wouldn't have existed. Why would the FF8 designers waste thier time making/putting "useless" things in the game? That wouldn't make sense, right? So I'm more inclined to believe that her castle was supposed to have a meaning, which is a symbolism of a thing (you know which) from the history.

This Artemisia connection was far-fetched to begin with, even if all the facts were true. But, after doing a little bit of checking of the facts, NOT ONE RELEVANT FACT IS ACTUALLY TRUE!

Fact 1) The greeks and other religious things in this game.

^ The paintings, her stuff.... and so on.

Fact 2) Ultimecia didn't clarify her motives / objectives.

^ Dr Odine has speculated this one but speculation is a speculation; never a first hand account from Ultimecia herself or anyone close enough to her to know for sure.

Fact 3) The game doesn't tell us anything about her past. Judging by the story, there's also no guarantee that Ultimecia even remembered anything about her past.

^
Artemisia drank ashes for two reasons: surviving Mausolus whom she was with and she was extremely crazy. Who would want to drink ashes anyways?

If Artemisia was extremely crazy, it's very reasonable for her to forget about her past. Just like Ultimecia.

Fact 4) The game doesn't show us events from each timeline. In the end, we got transported to the future's timeline, but did it show us what happened before that timeline? No, it didn't. Same with other missing timelines. Most people (includingthe FF8 designers) know that Time Travel is usually subjective and definitive. FF8 didn't show us extra timelines, so hench they leave us to make our own interpretations (obviously).

Fact 5) The name of Ultimecia is actually Artemisia in the Japanese version.

Oh, and I can answer my first question about why Squaresoft translated it to Ultimecia. It was so people did not get the wrong idea.

In that case, translating Aerith into Aeris in the English version to ensure that people didn't get the wrong idea doesn't sound right.

But if you were actually correct, then why didn't Square translate it into Ultimecia in the Japanese version, instead of Artemisia?

Why the QM Theory is also a bit irrelevant

The QM theory is an interesting article. I suggest you read it. But why it is irrelevant to the R=U debate is quite simple.

This theory is not heavily based on R=U, but rather Ultimecia being Artemisia.

Firstly, just because someone is able to do something, does not mean that they are going to do it. My car can go x km/h. This does not mean I am going to drive it at x km/h. Same applies to Rinoa.


Secondly, there is no evidence from the game that Rinoa is able to travel forwards in time. Excluding time compression, there is no evidence of a being moving their entire being through time to another point. Time compression is a freak occurence, and obviously has never been completed, as the game would not be able to occur if all time was compressed into one state. Ellone and Ultimecia, through her machine, are moving mental consciousnesses to people in the past. And, in Ellone's case, not changing anything. But that is very different to moving one's entire body through time & space.

Thirdly, the QM theory only states that if one moves backwards through time, you will not change the present. But it is possible that it rules out forward time travel (I am no scientist, so I may be wrong). The way I picture it is that we are kind of like a train. From the present, if I look back, there is only a single railway track. If I move back into the past, I will not be able to change the present. However, the future is still uncertain, and as such there is an infinite number of railway tracks, illustrating all my possibilities. Therefore, one cannot move forwards through it, because one cannot know what the future actually is.

Yes, there is evidence. Ellone/Ultimecia can travel through time. If they can travel through time, then someone else can do too.

There is evidence that the game has contained parts of Time Travel.

Most of all, there's no evidence that the game has told us what would really happen if TC was completed.

So I don't get what you're trying to say here. That was what the theory was about. Ultimecia couldn't kill Rinoa, ever, even if she attempts in doing so. Ultimecia certainly did something: interfering Squall and Rinoa's timelines.

Conclusion
In my opinion, Serapy's use of Artimesia to try and prove R=U is completely flawed, as all the evidence brought forward is flawed. The QM theory is irrelevant to the game because of my first two points, and may actually remove the possibility of forward time travel, if my third point is correct. Perhaps someone wise in the mechanics of time travel can have a look at this article and see what they think the implications of this are in terms of forward time travel.

Once again, this theory is not all about R=U.

The reason why I added the QM theory is because the game didn't tell us about the mechanisms behind the Time Travel that they have used.

Completely flawed? Why don't you make a theory to prove that R=U is truly false? Because it's exactly the same thing, there's no evidence that it's truly false (apart from the Human Life Span explanation).

[dream ending sword]

im bowled over by the sheer depth and utter clarity of the evidence, i was born in England and speak english so i know absolutely everything that has ever happened in England from the beginning of time. I remember how closely FF8 followed all the myths it referenced, such as going into that mayan style pyramid for get quezacotl (who was of course a excellently depicted in his winged snake self) and and how Beowulf slew the Grendal because we were unable to harm it!

[Moon Rabbits]

My theory is that Final Fantasy VIII is a game and you shouldn't read into it so much (for your own sanity).

[Serapy]

My theory is that Final Fantasy VIII is a game and you shouldn't read into it so much (for your own sanity).

If Final Fantasy VIII didn't exist, there won't be any discussion about it.

[Fynn]

My theory is that Final Fantasy VIII is a game and you shouldn't read into it so much (for your own sanity).

Let them do what they want. I like this theory - it's interesting and makes you think. We'll never know what the creators really intended. There's nothing wrong in speculating and these arguments all sound quite solid to me. If you don't want to think, then just don't, but don't forbid others to do that. That way, the atmosphere only gets worse...

[champagne supernova]

I'm going to address these theories seperately.

Why Artemisia has very little/no relevance to Final Fantasy 8

If Square-Enix were going to base someone on a mythological Greek character, and considering the high quality of translations throughout VIII, one would think that they would give them the correct name when translating it to English.

It doesn't matter if they didn't translate it into Artemisia in the English version, because they already did it in the Japanese version. I think the Japanese version is the most important version of all other versions because it was the first version to be made.

Japanese transalation works out as Arutimishia. Granted, it sounds a bit like Artemisia, but not much.

Anyway, her name isn't the only thing to prove something, but also Ultimecia has similarities as Artemisia. Like what I said in the first post, the messages of the paintings in Ultimecia's castle are based on Greek. If Ultimecia wasn't Artemisia or interested in Greek or whatever else then why did she have them in her castle? Why does her castle exist? Why the greek stuff in her castle? At least, this theory kind of fit all the patterns together to me.

Someone has already pointed out that the messages are Latin. So, the Greek stuff must go.

Also, of interest about Artemisia is that her husband, Maussolus, was her brother. Squall & Rinoa are not brother and sister. And one cannot say that Artemisia was in fact mad. I went looking for the ash drinking reference you made, and could only find it in Wikipedia, at this link: Artemisia II of Caria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
where it states:
She is said to have mixed his ashes in her daily drink, and to have gradually pined away during the two years that she survived him.

Now, "She is said to have" from an article on Wikipedia is definitely not a substantiated truth, especially when what is said to have happened does not have any citation. Who is this person who said this? Seeing that I could not find any other article that referred to this ash drinking, I would think this is usual Wikipedia nonsense. Also, considering the way she tactically outclassed and defeated the Rhodians, I would think that her mental facilities were operating quite well, thank you very much.

Excuse me? I actually got this information from:

Artemisia II of Caria

Consisted of:

Ancient Greek Science and Technology

Created by Michael Lahanas (he also has demonstrated many other greek stuff), speaks Greek and he was born in Greece. Do you honestly think that he has made all this up? No, I don't think so.

If you look at the bottom of the information for the first link you provided: Artemisia II of Caria
you shall find that at the bottom, it in fact states that this was retrieved from Wikipedia.

The second link you provided: Ancient Greek Science and Technology
was an index. The only thing I could find that was relevant was the page on the Mausoleum, and that page also had a little statement at the bottom of the page stating that it was retrieved from Wikipedia.

So, unfortunately, you unknowingly have based several parts of your theory on Wikipedia. As I mentioned, in all the links I looked at on Artemisia, the Wikipedia one was the only one that mentioned this strange phenomenon. Clearly, something that gets information from Wikipedia will have the same flaws. Seeing that Michael Lahanas is willing to base his reputation on Wikipedia articles, his credibility is seriously dubious. And therefore, unless you find somewhere else to back up this madness, my point has to stand.

As for Artemisia being Mausolus's sister, I'm aware of that. But FF8 is a fantasy game and the FF series (including FF8) has represented so many metaphors based on the real life history. Not all the elements represented in FF are correct, that's what Final Fantasy is for.

It doesn't matter if they are real brother/sister, because in a sense, Artemisia loved Mausolus, just like Rinoa loved Squall, since FF8 is kind of based on a love theme.

They were incestuous lovers! I'm sorry, from what I've heard of Japan, it is quite a conservative place. I don't think Square would knowingly imply that one of the main characters was having an incestuous love affair with another main character.

The Mausoleum of Maussollos was not started by Artemisia, but by Maussolus. This is substantiated out of Wikipedia by articles such as this: Maussolus
There are differing versions on how far along the Mausoleum was when Maussolus' died. One article said that it had just begun, some said that it was almost completed, and some say that Artemisia just commissioned the artists to do the decoration. However, this is irrelevant. The key is that Maussolus, not Artemisia, started the idea.

Just like Squall started the idea of Griever, alias Lion. It's very possible that Squall has died in prior to the future of Ultimecia's existence. Ultimecia has decided to finish building the castle. Why else did she make the castle for? The castle also has Lion statues.

As mentioned before, it is not clearly stated whether Griever is a fiction of Squall's imagination, or a real GF. Also, my point was that Maussolus planned a tomb for him & his wife, not Artemis. So, Artemis, of her own accord, would have done nothing.

The lion on the coin was quite interesting. But take a look at this article: Caria
On the bottom left hand corner are some pictures of Carian coins, circa 200. And, one is a lion. This is after Maussolus' time. Also, according to this article: Silver Lion Coinage of Mylasa in Caria (Ancient Coins of Miletos)
the Carians stole the lion coin idea from their neighbour, and it first appeared in the time of Maussolus' father.

Indeed, when Mausolus died, his Lion statues and coins as well as his castle show up. Just like after Squall's time, his Lion statues show up. His love between Rinoa were expressed and represented in the game. The coin has a star symbol as Rinoa pointing at the star. Quite hard to reject that comparison, don't you think?

Again, missing my point. You were saying that because the coins were similar to in-game events, it reinforced the Ultimecia being Artemisia, and therefore Rinoa theory. My point is that these coins were created before Maussolus' time, and therefore have little to do with him.

The Mausoleum has a greater resemblance to Edea's house, with the pillars surrounding it. The paintings in Ultimecia's castle are on canvas, and canvas painting only occured much after (like 1400 AD) the building of the Mausoleum. There are also carpets, wooden stairs, etc. which gives Ultimecia's castle a resemblance to a Renaissance era castle, not an ancient Greek castle.

Yes, but remember that there's a reason why Edea's house existed: it's used as an orphanage.

We don't know the reason why Ultimecia's castle existed. That's why, with this theory, it gives you clues to think of how Ultimecia's castle existence start in the first place. Think about it, Ultimecia is a very powerful being, she has had so many options to do. For instance, Ultimecia can fly through the whole universe through her magic, so why does she need a castle for? Usually, most things represented in games have meanings. If a thing in a game has no meaning, that thing wouldn't have existed. Why would the FF8 designers waste thier time making/putting "useless" things in the game? That wouldn't make sense, right? So I'm more inclined to believe that her castle was supposed to have a meaning, which is a symbolism of a thing (you know which) from the history.

But the castle bears no resemblance to the Mausoleum of Maussolus. So, how are they related if they bear no resemblance?

This Artemisia connection was far-fetched to begin with, even if all the facts were true. But, after doing a little bit of checking of the facts, NOT ONE RELEVANT FACT IS ACTUALLY TRUE!

Fact 1) The greeks and other religious things in this game.

^ The paintings, her stuff.... and so on.

What Greek paintings, stuff etc. is there in the game that relates to Ultimecia?

Fact 2) Ultimecia didn't clarify her motives / objectives.

^ Dr Odine has speculated this one but speculation is a speculation; never a first hand account from Ultimecia herself or anyone close enough to her to know for sure.

Yes, this is a fact, but what relevance does it have here.

Fact 3) The game doesn't tell us anything about her past. Judging by the story, there's also no guarantee that Ultimecia even remembered anything about her past.

^
Artemisia drank ashes for two reasons: surviving Mausolus whom she was with and she was extremely crazy. Who would want to drink ashes anyways?

If Artemisia was extremely crazy, it's very reasonable for her to forget about her past. Just like Ultimecia.

As mentioned above, find me another article, that doesn't use Wikipedia's article, which says that Artemisia was mad. And I mean a credible article. Because, all the articles I looked at in my original post did not mention anything about Artemisia going mad, or drinking ashes.

Fact 4) The game doesn't show us events from each timeline. In the end, we got transported to the future's timeline, but did it show us what happened before that timeline? No, it didn't. Same with other missing timelines. Most people (includingthe FF8 designers) know that Time Travel is usually subjective and definitive. FF8 didn't show us extra timelines, so hench they leave us to make our own interpretations (obviously).

Yes, there is a missing timeline. And yes, one can form an opinion. But the validity of an opinion must lie in the realm of facts. And I'm still looking for a relevant one.

Fact 5) The name of Ultimecia is actually Artemisia in the Japanese version.

As mentioned above, the translation is actually Arutimishia. So, also not a fact.

Oh, and I can answer my first question about why Squaresoft translated it to Ultimecia. It was so people did not get the wrong idea.

In that case, translating Aerith into Aeris in the English version to ensure that people didn't get the wrong idea doesn't sound right.

But if you were actually correct, then why didn't Square translate it into Ultimecia in the Japanese version, instead of Artemisia?

Back to Fact 5. The direct translation is not Artemisia, it's Arutimishia. Bit of a mouthful! So, they decided that Ultimecia got the message across, and prevented people from thinking - "Hey, that sounds like an ancient Greek person. Maybe it's got something to do with the game."

Is there a historical or mythological creature called Aeris or Aerith, outside of FFVII? Don't think so. So, what does this have to do with anything?

Firstly, just because someone is able to do something, does not mean that they are going to do it. My car can go x km/h. This does not mean I am going to drive it at x km/h. Same applies to Rinoa.


Secondly, there is no evidence from the game that Rinoa is able to travel forwards in time. Excluding time compression, there is no evidence of a being moving their entire being through time to another point. Time compression is a freak occurence, and obviously has never been completed, as the game would not be able to occur if all time was compressed into one state. Ellone and Ultimecia, through her machine, are moving mental consciousnesses to people in the past. And, in Ellone's case, not changing anything. But that is very different to moving one's entire body through time & space.

Thirdly, the QM theory only states that if one moves backwards through time, you will not change the present. But it is possible that it rules out forward time travel (I am no scientist, so I may be wrong). The way I picture it is that we are kind of like a train. From the present, if I look back, there is only a single railway track. If I move back into the past, I will not be able to change the present. However, the future is still uncertain, and as such there is an infinite number of railway tracks, illustrating all my possibilities. Therefore, one cannot move forwards through it, because one cannot know what the future actually is.

Yes, there is evidence. Ellone/Ultimecia can travel through time. If they can travel through time, then someone else can do too.

You missed the first point. Just because someone can travel through time, doesn't mean they actually will travel. There has to be a reason why Rinoa would travel into the future, which has not been provided by you.

Secondly, Ellone & Ultimecia consciousness travels through time, not their whole body. So, there is no evidence of someone moving themselves completely from one time to another.

Thirdly, Ellone & Ultimecia consciousness travel backwards through time. No evidence of it moving forward.

Completely flawed? Why don't you make a theory to prove that R=U is truly false? Because it's exactly the same thing, there's no evidence that it's truly false (apart from the Human Life Span explanation).

Except for the Human Life Span explanation!?! The one that says that Rinoa cannot naturally be alive in Ultimecia's time. That is quite a problem in the R=U theory.

And I have made one that completely disproves the R=U theory.

Ultimecia is actually Aeris. Therefore it can't be Rinoa. During the events of VII, Aeris fell through the fabric of time and space and landed in VIII. She wanted to go back to VII and thought she could achieve this through Time Compression.

Now, Serapy, please disprove this

& for everyone else, I don't actually believe it. But, I'll pretend I do.

[Fynn]

As for Artemisia being Mausolus's sister, I'm aware of that. But FF8 is a fantasy game and the FF series (including FF8) has represented so many metaphors based on the real life history. Not all the elements represented in FF are correct, that's what Final Fantasy is for.

It doesn't matter if they are real brother/sister, because in a sense, Artemisia loved Mausolus, just like Rinoa loved Squall, since FF8 is kind of based on a love theme.

They were incestuous lovers! I'm sorry, from what I've heard of Japan, it is quite a conservative place. I don't think Square would knowingly imply that one of the main characters was having an incestuous love affair with another main character.

Excuse me, but there is something I must say. In ancient Greece it was normal for siblings to marry each other. At least it wasn't seen as perverse or anything like it...

[MushroomZOMBIE]

If I'm right, it also happened in the medieval times, as well.
Edgar Allan Poe married his cousin, in the 1800's.
In case of the people wondering about Shiva, in Hiduism, Shiva is the god of destruction. From what I heard, They used another Shiva; One from the Celtic mythology.

[Fynn]

I heard she was the Slavic goddess of winter or something...

[Serapy]

I'm going to address these theories seperately.

Why Artemisia has very little/no relevance to Final Fantasy 8

If Square-Enix were going to base someone on a mythological Greek character, and considering the high quality of translations throughout VIII, one would think that they would give them the correct name when translating it to English.

It doesn't matter if they didn't translate it into Artemisia in the English version, because they already did it in the Japanese version. I think the Japanese version is the most important version of all other versions because it was the first version to be made.

Japanese transalation works out as Arutimishia. Granted, it sounds a bit like Artemisia, but not much.

But the fact still remain that the English and Japanese versions have different names for the main villian -- Ultimecia and Arutimishia. The question is why? Those two names obviously don't sound similar to each other. There has to be a reason for that existence. On a blank paper, it's probably leading to something significantly.

Anyway, her name isn't the only thing to prove something, but also Ultimecia has similarities as Artemisia. Like what I said in the first post, the messages of the paintings in Ultimecia's castle are based on Greek. If Ultimecia wasn't Artemisia or interested in Greek or whatever else then why did she have them in her castle? Why does her castle exist? Why the greek stuff in her castle? At least, this theory kind of fit all the patterns together to me.

Someone has already pointed out that the messages are Latin. So, the Greek stuff must go.

My apologises, I was meant to refer Artemisia as being Greek. If she was Greek, then that fact still can't be removed from the theory. The castle holds quite a lot of things based on specific cultures and religions. There are connections that are identical to Greek history, such as Artemisia, the castle, lions, star, etc which were displayed in the game. Other Final Fantasy games of course have displayed specific things from reality but they were explained quite easily, apart from Final Fantasy 8.

Also, of interest about Artemisia is that her husband, Maussolus, was her brother. Squall & Rinoa are not brother and sister. And one cannot say that Artemisia was in fact mad. I went looking for the ash drinking reference you made, and could only find it in Wikipedia, at this link: Artemisia II of Caria - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
where it states:
She is said to have mixed his ashes in her daily drink, and to have gradually pined away during the two years that she survived him.

Now, "She is said to have" from an article on Wikipedia is definitely not a substantiated truth, especially when what is said to have happened does not have any citation. Who is this person who said this? Seeing that I could not find any other article that referred to this ash drinking, I would think this is usual Wikipedia nonsense. Also, considering the way she tactically outclassed and defeated the Rhodians, I would think that her mental facilities were operating quite well, thank you very much.

Excuse me? I actually got this information from:

Artemisia II of Caria

Consisted of:

Ancient Greek Science and Technology

Created by Michael Lahanas (he also has demonstrated many other greek stuff), speaks Greek and he was born in Greece. Do you honestly think that he has made all this up? No, I don't think so.

If you look at the bottom of the information for the first link you provided: Artemisia II of Caria
you shall find that at the bottom, it in fact states that this was retrieved from Wikipedia.

The second link you provided: Ancient Greek Science and Technology
was an index. The only thing I could find that was relevant was the page on the Mausoleum, and that page also had a little statement at the bottom of the page stating that it was retrieved from Wikipedia.

So, unfortunately, you unknowingly have based several parts of your theory on Wikipedia. As I mentioned, in all the links I looked at on Artemisia, the Wikipedia one was the only one that mentioned this strange phenomenon. Clearly, something that gets information from Wikipedia will have the same flaws. Seeing that Michael Lahanas is willing to base his reputation on Wikipedia articles, his credibility is seriously dubious. And therefore, unless you find somewhere else to back up this madness, my point has to stand.

Why would you call his credibility dubious when he obviously knows about Greek and its history more than you do? I'm sorry if I'm wrong.

He was the one who validated the article and then added it onto his website. So isn't it obvious that if the information were actually incorrect, he wouldn't have added them onto the website in the first place? I'm pretty sure that he will remove them if that was the case. Other articles about Artemisia don't seem inconsistent to each other, so this article is still credible.

About Wikipedia, it's true that some Wiki pages appear to be incorrect (indirectly), but these eventually will be corrected by "genuine" users some day.

There's another proof:

Artemisia drinking the Ashes of Mausolus

As I have checked that page about three times, I have concluded that it didn't mention wiki, wikipedia or whatever. ;/

Here's the quote

This painting was long known as 'Sophonisba taking Poison' because it was thought to show the suicide of Sophonisba, wife of the Numidian King Massinissa, as recounted by Livy. In fact Creti based his composition on a painting of Artemisia by the Bolognese painter Giovan Gioseffo dal Sole (1654 - 1719). Queen Artemisia drank the ashes of her dead husband Mausolus in order to become his living tomb. She built a great funerary monument (mausoleum) at Halicarnassus to his memory, which became one of the wonders of the ancient world.

As for Artemisia being Mausolus's sister, I'm aware of that. But FF8 is a fantasy game and the FF series (including FF8) has represented so many metaphors based on the real life history. Not all the elements represented in FF are correct, that's what Final Fantasy is for.

It doesn't matter if they are real brother/sister, because in a sense, Artemisia loved Mausolus, just like Rinoa loved Squall, since FF8 is kind of based on a love theme.

They were incestuous lovers! I'm sorry, from what I've heard of Japan, it is quite a conservative place. I don't think Square would knowingly imply that one of the main characters was having an incestuous love affair with another main character.

If Final Fantasy 8 contains a lot of things based on specific cultures and history that appear to be inconsistent, then that doesn't mean Squall and Rinoa were trutly relatives. However, the concepts/symbolisms still remain (e.g. the star and lion). What I'm saying is that same blood or whatever is a physical form, but in Final Fantasy 8, it has shown a lot more mental forms rather than physical forms. So maybe, mentality is more important than physicality, when it comes to theories.

What does that have to do with Japan, anyway? Final Fantasy 8 may have been developed in Japan, but that contradicts the world of FF8 as it was supposed to be somewhere else, not Japan.

The Mausoleum of Maussollos was not started by Artemisia, but by Maussolus. This is substantiated out of Wikipedia by articles such as this: Maussolus
There are differing versions on how far along the Mausoleum was when Maussolus' died. One article said that it had just begun, some said that it was almost completed, and some say that Artemisia just commissioned the artists to do the decoration. However, this is irrelevant. The key is that Maussolus, not Artemisia, started the idea.

Just like Squall started the idea of Griever, alias Lion. It's very possible that Squall has died in prior to the future of Ultimecia's existence. Ultimecia has decided to finish building the castle. Why else did she make the castle for? The castle also has Lion statues.

As mentioned before, it is not clearly stated whether Griever is a fiction of Squall's imagination, or a real GF. Also, my point was that Maussolus planned a tomb for him & his wife, not Artemis. So, Artemis, of her own accord, would have done nothing.

If Artemisia didn't take any part in aiding the Tomb's development after her husband's death, it will then become nothing. Also, I think she has inherited things from her husband after he died, so as long as Artemisia is alive, she still owns the tomb.

The lion on the coin was quite interesting. But take a look at this article: Caria
On the bottom left hand corner are some pictures of Carian coins, circa 200. And, one is a lion. This is after Maussolus' time. Also, according to this article: Silver Lion Coinage of Mylasa in Caria (Ancient Coins of Miletos)
the Carians stole the lion coin idea from their neighbour, and it first appeared in the time of Maussolus' father.

Indeed, when Mausolus died, his Lion statues and coins as well as his castle show up. Just like after Squall's time, his Lion statues show up. His love between Rinoa were expressed and represented in the game. The coin has a star symbol as Rinoa pointing at the star. Quite hard to reject that comparison, don't you think?

Again, missing my point. You were saying that because the coins were similar to in-game events, it reinforced the Ultimecia being Artemisia, and therefore Rinoa theory. My point is that these coins were created before Maussolus' time, and therefore have little to do with him.

I can't say I agree with this statement (says different from the Wiki page), but even if it was true, then it still doesn't matter because as what I've said above that if it was more about mentality then the symbolism are more important. Why else were the lion/star represented in the game? That's why I lead to believe that they came from the Greek history.

The Mausoleum has a greater resemblance to Edea's house, with the pillars surrounding it. The paintings in Ultimecia's castle are on canvas, and canvas painting only occured much after (like 1400 AD) the building of the Mausoleum. There are also carpets, wooden stairs, etc. which gives Ultimecia's castle a resemblance to a Renaissance era castle, not an ancient Greek castle.

Yes, but remember that there's a reason why Edea's house existed: it's used as an orphanage.

We don't know the reason why Ultimecia's castle existed. That's why, with this theory, it gives you clues to think of how Ultimecia's castle existence start in the first place. Think about it, Ultimecia is a very powerful being, she has had so many options to do. For instance, Ultimecia can fly through the whole universe through her magic, so why does she need a castle for? Usually, most things represented in games have meanings. If a thing in a game has no meaning, that thing wouldn't have existed. Why would the FF8 designers waste thier time making/putting "useless" things in the game? That wouldn't make sense, right? So I'm more inclined to believe that her castle was supposed to have a meaning, which is a symbolism of a thing (you know which) from the history.

But the castle bears no resemblance to the Mausoleum of Maussolus. So, how are they related if they bear no resemblance?

They don't look exactly the same, but they do certainly bear same resemblance (mentally) from the Greek history. Artemisia was insane when her husband died, she drank ashes in order to be his living tomb, helped finishing the tomb. Her husband resembled as a lion to his wife, his wife resembled as a star to his husband. If Ultimecia was a woman, why in the earth would she have lions statues on her castle? This leads me to believe that MAYBE she has had a husband in the past. In order to respect him is to have lions statues on the castle, I'm guessing. There's another question still remains unknown-- if she's so powerful, why does she need a castle for?

This Artemisia connection was far-fetched to begin with, even if all the facts were true. But, after doing a little bit of checking of the facts, NOT ONE RELEVANT FACT IS ACTUALLY TRUE!

Fact 1) The greeks and other religious things in this game.

^ The paintings, her stuff.... and so on.

What Greek paintings, stuff etc. is there in the game that relates to Ultimecia?

Yes, they all relate to her in a way because she own them in her castle.

Fact 2) Ultimecia didn't clarify her motives / objectives.

^ Dr Odine has speculated this one but speculation is a speculation; never a first hand account from Ultimecia herself or anyone close enough to her to know for sure.

Yes, this is a fact, but what relevance does it have here.

If she has clarified her motives / objectives by herself, I would have never made this thread in the first place.

Fact 3) The game doesn't tell us anything about her past. Judging by the story, there's also no guarantee that Ultimecia even remembered anything about her past.

^
Artemisia drank ashes for two reasons: surviving Mausolus whom she was with and she was extremely crazy. Who would want to drink ashes anyways?

If Artemisia was extremely crazy, it's very reasonable for her to forget about her past. Just like Ultimecia.

As mentioned above, find me another article, that doesn't use Wikipedia's article, which says that Artemisia was mad. And I mean a credible article. Because, all the articles I looked at in my original post did not mention anything about Artemisia going mad, or drinking ashes.

I've gave you another link above.

Fact 4) The game doesn't show us events from each timeline. In the end, we got transported to the future's timeline, but did it show us what happened before that timeline? No, it didn't. Same with other missing timelines. Most people (includingthe FF8 designers) know that Time Travel is usually subjective and definitive. FF8 didn't show us extra timelines, so hench they leave us to make our own interpretations (obviously).

Yes, there is a missing timeline. And yes, one can form an opinion. But the validity of an opinion must lie in the realm of facts. And I'm still looking for a relevant one.

Are you saying that the symbolisms and images in FF8 are not facts? I have already linked them here in this thread. My opinions here are mostly based on the comparisons. Do you actually expect me to find a dialogue that states "Hi scum bags, I have a great obsession with this great legend-- Artemisia!" ? I don't know why, but most people think that dialogues are the true facts, somehow. I can tell that Square didn't want to add information like that. If they did, the plot of Final Fantasy 8 would be so different.

Fact 5) The name of Ultimecia is actually Artemisia in the Japanese version.

As mentioned above, the translation is actually Arutimishia. So, also not a fact.

Oops, I've made a typo. Yes, it was Arutimishia. My point was that the English/Japanese versions have different names for the main villain, which is a fact.

Oh, and I can answer my first question about why Squaresoft translated it to Ultimecia. It was so people did not get the wrong idea.

In that case, translating Aerith into Aeris in the English version to ensure that people didn't get the wrong idea doesn't sound right.

But if you were actually correct, then why didn't Square translate it into Ultimecia in the Japanese version, instead of Artemisia?

Back to Fact 5. The direct translation is not Artemisia, it's Arutimishia. Bit of a mouthful! So, they decided that Ultimecia got the message across, and prevented people from thinking - "Hey, that sounds like an ancient Greek person. Maybe it's got something to do with the game."

That doesn't seem right. If the game has contained completely different symbolisms, plot and culture/religion stuff, her name was still Arutimishia, we would just ignore it as we normally would think like "Oh, that Arutimishia is just a name, which has nothing to do with the game for sure"

Is there a historical or mythological creature called Aeris or Aerith, outside of FFVII? Don't think so. So, what does this have to do with anything?

The point was that if Square wanted to have the same name for both versions. They would have アルティミシア (Arutimishia) translated to Arutimishia for the English version. In this case, they didn't.

Firstly, just because someone is able to do something, does not mean that they are going to do it. My car can go x km/h. This does not mean I am going to drive it at x km/h. Same applies to Rinoa.

No, if she has gained the ability to travel, that doesn't mean she will travel right now but eventually she will.

Secondly, there is no evidence from the game that Rinoa is able to travel forwards in time. Excluding time compression, there is no evidence of a being moving their entire being through time to another point. Time compression is a freak occurence, and obviously has never been completed, as the game would not be able to occur if all time was compressed into one state. Ellone and Ultimecia, through her machine, are moving mental consciousnesses to people in the past. And, in Ellone's case, not changing anything. But that is very different to moving one's entire body through time & space.

The game wouldn't occur if it was completed? That's like saying Ultimecia have destoryed everything too! If that was her main goal, which is quite pointless but then maybe that because she was insane. However, if SeeD didn't exist, Ultimecia wouldn't need to exist as well ...

Thirdly, the QM theory only states that if one moves backwards through time, you will not change the present. But it is possible that it rules out forward time travel (I am no scientist, so I may be wrong). The way I picture it is that we are kind of like a train. From the present, if I look back, there is only a single railway track. If I move back into the past, I will not be able to change the present. However, the future is still uncertain, and as such there is an infinite number of railway tracks, illustrating all my possibilities. Therefore, one cannot move forwards through it, because one cannot know what the future actually is.

Rinoa is worried about her powers. Will she give it to an innocent person? She cannot tell because she doesn't know the future. Why wasn't one of the party members' killed by an attacker from the future? That didn't work, because the past cannot be changed which would explain why the SeeDs didn't get killed.

In the vision of Ultimecia, she's treating the present time (Squall and Rinoa's times) as past. In that certain time, Squall and Rinoa is treating it as present. So technically, it's past which cannot be changed because Ultimecia came from the future and was trying to interfere the past (present).

You missed the first point. Just because someone can travel through time, doesn't mean they actually will travel. There has to be a reason why Rinoa would travel into the future, which has not been provided by you.

It has been provided from the game, she travelled in order to fight Ultimecia.

If you have the ability to travel, of course, you won't just travel exactly right away, but eventually you will.

Secondly, Ellone & Ultimecia consciousness travels through time, not their whole body. So, there is no evidence of someone moving themselves completely from one time to another.

The point still remains, they can travel time.

Thirdly, Ellone & Ultimecia consciousness travel backwards through time. No evidence of it moving forward.

In that case, nobody could fight Ultimecia as she came from the future. In the present time, Ultimecia's castle wasn't there, but it shows up in the future time which was where the party have fought her. Even in TC, you cannot travel in any direction (random) just to face Ultimecia.

Completely flawed? Why don't you make a theory to prove that R=U is truly false? Because it's exactly the same thing, there's no evidence that it's truly false (apart from the Human Life Span explanation).

Except for the Human Life Span explanation!?! The one that says that Rinoa cannot naturally be alive in Ultimecia's time. That is quite a problem in the R=U theory.

And I have made one that completely disproves the R=U theory.

Ultimecia is actually Aeris. Therefore it can't be Rinoa. During the events of VII, Aeris fell through the fabric of time and space and landed in VIII. She wanted to go back to VII and thought she could achieve this through Time Compression.

Now, Serapy, please disprove this

Yes, Final Fantasy 7 and Final Fantasy 8 didn't mate repeatedly.

[Zeromus_X]

But the fact still remain that the English and Japanese versions have different names for the main villian -- Ultimecia and Arutimishia. The question is why? Those two names obviously don't sound similar to each other. There has to be a reason for that existence. On a blank paper, it's probably leading to something significantly.

Ultimecia, Artemisia, and any other variants you can think of are equally valid romanizations of アルティミシア. The reason they went with the spelling Ultimecia is likely because the spell Ultima is rendered as アルテマ and they didn't want to deviate from what was already standardized. I doubt it means anything significant nor does it warrant a conspiracy theory because of a simple name.