[NFP] Civilization VI: Possible New Civilizations Thread

[sweetbrown89]

Okay, I think I found the source.

The earliest mention of "Bà Triệu" and a "whale quote" together should be the Thanh Hoá kỷ thắng (清化紀勝) written by Vương Duy Trinh (王維楨, ?-1908 CE), a Vietnamese official and writer.

Thanh Hoá kỷ thắng is a booklet written in Classical Chinese about places of interest in Thanh Hóa Province; Vương Duy Trinh probably wrote this book when he was a local official in the Thanh Hóa Province in early 1890s.

One entry of the book talked about Bà Triệu in detail; you can check the entry in the photocopy of the book's manuscript here.

Below is the photo of the page that talked about Bà Triệu, and the texts marked in red is the famous Bà Triệu quote that referred in the Vietnamese first look video.

Spoiler :

View attachment 582848

Bà Triệu's famous statement is (largely?) written in Classical Chinese, which reads as
嫗曰：但欲乘風破浪，斬長鯨於東溟，扫清海宇，極斯民於□□*，豈效世人頓首曲腰，作人婢妾为□*？

Translation - The Ẩu** said: I just wish to ride the winds and rip though the waves, to behead the long whales in the Eastern Sea, to sweep clean the realm within the seas, to help (?) the people from □□; how can I imitate other people, bow my head and bend my back, to become other's slave and concubines and □?***

*I can't read these words so I marked them as □. They are probably obscure forms of Chinese characters, or even Chữ Nôm, which I don't have any knowledge of. Probably need to check with @Andrew Johnson [FXS] as I am sure he can read Chữ Nôm.
**Ẩu is Triệu's title in Vietnamese and Chinese, which literally means "old women" or "granny", but is used as a respectful title here.
***Judging from the general meaning of this sentence, I think the translation posted by @notNamed is actually the translation of this sentence from the manuscript.

The line 斬長鯨於東溟 is the origin of the "whale quote", which literally translates as "to behead the long whales in the Eastern Deep". It is a typical stock phrase about "killing whales" - again, whale just means evil beings here, doesn't mean any specific types of whales - in traditional Chinese writings.

At the end of the day, it might not even be a subtle hint. It’s entirely too early to be in tinfoil hat mode before this pack is even released.

 

[AntSou]

At the end of the day, it might not even be a subtle hint. It’s entirely too early to be in tinfoil hat mode before this pack is even released.

There's nothing to be excited about. If the hint were the whale and it was a hint at Lady Trieu, then she has already been revealed and therefore that's the end of the story. The events are in the past.

But at the very least this a pretty funny coincidence and nevertheless what @8housesofelixir posted is awesome stuff.
---

Keep in mind these are the same people who last month pat and kissed a figure of a barbarian for a few long seconds to hint at a Barbarian mode and wore a top hat to hint at a Corporation mode. They wouldn't suddenly switch to using cryptic messages with three layers of depth that nobody would be able to decipher on time.

The truth is, they couldn't even bother removing the label from the bottom of the mug for the video. That's how low effort this is
---

TLDR: Do not let the orcas distract you. It's the mug & beanie folks.

Also,

 

[Josephias]

Methinks they are just promoting some merchandising you can buy in the FXS store

(but, seriously, civ VI devs have a shown trough the videos a lot of cool things branded with the game name or specific features)

 

[sweetbrown89]

There's nothing to be excited about. If the hint were the whale and it was a hint at Lady Trieu, then she has already been revealed and therefore that's the end of the story. The events are in the past.

But at the very least this a pretty funny coincidence and nevertheless what @8housesofelixir posted is awesome stuff.
---

Keep in mind these are the same people who last month pat and kissed a figure of a barbarian for a few long seconds to hint at a Barbarian mode and wore a top hat to hint at a Corporation mode. They wouldn't suddenly switch to using cryptic messages with three layers of depth that nobody would be able to decipher on time.

The truth is, they couldn't even bother removing the label from the bottom of the mug for the video. That's how low effort this is
---

TLDR: Do not let the orcas distract you. It's the mug & beanie folks.

Also,

I generally see modes as separate from the leaders when they tease them. They’re often not really intertwined.

 

[anonxanemone]

To be precise, "whale" (鲸) was a Chinese stock concept of evil monsters especially in poems; for instance, Li Bai often talked about some heroic figure were "killing whales" in his poems. I would say there is not a lot of chance that she - or the writer of the text - was refer to specific animals.

Sounds very similar to how Leviathan is thought to be a type of whale.

 

[Republic of San Montuoso]

OK, I better put my Logician Hat on again, because we're on the fields of my favourite discipline: Ad Hoc Non Sequitur Speculation

So, we know for a fact[1] that Firaxis Teams know nothing more than teasing us, Fanatics of the Civ, with obscure and malevolent clues to warn us from the impending doom of future civs and mode. We can fairly assume that they did it too in the January Update video. So, let's analyze it.

First, lay on the fact, which are two:

1. The new civ will be part of the most requested ones for the March Update, meaning Portugal and a Native American Civ (mostly the Haudenausonnee)
2. The clues lie in the beginning and end of the video, with Chang cearing a beanie and allegedly drinking from a mug, the two only instances where there is a little screenplay it appears

So, from this informations, what can we deduce?

If we look very closely the video, we can see the pores of the skin of Chang. That means we are looking too closely, so just zoom out a little. People are focusing on the beanie, but what colour is this beanie? Red. And what other things are red? Herrings. This beanie is then, obviously, a red herring. Does that mean we shan't focus on it? Of course not! We shall focus on it, but we ought to look in the opposite direction! Stay with me for a moment, it will all become clear.
Look at the mug, now. As some people noticed, there is a sticker with an orca. "Another red herring", you might ask? Of course not. First, this orca is black and white, not red, and second, orcas are mammals and herrings are fish, so this orca is clearly not a red herring, and you should be ashamed of yourself, random reader I imagined in my head. But what orcas are known for? Two things: 1) their other name is "killer whale" which is really insensitive and so in respect for orcas we ought to forget this fact and 2) they're vicious, deceptive animals that lure and tricks birds and fishes in traps to eat them.
That's what the orca means: it's a trap (feel free to imagine me saying this sentence with a squid head). If we combine this orca with the red beanie being (as I previously demonstrated without any doubt nor flaw in my reasonings) a red herring, we now know that both of those clues are anti-clues, a rare kind of clue that gives clue in the opposite direction, saying to us what those clues are not.
"But wouldn't two anti-clues cancel themselves becoming actual clues?"
Normally I would have agreed, but it doesn't suit my narrative, so I'll conveniently ignore it.

Therefore and hence, we shall analyse those clues, deduce what they would mean normally and then go in the opposite direction.
Beanies+mug=things to heat yourself[2]. That would, normally, in a not-anti-clue setting, means that the next civ would be a civ in which people need to heat themselves, ergo et sequitur a cold civ: Inuits, Finland, my bedroom in the middle of winter... But remember, folks and pals, it's an anti-clue, therefore is leads in the opposite direction: a hot civ. Here, we will make the assumption that "hot" means "with a lot of Celsius degrees in it" hot, not "Gilgamesh flewing his muscles at me" hot.

Is it enough to deduce a civ? Not yet. We still have more clues to analyze: Chang's shirt.
It's a blue and grey shirt, with a plaid pattern. I don't really know what it could means for the moment because I'm blatantly improvising here. No country has "grey" on their flag because it's a hideous colour in vexillology (which is a clue in itself: the future civ doesn't have any grey on his flag), but the pattern is clearly made of squares. The country is then made of squares, or a big regular geometric shape.
What a simpleton might deduce from it would be: "Well, it's decided then, it's Portugal: a hot country in the shape of a rectangle, done!". Except you're WRONG!
Remember when I said:

The new civ will be part of the most requested ones for the March Update, meaning Portugal and a Native American Civ (mostly the Haudenausonnee)

Well, I was obviously lying, because it's none of them.

That's true, my friend, because there is only one possible future civ that three important pieces of information:

1. Hot
2. Squarish
3. No grey in its flag

Therefore, I'm proud to reveal you the future and last civ of the New Frontier Pass:

TEXAS​

Another victory for logic!

[1] Just look it up
[2] You can't argue with maths

 

[almughavar]

I'm pretty sure Lady Triệu meant orca aka killer whale in her quote. "Cá kình" truly means "orca" in Vietnamese: Cá kình – Wikipedia tiếng Việt

Another evidence which proves that approach is the fact that Vietnamese is the only one among nations all over the world which has consistently worshipped whales. So Lady Trieu said that she wanted to kill orca/killer whale/shark, not whale.

You can simply google "whale worship" to see for yourself.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

Vietnamese is the only one among nations all over the world which has consistently worshipped whales.

Maori!

 

[AntSou]

I'm pretty sure Lady Triệu meant orca aka killer whale in her quote. "Cá kình" truly means "orca" in Vietnamese: Cá kình – Wikipedia tiếng Việt

Another evidence which proves that approach is the fact that Vietnamese is the only one among nations all over the world which has consistently worshipped whales. So Lady Trieu said that she wanted to kill orca/killer whale/shark, not whale.

You can simply google "whale worship" to see for yourself.

But how do you know Ca kinh wasn't applied to orcas much later? Would she even be aware of them?

 

[Wielki Hegemon]

And how about this:

Anacaona chief of Taino.
Female leader checked
New civilization checked
Indigenous Americans checked (Carraibean was a region not yet explored by Civ series)
and last but not least. Mugs appeared in Pirates scenario video set in Carraibeans.
PS. Orcas are living there too!

 

[Xandinho]

Taino? Seems unlikely, Caguana was just added as city-state.

 

[Wielki Hegemon]

That is still 5 arguments vs. 1.
And Orcas and Mugs are on my side
Plus there is no maritime/island Civ that could interact with sea titles in NFP yet.

 

[notNamed]

But how do you know Ca kinh wasn't applied to orcas much later? Would she even be aware of them?

Yeah, no. We've got the original text and that calls it 長鯨 (so "trường kình") and if 8housesofelixir is to believed, it's a standard literary trope.
Likewise, kình is a Middle Chinese word, Middle Chinese would come into existence centuries after her death so she couldn't have called it Cá kình herself.
The word for whale in Vietnamese I could find that isn't Chinese in origin is cá voi (fish elephant) which is reconstructed as [a-kaːʔvɔːj] some 500 years after her time, which is where I'd end this small excursion into the languages concerned.

 

[Jeppetto]

I really hope it will just end up teasing Mug-Creating Industry you can make out of Whales in the upcoming Mode for the extra mile in the joke.

If it's teasing some Native Northern Civ, might be better, more space for another Pass.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

The orca sticker on the bottom of the mug is literally the manufacturer's logo for the maker of the mug. It's not some secret message unless they intentionally sourced their custom mugs from that company just so the label would have the right image. It's incredibly implausible.

Likewise, Grant's toque is not a hint. Canada is already in the game.

 

[cuc]

嫗曰：但欲乘風破浪，斬長鯨於東溟，扫清海宇，極斯民於□□*，豈效世人頓首曲腰，作人婢妾为□*？

Translation - The Ẩu** said: I just wish to ride the winds and rip though the waves, to behead the long whales in the Eastern Sea, to sweep clean the realm within the seas, to help (?) the people from □□; how can I imitate other people, bow my head and bend my back, to become other's slave and concubines and □?***

*I can't read these words so I marked them as □. They are probably obscure forms of Chinese characters, or even Chữ Nôm, which I don't have any knowledge of. Probably need to check with @Andrew Johnson [FXS] as I am sure he can read Chữ Nôm.

1. Rather than 極, which makes no sense as a verb here, the character should be 拯 "rescue". The next word should be 塹壕 - "moat, trench".

Together, the phrase is 拯斯民於塹壕: "to save our people from the deep trench."

2. The second word you don't recognize seems like 邪 to me, equivalent to 耶 (yé in Putonghua), expressing an interrogative mood.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

But still the most important question for that "clue" is how do I get a mug. It's pretty sweet.

 

[cuc]

Reading this thread, I must say this is quite the telephone game we are witnessing here. From a 250 CE insurgent about which we naturally have limited primary sources, to a 1900 CE booklet on local sights that attributed to her a few words like 扫清海宇 "to sweep clean the realm within the seas", which then got translated into "clean up our frontiers", somehow became a blunt "chase away the Wu army", and finally "Drive Out the Aggressors".

All through the misinformation train, from academics to writers' room wordsmiths, nobody actually cared about veracity of the knowledge or the context of its creation; all they wanted is BADASS QUOTES.

 

[Zaarin]

Another evidence which proves that approach is the fact that Vietnamese is the only one among nations all over the world which has consistently worshipped whales.

Literally the entire Pacific Northwest and several Siberian tribes disagree.

 

[8housesofelixir]

1. Rather than 極, which makes no sense as a verb here, the character should be 拯 "rescue". The next word should be 塹壕 - "moat, trench".

Together, the phrase is 拯斯民於塹壕: "to save our people from the deep trench."

2. The second word you don't recognize seems like 邪 to me, equivalent to 耶 (yé in Putonghua), expressing an interrogative mood.

Thank you for the correction! 拯, 塹壕, and 为耶 definitely makes sense. The scribe of Vương Duy Trinh's manuscript used a mixture of typical Classical Chinese, alternative Classical Chinese, and popular simplified Chinese, which makes the reading a bit harder.