Jingo Discussion *spoilers*

[Jan Van Quirm]

But, dear smartypants we've more or less agreed that the Boat had been used/built before and why make a sub unless you wanted to go looking under the water somewhere or other...? While they were on their way to Leshp, Vetinari and Leonard were looking at his sketches and didn't take much notice of the surface of the island. They headed straight underneath making for the underground caverns, which implies that Leonard knew they were there and probably sketched them too, having discovered them previously...

Let's have a look at the map again...

Thought this might come in useful for this thread after briefly talking about other instances of lost cities on the Disc



The numbered locations on the Circle Sea region are as follows (clockwise from our NW into the sea itself) -

8 - Para Mountain }Moving Pictures
14 - Holy Wood... }
7 - Jowser Cove
15 - Chirm
19 - Kom
21 - N'Kouf
3 - Ephebe
2 - Djelibeybi
1 - Tsort
6 - Erebos
5 - Papylos
4 - Crinix

also - just 'cos it's so funny 13 - Heliodeliphilodelphiboschromenos

As a tangential point, but still on Leshp in general and it's place in Circle Sea cultural importance (as a Mediterranean style cradle of civilisation ) and of Holy Wood and it's sunken 'city' (which really is too close to Leshp for co-incidence), I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that a retro mage-war Discworld Atlantis/Indiana Jones-style story is waiting to happen if Terry is spared long enough to get around to it?

The entire Circle Sea is too super-volcanic caldera-like for comfort in fact.

OK - Atlantis-style theory
a) Leshp is mostly built on pumice - that's an aerated volcanic rock which is formed during an eruption when super-heated air-borne lava hits a large expanse of water...
b) the buildings on Leshp are a mix of earlier cultural architectural styles from societies bordering the Circle Sea.
c) we have another, permanently sunken city off the coast of Holy Wood and Para Mountain (8 & 14) that we've already seen in MP (blue text).
....(i) Terry also mentions the occasionally floating island of Leshp in either CoM or LF that he develops fully in this book
d) Vetinari found records concerning Leshp in A-M's municipal archives that dealt with previous risings
e) because people had built on Leshp before at various times this indicates that previous risings may have been for longer periods or even from before it sank - is it not therefore likely that knowledge of it's existence would have survived from even earlier times as folklore and legend?

In that last point Quirm (24 on the map) is not so far off that they may have had tales of the island too, perhaps from survivors of the original sinking? So Leonard, being that sort anyway, may also have investigated the odd tales and went to the general area to find out more. Whether or not it was on the surface is perhaps not so important - he could have gone there via a conventional boat but, this is thing - why would he build the Boat in the first place if not because he extrapolated and wanted to find out if the island did indeed float and so could sink as well (demonstrated in a & b) - the seaweed etc all over is proof enough of that surely for someone as clever as Leonard isn't it...?

[Tonyblack]

Vetinari goes a stage further in his thinking than anyone else. Everyone thought: 'a new piece of land! How can I exploit it?'

Vetinari thought: 'A new piece of land! Where did it come from?'

He's actually being more like a scientist than a politician.


The very fact that there were other much older buildings there was an indication that the island probably wasn't going to stay put.

[poohcarrot]

why would he build the Boat in the first place if not because he extrapolated and wanted to find out if the island did indeed float and so could sink as well...

Who said Leonard built the boat? Why didn't Vetinari have it built? He didn't build all those war machines he drew, so why should he have built a boat?

[Tonyblack]

I seem to recall that it says that the boat was already built and locked in a boat shed.

[poohcarrot]

Who built it? Does Leonard say he built it?

[Jan Van Quirm]

Leonard said he had been to Leshp before - that's why Vetinari suddenly realised there was another way to sort it and hurried back to him. Who else but Leonard would even think of building an underwater boat - had already started it and possibly even used it already before putting it into storage as Tony's just said.

Leonard designed the thing. It was already built or mostly so before Leshp resurfaced. Vetinari couldn't have already had it built on his own behalf, because at that stage he'd not even thought of, or knew about Leshp in a way that mattered. It must have been Leonard's and it's the reason he designed the rotten thing that's the key here. He'd been to Leshp before on it or else been motivated to build it at that point, because he already worked out that Leshp must only surface periodically.

[raisindot]

Who built it? Does Leonard say he built it?

Wow...you're actually agreeing with my...ORIGINAL view.

It's never really established whether Vetinari had the boat built to Leonard's specifications, Leonard had already built it and was keeping it stored, or whether Leonard built it himself (or supervised its construction) in a week after Vetinari found out Leonard had seen Leshp before. All of these are possibilities, so the best you can do is make an inference based on Pterry's few narrative "clues."

Vetinari asked Leonard whether he knew anything about "the [something like "underseas/submerged/lost continent of Leshp," (don't have the book in front of me. Please correct me if I'm wrong)], Leonard replied, "Yes, I did some sketches there several years ago."

Note that Leonard didn't say anything like, "Submerged? Underwater? I only saw a floating island." Being a literalist, had the island Leonard seen not been underwater, he would have correct Vetinari's mistake.

2. If Leonard had indeed seen the surfaced Leshp "several years ago" (you have to determine that length of period if Leonard's version of time), one wonders why the same battle/uproar over it didn't happen. Even it surfaced a hundred years ago wouldn't there have been some kind of history in AM about it that would have prevented the battle taking place in the time of Jingo? Unless, of course, Leonard was the only one to see the surfaced Leshp? Doubtful.

3. When Leonard goes to the berth for the first time he comments that no one has been able to pick the lock. When he inspects the boat, he sees that it is in good shape and only needs minor maintenance. This suggests that the boat already existed, that he had used it at least once (and during this time did his sketches of undersea Leshp), and normally kept in under lock in key in dry dock in AM.

J-I-B

[Jan Van Quirm]

The other thing here is that we've once again got the Roundworld Renaissance connection working quite obviously in this.

Vetinari thought: 'A new piece of land! Where did it come from?'

He's actually being more like a scientist than a politician.

Discworld Leonard (DL) is of course a Renaissance man but so's Vetinari isn't he? Many of Roundworld Leonardo's (RL) patrons were powerful lords or politicians - the Medicis were also Macchiavelli's inspiration for the Prince although the Borgias were in fact a far better model for the more ruthless aspects and RL lived in Lorenzo II 'The Magnificent' de Medici's Palace until they were driven out of Florence by the republicans led by Soderini under whom Macchiavelli held high public office. Other patrons were Cesare Borgia, popes, other city-state lords and finally Francis I of France... Lorenzo the Magnificent, Francis I and, arguably and more darkly, Cesare Borgia were all regarded as Renaissance men, all being very well educated in both the arts and sciences.

The DL link is that his patrons paid for his ideas to be studied and realised. With Borgia in particular these were to do with military applications involving architectural aspects including siege weapons and the like - Vetinari could well have paid for/built The Boat but the point once again is that DL designed it in the 1st place. Without that input and the reason to dream it up in the first place there'd be no Boat to build would there?

[poohcarrot]

I do, as you know, experiment with devices...which of course, obedient to your viws on the matter, I subsequently dismantle because there are, indeed, evil men in the world who might stumble upon them and pervert their use.

[Jan Van Quirm]

Then he obviously either hadn't got around to dismantling it OR Vetinari got it built in short order if you want to ignore Tony's ref to it being in storage already... ?

Also, as Vetinari didn't know all about Leonard's earlier excursion to Leshp until the war was kicking off, and if he had built the Boat already, this was obviously before Vetinari had starting playing at being his patron/protector, so maybe Leonard simply hadn't finished using it/building it and then got distracted and forgot all about it...?

[snowballs]

Leonard had allready built it before he got captured and put in the attic.

He tells Colon and Nobby that he used to get quite a turn of speed out of it.
Then Vetinari was surprised that Leonard had been under Leshp.
That must mean that it allready existed before his incarceration.

[raisindot]

Leonard had allready built it before he got captured and put in the attic.

He tells Colon and Nobby that he used to get quite a turn of speed out of it.
Then Vetinari was surprised that Leonard had been under Leshp.
That must mean that it allready existed before his incarceration.

Ummm, Snowballs, aren't you forgetting something here?



J-I-B

[snowballs]

Leonard had allready built it before he got captured and put in the attic.

He tells Colon and Nobby that he used to get quite a turn of speed out of it.
Then Vetinari was surprised that Leonard had been under Leshp.
That must mean that it allready existed before his incarceration.

Ummm, Snowballs, aren't you forgetting something here?



J-I-B

Like??

Floating could mean floating as in not on the sea bottom, a submarine is floating even if it is not submerged as long as it is not resting on the sea bottom.
Is my book strange or does Colon once get called Cohen around the second chapter??

[raisindot]

*Sigh*

I was hoping you'd figure it out for yourself, Snowballs. Has nothing to do with any WORDS you're posting.

[raisindot]

Has nothing to do with any WORDS you've been posting, Snowballs.