The Imperial Anthem is a pledge of allegiance to the Empress, a staement of the metaphysical significance of the Empire and a concise telling of the story of the first Empress (or Raihiranya), the Sun-Daughter, Sai Rayanna.
The Story of Our Anthem
The Anthem tells the story of the founding of the Empire.
Before our Era the greatest civilisation in Sai Herthe was that of the great Southern Continent, which was submerged at the end of the Age of Bronze. In the early part of the Age of Iron there was some continuation of that civilisation.
Attacks upon the world of maids by demonic forces increased during this period and the greatest force of defence against them was the Chenti, a civilisation-in-arms dedicated to Sai Vikhë and tracing its lineage back to the Old World.
However, in the Battle of Noonday Night, the Chenti were defeated by the demon-barbarians, and their great Princess, Caran was slain, along with most of her people. Her sword, given to her ancestors by Sai Vikhe herself, was broken — a sign of the final destruction of the Chenti.
Caran, with her dying breath, charged that the pieces of the sword should be preserved and given to the One who was worthy to re-forge and wield them.
After many adventures, the shattered sword came to the city of Caire and its Princess, the young earth-born daughter of Sai Raya, who re-forged the sword and took it into battle to defeat the demonic hordes and their terrible ruler.
By this act she won the allegiance of all the Rayins of the world, and her city of Caire, far in the East, became the capital of the new civilisation.
All subsequent Empires are the continuation of this one, including the present Westrenne Empire. In the kinema this is symbolised by the transformation of the Flag of Caire into the modern Imperial Flag.
Commentary from Encyclopaedia Aristasiana
While the Anthem is sometimes sung in full, the first verse and chorus are more commonly heard, and this commentary on them appears in the Encyclopaedia Aristasiana:
From the mountain's rayant pinnaclé
To the troublèd waters of the sea,
Clearly means, geographically, "from the inland mountains to the coasts" i.e. throughout the land. However it also signifies metaphysically, from the Centre or "mountain-peak" from whose (rayant) radiance all things take their being, to the outward world of flux and change". "Troublèd" means "turbulent" but also refers to the inherent sorrows of the changing world of samsara. The underlying thought is that expressed in the Scripture:
Earth moves but Heaven is still
The rim revolves, but the Centre remains without motion.
While the troublèd, or turbulent, sea, beyond the shores of Empire, is pure samsara, the Holy Raihir itself is, to some extent, protected from the worst vicissitudes of worldly chaos by the Celestial Influence of the Solar Empress. This influence is described in the lines:
O, Rayan' thy rule doth run
As coursers of the sun,
Here we have the traditional image of the sun's rays as horses, galloping out from the central point, spreading the benign warmth and light of the Spirit into places that would otherwise be dark and "troublèd"
Rayan' is Raihiranya Sai Rayanna I, the solar avatar who defeated the demonic forces then besetting the land and became the first empress of Aristasia, from whom all subsequent Empresses are descended and by virtue of whose blood they are termed Sun-Daughters.
The repeated pledge of allegiance is all-important, since it is only insofar as we affiliate ourselves in harmony and obedience to the Golden Order that we may be rescued by it from the turbulence of chaotic being.
Thus, the Imperial anthem is a hymn to the saving harmony of the Golden Order as manifested through the Celestial Empire and her Solar Empress.
The Imperial
Standard (right) carries the same symbolism, with its solar centre raying
out in all directions, covering the whole field (or Empire) with its celestial
light.
So, when we salute the flag to the strains of the Imperial Anthem, we receive the same unifying and saving vision in both "mythic" and visual terms. And thus this very activity may be seen, not as the merely worldly formality that it is in Telluria, but as an effective ritual, binding oneself and one's dear ones to the loving, protective and harmonious Light.
Words used in the Anthem
Rayant: Often translated as "radiant", but literally "raying"
- sending out rays.
Troublèd: turbulent
Coursers: running horses
Torent: broken
Slaghan: slain
Distrait/destrait: destroyed
Fast: bindingly (not quickly)
Rayin: Queen
"There to send them well again": i.e. to send them back to hell
Lest: least
Est: East (the older form, still used in the word "Estrenne",
meaning a person from the East)