The ancient enemy of the Eldar, and the Old once, they gave their souls in return for endless life. The Necrons represents an ageless, unknowable evil in the Warhammer 40k setting, their technology so advanced, they seem to have magical powers.

Introduction

As always will I begin my series with a quick rundown on the major topics series, as well as giving a general overview of what the faction is about. I want to in this series use the Necrons to discuss a few topics, chief amongst them being, the individual and the collective, death and rebirth, the Necrons complicated relationships to their gods.

War and sickness

The story of the Necrons is one of suffering and strife, like many narratives in the 40 universe. Plague and war are themes that runs trough the factions narratives, I will begin this text by giving a short summery of the Necrons in universe history.

The age of the Necrontyr

The Necrons was once a mortal race, made out of flesh and bones, known as the Necrontyr The race of the Necrontyr is described as a warlike race which short life spans full of suffering and illness. This fate has lead them to developed a burning obsession with death and immortality. They searched outwards towards the starts to find the secrets to life and death. As their armies expanding ever outwards, their kings and priests devoted their times to gain mortality via rituals, research and the great acts of fame and infamy. As their empire grew, the Necrontyr eventually fell to infighting, and it was this division that eventually forced the Necrontyr rulers to find an external enemy to fight. They chose for their foes was the immortal Old Once, the future creators of the Eldar race. The Necrontyr despised that the long-lived and tranquil Old Once refused to share the secret of immortality with the long suffering Necrontyr. (Games workshop 2015)

War of the heavens

The Necrontyr greatly underestimated the power of their foes. In an hour of desperation their ruler, known as the Silent king made a deal with ancient and all-powerful gods, known as the C’tan . He offered the the servitude of his entire races, for the gift of immortality, as well as the power to smite their foes. The C’tan offerd the Necrons the secrets of a process known as the biotransferences. This arcane procedure transformed the Silent kings subjects from the mortal Necrontyr of flesh and blood, to immortal Necrons of steel and plasma. This king, known as Szarekh, later realized what he had done to his races, and lead the Necrons against their former masters, managing to break doen the seemingly immortal C’tan and enslave the remaining shadowy forms of their former gods.

In the end, both the C’tan, and the Old Once lay defeated, but the Necrons were to wounded and scattered to continue properly rule their new empire. The silent king Szarekh ordered al his subjects to go in to hibernation, and return only once the galaxy was once again ripe for conquest. (Games workshop, 2015)

The awakening

the Nercons awaken decades later to find a galaxy infested with new adversaries, as well as old foes. The Necrons awoke scattered, disorganized, and in some cases, quite mad. One of the more intriguing facets of the Necron narrative, is what the passage of time has done to them during their cryosleep, as endless aeons have not left them without wounds. Despite these early setbacks, the Necrons have managed to slowly retake more and more of their former empires Their technology vastly outshining anything that the other races have to their disposal. Here is where the cosmic horror of the Necrons comes from. they are portrayed as an ancient, sleepless race of death machines who have managed killed their own gods. It is not a question of if the Necrons will return, it is a question of when. (Games workshop, 2015)

Death, reincarnation, and the individual

The Necron society is represented to be built on honour, war and a strict cohesion to hierarchy. The overlords and kings at the top being able to freely pursue any agenda they see fit, while the lowly Warrior and scarabs are little more then an automata, with only middling consciousness remaining.

Gods and masters

The C’tan, being the architects of the Necrontyrs transformation in to the Necrons was first lorded as gods by their followers, the Necrons. In return for immortality and power, the Necron would swear endless servitude to their new gods.

The highest members of the Necron society, the priests, researchers and rulers are the only individuals that were allowed to keep their personality, autonomy and memories intact when the when trough the biotransference. In fact, the codex descries how, not only these individuals persevered by their new bodies, and their ambitiousness now freed from mortal fears and desires greatly enhanced their powers.

Many of the Necron worlds are described to have been lost during the season of cryosleep, and even those who have remained intact, have come out changed. Their vital programming irreversibly damaged, and the inhabitants have often awoken with a strained grasp on reality, at best. The dichotomy of madness, and soulless logic is one of many opposing themes that can be found within the Necron narrative. (Games workshop, 2015)

Slaves and servants

The lesser casts of the Necrontyr were not deemed worthy of being fully transformed, in the same manner as their masters were. Instead only the tiniest bit of each individual was preserved within each Necron Warrior. These Warriors are now traded, stolen, and discarded much like any other commodity would, and the Necron lords regard them with as little empathy as the weapons they carry.

Following betrayal of the C’tan, these once world ending deities split up were, enslaved turned in to mere tools to the pragmatic and power hungry Necrons.The masters had effectively become the slaves. The C’tan of the 41th millennium is used as glorified energy sources for al manner of twisted and horrendous war machines, much to the joy of their Necron captors. (Games workshop 2015)

Science and magic

We once again return to the topic of sciense and magic within the world of Warhammer 40k. We find the same common trend of mixing the terminology of magic, with that of the scientific. Note that much of these descriptions comes from the viewpoint of the enemies of the Necrons, who see their advanced technology akin to mysticism and arcane wonders. (Games workshop 2015)

Techno-sorcery

The levels of technological mastery of the Neconrs is has allowed them to bend the very laws of physics to their whims. They are able to slow down down time, travel to time and space in an instant, or to service possible futures. This power is at once decried as mystical and purely scientific. Nowhere else is this duality made more clear as in the term for the arts of the Necron Scientist use, “techno sorcery”.

Just like with the Humans and Dark Eldar of the Warhammer 40k universe, is technological and scientific know-how bound to a specific, often secretive group of individuals, in the case of the Necrons, the Cryptek. The names of the individuals can either derive from the word crypt, as in the funeral complex, or the term cryptic, as well as the term technology or technician. Furthermore, the rest of the (sentient part) of the Necron society seems to be fully or partially apathetic to how these scientific marvels function, only that they do so. (Games workshop 2015)

The blending of science and magic, as well as limiting knowledge and wisdom of al things scientific and mechanical to a certain small group, often referred to in some form of arcane society, are themes that will return over and over again trough out the Warhammer 40k series. The apparent apathy of the wider societies of Necrons, Eldar and Humans alike, is also a theme that will continue to return again and again. We have already seen the same pattern a few times with the human Tech priests, and the Dark Eldar Homunculi.

Prophesies and magic

The most apparent trend of mixing magic and sciense, when it comes to the Necrons comes in their use of astrology to try and perceive future events, and if possible change them to their liking. The use of astrology is another theme that we have seen both in the Eldar properties, as well as in the Emperors tarot used by human scholars. Despite the Necrons being described as a fully scientific and logically based society, they still follow the arcane rules of astrology. In most occult traditions is this rule known by the phrase “as above, so believe”, referring to the idea that the starts, and the lives of mortals are inexplicitly linked. The happenstance of one will directly relate to the other. The starts guides the life of mortals, just as much as the mortals guide the paths of the stars (Cavendish 1983).

Conclusions

In this chapter have I presented some base concepts relating to the Necrons, as well as some of the thematic Thematic elements they share with the rest of the 40k universe universe. I have presented the themes of strict hierarchies that can be found within the Necron narratives, as well as an ever present focus on life, death and immorality. Like many other factions is the Necrons also a faction of endless war and strife, a fact we will discuss further at a later date. Lastly have I here tied the Necrons to a tradition of deliberately mixing and mystifying technology and sciense, by blending it with images of the occult and mystical.

The Necrons themselves presents an unknowable threat to all life in the universe. An unfathomable ancient spectre that has returned to exterminate all life, and reinstate their proper rule over all. I will in the next Necron chapter discuss some of the Necrons real life inspirations, as well as how they fit in to the wider narrative traditions of sciense fiction.

References

Games Workshop (2015) Codex: Necrons. Games Workshop

Cavendish, R. (1983). The Black Arts: A Concise History of Witchcraft, Demonology, Astrology, and Other Mystical Practices Throughout the Ages. TarcherPerigee