The Emperor of Mankind.
Great rulers that manage to unite their people and lead them to glory and victory are found
through both history and fiction, from alexander the great, to Aragorn, to Ghengis Khan.
The Emperor of mankind in the warhammer 40,000 universe leads perhaps a larger empire than
practically anyone else, and on top of that is worshipped as an actual god.
It's hard to think of 40k without thinking about the god-emperor, and so this is a pretty
good springboard to dive further into the lore of the universe.
Like all of my videos, this won't be totally comprehensive, but it will provide a pretty
good look at the emperor of mankind.
The emperor's origin is shrouded in mystery, and it's likely we'll never get a clear explanation
of his creation.
The earliest source on the topic is questionable at best in today's lore, so take it with a
grain of salt.
It was said that in the early history of humanity on the planet Terra, there existed a number
of psykers, a.k.a. psychic individuals, called shamans.
The use of psychic abilities most commonly means an individual draws power from the warp,
the parallel dimension of boundless chaotic energy.
These shamans were benevolent people, using their powers to aid humanity, and when they
died, they could use their connection to the warp to reincarnate into a new form.
However, since the warp is essentially created and fueled by the emotions and thoughts of
practically every living intelligent creature in the universe, as humanity drifted towards
ambition, greed, and violence, the warp began to change.
The warp was becoming a darker dimension, and hellish entities began forming inside
of it.
The shamans discovered that it was becoming more difficult to use their powers, and upon
death, their souls were being devoured.
They gathered together, realizing that humanity was at great risk from the growing power of
the warp.
After much deliberation, they decided to combine their powers into a single man that would
guide and protect humanity.
The shamans committed mass suicide, pooling their energies, and reincarnated into an immortal
new man, the emperor.
Like I said, this is an old explanation, and plenty of fans throw this out completely,
preferring the emperors origins to remain mysterious.
It is clear that the emperor was born around 8,000 BC in Anatolia, which would be modern
day Turkey.
While still a child, his father was murdered by his uncle, and while he prepared his father's
body for the funeral, he received a pyschic vision of the murder.
He approached his uncle, and used his power to stop his heart.
This was apparently the moment that the emperor realized humanity needed guidance to establish
law and order.
Despite this, the emperor would not specficially rise to global leadership for many millenia,
choosing instead to observe humanity, subtly influence them, and develop his abilities.
The emperor was deeply aware of the growing powers in the warp, and hoped to influence
humanity towards peace so as to slow the growth of chaos.
These efforts largely failed, as man inherently drifts towards ambition, self-satisfaction,
and defiance.
The emperor went through many identities as humanity developed, including political advisors,
religious leaders, pioneering scientists, crusaders, and so on.
Eventually, mankind took to the stars, and the emperor went with them.
He traveled to the planet Molech, where there existed a great portal to the realm of chaos.
The ruinous powers had been created millenia ago by this point, and the emperor stepped
through the portal to meet them.
It's unknown exactly what occured during that visit, or what was said, but the emperor supposedly
obtained a measure of their power.
Whether he stole it, forcibly took it, or made some bargain that he didn't follow through
on, the gods of chaos forever labeled him as the anathema.
The golden age of mankind eventually came to an end, and the age of strife began.
For millenia, humanity was at its most divided, plagued by uncontrolled psykers, warp storms,
demonic possesion, robotic armies, hostile aliens, and sheer isolation from one another.
Terra became an apocalyptic home to warring barbarians and warlords, and the emperor finally
decided that it was time to step in and lead his people.
The emperor met his chief advisor during this time, Malcador, who was the one who suggested
he take on the emperor title.
The emperor proceeded to spearhead the unification wars, defeating the other warlords and conquering
terra.
To achieve this, the emperor began experimenting with gene editing and enhancement techniques,
creating the first super soldiers, called the Thunder Warriors.
The thunder warriors were massive, incomparably strong, and savage, making them perfect weapons
for the unification wars.
The emperor also took on a personal guard of soldiers that he valued above all others,
called the custodian guard.
It's said that the final battle of the unification warriors saw the death of all of the thunder
warriors, although some say that the emperor himself saw to it that they died, as they
weren't a good fit for his plans of conquering the galaxy.
Despite this, a small number of thunder warriors did survive the war and were rediscovered
later.
With Terra united, the emperor began to prepare for his great crusade to conquer the galaxy
and unite all of humanity under one banner.
He went to the mechanicum of mars, the technological organization that holds the greatest collection
of humanity's technical knowledge, and formed a treaty with them.
The main issue was that the emperors ideology he was planning to spread was of logic, reason,
and atheism, ridding the galaxy of superstition and religion as they have only served to divide
mankind.
The mechanicum however, worshiped a machine god of knowledge, conflicting with this ideology.
The emperor knew that his crusade would be hopeless without the technical support of
the mechanicum however, and so he signed the treaty, allowing them a degree of automony
in exchange for their assistance.
The mechanicum agreed to the treaty partly after witnessing the emperor repair a machine
with only a touch, beliving him to be the physical manifestation of the machine god,
called the omnissiah.
The emperor then had the mechanium assist in creating the astronomicon, a massive device
powered by the emperors psychic energy that would function as a beacon during warp travel.
Without this, the great crusade would have been practically impossible.
The emperor also continued his efforts in creating genetic super soldiers.
He had plans for legions of genetically modified soldiers that would be invaluable in his crusades,
but he also wished to have a number of great generals to lead them.
These generals were called the primarchs, and the emperor created 20 of them, using
secretive genetic techniques, parts of his own DNA, and likely some part of the power
of the warp he gained from the chaos gods.
The primarchs were created to be stronger, faster, smarter, tougher, and more charismatic
than a normal human, the greatest leaders available to mankind other than the emperor
himself.
The use of the warp in creating them likely resulted in making them even greater, but
also would potentially leave them more open to its influence.
After creating his twenty sons, the gods of chaos managed to take them and seperate them
across the galaxy.
The reasons for this are unknown, but the most probably reason was to sow chaos in the
future, rather than just killing them and delaying the emperors plans.
Hoping to later find his sons, the emperor took dna samples that he had taken from each
primarch, and used them to created twenty legions of space marines, not as great as
the primarchs, but more controllable and sophisticated than the thunder warriors.
With his fleets of ships and legions of soldiers, the emperor began his great crusade.
The imperium of man began conquering planets, rediscovering territory and bringing lost
allies back into the fold.
The emperor found one of his primarchs, Horus, and began bonding with him.
Horus would prove to be an incredibly capable general, and over time the imperium would
rediscover all of the lost primarchs.
Each one was placed in charge of the legion of space marines created from their dna. 200
years or so into the great crusade, the imperium achieved a triumphant victory against the
ork hordes in the ullanor sector, largely thanks to Horus.
The emperor believed that horus was ready to lead the war effort in his stead, as he
had bigger plans.
Horus was granted the title of warmaster and placed in charge of the crusade, and the emperor
returned to Terra.
Practically everyone in the imperium, including Horus, were mystified as to why the emperor
would suddenly abandon the crusade and return home, but the majority trusted in their emperor
and in Horus.
The emperor's secret plan, known only to a few, was the webway project, an effort to
completely divorce the imperium from their dependency on the warp.
The webway was a conduit created by the ancient race known as the old ones and also utilized
by the eldar that allowed for extremely fast travel across the galaxy without involving
the warp.
The emperor created a portal from the golden throne on Terra into the webway, and had the
mechanicum begin creating new webway tunnels, but since they weren't created from psychiccaly
resistant material, the emperor had to use his own psychic will to protect the tunnels
from the warp.
The webway project would have been a tremendous boon to the future of humanity, but unfortunately,
the horus heresy occured.
Horus became corrupted by the forces of chaos, acting upon his natural ambition and concerns
over the emperor's secrecy.
Another primarch, Magnus, saw a vision of his brothers fall and revolt against the emperor.
He tried to warn the emperor by sending out an astral projection into the warp, and came
across a webway tunnel that led back to terra, unaware that it was part of the emperor's
secret project.
He tried to break into the tunnel to use it as a shortcut, but failed, until a voice offered
him the power to do so and he accepted.
Magnus' breach allowed the demonic forces of chaos to enter the webway and destroy it,
enraging the emperor, who banished magnus from his presence.
Since the forces of chaos told Horus that the emperor was planning to ascend to godhood
and abandon his primarchs, he led a revolt against his father, joined by half of the
forces of the imperium.
The great crusade ended in a complete failure as mankind plunged into the greatest civil
war they would ever know.
Rather than leading the charge against the traitors, the emperor was forced to remain
on the golden throne in order to protect terra from demonic invasion by way of the webway
breach.
He did spend time communicating telepathically with some of his subjects, but practically
all of his focus was spent on the golden throne.
The horus heresy came to an end the only way it could really, with a battle between the
emperor and his once favored son Horus on Terra.
Horus had begun the battle with a tremendous orbital bombardment on Terra, followed by
landing his legions of space marines and marching on the imperial palace.
Despite Horus' forces being massive, it would prove to be difficult to reach the emperor.
Those still loyal to him defended with all their might, and Horus suffered heavy losses
as well.
Horus had hoped to storm the palace and slay the emperor before the other loyal legions
could arrive to help, but it was looking like he was running out of time.
He decided instead to lower the shields on his flagship that prohibited teleportation
and invited his father to come to him.
Knowing what was going to occur, the emperor left the golden throne in the temporary care
of his advisor, Malcador, and went to the ship.
Another primarch, Sanguinius, had arrived first and attempted to slay Horus, but failed.
The emperor arrived to see Sanguinius' corpse at the feet of Horus, and he was overwhelmed
by sorrow.
Horus was convinced he was doing the right thing, overthrowing a false emperor, and believed
that he had bound the chaos gods to his will.
The emperor knew he wouldn't shake Horus from his corruption, and the duel began.
The emperor, tens of thousands of years old and incomparably powerful, found his match
in Horus,a primarch with the might of four chaos gods imbued in him.
Partly due to the emperor holding back, hoping to not kill his son, Horus managed to grievously
injure the emperor, severing the tendons in his wrist, cutting his jugular, breaking several
of his ribs, melting his face, breaking his back, and finally tearing off one of his arms.
At this point one of the custodian guard entered and tried to protect the emperor, but Horus
flayed the man alive.
The emperor then gathered his full power and shot a bolt of psychic energy through Horus'
heart, ending the duel.
The emperor was very near death, and was taken to the golden throne where he was put on life
support, forever shackling him to that spot.
No longer physically leading the imperium, the emperors role shifted to a psychic and
spiritual one.
Casting his mind into the warp, the emperor could continue to battle the forces of chaos
in addition to powering the astronomicon, all while his body slowly decayed.
The psychic effort of this is incredible though, even for the emperor, and requires the daily
sacrifice of a thousand psykers in order to provide him with the energy to continue.
The adeptus Astra Telepathic continually comb the galaxy for potential psykers to amplify
the astronomicon and eventually be sacrificed.
The golden throne itself is maintained by the techpriests of the adeptus mechanicus,
but even they might not be able to keep it functioning forever.
Without the emperor as their ruler, leadership in day to day running of the imperium fell
to the high lords of terra, a council of 12 leaders, each the head of some part of the
imperium.
In part due to emperor's legendary status, and part due to the emperor's role in protecting
and guiding the imperium from the golden throne, more and more of humanity began to worship
him as a living god.
In the time of the great crusade, worship of the emperor as a god was a secretive activity,
frowned upon by many and banned by the emperor himself.
Ironically, despite the emperor's belief that religion only served to divide humanity, worship
of him would unite much of the imperium.
In time, worship of the emperor would become the official religion of the imperium, and
the ecclesiarchy would be formed to maintain and promote the religion.
Two notable exceptions that don't follow the ecclesiarchy are the adeptus mechanicus, who
worship the emperor in their own way, and the majority of the space marines, who revere
and respect the emperor, but don't worship him.
There are those who say that the emperor will someday be reborn and return to lead the imperium
with his physical body once again.
They say that the emperor's soul is currently residing in the warp, much like the shamans
on terra millenia ago, and is reforming into a new entity.
Perhaps this is nothing more than a rumor, or perhaps the emperor will indeed return
to the imperium during its darkest hour.
The emperor was undoubtedly a powerful individual and an i leader, but much of his history and
actions have been altered to some degree by imperial propoganda.
Truth be told, he can often be seen as warmonger, forcing compliance on the whole of humanity
irrelevant of their beliefs or cultures.
Regardless, trillions of humans worship and depend on the emperor, and his continued existence
on his throne is vital for the imperium's future.
Him physically returning would certainly shake things up, but as is, the emperor of mankind
is undoubtedly an iconic element of the warhammer 40,000 universe.