#ghost theories

[copiousloverofcopia]

Ok ok so here me out with my BS

We have been getting A LOT of imagery of Secondo/Infestissumam related things inregards to Papa V.

Not only does the official flash animation for Papa V show the infamous flashing scene of Secondo's ancient serpent deceiver from the Year Zero video, but there is even a more recent "Red Death" inspired shirt featuring Secondo on it. This new Papa V looks seems, at least to me, seems to be partly inspired by Phantom of the Opera (the Red Death) specifically. Plus, the whole baby on the Infestissumam album cover with a HALF MASK!!! right, RIGHT lol

Also, they made the whole infestissumam stuff a part of the last tour, anyone remember the huge rendition of the album cover in the Spillways lounge?

This new Papa is younger right? What if we were led to believe that this is Copia's twin, but it is in fact Secondo's SON.

Therefore, they are still very much part of the bloodline and would tie into some things and make the younger Papa make sense.

Also notice in the V flash animation that we get two sides of Papa V mirrored what it that is a clever way to head that they will be two different Papas with two separate masks to differentiate them and they will share the spot line... so the twins?!

Also, if you would lol, remember that there is t-shirts and other merch with only Secondo (from my recollection) specifically that shows him with 2 babies which everyone assumed were the twins from the chapters but what if that was a red herring....

So.... my theory is that the new Papa, Papa V Perpetua is Papa Emeritus II/Secondo's son and that we may even be in fact in store for it to be 2 SEPARATE PAPAS, TWINS!

What do you all think? I'd love to know.

[bonesy-doodles]

Okay, so!!! I was just watching the Kiss the Go-Goat and the Mary on a Cross music video, and the date in both of them is September 13th, 1969. If it is to be correctly assumed that Sister Imperator was already pregnant with Copia (and possibly his twin brother), then their birthdays would be sometime around June 13th, give or take for the estimated day of birth, but there is a high chance that Copia is a Gemini.

Gemini, the twins, the TWINS!!!

I could be over thinking things, cause who knows if Tobias thought about Copia and his possible twin down to a specific date just to have them be Geminis, maybe I’m insane, but I think it makes sense!!!

Side Note: He could also be a Cancer, which haha 69 on the side (I’m so funny).

Second Side Note: We (me and my wives) also watched the Rats music video, and Copia on the Pale White Horse, the Horseman of Death, and the fact that all of his family members (three brothers, mother and father) are all Dead in some way connected to him. The Emeritus brothers died to go on tour with him, his father died at the end of his first tour, and his mother died at the end of his second tour. Let’s hope his twin brother is not next!!

[blackbird5154]

Just an observation. Sis is obsessed with conquering the world.

I just put it all together. She criticized the first two Papas for not getting a single president on their side. She criticized the Third for getting carried away by fame and "straying from the Path". The final album is dedicated to the Empire. The tour ended with the phrase "Empire is built", when Ghost played on almost every continent. If you read their Instagram, you can see that Sis has a boner for the phrase "world-wide".

And then I remembered she's fucking IMPERATOR!

[osiiiris]

Primo Emeritus: Florence.

This is the first of my posts where I locate each Papa in Italian cities based on the occult influences/history of each city. I hope you find it interesting and useful!

Primo | Secondo | Terzo

Primo Emeritus, The Old One, the embodiment of all that is sacred. A personality like his deserves to be located in an ancient city full of art, poetry, and history, shaped by the esoteric and alchemical obsessions of the Medici family, amidst the enduring shadow of centuries-old Satanic cults.

Let’s see why I have chosen Florence for Primo.

In this chapel of ritual…

From the early 70s to the late 80s, a series of murders occurred in various regions of middle-north Italy, with the most infamous taking place in Tuscany, known as the case of the 'Monster of Florence' (Mostro di Firenze), which resulted in the deaths of 14 people - officially, but it is believed there were way more.

The theory is that these murders were part of a large network of Satanic rituals involving influential figures from Rome, Perugia, and Florence. This network is supposedly still active. The original cult allegedly responsible for initiating these rituals seems to be the 'Rosa rossa' (Red Rose) cult. 

A fertile ground for writing Ritual...

2. The creator of Hell.

Florence is the birthplace of Dante Alighieri, the renowned author of the Divine Comedy and the creator of the now canonical structure of Hell.

Primo could have had many more things in common with Dante than we expect: indeed, it is said that Alighieri was part of an esoteric cult named ‘Fedeli d’Amore’ (Loyals to Love), probably affiliated with the Templars. From there, Dante is said to have drawn inspiration for his symbolic and esoteric tales, as well as his passion for numbers.

Keep an eye on Dante, as he will eventually come back in the next chapters.

3. The ghost behind the open window.

It’s not a Ghost story without an actual ghost.

In Piazza Santissima Annunziata, there is a building, Palazzo Grifoni, that holds a mysterious detail: a window that remains open at all times, whether day or night, summer or winter. Legend has it that a woman of the Grifone family bid farewell from that window to her lover, likely Ferdinando I, who departed for war. She waited for him by that same open window throughout her life, but he never returned, dying in battle. When she passed away, the window was finally closed. However, soon after, numerous mysterious events happened in the building, to the point the residents concluded that the building was haunted by the ghost of the woman, and they have kept the window open ever since not to upset her.

But that's not all: the Ferdinando I statue placed in the square, has his face turned to look right to that window… At the very end, he finally came back to her.

4. The Boboli alchemical garden.

Boboli represents a very particular case of an alchemical garden conceived to be ‘accessible’ only to those who have a strong alchemical and esoteric knowledge. It is built as a symbolic route where you can contemplate the principles of magical and alchemical doctrine along the way. You’ll be welcomed by two fountains, placed one on top of the other: the Mose’s (it is an indoor fountain) and the Carciofo’s (artichoke). They are believed to represent the esoteric concept of “as above so below”, but the references to esoteric concepts are present along the whole garden.

Primo would have surely loved this place.

[gothdaddyissues]

Vague and Random RHRN Thought...

Should we re-visit Escape from the Ministry?

In the after-credits scene, the first thing Copia/Frater Imperator says is a comment about the renovations.

The renovations were taking place during the Escape the Ministry game.

Did Tobias just want to give a little nod to the game? Or did he mention it for a reason? Seems odd to bring it up unless it was significant somehow...

I would also assume that him mentioning it means the game is canon? Someone has a gun (Chekov's gun....)

[phantoms-finger-tapes]

I've seen a lot of people thinking these are tombstones. Let's clear that up.

For those who don't know, this is a reference to the stone tablets (there are 2) where the 10 Commandments were written. The title of the compilation, 13 Commandments, is the most obvious sign that it was in reference to that but this is also made clear by the fact that Secondo is holding a staff which is in reference to Moses, the one who brought the stone tablets. Also, the waves around Secondo is a reference to Moses parting the Red Sea.

Now what's interesting is that there are 13 Commandments meaning one tablet should have 6 commandments and the other, 7. But the one shown has only 5 which imo is definitely a reference to Papa Emeritus V.

[mezzyb0nb0n]

Papa VI theory (Ghost)

That’s all.

[lucifers-little-sunshine]

Dance Macabre/ Papa Nihil Origin Theory

Dance Macabre is one of my favorite music videos, but Lore wise it seems to open up more questions than it answers. It doesn’t seem to fit into the timeline that the Chapters present of a continuous bloodline of Papas that stretches back for ages.

This is my theory for how Dance Macabre fits into the Ghost Lore and reveals a lot to us about the history of the Ministry and Papa Nihil. I felt motivated to finally write this out after reading @ngnt-writes theories on how Papa Nihil may become the next Papa.

Let’s start with his title. Papa Emeritus Nihil. Like most things in Ghost this phrase has an actual counterpart in the Catholic Church and is used to refer to a deceased or retired Pope. This implies to me that the first person to carry that title within the Ministry of Sin would have been an actual Pope in the Catholic Church at some point. Maybe he quit after he began to worship Satan to form his own church, maybe he died and Satan sent him back from the pits of Hell.

We also have the issue of if the bloodline goes back so far why have we only reached number four? (Okay obviously the real world reason is that the lore wasn’t planned out at the time Secondo gave his “Io Sono Papa Emeritus Secondo” speech, but I’m still going to try and reconcile it with the lore.) I think that Papa Nihil was the first ancient Papa who founded the Ministry.

At the Start of the Dance Macabre video we see Nihil and his friend show up at the party. They seem clueless to what the nature of this party actually is, although Nihil isn’t really digging the vibes. At first I interpreted this a couple different ways.

Nihil has no idea what’s going on and they’re walking into a trap

Nihil is already a part of the Ministry and is luring in an unsuspecting victim to be sacrificed

The first seemingly doesn’t fit, unless somehow Nihil is from the bloodline and doesn’t know it, and this party is meant to bring him back into the fold. But I think there’s another possibility. The Nihil we see without a white eye at the beginning of the video really is just a random guy the Ministry picked out. So this is my most far fetched theory, but the one I think explains the most.

Before the video the Ministry has a major problem. The last Papa died with no successor. They are scrambling to appoint a new person. A young Sister with ambitions of power sees this an opportunity and begins to dive into the history of the church. She learns about the first Papa Emeritus and attempts to contact his spirit within the crypts of the Ministry. After all, if Satan brought him back to life once he might do it again.

Next they select the host and the sacrificial lamb. The party is set up to lure them both in for the resurrection ritual. The doorman can’t let them in until he’s sure they’re the ones that have been chosen, because it can’t just get out into the world that the Ministry performs human sacrifices. I don’t think they’re even something they commonly do these days. But in this case it’s clear that the only way is a life for a life.

At the moment that Sister punches Nihil and gives him his white eye, he looks around as if seeing the world for the first time. He could be seeing things from a new perspective as someone who has ‘seen the light’, or it could be that this is Papa Nihil’s first time being alive in centuries.

This makes Nihil’s betrayal of Sister all the worse. The kiss at Whisky a Go-Go was just the last straw. She had brought him to life, fallen in love with him, and he didn’t even choose to have one of his heirs with her. I think there is also a good chance that she thought she could control him and his career in ways that she couldn’t. We see with Copia that even though she loves the people closest to her very deeply, that manifests in her having her own plan for their success that she expects them to follow.

She brought him back to life with expectations for how his career and their relationship would go, and when he didn’t play along she left and plotted give her son that power.

[cowbell-ghuleh]

I doubt anyone else will find this interesting, but I want to ramble so here's my Primo head-canon just to try and make sense of his age! XD

Primo is supposed to be significantly older than Papa's 2-4 (who are in their mid 50s or older). People seem to typically say Primo is in his 70s or 80s, but canonically he is also Nihil's son. But Nihil died when he was "almost 80 years old".

I head canon a summoning spell went wrong for him and he got dragged into the pit by an angry summon, or he willingly chose to go so he could better understand the ministry's mission. And we have some multi-dimentional timey-whimey stuff where years/decades passed for him while no time passed in the mortal realm. Either that, or being a mortal in the pits prematurely aged him.

Honestly, given Primo was the most hardcore "true believer" of all the Papas I could see him actively choosing to explore the pit despite the risks.

I just wanted to get that written down to be honest. I don't write fanfics/ or long form fan comics anymore for various reasons, but I do like talking about my head-canon theories /ideas occasionally. And hey, I'm a doctor who, Babylon 5 and star trek fan, I like some time travel nonsense in my stories sometimes XD

[juttytaylorsmustache]

I was watching RHRN, when I noticed odd attention to the books on the shelf beside the TV Jesus was watching before watcher in the sky. So I did some digging as usual, and found this rabbit hole on Reddit!!!! Credit is in the photo to the redditer. But OMG the detail is just….lord….every detail is important with TF

@slavghoul @thebandghostofficial

[cheerycherrycandy-resurrected]

crackpot copia theory prediction post: (written 17.06.24, before the RHRH release)

so. the title of dance macabre (ghost) is a clear reference to the symphonic poem danse macabre (saint-saëns). but I can see more connections than the name, and think I can take it a step further. (and this might have been said before, in which case oops!)

maybe spoilers?? idk yet! below the cut:

the story of danse macabre goes that at midnight on halloween, skeletons come out of their graves and dance for Death, represented in the piece by a solo, interestingly-tuned violin. having played a shortened version of this when I was younger can confirm it's really fun and evil-sounding lol. then at dawn when the cock crows, they return to their graves for another year. not going into a deeper musical analysis rant about it, but the skeletons bones are also represented by xylophones and that's really great.

after the LA rituals we heard that skeleton dancers dance with/around Copia during dance macabre, lifting him up etc.

skeletons dancing for Death in a dance macabre? wait that sounds familiar...

COPIA IS DEATH CONFIRMED?!

idk, this is a scheduled post for after the movie's release, let's see if this gets any more evidence!!

[copiousloverofcopia]

I wonder if the new look for the ghouls will give like Masquerade or like Harlequin/Jester vibes

🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔

[wifetomanyfictionalmen]

Unpopular opinion but imperator might actually just be a very sensitive and overprotective mother to Copia. She doesn’t want to guilt trip him or anything, she had primo Secondo and Terzo killed so Copia could finally become papa and fulfil his birth right.

Also if you think about it in the chapters there were so many times Copia slipped up around imperator calling her mom or saying I love you.

[blackbird5154]

My head has been generating a lot of theories about Terzo these past few days.

Many indicate that his mythological prototype is Lucifer, and he is replaying his path of the fall. Lucifer rebelled against his father and was thrown from heaven.

What if Nihil remained in charge even during the reign periods of his sons and his opinion was to be reckoned with? But we all know what kind of ruler Nihil is.

Merliora's theme is a world of absent God and man's ambitions in it. What if Terzo pushed aside Nihil and tried to rule himself? So at the end of the era, Nihil came back and "threw him out of heaven". Next comes the Prequelle - thematically, the era of the Lord's punishment.

Of course, this still involves Sister Emperator, who was clearly the grey eminence behind Nihil's back. It was convenient for her to control the will-less Nihil, but it was undesirable for her that Terzo would interfere in their duo by taking power away from her obedient puppet.

Judging by the way Terzo had placed his hand threateningly on her shoulder in one of the Summonings, he had gotten to her as well. He knew she was the real source of decisions in the Ministry. Thus, he had created two enemies for himself at once: Nihil and Sister.

You know the rest.

[osiiiris]

Terzo Emeritus: Turin.

Primo | Secondo | Terzo.

We know Terzo spent some time as a Cardinal in Poland (I'm going to do some research on Krakow too, just for fun), but if I had to locate him somewhere in Italy, I know where to place him. For Terzo, the most mystical and mysterious of the Papas, I have thought of the most evil and contrasting city in Italy: Turin. Turin is, literally, the Italian City of the Devil, and it is divided into two sides, one evil (black) and one good (white). Let's see what may have influenced the rebellious Terzo Emeritus.  This will be a long one.

1 - Life and death, good and evil, black and white… 

Turin is geographically divided into two sides: the good side to the east, where the sun rises, and the evil side to the west, where the sun sets, divided by the gates of the Royal Palace. Both sides feature monuments and buildings reflecting their predominant energy, and each side counterbalances the magical influence of the other. Turin, with its duality, is both a point of the Black Magic triangle (Turin, London, San Francisco) and one of the White Magic triangle (Turin, Lyon, and Prague).

On the west side, the dark one, the ancient Romans had built the necropolis and the gallows where condemned prisoners were executed. There was nothing but death and darkness.

On the east side, the bright one, the Mole Antonelliana acts as an antenna that gathers white energy from the ground and projects it onto the city through its tip. (Additionally, there is the Sacra Sindone, the cloth with the image of Jesus supposedly printed with his sweat and blood.)

The combination of the two forces creates a coniunctio oppositorum.

Given that Meliora is based on the concept of a city overpowered by dark forces, I believe a whole city where contrasting forces are so strong that they have shaped its aesthetic would have been fitting for him.

2 - Mysterious spectre wrestles power supplies from oligarchs.

The negative fame of Turin seems to stem from the hard rivalry between the Savoy family and the Vatican, especially during the Risorgimento, when Turin was labeled as "diabolical" due to its strongly anti-clerical positions. Turin (and Savoy family) became the anti-Vatican, basically, and we know how controversial Terzo was considered in the Ministry.

So the Savoy family erected five buildings in five different points of the city to form a pentacle: the hunting reserve of Stupinigi, the Moncalieri Castle, the Rivoli Castle, the Venaria Reggia, and the Basilica of Superga. (I have tried tracing the pentacle lines myself, as you can see in the image. Yep, that’s true.) Additionally, the cremation practice was strongly pushed by Turin, in opposition to the traditional burial.

And you are here to stay and burn with me, right?

3 - Lucifer’s statue.

Piazza dello Statuto coincides with the apex of the black magic triangle and the place where prisoners were executed, and it is right here that the presumed statue of Lucifer stands, above a necropolis that is called both la Vallis Occidanum, “West valley” or "where the sun sets" and Vallis Occisorum "Valley of the murdered". The statue is actually a fountain, built in memory of the victims of the Frejus tunnel accident... but looking at it, it's easy to understand that there is something more. The angel placed on the top of the fountain bears an upside-down five-pointed star on its head, and its gaze is not directed towards the Frejus, as one would expect, but towards the white part of the city. Towards the light.

I don’t know you, but to me, He is.

4 - The Masonic headquarters.

Terzo was known to have included many references to the Freemasons, especially in Square Hammer, where many see in the lyrics the tale of a Freemasonry initiation ritual.

In Piazza Solferino, we find the Fountain of the Four Seasons, where the four seasons are represented by four statues: spring and summer by two female figures, while autumn and winter by two male figures. Those male figures are identified with the giants Boaz and Joaquin, supporters of the pillars of Hercules which, in Masonic symbolism, would represent the first step of the initiate in their Masonic journey. Furthermore, it is said that the water of that fountain it’s a source of knowledge.

Continuing on the Masonic path, on via Lascaris, there is now a bank, but in the past, it was the headquarters of a Masonic lodge (curious that in a former Masonic lodge, there is now a bank... Mummy Dust-curious). On the sidewalks of the street, you can notice cracks in the shape of evil eyes. The gaze of the devil.

5 - The first lightning rod in Italy.

Terzo is often depicted surrounded by lightning, so he must have felt at home in Turin. In 1752, in fact, Gianni Battista Beccaria successfully repeated Benjamin Franklin's experiment by installing a lightning rod above his apartment. He created the first lightning rod ever seen in Italy, but since then Beccaria was accused of wizardry for his ability in manipulating electrical energy.

I know that I set a maximum of 5 points, but Turin is so full of occultism that I had to add a bonus point. 👇🏻

6 - the Devil’s door.

This door could have a post on its own for how much there is to say about it, but I’ll cut it short.

Legend has it that it was built in one night by the devil himself to punish a man who had invoked him in vain, and since its installation, terrifying episodes have occurred inside the building, such as the disappearance of a soldier or the murder of a dancer stabbed during a dance that lasted three days and three nights.

The decorations on the door are rich in esoteric symbolism (There is also a little rat…) and in the center, the clapper is literally the face of the devil with two snakes, while in the central column there is a monster holding the world in its claws.

Today, this building also houses a bank… my Mummy Dust.

[gothdaddyissues]

I've posted this theory elsewhere, but I'm just putting it here in my blog - official-like - in case I'm right...

New Papa is NOT Copia's twin.

New Papa is Secondo's son, raised to believe that HE is the Antichrist (since that was kind of Infestissumam was about).

But Copia's twin knows the real truth... and he'll be back to reveal it eventually...