13 Real-Life Inspirations for Dark Souls

Dark Souls II is almost here, squeeee! A great excuse to play a bit more Dark Souls, of course, and one of the things you start to respect more and more about this masterwork is its unusual take on fantasy – usually such a hackneyed genre, replete with dwarves and goblins and all sorts of other Tolkienesque nonsense. Dark Souls' world feels coherent, believable, and one of the reasons for this is the many roots it has in the real world.

I've been collecting these references since the game came out in an idle way, but the credit should not go to me – instead it's the largely anonymous army of Chosen Undeads that populate the Dark Souls subreddit, the wiki, and the magnificent youtube community that has grown around the game. Almost everything here I first saw in one of these places. So I bow to all of you – and look forward to seeing everyone in Drangleic. Without further ado, let's look at the real-world inspirations behind the real fantastic world of Dark Souls.

Anor Londo and Il Duomo

Hidetaki Miyazaki himself owns up to this in the superb Dark Souls: Design Works, but the community had long ago rumbled them. Il Duomo is a cathedral in Milan and the visual inspiration is obvious, but a particularly important detail is the balustrades – one of which you have to cross in-game. Designer Masanori Waragai mentions that he visited this location: “I recall looking up at the buttresses and imagining how amazing it would feel to walk on them... it really inspires your adventurous side.”

Domhnall and Henry VIII

Henry VIII didn't just have six wives – the phat bro had some crazy helmets going on too. This bad boy was given as a gift by the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian 1, part of a complete armour set.

 

The Horned Helmet. Dates from 1511–14, Austrian, Innsbruck.

In-game Domhnall is the only person we meet from the region of Zena, and describes himself as 'a peddler, of sorts.' This isn't the whole truth. Domhnail's really a scavenger, following the player and picking up what they leave behind in order to sell later – for example, after you've beaten many of the bosses go and see him to buy their armour sets. His own armour, which he'll happily sell you, is kind of a joke – the grandiose naming bespeaks a land where intention is more important than accomplishment.

 

Domhnall of Zena

You got served son!

 

The real-life server.

The Server, “a curved greatsword used in a mysterious ancient rite,” turns out to be based on a real sword used in a mysterious ancient rite! The sword originated in either Nepal or India and was used to behead animals ready for sacrifice and, some say, even humans. In-game the server is associated with Shiva of the East, and is also notable for restoring a tiny bit of health with each hit – the only weapon that does so.

 

The in-game server.

The Captain and the Composer

 

Composer Leo Ornstein.

Ornstein, the reputed captain of Gwyn's knights, has a helmet shaped like a Lion – and uses the Leo Ring, which strengthens counter-attacks with thrust weapons. In 2002 the composer Leo Ornstein died at the age of 109 after a frankly astonishing life. A piano prodigy, Ornstein's early compositions both shocked and fascinated the musical world of the 1920s – and then he faded into obscurity, re-emerging in the 1980s with new compositions. For a short time Ornstein was the oldest published composer in history.
The link between Ornstein and Leo Ornstein is really more of a nod than anything substantial, though it is tempting to draw one thematic parallel – that bright youth filled with promise, followed by a long period of withdrawal from the world, topped off by a final, bravura flourish.

 

The Captain of Gwyn's Knights, Ornstein.

Oh and – thought Ornstein's helmet was total fantasy, eh? Well it's certainly a more refined take on the idea, but this 15th century Sallet from Italy, currently in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection, suggests others have been there before. Wonder if they slew any dragons?

 

15th Century mask from Sallet, Italy.

The Washing Pole and the Drying Pole

Sasaki Kojiro was a Japanese samurai, one of the greatest – and in many accounts was taught to fight by Toda Seigen, a master of the short-bladed katana known as the kodachi. What does one use to counter a man fighting with a short-bladed katana? Why a long-bladed one of course, and in Kojiro's case this was the Monohoshi Zao – 'the laundry drying-pole.' It's fair to say this was a man with a sense of humour to match his mad skills.
In Dark Souls you can acquire the 'Washing Pole' from the mysterious Shiva of the East, a katana with an enormous blade much favoured by PvPers. Kojiro's 'swallow strike,' a swift downwards stroke followed by an upwards cut, may just live on in the Washing Pole's many victories.

 

The Washing Pole.

Kirk, Knight of Bear-Hunting

 

 Come at me, bro!

Not really much to say about this one other than Kirk, the Knight of Thorns, hunts down noobs – and apparently Siberians in the 19th century had similar ideas about how to hunt bears.
 

It makes complete Sens

Sen's Fortress has a few possible antecedents – 'Sen' in Japanese, for example, means 'thousand', so it could be the fortress of a thousand traps. But then there's also William of Sens, an idea I first saw here. A master mason, Sens is one of the earliest known gothic architects – and a particular detail about his life sticks out. He was incapacitated in a fall from his own scaffolding. I don't know Hidetaka Miyazaki personally, but I think I get his sense of humour – and this would be a perfect example.

Outside Sen's Fortress.

Lost Izalith and Angkor Wat

Angkor Wat is the model for Lost Izalith's architecture, but a particular inspiration is the temple of Ta Prohm or Rajavihara – because unlike many of the other temples it's never been restored, and has been reclaimed by trees. The suggestion in-game is that Izalith, before the Witch of Izalith's disastrous attempt to recreate the first flame, was exactly like Angkor Wat – then the birth of the Bed of Chaos led to destruction and a kind of rebirth represented by the tree that now winds and bends around the architecture. Nature reclaims all and, in Dark Souls and real life, nature can mean chaos.
 

New Londo Ruins and Mont Saint-Michel

The exact history of New Londo is, like almost everything in Dark Souls, blank but for a few details – we know it was a human settlement, highly thought-of for its culture, and brought low by the venality of the Four Kings. Clearly the title and location (at the foot of the great wall) also imply this was man's equivalent to Anor Londo, and suggest something about man's standing in the old age. But by the time the player happens along, New Londo is a flooded ruin.

 

New Londo Ruins.

The model for New Londo is Mont Saint-Michel, an island fort in Normandy France – which uses the tide as part of its natural defences. In Dark Souls: Design Works Miyazaki explains “we took the structural style straight from a building that exists in the real world: Mont Saint-Michel. Of course it's not an exact copy or anything, but I think you can easily spot the similarities if you compare the two.”

 

 Mont Saint-Michel – Normandy, France.

Even the Crystal Caves are real

Mexico's 'Cave of Crystals' is a natural marvel, and bears an uncanny resemblance to Seath's similarly-named retreat. The cave was discovered in the early 2000s and is located over a thousand feet below a mountain – the crystals apparently grew to their giant form after being submerged in mineral-rich water for millenia. No word on giant magical butterflies though.

Hawkeye Gough, and a bit of a stretch...

This one's more tenuous than all the others, but let's live a little. Gough is a 'blind' giant, and one of Gwyn's four knights – you find him imprisoned on the outskirts of Oolacile, carving away his days. One thing that's especially notable about Gough is his philosophical take on Dark Souls' world, and it's this that makes me think he may have some link to the 18th century natural philosopher John Gough, who lived in England's Lake District and also happened to be blind.

 

 A link to the philosopher John Gough?

“At thy twilight old thoughts return, in great waves of nostalgia.”

A particularly strange connection here is John Gough's most lasting discovery – that an elastic band, when stretched and then heated, would shrink rather than expand, an observation that would later become important in engineering and known as the Gough-Joule effect. For some reason this blind man, twanging his elastic bands and fascinated by the feel of animals, makes me think of Hawkeye Gough and his unused Greatbow, sitting and waiting for one final hare to hunt.

 

One last shot.

Seathe's books

There may be a deeper link, but for now this is just a neat nod – you can find the works of Geoffrey Chaucer in The Duke's Archives. Perhaps Seathe was interested in the Parliament of Fowls, and “The raven wise, the crow the voice of care” – or perhaps he just enjoyed a Canterbury Tale of an evening. Credit for these up-close images goes to the Dark Souls subreddit.

On another note, the smart folks in this forum thread discovered that the index to William Playfair's book about British nobility is one of the spine textures in the Duke's Archive. Perhaps, given the British names that proliferate throughout the Souls series, this is one of Miyazaki's secret reference tomes – or perhaps it's just a random texture.

Havel your cake, and eat it

 

Václav Havel

Havel the Rock is one of Dark Souls' greatest NPCs. Václav Havel is one of the 20th century's greatest figures. Is the name just a tip of the hat?
The in-game history of Havel suggests not. It's been suggested by many YouTubers that Havel was a rebel, based primarily on the fact that you can find a stash of his gear in Anor Londo that includes an Occult Club – that is, a weapon designed to combat the gods. Kind of interesting, though, that this weapon is found in a Mimic rather than a normal chest. Protection? Or a plant?

 

Havel the Rock, in all his glory.

Václav Havel became the first president of the Czech Republic – yet before this, was imprisoned numerous times. Havel the Rock was imprisoned and left to rot “by an old friend.” This is one of the most ambiguous pieces of lore in Dark Souls. Because it was “for his own good, of course.” One of the few things we know about Havel the Rock is that he was, of course, the sworn enemy of Seath the Scaleless – an ally of Gwyn too powerful to be ignored. And that, somehow, Havel or one of his men found his way down to Ash Lake and the one Everlasting Dragon that remains.
“We never decided to become dissidents,” Václav Havel wrote. “We have been transformed into them, without quite knowing how, sometimes we have ended up in prison without precisely knowing how. We simply went ahead and did certain things that we felt we ought to do.”