Sigil of Halphas
At a glance
- Entry
- 38 of 72
- Rank
- Earl
- Legions
- 26 in the text
- Also written
- Malthus, Malthous, Malthas
Description in the text
Halphas is credited with building towers and supplying them with arms and ammunition. The text also says he sends armed men to appointed places.
Read entry 38 on page 34 of the 1916 edition
Appearance
A stock dove with a hoarse voice.
Topics attributed to this entry
- Fortifications
- Weapons
- War parties
Reading this entry
Halphas, also Malthus or Malthas in the passage, is an earl in the form of a stock dove. He speaks hoarsely, a recurring vocal description in the catalogue. His office, however, is sharply military: building towers, stocking them with weapons and ammunition, and sending fighting men to appointed places. The dove form therefore should not be used to infer a peaceful office.
The source gives no human transformation or account of what sort of towers are meant. It offers a logistical portrait: fortification, provisioning, and deployment. That distinguishes Halphas from spirits associated with winning favor in war or predicting battle outcomes. He rules 26 legions and has a seal. The entry’s alternatives in naming and the mismatch between bird image and martial task are its most informative features.
Read entry 38 on page 34 of the 1916 edition or compare the 1904 transcription.
A closer reading of entry 38
What the numbered text says
Halphas’s stock-dove appearance and hoarse voice introduce an entry focused almost entirely on military logistics. Building towers, stocking them with ammunition and weapons, and dispatching armed men form a connected sequence. The text does not say that Halphas personally fights, rules a city, or predicts a battle. Three alternative name forms appear in this witness, so a catalogue should keep the heading and body spellings together under one number.
About the printed seal
Frontispiece 5 carries seal 38. Its presence confirms the single numbered entry despite multiple spellings, but the plate cannot decide which spelling is historically prior. There is no prose key connecting the stock dove’s shape to the drawn emblem.
Compare another entry
Compare entry 39: Malphas. Malphas also builds high towers, yet the next entry adds houses, intelligence about enemies, and a deception warning. Halphas’s account stays with fortifications and their supply. The similar names are no reason to collapse the adjacent spirits into one profile.