Netflix’s The Witcher: Blood Origin does not exist in the original books by Andrzej Sapkowski. Creator and showrunner Declan de Barra created a prequel series to help answer a few loose threads in The Witcher series. One of them is the monoliths seen throughout the continent in the original series. As fans learn how the monoliths were used to open gateways, Meldof also reveals in The Witcher: Blood Origin how dwarves are part of its history.
[SPOILER ALERT: This article contains spoilers for The Witcher: Blood Origin]
Monoliths are never given a clear backstory in ‘The Witcher’
Before the prequel series, monoliths remained an obscure mystery in the Netflix series. They are giant black towering stones seen outside Cintra and buried throughout the continent. Fans first saw them when Ciri used her scream and broke one of the oldest monoliths they had recorded into pieces.
In The Witcher Season 2, Geralt investigates the cracks in the earth and its connections to the hybrid monsters. He enlists the help of Istredd to learn more about the monoliths. His research has him theorizing that the monoliths are not points of impact but conduits of energy. Fans later watched in The Witcher Season 2 finale how Ciri, controlled by Voleth Meir, summoned a monolith and opened a gateway.
The prequel series takes it a step further into the monoliths before the Conjunction of the Spheres. The origins of the monoliths are still not 100% clear. But fans know Syndril plays a key role in unlocking its powers in The Witcher: Blood Origin. He was able to uncover that with certain techniques, they open gateways to new worlds. But The Witcher: Blood Origin has Meldof reveal that the monoliths are originally tied to dwarven history.
Monoliths were part of dwarven history before elven rule in ‘The Witcher: Blood Origin’
So far, the most fans know about the monoliths is that Syndril has dedicated his life to using them to venture to new worlds. His dream was to find a world with viable resources to survive. He created the Book of Monoliths cataloging his work. But his work was taken advantage of by Chief Sage Balor and used for evil. Balor uses the monoliths to open a gateway to another world where he meets a female celestial voice.
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In The Witcher: Blood Origin Episode 3, Meldof, a dwarf, reveals to Callan a specific detail about the monoliths. She recounts how dwarves have experienced immense pain at the hands of elves for centuries. Part of their history involves the monoliths. “Know why I call those monoliths c*ck towers? Because our ancients buried them to bring fertile bounty to the land,” explains Meldof. “They’re sacred. And, yet again, elves defile them. No wonder famine’s rife.”
The prequel series helps establish that dwarves were once the continent’s rulers before the arrival of Solryth. The Witcher: Blood Origin explains that Solryth was an elven warrior who arrived on the land, seized the dwarven land, and built Xin’trea on its ruins.
Declan De Barra explains creating the monoliths backstory for ‘The Witcher: Blood Origin’
De Barra had to explore the origins of the monoliths as they are never fully explained in The Witcher. Monoliths were initially used as sacred stones for fertility turned massive weapons of destruction. According to Collider, the showrunner also tied in an elf’s ambition to use them to find a viable world.
“I just love the idea that it became very clear that they [Monoliths] were sacred and used as fertility for the land, and they were very important to the wars, of course. Then [the orcs took over], but this one very smart, I don’t know what you’d call him, savant sage, who had these wild ideas that nobody believed in, thought he could use these and co-opt them, co-opt another culture’s technology and use it to open portals out of worlds,” explained De Barra. “The story kind of wrote itself once it sort of figured out that they were originally dwarven, and they were originally used for fertility on the land almost like on Easter Island.”
Unlike The Witcher series, the prequel emphasizes that elves are not the only minority. While elves are hunted in the original series, dwarves have gotten the bad end long before the conjunction.
“What I love about them is that they’re dwarven, who are…sort of get short shrift, these are the guys who are always the butt of the fantasy joke, but they have this wonderful system,” says De Barra. Meldof’s tragic backstory in The Witcher: Blood Origin adds to the overall sentiment.
