Facts!
What does Subject 16's The Truth video mean?
Strictly speaking, it isn't just a video. It's a memory, as recorded by the Animus. This means that Subject 16 must be a descendent of Adam. Not figuratively, but born of Adam's ancestry. The memory reveals that the story of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden is true-in a fashion. It would appear that they disobeyed their masters and strove to rebel by stealing a Piece of Eden, an Apple, presumably to give themselves some kind of defense or power to resist. This could have been the first act of defiance that led to the conflict described by Minerva. The "innocence" of humankind was lost when we realized how much of their superiority lay in their technglogy, and a war between the two species-First Civilization and humans-began.
Is this why "Apples" can be used to control humans?
Subject 16's record also shows that the artifacts-the Staff, the Apple, the Pieces of Eden-were tools that the First Civilization used to wield power over humans. Whether the aritfacts were made to control humans, or humans were made to obey the artifacts, is another mater. Even so, some are immune to their effects.
Morever, the Glyph puzzles give hints to the involvement of Pieces of Eden in world history. Famous figures and crucial events may have been shaped by the influence that the technology can exert.
Are Desmond, Ezio, and Altair somehow descended from the members of the First Civilization? Doe this explain Eagle Vision, ad their resistance to Pieces of Eden?
From Subject 16's The Truth memory, it's also apparent that Adam and Eve demonstrate feats of agility that might ordinarily be scribed to Assassins. Are they humans? What might be interesting is here is to note the text from Subject 16's Glyph Puzzle #14, which reads:
The seeds were planted as two worlds became one. Behold, the Assassins, the children of two worlds!
If we were built in their image, is it too much to suggest that Assassins. with their innate abilities, are a product of the union of human and the First Civilization?
Who is Minerva?
"Minerva was one of the last surviving members of the First Civilization, and so it fell to her to shoulder their duies to prosperity. She is most cetainly long dead, even in Ezio's time, as it is clear that only a holographic simulacrum of her now remains. The Capitoline Triad of Jupiter, Juno, and Minerva was a sub-pantheon of supreme deities worshipped in Rome long before the Holy Roan Empire, prior even to the Republic.
What are the images that appear on the wall as Minerva speaks to Desmond?
"They show vault locations: this is the true "data" of Minerva's fenetic tranmission. For example, you can clearly see the step pyramids, so one can assume that there's a Vault in Mesoamerica or perhaps in a ziggurat of Mesopotamia. But what are the other symbols and images?
Looking back to Assassins Creed , Altair encountered a holo-globe indicating the locations of other Pieces Of Eden. These may well be the same locations as the Vaults that Minverva describes."
What is the link between the First Civilization and the Roman gods?
"In passing, Minerva mentions the Etruscan etymology of her name. With the other names she gives us, the unavoidable implication is that all faiths and mythologies have derived from her people's manipulations of, or interactions with, humans. It also follows that all known 'gods' and 'goddesses' were actually members of the First Civilization, local to regions where respective religions first flourished."
How long have Minerva and her companions in the other sarcophagi been dead?
"It is possible that they lay dead for millennia before they came to be worshipped as gods...
Are Members of the First Civilization human?
"They must be mortal, at least, though little more is known. Perhaps they're just human, but with the ability to tap greater potential only latent in mankind. In any case, the First Civilization is clearly tremendously advanced, with incedible technology, but there is no indication of whetehr they are from another time, or space, or dimenson, or simply the true and original indigenous race of Earth. Minerva says they built humans in their own image, and that theymade them to survive. But it appears they made us too well: not content to exist as slaves and inferiors."
Who won the war between the First Civilization and humans?
"All we know is that the First Civilization died, and that humans didn't, so we can assume that the latter (and more specifically, we might guess, proto-templars in heir lust for power) won the war. This would explain why Minerva warns Desmond to"guard against the cross-for there are many who wil lstand in your way."
