The Great House of Roke
The Great House of Roke, also called the School for Wizards or the House of the Wise, is the central building of the School for Wizards on Roke Island. It is a fortress-like structure of mighty grey blocks of stone, with few small windows set higher than the chimneytops of the surrounding town of Thwil. The building is not merely a physical edifice; it is built of magic stronger than stone, and its innermost rooms are open to the sky. Ged first encounters it as a bewildered boy from the mountain village of Ten Alders, and it becomes the crucible of his education, his pride, his fall, and his partial redemption.
Architecture and Threshold
The Great House is entered through a mean little door of wood, which is in fact a door of ivory without joint or seam, cut from a tooth of the Great Dragon, and closed by a door of polished horn carved on its inner face with the Thousand-Leaved Tree. The threshold is guarded by the Master Doorkeeper, who tests all entrants: Ged must speak his true name aloud to gain entry, a rule that underscores the House's deep connection to the Old Speech and the power of naming. Inside, the House contains open courts, roofed halls, the Room of Shelves where books of lore and rune-tomes are kept, the great Hearth Hall where the school gathers on festival days, and upstairs, in the towers and under the roofs, the small cells where the students and Masters sleep. Ged's own cell is in the South Tower, with a window looking down over the steep roofs of Thwil town to the sea. The House also contains the Court of Seeming, where the Master Hand teaches illusion, and the Fountain Court, where the Archmage Nemmerle first greets Ged and where, later, the new Archmage Gensher refuses Ged's fealty.
Life and Learning Within
Within the Great House, Ged studies with the Nine Masters of Roke: the Master Chanter, the Master Windkey, the Master Herbal, the Master Hand, the Master Changer, the Master Summoner, the Master Namer (who lives apart in the Isolate Tower), the Master Patterner (who teaches in the Immanent Grove), and the Master Doorkeeper. The daily life is spartan—students sleep on straw-filled mattresses in stone cells—but the learning is intense. Ged excels at the arts of illusion, so much so that the Master Changer begins to teach him the Great Spells of Change, a decision made without the Archmage's knowledge and unwisely. The House is also the site of the Long Table in the refectory, where it is said that no matter how many sit, there is always room. It is here that Ged first meets Vetch, who becomes his truest friend, and here that the rivalry with Jasper festers, culminating in the challenge that leads to the Loosing of the Shadow on Roke Knoll.
Crisis and Aftermath
The Great House is the stage for the immediate aftermath of Ged's catastrophic summoning. After the shadow is loosed, Ged is carried to the chambers of the Master Herbal, where he lies blind, deaf, and mute for four weeks, his wounds refusing to heal. The Archmage Nemmerle, who saved Ged by spending all his power, lies dying in the unroofed Fountain Court, watched by the Masters. The raven of Osskil, Nemmerle's pet for thirty years, disappears, flying before him, as the Master Patterner says. The iron bells of the Chanter's Tower toll his death. Later, when Ged is released from the healing-chambers, he must offer his fealty to the new Archmage Gensher in the same Fountain Court, but Gensher refuses, saying he knows what Ged did but not what he is. Ged is allowed to stay, but he is a shadow of his former self, his speech halting and his hands faltering at their craft. He studies with younger lads, and the House, once a place of wonder and ambition, becomes a place of shame and silence.
The Doorkeeper's Final Test
Ged's final trial within the Great House is the Doorkeeper's test. After years of study, Ged returns to the House and is met at the door by the Master Doorkeeper, who tells him, "You won entrance to Roke by saying your name. Now you may win your freedom of it by saying mine." Ged spends a night and a day fasting and pondering, unable to wrest the name by force, ruse, or sorcery. Finally, he admits he cannot take the name, and asks the Doorkeeper to tell him. The Doorkeeper smiles, speaks his name, and Ged, repeating it, enters the House for the last time. When he leaves, he wears a heavy dark-blue cloak and carries a staff of yew-wood, bronze-shod, a full wizard. The Doorkeeper bids him farewell, opening the back door of horn and ivory, and Ged goes down to a ship waiting on the bright water. The Great House, which had been the site of his greatest triumph and his deepest shame, releases him into the world, a changed man.
