The Nine Masters

The Nine Masters are the supreme governing body of the School for Wizards on Roke, the eight named Masters of specific magical arts plus the Archmage, who together guide the education of wizards and choose the new Archmage when the office falls vacant.

Composition and Identity

The Nine Masters of Roke are the eight named Masters of distinct magical disciplines—Windkey, Hand, Herbal, Chanter, Changer, Summoner, Namer, and Patterner—together with the Archmage, who is the ninth. The Master Doorkeeper, though he is not counted among the Nine in the usual reckoning, is also a Master of the School; when a new Archmage must be chosen, it is the Nine Masters who gather to make the selection. Ged, after five years at the School, realized that he knew only eight Masters by name and that people spoke of the Archmage as the ninth, yet when a new Archmage was chosen, nine Masters met to choose him. He then understood that the old man who had let him into the School on his first day, the Doorkeeper, was himself a Master, and that the Doorkeeper was the ninth.

Role and Authority

The Masters teach the various arts of magic to the students of the School. The Master Chanter teaches the Deeds of heroes and the Lays of wisdom, beginning with the oldest of all songs, The Creation of Éa. The Master Windkey instructs in arts of wind and weather, taking students out into Roke Bay to practice steering by word, stilling waves, and raising the magewind. The Master Herbal teaches the ways and properties of things that grow. The Master Hand teaches sleight, jugglery, and the lesser arts of Changing. The Master Changer, himself a young man, teaches the true Spells of Shaping and the perils of changing, especially the risk of a wizard being caught in his own spell when he transforms his own shape. The Master Summoner deals with no illusion, only true magic—the summoning of energies such as light, heat, and the force that draws the magnet—and he shows his pupils why the true wizard uses such spells only at need, since to summon up earthly forces is to change the earth of which they are a part. The Master Namer, Kurremkarmerruk, lives alone in the Isolate Tower on the northernmost cape of Roke, where he teaches the true names of all things, places, and beings, a task that is endless because the language of true naming has no end. The Master Patterner learns his supreme magery within the Immanent Grove, a place of enchantment where no spells are worked; it is said that if the trees of the Grove should die, his wisdom will die, and in those days the waters will rise and drown the islands of Earthsea.

Selection of the Archmage

When the Archmage dies, the Nine Masters gather in a place somewhere under the dark trees of the Immanent Grove, setting nine walls of silence about them so that no person or power may speak to them or hear them as they choose from amongst the mages of all Earthsea him who will be the new Archmage. After the death of Archmage Nemmerle, who spent all his power to save Ged from the shadow he had loosed, the Nine Masters chose Gensher of Way as the new Archmage. A ship was sent forth at once across the Inmost Sea to Way Island to bring Gensher back to Roke, with the Master Windkey standing in the stern raising the magewind into the sail.

Significance

The Nine Masters embody the highest authority in wizardry in Earthsea, governing the only school where the high arts are taught. Their collective wisdom, judgment, and power maintain the Equilibrium of the world, and their choice of the Archmage determines the direction of magical governance for all the islands. The Masters themselves are not merely teachers but living repositories of the deepest knowledge of their respective arts, and their presence on Roke makes the island the center of true magic in the Archipelago.