The Boy Who Named Himself (a short story)

This would be an example of a Bildungsroman.

One of the earliest events of the DIES IRÆ story (of Symphony No. 1) is that of Hris (written حريس in the Kitâb al-Majnûn, a mysterious and long-lost book written in Baghdad around 1250--more on that in a future blog post), a young orphaned warrior who became a philosopher and scientist, possibly the first ever.

He had forgotten the name given to him at birth, so he called himself Hris (in the modern Elven language: Ħrì, with a falling tone), meaning "the free one" in his prehistoric language (which may have been Nostratic). He lived in the Levant around the year 13000 BC. He was a young warrior, thirteen years old, the sole survivor of a tribe that was wiped out in war. He managed to flee to a distant land and dwelt in caves for three years. During his time in seclusion, he first remembered having to kill a man in battle, and chose to forever forswear violence, even towards animals, except in self-defense, as he subsisted from only gathered fruits and vegetables, mushrooms, wild honey and the milk of animals he had adopted as pets.

Having little to do other than contemplate the world, he developed his philosophy further: soon after, he came to reject the gods (that is, dead warriors, chiefs and other heroes that had been deified) of men, and serve only nature and truth, wherever it may be found. He would spend his lonely days observing and learning from nature.

At age 16, a girl was gathering berries near where Hris lived. They met, fell in love and chose to live together for life. He told her early in the relationship, "You are my equals; I must respect you as I did my mother and sister." From there, he denounced the idea that any person could own and treat any other as property. He saw all men and women as equals, and swore to oppose the tyranny and injustice too often seen in leaders. They had a number of sons and daughters, and they taught them their enlightened ways.

Sadly, Hris would meet a tragic end at the hands of a group of warriors he had tried to preach to. They captured him and his family. He was tortured and killed, but his wife and children escaped. She took the name Hrith, the feminine form of Hris, and her family returned to her husband's homeland and establish a powerful nation there. Their descendants would build a great city, which thrived from trade and peaceful relations with neighbors, until it suddenly collapsed from within around 9600 BC.

Among the things Hris is said to have invented, according to the legends: monotheism (though some would say atheism), agriculture, astronomy, writing, mathematics, music, poetry, several musical instruments and early forms of medicine, the scientific method and democracy. It is claimed that he built a harp or lyre from the bones and other remains of a son that had tragically died in childhood; he was himself a music lover, and his father believed this is how he could "live forever".