The Brotherhood of the Assassin’s Creed series is no stranger to secrets and hidden details. Being an organization of contract killers in a mythic conflict with the Knight’s Templar, the group itself is designed to be a mystery to the world even while conducting its practices in broad daylight. However, one of the Brotherhood’s secrets has been hidden in plain sight so well that it took Ubisoft revealing it in Assassin‘s Creed Origins – a decade original game’s release – for it to be discovered.
In Assassin’s Creed Origins, players follow the story of the Ancient Egyptian Medjay Bayek of Siwa and Aya of Alexandria. As the game’s name suggests, this married couple are the ones who start the titular Assassin’s Creed. More specifically, they create the organization known as the Hidden Ones (what would later become the Brotherhood) to fight against an early form of the Knight’s Templar called the Order of the Ancients because the organization killed their son, Khemu.
But Bayek and Aya are responsible for more than just the formation of the Assassin’s Creed: they are also responsible for its iconography. In remembrance of his son, Bayek wears necklace adorned with the skull of an eagle. However, in the mission “Last of the Medjay,” Bayek rips this necklace off when he and Aya decide to end their relationship, sacrifice their personal lives, and dedicate themselves to what will become the Assassin’s Creed. When Aya picks up the skull of the bird from the sand, its imprint forms the emblem of the Assassin’s Creed, which is a fitting representation of the sacrifice necessary to join the Brotherhood.
The Importance Of Eagles As Symbols In Assassin’s Creed
This moment in Assassin‘s Creed Origins is an awesome reveal behind the organization’s iconic symbol, but it should not come as too big of a surprise that an eagle is the source of the Brotherhood’s emblem. The eagle and parkour are central to Assassin’s Creed in equal measure, and have been since the beginning. Not only was “Eagle Vision” an important mechanic introduced in the first game, but its main character Altaïr’s name is based on eagles. Altaïr is the name of the brightest star in the Aquila constellation, and “aquila” means eagle in Latin. Furthermore, Altaïr’s possession of the Eagle Vision ability shows his connection not just to the origins of the Assassin’s Creed but humanity itself. Those with Eagle Vision are related to the Isu, an ancient humanoid species who possess magical powers. The Isu played a major part in the origin story of humanity, as in the Assassin’s Creed universe, it is with the Isu that the Biblical Adam and Eve fought in what is known as the Great Catastrophe.
Eagles are thus an integral part of the Assassin’s Creed mythology, character design, and iconography. They represent a connection to the mythological stories that are at the center of the Brotherhood’s conflict with the Knight’s Templar, but they also embody the personal sacrifices one must make to dedicate themselves to the Creed. It thus only makes sense that Assassin’s Creed Origins would show the secret history of the Brotherhood’s emblem lied in the skull of an eagle.
