When did the Dark Angels switch to green?

[The Shadow Guard]

A good summary Lucien but a couple of comments.......

 

1) Apparently nobody noticed they'd done it until after the Heresy, so they were presumably still in black when they finally reached Terra.

 

The Dark Angels reached Terra first and only later did they head to Caliban and the confrontation between Luther and the Lion so they definitely would have been in the Black Livery as there would have been no reason for the change of colour.

 

4) There have been hints that the old Deathwing story, about them painting their armour bone white before freeing a world from the grip of heresy, is really an allegory of the Fall.

 

The Deathwing colour change occured well after the Heresy and was originaly described in Bill King's novel "Deathwing" which has been reprinted in anthologies subsequently. Thirty Deathwing terminators (Black Armour) land on the "Plains World" a Dark Angel recruitment world to commnce a round of recruitment. All of them originated from that world. They find the world in the thrall of genestealers and ppan to retake it. They paint their armour white in the expectation of their coming death (Dead men Walking) but ultimately vanquish the 'stealers and their brod lord (?). Only five terminators remain and each of them take on the mantle of tribal eladers lead their tribes back to their old way of life so that their progeny may become strong enough to provide continued recruits for the chapter. When the DA subsequently arrive and take possession of the terminator suits they decide to honour the deeds of the thirty by repainting the armour bone white. - This story has nothing to do with the heresy except to confirm that Deathwing armour retained their original black until the Plains World incident.

 

This alteration of colour scheme is unique to the Dark Angels and has nothing to do with any of their successors.

 

Perhaps the Ravenwing, being a vanguard force, didn't have time to repaint their armour before beginning the attack, explaining why they retained the black.

 

Both the RW and DW retained their original black as a mark of the unforgiven (Index Astarted Dark Angels circa WH40 3rd Edition) denoting the events of the Lutherian Heresy. The second founding chapters did the same with the exception of the Angels of Absolution who painted all their armour white which is in keeping with their belief that the actions of their loyal forfathers had expunged the treachery of their fallen.

 

... I'm stretching my memory with these.... but details must be held accurately within the vaults of the Rock.....  and passed on to the following generations without deviation... :)

 

SG

[The Shadow Guard]

A point of order.

 

Black Library stories cannot be declared as canon.

 

The official canon is what is placed in the Codex. Though I would put the data slate behind this in precedence as it was written by Games Workshop from their Games Dev team.

 

That being said, there is enough corroboration to allow for both interpretations to co-exist within the grim dark 40K universe and the Administratum's ability to misplace or scribe a line that will be misinterpreted for centuries.

 

I think we need to reconsider this opinion...whihc was very valid in the aerly eyars of Black Library's venture in to WH40K fiction..but with the success of the HH series, the clear collaboration between authors to maintain timelines and personality developments within the characters along with the sheer volume of HH related literature and the stated view of current Bl authors that GW considers this to be canon.... It really needs to be considerd canon within the limits of it being 10,000 years old and that there are many sources and interpretations... :)

 

SG

[Aegnor]

My recollection was that they changed to green after the destruction of Caliban in memory of their lost homeworld - not sure whether that was from the IA. Obviously the new Cypher dataslate (which I have to get) adds a new potential crinkle in that account.

 

As rather nicely explained in the new codex, all these explanations likely reflect parables told to the Dark Angels by the Inner Circle to help prepare them for potentially learning the "truth" (or at least a slightly more accurate version of it) later on.

[Slave to Darkness]

A point of order.

 

Black Library stories cannot be declared as canon.

 

The official canon is what is placed in the Codex. Though I would put the data slate behind this in precedence as it was written by Games Workshop from their Games Dev team.

 

That being said, there is enough corroboration to allow for both interpretations to co-exist within the grim dark 40K universe and the Administratum's ability to misplace or scribe a line that will be misinterpreted for centuries.

According to Laurie Goulding from black library, the heresy novels ARE officially cannon. Ant what is written in the codexs is  ten thousand years of propaganda written by the victors.