(Edit: Just saw on my dash that @glacierspirit and @thedarkestcrow had exact the same thoughts, but since I had already written this post and I just can’t bring myself to delete it because it took me a lot of time to write this down I’ll post it anyway ＼(＾o＾)／)
There has been an intense discussion about the latest chapter in the Japanese fandom in the past few days and there was one theory which I personally found very interesting, so I’m gonna share it here! =D
As the title says, some Japanese fans had the idea that Bravat and the sect’s aim might be gaining blood from its followers, i.e. the sect secretly “steals” their blood while they are sleeping in the hall. The reasons why we regard this theory as likely are listed below =D
The 4 different stars (Sirius, Canopus, Vega and Polaris) could actually stand for the 4 different blood types: A, B, O and AB.
“Sirius is extremely rare” (ch111) and “Canopus is rare”, too (ch110) → Sirius might stand for AB, which is the least common blood type (4%), and Canopus for B which is the second least common type (10%) in UK. (See this article about blood type distribution by country: X)
The reason why the meetings of the holders of each bracelets are held on different days might be to avoid possible mixing of the different blood types.
People have to wear those Roman costumes so that it’s easier for the sect to take blood from them.
Baravat’s fortune telling might be a method to tell what blood type the person has. (There might be some sort of serum with antibodies in the cup, thus Bravat can tell what blood type the person has depending on how their blood reacts to the serum. Source: X)
Bravat’s ‘personality analyses’ based on the stars perfectly correspond with the “blood type personality mythos”. People who are not familiar with this might think “Wtf, what does one’s blood type have to do with their personality!!??”, but this is such a big thing in Japan and many people seriously believe in this bullshit pseudo-science. (You can read about it here: “Japan and blood types: Does it determine personality?”, “The importance of blood type in Japanese culture”.) So, according to Bravat, people under the protection of Canopus are “individualistic, do their own things and they are extremely attached to things they like” (Lizzy & Redmond). This is a stereotypical “B”-person. And people under the protection of Sirius are often a “genius-type” and “two-faced”, which are commoly known personality traits of people with the blood type AB (Ciel and Violet).
The mysetrious corpses might be those people who died from bleeding.
The bodies are too ‘lovely’ and there are barely any signs of livor mortis. → When people die from bleeding, the formation of livor mortis as well as the decaying process is slow and weak.
People get drinks and snacks after they woke up. -> I’m not sure about other countries but in Japan the donors are usually given something to drink, especially orange juice, and to eat after blood donation. This was actually the scene where fans hit upon this whole theory XD
Yana once posted a photo of the book she was reading at the time (source: X). Its title is “Blood work: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revolution” and it’s a true story about a guy in the 17th century who was one of the first scientists that experimented with blood transfusion.
The blood type system was discovered in early 20th century, but considering that the technology as well as science in Kuro-verse are always 30-40 years ahead of the time the story is actually set in (1889), I don’t think it’s too far-fetched to assume that the sect already discovered the exsitence of the blood types and the method to tell them apart =D I mean, we saw a modern planetarium in this chapter, but the first planetarium was actually built in Germany in 1923, so 34 years later^^;;
However, as much as I like this theory (and also, blood transfusion is the kind of topics UT might be interested in, too), it still has some ‘flaws’, the biggest being that Abberline stated that the ‘lovely’ corpses had no visible external wounds. So we’ll have to wait and see, maybe we’ll get more information about this next month! Neverthelss I think it’s interesting and personally, I can imagine Yana going this route~! =D
where I talked about the bracelets that are given to those who get their future told by Bravat (here). But I noticed a few more things about the bracelets that I want to share:
I’ve already mentioned that the letters on the outer ring of the amulet most likely stand for the months of a year. And the needle points to July.
@into–the–abyss had the idea that the inner ring could show the days of a month and I think that’s very likely. So the needle probably points to not only a month but also a specific day. Now it’s hard to tell to which day exactly the needle points since the numbers are very small. But here’s another picture of the amulet:
On the left side of the inner ring you can see the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,… (counterclockwise). In the first picture there’s a number that could be a “12″ two or so fields to the right of where the needle is. So the date the needle points to is probably something between July 8th and July 10th.
But the question remains: What does the date stand for?
It’s not the current time. In the Green Witch arc we’ve seen Hilde’s date of death being August 17th, so it’s already later now. Ciel’s birthday is December 14th, so that’s also out of the question. A date that’s very close is the death of Claudia Phantomhive which was at a July 13th. But it looks as if the date of the amulet isn’t exactly the 13th and why would it be connected to Claudia’s date of death?
Maybe the date refers to Sirius, the star that Bravat says is Ciel’s divine protection. On July 5th Sirius and the Sun are in one line with the Earth. And the so-called “dog days” – an expression for hot days in summer – which begin at the end of July are also associated with Sirius (as the Dog Star). The appearance of Sirius in the night sky in late July was thought to bring the heat.
There’s another thought that came to me when thinking about the meaning of the date. If it doesn’t show the owner’s birthday (past) and it doesn’t show the actual date (present), either, maybe it shows an event in the future. Since Bravat is a fortune teller that would be fitting. So maybe this date around July 10th will be Ciel’s date of death…?
midnight-in-town 