What’s an eonothem?
According to Wikipedia, an eonothem is “the totality of rock strata laid down during a certain eon of the geologic timescale,” but I barely understand what that means. Essentially (as far as I can tell), the term refers to the huge layer of rock that covers the earth during an “eon.” Eons and their eonothems are referred to by the same name, but the eonothem is referring specifically to the rock, rather than the time period.
More from Wikipedia:
Eonothems have the same names as their corresponding eons, which means during the history of the Earth only four eonothems were formed. Oldest to newest these are the Hadean, Archean, Proterozoic, and Phanerozoic.
Those first two, “Hadean” and “Archean,” sound pretty interesting to me.
Hadean
Here’s the etymology of the “Hadean” eon / eonothem, via Wikipedia:
“Hadean” (from Hades, the Greek god of the underworld, and the underworld itself) describes the hellish conditions then prevailing on Earth: the planet had just formed and was still very hot owing to its recent accretion, the abundance of short-lived radioactive elements, and frequent collisions with other Solar System bodies.
That reminds me a lot of the Old World, before the era of archons in Teyvat. the reference to the underworld is just a fun bonus.
Archean
Then we have the “Archean” eon, which obviously brings to mind the archons of Yeyvat — and I think it definitely makes sense to look at this period of time in Teyvat as a second “eon,” following the period before the archon war.
As for the etymology of “Archean,” via Wikipedia:
The word Archean comes from the Greek word arkhē (αρχή), meaning ‘beginning, origin’.
Another thing I think is interesting:
The Earth during the Archean was mostly a water world: there was continental crust, but much of it was under an ocean deeper than today’s ocean.
We’re starting to get more and more hints about Teyvat’s ocean — I definitely believe that there’s a lot underwater that we haven’t even heard about yet. not to mention Enkanomiya.
What does it mean?
At first, I wasn’t sure why they chose the goblet, specifically, as a symbol of eonothems. Maybe it’s linked to the tarot suit of cups, which pertains to emotions, intuition, spirituality, and water. Or maybe it’s referencing the holy grail, symbolizing healing & infinite sustenance. The descriptions of a lot of goblet pieces tend to be related to good, triumphant feelings, or happier times — or just times when someone was drinking.
What I do know is the choice to call it the “Goblet of Eonothem” rather than the “Goblet of Eon” was deliberate — and the same goes for the Sands of Eon. These pieces represent different, but related things; while the sands go hand-in-hand with the passage of time, the goblet represents something more physical.
Jillian
It has become clearer since I originally wrote this that the artifact types are all linked to differed Shades, with the Goblet of Eonothem = Shade of Void (or Space). This makes sense to me — the space within an empty goblet is the void.
I think it’s cool to imagine the void as the physical counterpart to time, especially in the Abyss, or whatever is in the space outside Teyvat’s borders.
The different eons of Teyvat are important (especially the insinuation that there is another, perhaps post-archon eon coming later) but with the goblet, we’re more focused on the layer of rock that buries Teyvat’s histories underground. We’ve seen & heard of plenty of ancient civilizations by now that used to live on the surface, but are now deep underground. And it will continue to happen, because that’s the nature of the world.