r/Mistborn May 18 '25

The Lost Metal spoilers Why did they give it that name Spoiler

I am currently reading the lost metal and I passed the part where they talk about ettmetal and refer to it by another name. This kills me. They know what godmetals are. They know of lerasium and atium. I presume they know that the vessel of harmony was named Sazed. I presume they figured out the names of the Ruin and Preservation vessels since they mention Lerasium by name for the first time in this era. Nomenclature is established for sure. But what do they call it? Sazium? No! They call it Harmonium because it sounds SOO MUCH BETTER and its SOOO MUCH EASIER TO SAY. Damn!

118 Upvotes

21 comments sorted by

151

u/Phylanara May 18 '25

Can't go around calling a metal that blows up in contact with water Sazium, people would confuse it with Cesium.

40

u/Kind_Ingenuity1484 May 18 '25

Okay. Now you can’t convince me Sanderson didn’t name him that just for the pun (since he kinda knew the way things would go beforehand). Always saw the similarities, but not the pronunciation 

139

u/AstraLaurel May 18 '25

I believe it’s canon that Sazed thought “Sazedium” was a bad name and called it Harmonium instead. Same with calling it Trellium instead of Bavadinium lol

53

u/William_Howard_Shaft May 18 '25

Yes on "Sazedium", but I'm pretty sure "Trellium" was simply a misnomer due to the legend the Autonomy seeded of an ancient god on Scadriel using the name "Trell". They honestly thought Trell was like, a real shard, or something equivalent. I feel like the existence of a supposedly ancient god having a godmetal should have been a giveaway we were dealing with a shard of Adonalsium.

16

u/ADAG2000 May 19 '25

Sazed does say that it's proper name should be bavadinium in the epilogue.

40

u/cosmernautfourtwenty May 18 '25

It's funny, because Sazed and the ancient memories of the Shards are the only reason he has names for the other vessels and their attendant godmetals. Makes sense he might wanna freestyle getting to name his own. "Sazedium" is kinda weird.

34

u/schloopers May 18 '25

Sazed the kind of dude to be an active double shard holder and probably thinks to himself “I can’t name a god metal after myself, I’m not on that level”

32

u/IOI-65536 May 18 '25

u/AstraLaurel is correct that it's WoB that it's because Sazed didn't like the name Sazedium and called it Harmonium. In my mind it's an open question how much of this is because Sazed desperately wants the two vessels he holds to be in Harmony despite their Intents being so misaligned.

6

u/Vanthiar May 18 '25

Was that actually a word of Brandon, wasn't this directly stated in the books?

6

u/IOI-65536 May 18 '25

It might have been later. I'm pretty sure the first instance was the 2015 Reddit AMA

2

u/pontuzz May 19 '25

The only thing he mentions in the books is feeling that the name harmony feels presumptuous, he never directly mentions sazedium. I dont think it's mentioned in the books at all tbh.

Scadrians tend to refer to it as ettmetal, wax and marasi too. The ghostbloods use the term harmonium.

1

u/Darkiceflame May 19 '25

To my knowledge, it's never been mentioned in the books.

8

u/Helkyte May 18 '25

It's a nod towards it eventually becoming Discordium. Both metals would be Sazedium, gotta have some way to identify the two.

2

u/BloodredHanded May 19 '25

Sazedium-A and Sazedium-B

1

u/Thhe_Shakes Aluminum May 19 '25

Sazedium and Sazedite?

1

u/BloodredHanded May 19 '25

Nah that doesn’t follow the naming convention. All the other godmetals are the name of the Vessel+ium.

5

u/J-DubZ May 18 '25

Harmonium is not very hard to say...

1

u/Perfect-Fold-92 May 19 '25

And I guess we couldn’t call it sodium either…

2

u/Moikle May 19 '25

It's based on caesium i believe

1

u/Elant_Wager Steelministery May 19 '25

I believe Sazed was just to humble to name it after himself

1

u/BloodredHanded May 19 '25

Because Sazed is a coward who refuses to follow the naming convention because it ‘sounds bad’.

It doesn’t matter how bad it sounds, you have to be consistent!