CryptoAngels: Sandalphon
The eighteenth in a series of posts about the Archangels of the CryptoAngels project and their inspirations.
Owned by Bharat Krymo, Sandalphon is the greatest healer of the Archangels. When a wound is so deep or a malady so grievous that it is beyond all other ministration, the blessing of Sandalphon may yet draw the darkness from the dying body or the waning soul.
Sandalphon dwells in the Viridian Forest, a beautiful sun-dappled woodland that borders the Meadows of Ambrosia in Heaven. Deep within it he can be found in a glade called the Sucratissimus Lucus, which is Latin for ‘sweetest grove’. The Viridian Forest is inspired by the romantic forests of folklore and story, such as the Brocéliande of Arthurian legend, Arcadia the home of the god Pan in Greek mythology, and the elven land of Lothlórien in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings.
The character of Sandalphon is inspired by the healers of myth, such as the god Asclepius, son of Apollo in Greek mythology and pupil of another great legendary healer, the centaur Chiron. It was said that Asclepius’s skill in healing was so great that he could restore the dead to life. Sandalphon’s constellation is the serpent, and the entrance to his grove is marked by a serpent coiled around a chestnut staff. This is a reference to the Rod of Asclepius, a staff wielded by that god, which is still used today as a symbol of healthcare.
