Scholar

**Scholars** are the members of the Great Library of Alexandria. It is a title given to those who have completed their training as a postulant.

## Description

Scholars are easily identified due to the billowing black robes they wear and the bands they wear on their wrists. These bands mark their position and rank in the Library's system. There's bronze, copper, silver, and gold. Gold-band Scholars are the highest ranking and most rare. The bronze band is the lowest of the levels. These bands are not removable. They must be cut away at the termination of a Scholar or librarian's contracts. Librarians meanwhile run the Serapeum around the world. The first purpose of a librarian is to preserve and defend books. Sometimes this means dying for the books or making someone else die for them. Scholars also have their own edition of the Codex. A Scholar's edition of a Codex has plenty of extra pages for notes. Like other Codexes, they're usually bound in leather and embossed with the Library's seal.

### Divisions

Scholars specialize in one division of the Library. The divisions are Medica, Artifex, Historia, and Lingua. Artifex encompasses mathematics, engineering, and the practical arts. Medica specialists have a red blood-drop symbol on the lapel of their uniform. Scholars frequently investigate the black trades and markets looking for rare books. Thus, part of their training includes learning about them. Senior Scholars are taught more about Obscurists than the regular level librarians. Research Scholars are constantly on the move out in the world, conducting research, experiments, and doing the work of the Library. Due to the growth of the Burners, it's no longer only the job of the High Garda to pursue Burners, now Scholars must as well.

### Librarians

Librarians are below Scholars in the Great Library's hierarchy. Librarians are those who run Serapeums. They take their training in their home cities, and then sign one-year contracts for a copper band. To be a Scholar, one must be better. Part of the job of a librarian is that as they locate an original work, whether it’s a personal journal surrendered on the death of the owner or recovered materials, it must be added to the Library’s collection. Librarians instruct, assist, research, develop, create, and protect. The librarian in charge of a Serapeum is the Senior Librarian. Librarians wear a sand-colored overcoat. Most librarians receive a bronze band. At the end of a bronze contract, a library employee either moves up, stays on, or moves out.

## Known Scholars

* Christopher Wolfe
* Thomas Schreiber
* Khalila Seif
* Dario Santiago
* Theo
* Artifex Magnus
* Neska Darzi
* Naomi Ebele
* Rafael Seif
* Murasaki Shirasu
* Prakesh
* Amahle
* Plato
* Tyler: Scholar stationed at the Oxford Serapeum who is killed for helping Morgan Hault
* Zhao: Scholar who provides Khalila Seif extra training in sophisticated mathematics and the study of the heavens
* Archimedes: A master Scholar from the first years of the Library; wrote *On Further Nature of the Elements*
* Phlogistes: A Medica Scholar
* Heron of Alexandria: Scholar from the 2nd century of the Library who worked on automata
* Johannes Gutenberg: Scholar and original inventor of the printing press in 1455, he was killed and his work erased
* Padma Dahwan
* Cao Xuequin: Lingua Magnus in 1750
* Gargi Vachaknavi: Archivist Magister
* Callimachus: Archivist Magister
* Alessandro Volta: Archivist Magister
* Zoran: Archivist Magister
* Akkadevi: Archivist Magister
* Alfred Nobel: Archivist Magister during the French rebellion
* Sarenpet: Artifex Magnus
* Thomas Qualls: Master of Cells during Christopher Wolfe's imprisonment

## Trivia

* Traveling Scholars have the nickname "stormcrow." They're called stormcrows because after they come to a Serapeum, there's almost always devastation.
* Scholars who die in service of the Library receive a consecrated stone in the Great Hall of Knowledge in Alexandria's Serapeum.