History Main / NaturalElements

* In ''VideoGame/BrutalLegend'', the elements of the world of HeavyMetal are Fire, Noise, Blood, and Metal. Fittingly, this fits with the four classical elements; Fire is obvious, but Noise is Air, Blood is Water, and Metal is Earth, they've just been rebranded for Heavy Metal aesthetics.

In addition, amongst these foundational elements were those considered the ''most'' basic, from which all others were derived. These are known as the "classical" or "great" elements. The elements that make up this group are, broadly speaking, '''water''', '''fire''', '''earth''', and '''air''', though this does change slightly depending on which philosophical tradition you're referring to:

* ''Series/Charmed1998'': In "[[Recap/CharmedS1E15IsThereAWoogyInTheHouse Is There a Woogy in the House?]]," Prue and Piper figure out that the Manor is located on a spiritual Nexus by noticing that it is equidistant from five elements: water, fire, wood, metal and earth.

* The ritual of the Kabbalistic Cross is an Esoteric protection ritual use in Cermonial Magick and summons the protection of four archangels, one for each element - Michael: Fire, Raphael: Air, Gabriel: Water, Uriel: Earth

* ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda:

** The series have had such powers exhibited to at least a minor extent by the Sages ever since ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', with the Sages of [[GreenThumb Forest]], [[PlayingWithFire Fire]], [[MakingASplash Water]], [[SoulPower Spirit]], [[CastingAShadow Shadow]], and [[LightEmUp Light]]. In addition, the three Golden Goddesses Din (fire and earth), Nayru (water), and Farore (air and [[GreenThumb wood]]) [[CreationMyth are said to have created the world with these powers]].

Before people discovered the atomic elements, past thinkers hypothesized the existence of ''other elements'' that were the building blocks of life and the physical world. These elements were the different forces of nature that humans encountered: water, fire, earth, air, lightning, thunder, dark, light, metal, sound, smoke, even space and cosmic energy, among several others. Though disproven, believing these forces of nature to be the base components of all matter has influenced several real world belief systems and practices and shows up in many fictional works, particularly those concerned with the mystical and magical. In fact, channeling these forces as [[ElementalPowers a magical ability or power]] or using them as the basis of a FunctionalMagic system are some of the most popular ways this concept gets applied in modern works.

** The series have had such powers exhibited to at least a minor extent by the Sages ever since ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'', with the Sages of [[GreenThumb Forest]], [[PlayingWithFire Fire]], [[MakingASplash Water]], [[SoulPower Spirit]], [[CastingAShadow Shadow]], and [[LightEmUp Light]]. In addition, the three Golden Goddesses Din (fire and earth), Nayru (water), and Farore (air and [[GreenThumb wood]]) [[CreationMyth are said to have created the world with these powers]].

Regardless of whether or not a work closely follows a particular school of thought or presents an original system using a different grouping, making use of the notion that the forces of nature are actually discrete "elements" falls under this trope, as do most references and allusions to the "classical elements," if it's not covered by one of the subtropes listed below. Bonus points if the elements' function in the work is connected to being a primordial substance or to the creation of life itself.

In addition, amongst these foundational elements were those considered the ''most'' basic, from which all others were derived. These are known as the "classical", or "great" elements. The elements that make up this group are, broadly speaking, '''water''', '''fire''', '''earth''', and '''air''', though this does change slightly depending on which philosophical tradition you're referring to:

[[folder:Different takes on the "classical elements"]]

See also AlchemyIsMagic, {{Transmutation}}, EasternZodiac, and WesternZodiac for tropes that typically incorporate the idea of the nautral or classical elements without necessarily being a direct subtrope.

Regardless of whether or not a work closely follows a particular school of thought or presents an original system using a different grouping, making use of the notion that the forces of nature are actually discrete "elements" falls under this trope, as do most references and allusions to the "classical elements" so long as they don't fall under one of the subtropes listed below. Bonus points if their function in the work is connected to being a primordial substance or to the creation of life itself.

See also AlchemyIsMagic, {{Transmutation}}, EasternZodiac, and WesternZodiac for tropes that typically incorporate the idea of the nautral or classical elements without necessarily being a direct subtrope. Given that this is quite a large SuperTrope, check first to see if there is a more specific SubTrope that an example can be listed under and list it there.

See also AlchemyIsMagic, {{Transmutation}}, EasternZodiac, WesternZodiac, and FourTemperamentEnsemble for tropes that typically incorporate the idea of the nautral or classical elements without necessarily being a direct subtrope. Given that this is quite a large SuperTrope, check first to see if there is a more specific SubTrope that an example can be listed under and list it there.

Regardless of whether or not a work closely follows a particular school of thought, making use of the notion that the forces of nature are actually "elements" falls under this trope, as do most references and allusions to the "classical elements" so long as they don't fall under one of the subtropes listed below. Bonus points if their function in the work is connected to being a primordial substance or to the creation of life itself.

* '''UsefulNotes/{{Hinduism}}''': Arguably the originator of this concept, Hinduism has the ''Pancha Bhuta,''[[note]]also known as the ''Pancha Maha Bhuta''[[/note]] Sanskrit for "five great elements" or "five physical elements", which are said to be foundation for all of creation. These are ''Agni'' (fire), ''Vayu'' (air), ''Jala/Varuna'' (water), ''Bhumi/Prithvi'' (earth), and ''Akasha/Dyaus'' (space/void), though some sects do not consider space a foundational element because of its lack of physical form.

* '''[[UsefulNotes/{{Taoism}} Chinese Tradition]]''': ''Wuxing'' ("five phases" or "five elements") refers to a cycle that ancient Chinese philosophers believed underpinned many natural phenomenon and human interactions. This makes it distinct from the other schools of thought on this list, which considered these elements the sub-components of all matter, rather than as the basis for change and processes. This cycle has five phases, the order of which changes depending on whether the process is creating (generative) or destroying (destructive), and each phase corresponds to a natural slement: wood, fire, earth, metal, water.[[note]]This is the order for the generative cycle. The degenerative cycle order is wood, earth, water, fire, metal.[[/note]]

* '''UsefulNotes/{{Alchemy}}''': Though early alchemists considered earth, water, fire, and air to be the smallest element one could reduce all life to, they expanded the concept to include three elements connected to the properties of metallic substances and agents of reactions: mercury, sulphur, and salt. Sulphur was the basis for combustion and flammability, mercury, the basis for volatility and metallicity, and salt was thought to be the basis for solidity.

* ElementNumberFive: A special, often mysterious elemental type to a setting's four classical elements.

Regardless of whether or not a work closely follows a particular school of thought, making use of the notion that the forces of nature are actually "elements" (particularly when those forces are limited to water, fire, earth, air, and sometimes an ElementNumberFive), falls under this trope. Bonus points if their function in the work is connected to being a primordial substance or to the creation of life itself.

Before people discovered the atomic elements, past thinkers hypothesized the existence of ''other elements'' that were the building blocks of life and the physical world to explain the world around them. These elements were the different forces of nature that humans encountered: water, fire, earth, air, lightning, thunder, dark, light, metal, sound, smoke, even space and cosmic energy, among several others. Though disproven, believing these forces of nature to be the base components of all matter has influenced several real world belief systems and practices and shows up in many fictional works, particularly those concerned with the mystical and magical. In fact, channeling these forces as [[ElementalPowers a magical ability or power]] or using them as the basis of a FunctionalMagic system are some of the most popular ways this concept gets applied in modern works.

* ''Series/{{Charmed}}'': In "[[Recap/CharmedS1E15IsThereAWoogyInTheHouse Is There a Woogy in the House?]]," Prue and Piper figure out that the Manor is located on a spiritual Nexus by noticing that it is equidistant from five elements: water, fire, wood, metal and earth.

The different elements in each tradition take on a wide assortment of meanings, functions, and roles, [[ElementalMotifs some of which are consistent across the different systems]] and others wholly unique to a particular system. So it is important to consider which conceptualization a work is (likely) referencing when analyzing this trope's application.

* A basic run down of historic elemental systems:
** The famous western system revolves around the classic four elements, usually divided into "hot"/"cold" (fire and air = hot, water and earth = cold) and "dry"/"wet" (earth and fire = dry, water and air = wet) axis[[note]] In the original Greek thought, it was pretty much a metaphor for separation versus unity (heat spreading things apart, cold uniting them) and the form cohesion (dry being a distinct shape, wet being flexible/absent shape), but expect no-one to remember this[[/note]]. May be aligned with seasons (nowadays Air/Spring, Fire/Summer, Water/Autumn, Earth/Winter, but apparently [[http://web.eecs.utk.edu/~mclennan/BA/JO-PE.txt originally starting]] in Greece as Water/Spring, Air/Summer, Fire/Autumn and Earth/Winter), and many other things. Aether was also always a part of it as the "superior element"; nowadays, it equals "Spirit", but historically it was pretty "{{light|EmUp}}".
** Most famously used by Aristotle whose ideas became the basis for medieval physics. Aristotle, unlike several of his predecessors, favored a blend of the elements in most objects. The main reason he was so influential was because of his ingenious and plausible sounding, but unfortunately completely wrong idea, of giving each element a preferred direction to move. Thus in Aristotelian physics a rock falls because it has lots of Earth in it and Earth's "natural motion" is down, while a flame rises because Fire's "natural motion" is up. Of course the ancient Greeks knew that whatever the heck the planets were doing they weren't moving in straight lines so Aristotle proposed they were made of a fifth element whose "natural motion" was circular. This is one of the main reasons Astronomy made no progress for hundreds of years. Thanks to Aristotle's brainwave people didn't bother asking why the planets were acting as they did because they had been educated to think that they were made of something so different that Earth's physics just didn't apply to them. Of course it's a bit harsh to put all the blame for this on Aristotle, it was his successors that (in keeping with scholarly thought of the time) simply assumed he'd got it right.
** Alchemy throws in salt, sulphur and mercury.
** In Hindu and Buddhist traditions, the elements, or "tattvas", are more like states of being than anything else, forming a ladder from the solid earth to the heavenly light. They're aligned with the senses (earth = smell, water = taste, fire = sight, air = touch and "akasha" [[note]]Originally meaning "[[LightEmUp sky]]", it's now pretty much synonymous with "[[MusicalAssassin sound]]". It's always described as a pure nectar[[/note]] = sound. They're also aligned with the chakras, which represent their ladder: [[DishingOutDirt Muladhara]] at the bottom, [[MakingASplash Swadhisthana]] in the genitals, [[PlayingWithFire Manipura]] in the stomach/solar plexus, [[BlowYouAway Anahata]] in the heart, [[MusicalAssassin Vishudda]] in the throat and [[LightEmUp Ajna]] in the forehead.
** In Chinese thought, the elements are [[GreenThumb Wood]] (which is also synonymous with [[BlowYouAway Wind]]), [[PlayingWithFire Fire]], [[DishingOutDirt Earth]], [[ExtraOreDinary Metal]] (which also includes [[ShockAndAwe Electricity]] and {{Light|EmUp}}) and [[MakingASplash Water]]. They are pretty much described as states of matter and natural phases, so logically they're also closely tied with seasons (Wood/Spring, Fire/Summer, Metal/Autumn, Water/Winter, and Earth being the time between seasons) and life stages (Wood = birth/childhood, Fire = teenagehood, Earth = adulthood, Metal = old age and Water = old age or death). They're divided in the Yin/Yang axis (Wood and Fire = Yang, Metal and Water = Yin and Earth is both Yin and Yang). TheFourGods each represent an element (the often forgotten Yellow Dragon is the fifth, representing the Earth). The elements are also associated with personality traits, some good, some bad (fire is politeness and aggression, water contemplation and indecision, earth stubbornness and greed, wind flexibility and yielding, metal righteous and headstrong)[[note]]Not a comprehensive list[[/note]] and are sometimes used as a form of horoscope. The system of thinking also includes ElementalRockPaperScissors, with each element "nurturing" another at their own expense, being nurtured by a second, and suppressing or being suppressed by the third and fourth (for instance, wood feeds fire, which produces earth, melts metal, and is extinguished by water), although excesses of any given element can throw this system out of whack (eg: excess fire scorches earth and boils water).
** In addition, UsefulNotes/BaGua further splits the elements, with Metal being divided into Heaven and Lake, Wood/Air into Wind and Thunder, Earth into Earth and Mountain, and Fire and Water remaining the same. Some correspondences are switched (i.e. Earth becomes pure Yin and Metal pure Yang, with Wood/Air being the "in between" element).
** Japan has a classical four elemental system, with [[ThePowerOfTheVoid Void]] being at the center. However, it switches the Earth and Air correspondences, as Earth is understandably attributed to Wood and Air to Metal.
** There's little evidence for a concrete Native American system, though the Plains Indians attributed their directional winds to South/Fire, West/Lightning and North/Water (as ice). In general, directions and times of day seem to have been the concepts that got formalized instead, with groups from at least across the American Southwest (extending into Mexico) associating each direction (North, South, East, West) with a time of day (morning/predawn, midday, evening/twilight, full night) and a color (what colors are used, and for what direction, varies significantly from culture to culture).
** The ritual of the Kabbalistic Cross is an Esoteric protection ritual use in Cermonial Magick and summons the protection of four archangels, one for each element:
*** Michael: Fire
*** Raphael: Air
*** Gabriel: Water
*** Uriel: Earth

[[redirect:ElementsOfNature]]