This Elden Ring Theory Changes Everything about The Shattering

1 week ago 6

Published Apr 20, 2026, 11:24 AM EDT

Melissa Sarnowski has been a game writer for over two years. While she's willing to dig into any game for an article, she heavily focuses on The Legend of Zelda, Resident Evil, Final Fantasy, and The Sims content, having played games from each franchise since she was a child.

Elden Ring has been out for years now, but you can still find new theories appearing about the complicated lore, which is told in the normal FromSoftware style that leaves it up to you to dig into events and piece together the full picture. A new theory changes the idea of what The Shattering was, which is an event that has been part of theories before, but usually with the default understanding that Marika broke the Elden Ring directly.

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However, there's evidence that The Shattering involved an actual physical object instead of the idea that it was a cosmic event where Marika broke the Elden Ring that she had become the vessel for, allowing its fragments to be scattered.

Here's the theory.

The Elden Ring is Marika's Diadem

Put together by Reddit user DarkStranger111, there's a compelling case to be made about the nature of The Shattering and the previously accepted idea of what the Elden Ring itself is. The core of the theory started by looking at the announcement trailer for Elden Ring and seeing that—when The Shattering is mentioned—Marika is shown using a hammer to destroy an object that isn't on-screen. It has generally been accepted to be the Elden Ring in some form. What's been missing is that the object being shattered was likely Marika's diadem.

Marika is almost always depicted with her diadem if you look at the various images of her and the statues in-game. However, there are clear points that mark when she acquires the diadem and when she's no longer wearing it that line up perfectly with this theory. She doesn't have the diadem when you see her ascending to godhood, and she no longer has it on when she's striking an unseen object on the anvil, meaning when you face her inside the Erdtree (as Radagon), she still isn't wearing it because it's been broken for a long time by that point.

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Looking at the theory, this would mean that The Shattering was a highly personal event for Marika rather than the abstract idea it's been until now. She carried the physical representation of the Elden Ring in her diadem, which marked her as a god. Then, when her godhood turned sour with the Knight of the Black Knives, she rejected it by breaking the item that made her a god, leading to the Elden Ring being scattered and her being punished by The Greater Will.

Miquella Supports this Theory in Shadows of the Erdtree

In the Shadows of the Erdtree DLC, Miquella retraces Marika's path in an attempt to become a god as well. While Miquella succeeds, you're still able to defeat him in the final fight against Consort Radahn, which ends his godhood before he could do anything with it. However, the important part is that Miquella, like Marika, went through the gate to ascend, and came back with a Circlet of Light, which looks an awful lot like Marika's diadem.

You pick up the Circlet of Light after you defeat Consort Radahn at the end of the DLC and touch the memory left at the center of the arena. It even includes the description that it was the foundation that Miquella's age of compassion would be built on, which mirrors Marika's Golden Order being built on her own diadem. It's likely that the Elden Ring being in pieces that are held by various characters, including the player, was the reason that Miquella wasn't able to claim the same amount of power as Marika when he ascended.

This theory doesn't change the events that happened, but it makes The Shattering feel more personal for Marika and possibly shifts her motivations, as she wasn't just rebelling against The Greater Will by breaking her diadem, and therefore the Elden Ring. She was rejecting godhood itself and the foundation of her Golden Order, which lines up quite well with the general vibe that godhood is a prison rather than a blessing in Elden Ring.