TigerClan, LeopardClan, and LionClan; where did they go? by Amberpaw

Amberpaw wonders what happened to the mythical TigerClan, LeopardClan, and LionClan.

Where did TigerClan, LeopardClan, and LionClan go? They were used as stories to tell kits how the clans were created, but now we have DotC that shows us how the clans were really created. Since TPB, we haven’t seen these beginning clans unless they were in prequels! Well in this article, I, Autumnpaw, am going to talk about it, because these clans have been neglected to be written.

Okay, so we all know how RiverClan and ShadowClan combined in The Darkest Hour to create ‘TigerClan’, which Tigerstar I named after one of the ‘first clans’. Then, ThunderClan and WindClan combined to create ‘LionClan’, because of a prophecy Firestar, the leader of ThunderClan at the time, had received from Bluestar, the leader of ThunderClan before him. Since those disbanded back into the four clans again, ThunderClan, Riverclan, ShadowClan, and WindClan, the famous ‘first clans’ haven’t had so much as a sentence written with them in it at all.

In Goosefeather’s Curse, we see him listening to the stories of TigerClan, LeopardClan, and LionClan. But, of course, as all the other times after TPB, this short ebook is a prequel.

During DotC, we learn about River Ripple, Thunder, Clear Sky, Tall Shadow, and Wind Runner, who created the five clans we know as ‘RiverClan, ThunderClan, SkyClan, ShadowClan, and WindClan’. So either the Erins forgot about TigerClan, LeopardClan, and LionClan, or they wanted us to think the story was created because nobody in the living clans remembered the way the clans were really created. BUT THEN, in ASC, they talk about Riverstar. Riverstar literally appears in Frostpaw’s visions. He leads her to the park cats, who somehow remember Riverstar. So nothing is adding up. It’s confusing, since the DotC cats weren’t mentioned up until the most recent arc, ASC, excluding DotC where they were literally introduced.

Maybe the tradition of these ‘first clans’ was left behind when the clans travelved to the lake, like the tradition of apprentices going to the Moonstone (or Moonpool) before becoming warriors. It might make sense, since the clans forgot a lot of traditions when they moved to the lake.

For some reason, in some of the other prequels written a while after TPB, these first clans have not been mentioned. It could be, again, that the Erins forgot, but I doubt it. I’m not sure it has anything to do with the Erins forgetting, but I might be wrong, since I haven’t reread a lot of the series in a while. Most likely, the Erins didn’t want things to be confusing after DotC, when they finally explained everything about the clans. If that’s the case, then it makes more sense than the Erins forgetting. Of course, it might be for a completely different reason that what I’ve been putting out, so who knows? I might be completely wrong, and it could be for some other unknown reason.

That’s all I have for now, let me know if you’d like a part two, possibly about other things the books (or the Erins) have forgotten.

Amberpaw out!