Arcane Timeline: Where Does Arcane Fits in LoL Lore?

The world of Arcane and its cities of Piltover and Zaun represent just a tiny fraction of a rich history spanning billions of years. To truly understand the tensions, fears, and ambitions driving characters like Ambessa, Heimerdinger, Jayce, and even the representatives of Noxus and Black Rose, we need to dive deep into Runeterra’s past.

Where Arcane Fits in the LoL Lore Timeline?

Before we explore the entire history, let’s establish when Arcane takes place. The series is set around the year 900-990 after the founding of Noxus (AN). This timing is crucial because it places the show’s events at a pivotal moment when multiple historical forces are converging. The development of hextech isn’t happening in isolation – it’s emerging just as Noxus is expanding its empire, the aftermath of the Rune Wars still haunts the older generations, and ancient powers are stirring across Runeterra.

For context, Heimerdinger has lived through roughly 300 years of this history, meaning he personally witnessed the horrors of the Rune Wars and the founding of Piltover itself. This explains his deep-seated fears about the unchecked development of hextech technology.

In the Beginning

The story of Runeterra begins in true cosmic fashion – with nothing. Before the universe existed, there was only the Void, home to beings called the Watchers. These entities existed in perfect, unconscious nothingness until the first light of creation pierced their realm. This light came from the formation of reality itself, and it initiated a conflict that would shape the universe.

As reality took form, a cosmic dragon named Aurelion Sol spread starlight across the cosmos, creating stars and planets. Runeterra itself was crafted by celestial beings using powerful artifacts called World Runes. This cosmic origin isn’t just ancient history – it directly connects to the hextech crystals that drive Arcane’s plot, as both draw upon the fundamental magical energies woven into Runeterra’s creation.

Life began flourishing on Runeterra around 9,000 years before Noxus’s founding. The first inhabitants included spirits, demons like Fiddlesticks, and the yordles. The yordles established their city around the Bandle Wood tree and began creating portals to interact with the physical world, marking the beginning of the intermingling between magic and mundane reality that would eventually lead to hextech.

Human civilizations emerged across the continent, each developing their own relationship with magic. In Ionia, people learned to live in harmony with the spirit realm. The tribes of the Freljord worshipped powerful demigods like Volibear and Ornn.

This period also saw the first major catastrophe caused by humans meddling with powers beyond their control. The Three Sisters of the Freljord – Avarosa, Serylda, and Lissandra – sought to harness the magic of their land. Their ambition led Lissandra to make a devastating deal with the Watchers, nearly bringing about an apocalypse that was only narrowly averted by freezing the Watchers in True Ice.

The Rise and Fall of Ancient Empires

Around 6,000 years before Noxus, migrants from the ancient land of Camavor established several crucial civilizations. Most notably, they founded Shurima, which would become the greatest empire Runeterra had ever seen. Using the power of the Sun Disc, Shurima created godlike warriors called Ascended, who protected and expanded the empire.

However, Shurima’s story ended in tragedy when the emperor Azir was betrayed by his friend Xerath during an Ascension ritual. The resulting magical catastrophe buried the capital under the desert and sent the empire into collapse. The Ascended warriors, now known as the Darkin, became corrupted by their power and turned into monstrous beings who waged war across the continent.

This period is particularly relevant to Arcane because it represents another cautionary tale about the dangers of uncontrolled magical power – a lesson that Heimerdinger tries to convey to Jayce and Viktor. The fall of Shurima and the subsequent Darkin War led to the first major efforts to regulate and contain magical power.

The Rune Wars and Their Aftermath

Perhaps no event has shaped the modern world of Arcane more than the Rune Wars. These catastrophic conflicts erupted when people discovered how to use the World Runes – the same artifacts used in Runeterra’s creation. The wars were so devastating that entire nations vanished overnight, and the fabric of reality itself was strained.

This is why Heimerdinger reacts so strongly to hextech development in Arcane. The wars finally ended when two mages, Ryze and Tyrus, began collecting and hiding the World Runes, establishing the principle that some powers are too dangerous for mortals to wield.

The Birth of Piltover and Zaun

The direct prehistory of Arcane begins around 790 years after Noxus’s founding when a city called Oshra Va’Zaun attempted an ambitious engineering project. They tried to create a sea passage using chemical bombs, but the plan backfired catastrophically, causing an earthquake that sank part of the city. Only the intervention of the wind spirit Janna, who blew away the toxic gases, prevented the complete annihilation of the population. Maybe this is why you would have noticed a Janna carving in Arcane 2.

In the aftermath, the wealthy merchants who lived above the destruction renamed their part of the city Piltover and constructed the Sun Gates to control sea trade. Those living in the sunken districts became known as Zaunites, creating the social and literal divide we see in Arcane. This event is crucial because it established the pattern of technological ambition leading to disaster for the lower classes, while the wealthy prospered from the aftermath.

Piltover has established itself as a center of trade and innovation, while Zaun festers beneath it. The show’s central conflict over hextech isn’t just about progress versus tradition – it’s about whether humanity has learned from its countless past mistakes with magical power.

Heimerdinger’s caution comes from personal experience with similar powers destroying nations during the Rune Wars. Meanwhile, Noxus’s interest in hextech technology suggests the potential for another world-spanning conflict.

The personal stories of characters like Vi, Jinx, and Viktor play out against this grand historical backdrop. Their choices and actions don’t just affect Piltover and Zaun – they could have consequences for their entire world, just as similar choices did throughout Runeterra’s long and often tragic history.

As we look forward to Arcane’s second season finale, this historical context becomes even more important. With Noxus and Black Rose taking a more active role and hextech technology advancing rapidly, the show is positioned to tackle themes that have shaped Runeterra for millennia: the price of progress, the cycle of violence, and the question of whether humanity can ever truly learn from its past mistakes.

Understanding this vast history helps us appreciate why the stakes in Arcane are so high. It’s not just about two cities fighting – it’s about whether history will repeat itself with another magical catastrophe, and whether the characters can break the cycles of violence and power that have shaped their world since the first light pierced the Void. As hextech technology advances and tensions rise, the lessons of the past loom large over Piltover’s gleaming towers and Zaun’s chemical-lit streets.