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Prime universe
(Capcom's primary storyline)


The Four Houses, also known as the Four Lords of the Village, were a political alliance of noble families which controlled a mountainous region of Eastern Europe. Founded in the distant past from four distinct dynasties, it was usurped by Mother Miranda in the 20th century as a tyrannical theocratic regime. The alliance collapsed in 2021 when the heads of each house were killed.

History[]

The Four Houses' origins lie in ancient times with four men who founded one of Europe's earliest settlements, with folklore naming them Berengario,[1] Lord Cesare,[2] Guglielmo,[3] and Uncle Nichola,[4][note 1] An unknown catastrophe befell the region, leading to the disappearance of its inhabitants and its abandonment, until a village was established on the surface of the fallen ruins. By the 15th century, rule over the region passed on to the descendants of these four men: Houses Dimitrescu, Heisenberg, Moreau and Beneviento. The direct connections between the four houses and their ancient cohorts are unspecified, though they likely represent a line of noble descent. These houses prospered into the 20th century, though their feudal domination appears to have waned over time.

Under Miranda[]

Some point shortly after the turn of the 20th century, a local woman named Miranda gave birth to her first and only child, Eva, in 1909, but the girl tragically passed away during the Spanish flu pandemic ten years later. Distraught and inconsolable, Miranda wandered into a nearby cave to take her own life, but instead encountered the Black God under the village. Unwittingly infecting herself with the Mold in the process, Miranda bore witness to the consciousness of everyone who had ever died and been consumed by the root, and became convinced that she could revive Eva through the power of the Mold. Miranda took over the village by presenting herself as a divine figure, a prophet of the Black God, and led the inhabitants to worship her as "Mother Miranda". Four subjects demonstrated unique reactions to the Cadou infection, coincidentally the descendants of the once-dominant Four Houses: Alcina Dimitrescu, Salvatore Moreau, Donna Beneviento, and Karl Heisenberg. Recognizing their potential usefulness in her work, Miranda adopted them as her own "family", and they operated together as a council.

Castle Dimitrescu became notorious as a place of "blood and death" due to its lord's need for fresh human blood to maintain her health, with the dead returned to life by the Mold as the vampiric Moroi and Samcă. Following a series of family tragedies, Beneviento isolated herself in and around her family home by an old waterfall, having implanted a Cadou parasite within her doll Angie for company. Not gaining superhuman resilience, she instead secreted a Mold-contaminated fluid which mutated local flowers to develop intense hallucinogenic properties, luring those who strayed too close as playmates who would never return from her estate. The fishing village to the north was claimed by Moreau, who dammed the river and flooded it to allow his piscean body to thrive while consuming wayward fishermen. Finally, Heisenberg made his home deep beneath an abandoned factory, where he would use stolen corpses from the village cemetery to mass-produce an army of Soldats to serve his wishes. Although he initially preferred to experiment on the dead, it was not long before he began to use living people.

The Four Houses also notably had an obvious animosity towards each other. Dimitrescu desired to be Miranda's favorite, deriding the fact she was considered a sibling to the other lords, calling the other lords "miscreants." Beneviento never explicitly stated her misgivings, but dialogue spoken by Angie indicates a similar resentment to the other lords, such as pushing Moreau and referring to him as “ugly”. Moreau desired love and attention from Miranda and was obedient in following her instructions, but did not have a good relationship with his "siblings" since the other lords looked down on him. Having hated his forced mutation under Miranda, Heisenberg vented his anger by constantly arguing with the other lords and secretly plotting a rebellion against Miranda with his Soldat army. Unbeknownst to the lords, Miranda merely used them all as a means of furthering her plans to revive her long-lost biological daughter, viewing them all as expendable and “false children”, having created them all merely as a byproduct of her means to an end, and as such was perfectly willing to sacrifice them to further her cause.

Fall[]

In February 2021, Miranda obtained reliable information of a superhuman recently born near the village to an American family. Assuming success to be inevitable, the Four Lords began systematically murdering the remaining villagers to give food to their Black God, which required sustenance to achieve Miranda's goals. In the early hours of February 9, Miranda returned with the child, Rosemary Winters, and the four met at the Cave Church to the south-west of the village, where they preceded to crystallize and mutilate the child as part of a ritual, keeping pieces of her until it was time for the ceremony. Only Heisenberg suspected he would be killed once the ceremony was complete, and planned on inciting a rebellion against Miranda.

Over the course of two days, the village was infiltrated by multiple parties, including Rosemary's father Ethan Winters, a BSAA scout team preparing for a major operation to counter the biohazard, and the rogue "Hound Wolf" unit led by Cpt. Chris Redfield. The Lords slowly became aware of one or all of these threats and retreated to their respective domains. Under Winters's hands, Dimitrescu and her daughters were the first family to fall, with Alcina's flask retrieved by him. With the Lords' ultimate plan disclosed to Winters by the village merchant, The Duke, Winters began pursuing the other three flasks. Beneviento was killed next by Winters, while Moreau drew himself into a fight with him after attempting to recover his flask. The final lord, Heisenberg, made efforts to form an alliance with Winters and use his army of Soldats against Miranda, though this was unsuccessful. In the night, the Hound Wolves were successful in raiding his underground factory and destroyed his army, with Heisenberg himself being killed by Winters. With his death, the lines of the Four Houses were officially rendered extinct.

Emblems[]

The emblems of the Four Houses are as follows:

  • House Dimitrescu: A flower with two crossed swords.
  • House Beneviento: The Sun and the Moon.
  • House Moreau: A mermaid.
  • House Heisenberg: A horse and a horseshoe.

If the four are together, an octagonal "umbrella" symbol is placed in the center. This symbol is what inspired the Umbrella Corporation, which was co-founded by one of Miranda's students, Oswell E. Spencer, Earl Spencer.[5]

Gallery[]

Further notes[]

  • The monsters in the Village of Shadows storybook each represent one of the Four Lords.
  • The surnames of the Four Lords each have a different European origin: Dimitrescu is Romanian, Beneviento is Italian, Moreau is French, and Heisenberg is German. Notably, the first three surnames are all from Latin languages, while Heisenberg is from a Germanic language; Mother Miranda's name is also Latin, leaving Heisenberg's name as the outlier.

Sources[]

notes
  1. Art Director's Memo: "四貴族の遺跡のコンセプトアート。四人の王が聖杯を中心に会合を開いている様子。かつてこの村を興した四人の始祖が聖杯を守っていたことを表している。"
references
  1. Resident Evil Village (2021), item: "Berengario's Chalice".
  2. Resident Evil Village (2021), item: "Cesare's Goblet".
  3. Resident Evil Village (2021), item: "Guglielmo's Plate".
  4. Resident Evil Village (2021), item: "Father Nichola's Angel".
  5. Resident Evil Village (2021), file: "Spencer's Letter".
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