Classism in Elderling society? (spoilers RotE books incl Blood of Dragons)

[Farseer]

There is indeed evidence the Elderlings had some scrolls. But they did not rely on that solely. Most of the scrolls Fitz found on Aslevjal were the stolen skill scrolls of Buckkeep, not Elderling scrolls. A lot about Elderling culture was probably never written down, as you would not write a scroll to describe what a horse is. It was once too common to write down, as anyone with questions would instead travel to ask instead of reading. Especially when text was written on parchment, not on paper. Parchment requires animal skin to make, so it is much more precious and would not be used to write down common knowledge.

I have a lot more to add to this discussion but I do first need to find time to have a look back over many other posts I have made regarding some of these points in a number of other threads eg that I also believe it to be more than just the Cataclysm that destroyed the Elderlings etc. Right back in AQ, even Fitz felt that a sudden earthquake couldn't have been the whole reason for the city's downfall:

I shook my head. Too much of it remained standing still. No doubt it had been a great disaster, but it did not explain the city's death to me.

I did want to quickly add though, that Fitz found many scrolls in the Kelsingra map tower when he went there, also in AQ. Despite my expectation elsewhere in the forum that some of the still-locked doors that are in the tower may also later reveal the presence of memory stone cubes, Fitz was able to break down the door of one of the inner chambers which revealed wooden racks of pigeonholes that lined all of the room's interior walls. In each pigeonhole there was a scroll, and also a stack of fresh vellums. It was in this same room that Fitz found the writing implements and the pot that contained a dried remnant of ink which he revived with his spit.

I also thought that this question of writing about a horse vs writing about an Elderling was later questioned by Fitz (whereas earlier he had just 'accepted' that as the reason for there being so few scrolls on Elderlings) . That although there were no scrolls that 'described' what a horse was, as such, there were still numerous scrolls that covered such things as the care of a horse and therefore, though it could be understood that there would not be many scrolls which described an Elderling, why were there so few scrolls regarding the culture of Elderlings? I will have to check that point but I am fairly sure that Fitz observed something along those lines in the TM series somewhere. Nothing specific as an example was given but an example from the text itself could be that Fitz could write down the ingredients he had used to make the horse linament he had given to Chivalry. In this, Fitz would not be describing a horse, as such, but there would still be a scroll with a direct reference to a horse or, at least, the care of one.

Possibly there will be many more Elderling scrolls unearthed as there seems to be a number of references to them in the Jhaampe library, Celerity had one for Fitz to view when he visited Bearns Duchy and Alise had also sourced some? EDIT: There is mention that they have been found in Chalced as well? This seems likely given its proximity to the Rain River/Rain Wilds.END EDIT:

It intrigues me that Fitz noted, about the locked doors of Kelsingra, that people don't lock a door unless they expect to come back...

I hope it's okay but I have amended the spoiler tag to include all books as discussion has, inevitably, widened beyond the RWC?

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Every instance where a character became witness to memories of Elderling society has only seen a thriving, elegant, happy one.

Now I've decided to jump in, I don't want to leave! Sorry to bring up AQ again but there was actually quite a bit of angst between those Fitz saw in the Kelsingra map tower. There were two men and three women standing near the map table and, at first mention, Fitz noted that one of the men was angry. By the time he later returned to the room and realised the table was actually a map, the people were arguing, even shouting. One woman he desribed as 'stubborn' and the other smiling coldly.

Of all the things though, it was mention of one of them angrily using their pointer to draw an imaginary line over the map that gave me cause to pause...it was almost as though they were arguing over territory or something and the imaginary line that was drawn with the pointer was seemingly drawn in the same place that the rift in the land would later appear. Of course, this latter point is only a possible interpretation of the passage! Just looking for it, ah, it's in Chapter Twenty-Seven, 'The City'.