Responsible for the care of the Red Grail, healing the wounded and retrieve the geneseed of those who are beyond saving, the Blood Angels’ Sanguinary Priest is valuable on the field of battle.
Via our friends at Lexicanum:
Like all Space MarineApothecaries, Sanguinary Priests are battlefield medics, trained to heal Battle Brothers‘ wounds, and retrieve the geneseed of those who are killed or too grievously wounded to survive.
They also share a role with the Blood Angels’ Chaplains in the spiritual guidance of their Battle Brothers. Where Chaplains are there to save Blood Angels from falling to the Black Rage, Sanguinary Priests watch for signs of the Red Thirst, doing their best to curb its effects, or – when the battle turns against them – harness it as a weapon against the enemy.
Sanguinary Priests also oversee the induction of new recruits into the chapter, by a process known as Insanguination. During the Insanguination, geneseed is implanted into successful Neophytes by drinking from the Blood Chalice held by a Sanguinary Priest.
Because of this role, the Sanguinary Priests are responsible for the care of the Red Grail, the chalice holding the blood of Sanguinius himself. This blood is regularly circulated through the veins of the Sanguinary Priests, who are injected with a sample from the Grail, then later cut themselves to bleed it back in. In this way, the blood is continuously kept fresh, and every single draught from the Grail contains a small percentage of the original blood of the Primarch.
As the chapter‘s leading specialists in the Blood Angels’ genecode, many Sanguinary Priests are engaged in an intensive – some would say futile – search for a cure for the Red Thirst and the Black Rage.
Because of their dual role, with the Chaplains, of watching over their battle-brothers’ spiritual health, it has become traditional, since M35, for the Sanguinary High Priest and the High Chaplain to assume joint command of the chapter, in the event the Chapter Master is killed or incapacitated. For this reason, the Sanguinary Priesthood is considered on an equal footing with the Chapter command in the Blood Angels’ hierarchy.
Learn more about the Sanguinary Priests
About the Author: Zeb Barrett
I am a huge gamer from miniature war gaming, to board games, to video games. When I’m not hanging out with my son, I try to spend all of my free time gaming in some sort of way and broadcasting on Twitch with my wife. I also like to do some video editing and throw up videos on our YouTube.
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