[SPOILER] Alexander von Brennenburg...

[Diz]

whilst I think Alexander's orb, I don't remember where he got his actually.

I believe he had access to a lot of orbs, all which eventually shattered. What was mentioned by Agrippa, however, is that Alexander stole his orb at some point, which is the orb you use to help breach forward to the Inner Sanctum.

[Alardem]

From what I understand, Herbert was one of Alexander's contacts who were involved with finding artifacts. Daniel happened to be part of Herbert's archaeological expedition, and it's when Daniel finds Herbert's list of contacts that he managed to meet Alexander.

Also, Justine's family is implied to be part of this same order of aristocrats - Daniel's letter was sent to Justine's father around the same time he was murdered, and Justine is hinted to be aware of the Orb's existence.

IMO, this Illuminati-like cabal of paranormal obsessives eventually gave way to the Archaic caste whose corpses we find in Penumbra: Black Plague.

[Mechavomit]

Does Daniel even fit as a great uncle of an adult man age-wise? I'm trying to figure out how old he and his sibling would have to be by 1899 to make it possible...

[Alardem]

Does Daniel even fit as a great uncle of an adult man age-wise? I'm trying to figure out how old he and his sibling would have to be by 1899 to make it possible...

Hell yeah. TDD is in 1839, 60 years (and a couple of generations) before Mandus' time.

We also know that Mandus Co. has been around since 1828, which would imply that either Oswald's father or grandfather had started the company. We don't know anything about Oswald's age, although his children are apparently 9 years old (Lily was buried in 1890) so I'd assume he's in his 30s or 40s.

[charuchii]

It's possible. Amnesia took place in 1839, so there is sixty years between a machine for pigs and the dark descent. We know when Daniel went to Algeria, Hazel was 15. The average age of marriage during the Victorian age was 21, so let's say Hazel survived her illness and got married when she was 21 and got kids a year later at age 22. (we still have 53 years to fill in). Her kids could also have grown up and gotten married at 21 and got kids a year later (31 years left over), which one of them could be Mandus, who could also gotten married when he was 21. We have 10 years left until the events of A Machine For Pigs. His wife appereantly passed away in 1890 when giving birth to the twins, nine years before Pigs.
If Mandus came from Daniel's wife (if he got married), we even have some more years to spare, seeying as we can safely assume Daniel is a few years older than Hazel.

[Alardem]

If Mandus came from Daniel's wife (if he got married), we even have some more years to spare, seeying as we can safely assume Daniel is a few years older than Hazel.

Then Daniel would be his grandpa, not uncle. :p

Spoiler below!

Maybe Oswald is Howard Lafresque's great-uncle.

[charuchii]

If Mandus came from Daniel's wife (if he got married), we even have some more years to spare, seeying as we can safely assume Daniel is a few years older than Hazel.

Then Daniel would be his grandpa, not uncle. :p

Spoiler below!

Maybe Oswald is Howard Lafresque's great-uncle.

Hehe, I meant like... If he got married and his wife had siblings (that could be either older or younger than her), sorry for being unclear on that one

[Artyom]

I'm continually baffled that people don't consider that to be someone's grand uncle (or just uncle) you don't have to be blood related. So say your mother has a sister, and that sister is married to a man. That man is your uncle, but you're not blood related to him right? They don't even have to have children at all, and they're still your aunt and uncle. That man could be an alien insectoid from Neptune, but that doesn't make you part alien insectoid.

So the grand uncle of Mandus could very much be Alexander without him being a partly other-dimensional being, if he just married a German noble woman to keep up appearances while he was masquerading as a baron, and a sibling of that woman is the grandparent of Mandus. Mandus has two coats of arms in his mansion that have heraldic eagles similar to those used in Germany for a long time (as opposed to coats of arms used in England which do not resemble that).

Also Alexander was a founding member of the Order of the Black Eagle and seemingly knew all the Prussian noble families pretty well and they knew him. In general, noble families from an area are all related in some fashion and people, seeing as they thought Alexander was part of the noble line, could have considered him "Uncle Alexander" regardless of just how he was related to them. (Edit: yeah what Alardem said.)

You sir... deserve a cookie!

[Doomed316]

...and his grand uncle is

Spoiler below!

not a human being.

This. Or most likely this, anyway. If so, how is it possible that Alexander is in relation with him? And let's say that Alexander was human, why would he have a child? He keeps talking about our world as if it is a horrible and alien place, and he really badly wants to return to this other world. Why would he then consider having or adopting a child for raise in our world?

Interesting topic, by the way! Had me thinking for a bit, actually.

this could be a big fat spoiler or maybe turn out to be a theory but maybe the game went off of alexander's ending were he lived and Daniel dies. I figured that it would go off of Daniels ending when he did not save agrippa but killed Alexander. Who know who Manfus is talking about but I still feel it is Daniel because of the fact he says this in a entry you find in the game "this is were me and my great uncle and I depart" which means his uncle could still be alive and maybe it is Daniel he speaks of. But yet again Daniel was not insane and wanting to slaughter people after he killed Alexander so this game could be going off of the ending were Alexander lives and Daniel dies or agrippa dies and Alexander dies but Daniel lives. The game is an indirect sequal so odds are it won't reveal anything further on this past this note (sorry if a made mistakes I am typing on a HTC phone and numbers and letters are small as hell and I end up typing the wrong thing most of the time)

[zico]

Besides trying to have some sort of "actual" relation, I could imagine Mandus was rather talking in a symbolic manner.

By time we know he tinkered with

Spoiler below!

an Orb.

In that relation he said about

Spoiler below!

the Gatherer

it had a smell of

Spoiler below!

Orb

on it. Additionally due to that

Spoiler below!

Orb

he got some insights ... and these might made him "aware" or Alexander of his doings I think. So he might refer to him as an "uncle" in terms of their profession or simply being "similar minds".

If that theory was brought up already, sorry, I didn't read all the posts - just flew by most of them.