[Glorantha] Animist seas

Mike Dawson

> Hi all,

> I've skimmed through Wyrm's Footprints, searched the web and read
> through Missing Lands.

> I've currently loaned out Men of the Sea to my buddy Kirk, who will
> run the game I'm creating a character for.

> So, I turn to this list to ask the question: What are the Great and
> Majestic Spirits of the Sea these days? All the older sources are
> prejudiced toward the old RQ "everything was a god" style of things.

Back in the earliest planning stages of what eventually became Men of the Sea, the premise was that the waters mostly are theistic entities.

At one point, the ten tritons were named as 7 ancestors of the 7 kindred of merfolk (one each of which were the Cetoi and the Piscoi), and the other three were the magical specialists (archetypical priest to the sea gods, archetypical shaman of the seas, archetypical sorcerer of the seas aka Waertag).

As the spawn of Storm Gods and niiads, at least the Cetoi and Piscoi merman forefathers are of theist background - interestingly excepting Kahar, who traces his ancestry to Iphara (the get of Vadrus and Heler in Blue Woman guise) and Sshorg, according to Wyrm's Footprints, but who also underwent mystic schooling.

> As I'm designing a hero who is hopefully practicing a tradition I'm
> planning to call the Outer Water Ancients, I'm particularly
> interested in the dark and scary spirits who are anathema to the dry
> world and men, like Varchulunga, Veredth, Ivinareshesh, and such
> monstrous entities.

Water is mutable, and much of it (unlike the merfolk or the CreekStreamRiver components) not decided to a single otherworld. The older, the less so...

> Thanks, and my apologies if all these answers are in Men of the Sea.

They aren't. MotS deals with sailors and most likely sailor gods _after the Closing/Opening_.

The most animist sailor culture are the Maslans (and Thinokans in Fonrit), who interestingly have their own watery enemies, some of them known to other cultures by name or identity, some obscure. If you have revealed mythologies, check the few Thinobutu sections (and the corresponding index entries). Some of those are in the Maslo homelands.

Second most animist sailor culture are (somewhat to my surprise) the Rightarm Islanders, basically unconcentrated worshippers of what powers can be found in their waters.

Peter Metcalfe

> Wyrms Footprint is useful
> in that it contains a tripartite division of divinities as being a
> combination of wisdom, waters and spirit.

Mostly repeated in Missing Lands.

Though it seems to me the distinction of the sorcerous properties Matter (Waters), Mind (Wisdom), and Energy (Spirit).

Fine in a God Learner document, but probably lacking some insight (such as the theist and animist points of view).

The God Learners/Malkioni name Genner, Bamat (both animist earth kings), Humct, Lankermy (both power or mixed power theist deities), Ladaral, Worlath (both elemental theist deities)) and Desdoram (that dragon Erasanchula) in the same breath, not making any distinction into which otherworld they have strayed.

> The deities - Magasta, Sshorg, Wachaza and Lorion - are a combination
> of wisdom and spirit and hence theistic entities.

Sounds weird, unless you look at the definition of Framanthe's "spirit" in WFP. Although I'd rather assign the three pure primal children to the different otherworlds than the secondary, binary mixes. Unfortunately, the Malkioni would claim Wisdom for Mind, hence sorcery, might agree about Framanthe but would claim Sramak(e) for simply being (theism).

> The watery ancestors -
> Veredth, Mirintha, Murthdrya and Tholania are a combination of wisdom
> and waters and thus animistic deities.

Why is this combination animistic? Because elves, trolls and Hsunchen are?

> Although not stated in Missing
> Lands, it seems to me that the actual seas themselves are a combination
> of waters and spirit and hence worshippable as essenses.

The third combination is pretty clearly stated. Whether this mixture or the pure waters are "essence/sorcery world" is a matter of opinion.

IMO many (though not all, see CreekStreamRiver) of these lower echelons are mixed world.

There also always is a fourth, mystic remnant of the water after taking some characteristic of water away: Osshamahoro - Edzaroun - Ivinareshesh - Dreneelo.

# Received on Mon 08 Jan 2007 - 15:13:54 EET