From: MSmylie@aol.com
Date: Mon 29 Jul 1996 - 21:28:08 EEST
Hello all.
First off, I'm a bit mystified by what happened to my Seasonal Festival
I agree with David Dunham that the Lightbringers' Festival occurs during the
calendar over the weekend, as I doublechecked and I had, in fact, sent it to
the right address at the Wharton server; whatever, I'm just glad it arrived.
A couple of catch-up notes -- I'm glad that Nils and Nick E. liked the
ritual calendar suggestion as an addendum to Nils' YAHQS, hope they can come
up with something, and appreciate Nick Brooke's general confirmation of
seasonal/sun progression in Glorantha (though the spring equinox occuring in
the middle of Sacred Time actually kind of screws up my thinking; oh well).
Michael Raaterova posted a bunch of good stuff on calendrical festivals, and
I think that we're probably pretty close to general agreement on most of it;
however, as Michael and I seem to be carrying on what amounts to a two-way
conversation I will restrict a point-by-point breakdown of our differences to
private email soon, assuming that's okay with Michael.
Sacred Time, but my own interpretation of the _RoC_ write-up is that the
Storm Season holy day (celebrating Orlanth's birth, I believe) is actually a
close second to the "most holy" rituals of the LBQ. I guess this might be a
bit like trying to decide which is more important, Christmas or Easter, so I
will concede the point.
Simon Phipp commented on the calendar idea:
>That is what the God Learners used to do. First of all you look
>at some cults, then you take their Holy Day festivals and work out the
>important parts, then you add those things which you think should be there
>and finally impose those festivals onto other cults.
Hmm; actually, just as a side note, the process was actually closer to the
>Generic festivals are all very well, but I perfer to have specific festivals
opposite. I had a number of festival and ritual calendars written up based
mostly on RW calendars (Celtic and Old European fire festivals, the Athenian
and Roman cultic calendars) and looked for the most seasonally- and
farming-based festivals I could, thinking that they would be the most
'Orlanthi' in feel. Having established what I thought made the most sense as
a seasonal progression, I tried to figure out which gods would figure most
"naturally" in each festival's myths. Orlanthi calendar first, Orlanthi
gods/cults second. God Learneresque, yes, but I am uncertain of a better way
of going about it; if Simon or anyone else has any suggestions I'd be glad to
hear 'em.
>for each cult. So, Ernalda, Asrelia and Aldrya all have High Holy Day
>festivals during Fertility Week/Earth Season and are all Earth Cults, but
>their festivals would be very dissimilar.
For the most part, I tend to agree. In the first place, the suggested
calendar was Orlanthi in nature, and the festival calendars of the Esrolians,
the Aldryami, the Dara Happans and Lunars, the Praxians, etc., would
presumably all look different; I'm not even sure if similar festivals and
holy days would necessarily occur on the same exact calendrical dates in
different cultures (now _that's_ God-Learneresque). Secondly, as I mentioned
at the beginning of the post, I didn't necessarily intend for the calendar to
_replace_ a schedule of cultic holy days, though I suppose it could, rather
that this was meant to be a public calendar of events rather than a private
(initiates-only) calendar -- the calendar arose out of a discussion of
pantheon initiation, so I was trying to figure out how a broad community can
participate in a form of collective worship. Finally, each festival should
ideally be broken down into a more detailed series of constituent events,
which could presumably include separate holy day worship ceremonies spread
out over several days. Simon's points are appreciated, thanks.
==========
Watching MOB delurk to slam David Boatright, I was initially going to avoid
Okay, so here comes the somewhat touchier part where I shoot myself in the
foot --
commenting at all, particularly in that as a _non_established poster who
regularly makes lengthy reference to RW scholarship I assume that I am
someone that contributes to the "pedantic, academic esoterica" that leaves
MOB cold -- and, incidentally, if it was my reference to Finley's _World of
Odysseus_ or recent digressions on comparative religion that made Jane
Williams, or anyone else, choose to avoid posting to the digest, then I
heartily apologize. To be a bit defensive, I'll admit I'm lucky enough to
have a pretty decent personal library to which I can make regular recourse,
but in general I'm willing to post such references in part because a) the
digest seems a reasonably literate bunch, if the number of .edu addresses and
doctorates is any indication, and b) most of the stuff I refer to can be
found in any decent bookstore or library, which, as a side note, is _not_ the
case with most items of Gloranthan ephemera unless you happen to be a regular
attendant at Cons willing to drop a load at an auction.
Anyway, MOB and others have slammed David for his negatism and "defeatism" as
OTOH, I think David has a pretty good point about the glacial pace of
Further, David's key point, after all, was "At Greg's address, he put the
regards the future of RQ. Some have noted, frex, that recent converts have a
broad sampling of material to purchase, and frankly I would tend to agree
that the sum total of support material now available is considerable without
even bothering to include nonAH products.
official (or even non-official) RQ products, particularly when looked at from
the perspective from long-time players. While there's little question IMO
that there's been a Renaissance of sorts (and high praise to those
responsible), on a certain level over the course of close to two decades this
is a strictly recent development -- for a long time, 'new' RQ/Gloranthan
material was little more than repackaged reprints (frex TPak, TGods, SPH,
ALane, etc) which should have come out largely _as_a_matter_of_course_. As
much as I like my brand new _Wyrm's Footprints_ (even with the blank
pages/printer's error) and the idea of a BUTTS package (shot down now, I
gather), most of it is, after all, 10 - 20 year old material being recycled
(even if it is necessary, and I agree that it is) and kind of hard to find.
final nail in RQ's coffin," with the emphasis on _RQ_. It seems reasonably
obvious that for some time now (since the sale, I guess) RuneQuest and
Glorantha are _not_ the same thing in the minds of many of its designers and
players (even the separation of the rq-rules and glorantha digests
illustrates that pretty well). As David was presumably not the only person
at the Con (and several posters have made veiled references to Big Things
which were revealed about the future of Glorantha and RQ), it should be a
relatively simple matter of determining if this is accurate. Having emailed
David, I will accede to David's wish to avoid posting his report publicly,
but presumably those that were at the Con know what David is referring to and
if anyone thinks he's misinterpreting Greg's _specific_ comments, then let
the rest of us know.
Oh well. Back into the woodwork, I think.
Mark Smylie
Quick p.s., David Cake asked:
>Has anyone else thought of using Cerebus for a source for
>Gloranthan stuff? I think my Yelmic campaign will drawn on it fairly
>heavily for inspiration, High Society and Church and State at any rate.
Way back (like '83 or 4) a friend of mine insisted on playing the 'last of
the aardvarks' in a Prax campaign I ran; we came up with a small
ancestor-cult of the aardvarks (which included a Cerebus hero-cult) which he
was attempting to revive, but then again that was before RQ3 and the temple
size rules. That was also before the revelation of Cirin's 'ethnic'
identity; personally, I would go with Cirin _is_ the Red Goddess, and yup,
she's an aardvark, and -- here's the tricky part -- _so_is_Argrath_. Hence
the persecution of the ducks becomes a case of misinterpreting prophetic
visions, confusing feathers with fur and beaks with snouts :-).
------------------------------
End of Glorantha Digest V3 #82
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