From: Saravan Peacock (saravan@perth.DIALix.oz.au)
Date: Mon 11 Nov 1996 - 02:42:46 EET
From a little while ago:
>Why must we assume that simply because Plentonius was
>a sexist twit writing a history of the world to glorify his employer,
>he's wrong on all accounts?
Right on Pam!
More recently:
Nick E. writes:
>people seem to
be ignoring my statement that these are not my own, personal, set-in-stone
POV but what I would consider a rational set of ideas from the Gloranthan
cultures.
Yeah, that seems to be going around a bit... A lot of the ideas I posted
were just that - ideas. I'm personally in favour of a couple of different
views on the issue. But hey, in the meantime, I'll argue for whichever
strikes my fancy at the time...
>Pete M.:
>>I'm saying that the Orlanthi version of
>>Godtime IGNORES time, completeley. Utterly.
>
>Wrong. What were those KoS fragments that I just quoted at you?
>The Orlanthi myths are able to survive without time
Ahhh... now I understand what you've been getting at. Perhaps like Peter, I
being mentioned at all. Therefore odd things such as Vinga rescuing Elmal at
the HoG after becoming a warrior madien, even though Orlanth had not left
his stead to go on the LBQ and therefore, since Vinga only became a member
of his Ring after he left it could not occur. QED.
assumed that by "Orlanthi version of time" you meant the version of time
expressed by Orlanthi _people_ (in all time periods including especcially
the Third Age), not that experience undergone by Pre-Dawn gods and maybe
their peoples.
Nevertheless, with this useful corrective, I would be happy to take up the
bat for the Orlanthi once more, and suggest again that of course they had
an understanding of logical sequences, if not of 'time' as it is understood
in the third age. I think we've distinguished sufficiently between time and
logical/ 'cause and effect' sequences. What follows is a crtique of the
idea that 'Orlanthi' do not perceive logical sequences in the pre-Dawn
mythology, as it seems from your posts Nick that you have conflated the two
issues. (Whether or not they experienced 'time' in terms of days and nights
or seasons is far less important than this bit - though it is an
interesting one nevertheless.)
All the examples Peter quoted from KoS are understood in a framework of
GodTime events. Whether or not there were measurements in days, seasons,
turnings of the Red Sands etc., the Orlanthi throughout history, even
Pre-Dawn I would suggest, understood that _before_ Umath there was no storm
(probably). Life was different _after_ Umath tore apart the earth and the
air. Orlanth decided to kill Yelm _after_ a series of contests. Chaos came
into the world _after_ a period of good rule by their mighty storm king.
_Because_ of the entry of chaos Orlanth had to go on the LBQ. _After_ it
succeeded things were different. This perhaps only applies to the major
myths about which there is little dispute among Orlanth worshippers
lozenge-wide. The Vinga myths are minor and quite varied across the lozenge
(IMO) and have not yet been set down for the public even by that mighty
sage Greg Stafford (AFAIK). In any case it is almost certain that any third
age priest worth his salt is going to have a very coherent sense of the
order of events in GodTime which his society recognises. He visits them at
every Holy Day after all. I don't think mixing up different myths of a
minor deity like Vinga from different parts of the lozenge is a very good
example of myth inconsistency with regard to time or logical sequences.*
But then again, inconsistencies (and there are some - eg Elaml/Yelmalio -
depending on where you are) cause some of the best schisms and groovy
conflicts available.
I think it extremely probable that all Orlanth followers (even in the God
Time) understood these events to be progressing in some logical order. It
did not _happen all at once_, whatever that might mean to a Gloranthan, or
in a vacuum of meaning where 'events' took place in an unrelated fashion.
>The God Plane is the place where myths happen. So time works just like in
>myths: inconsistently if at all.
>
>Apparent order is in the eye of the beholder not in the myth.
>Exactly. At least someone has managed to understand what the Orlanthi believe.
" Order in the eye of the beholder" ?
I would think that the Orlanthi would consider such a view _very_
dangerous. Sounds like Lunar double-speak to us hill folk. We know what we
know, and anyone who says different is deluded, a liar, or a chaos-traitor.
Happy to be corrected
Saravan
*Unless of course you mean that the myths told by different peoples tell
different things about the GodTime. Which I wholly agree with. But that is
getting into something like what David Cake and others are talkng about
with regard to Gods being anthropomorphisations of their people, God
Learners screwing up the identities of deities, natural Powers and all that
stuff... My view is something like this:"Somewhere they have a belief in
and understanding of a deity called Vinga. Somewhere else they have a
belief in a deity that looks a bit like Vinga and is called a similar name.
She did different things , though, at different 'times'(in a different
order)." Are the two Vingas the same being (or aspects thereof) or ....?
Anyway I'm glad the discussion is headed this way, because my understanding
of these natures is very hazy...
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