From: Alex Ferguson (alex@dcs.gla.ac.uk)
Date: Sat 09 Apr 1994 - 01:04:36 EEST
[This is a bunch of assorted followups to things Solar, mostly pretty out of date. Bear with me.]
MOB:
> I wonder if anyone else out
> there can figure out other weird sources of Gloranthan nomenclature....
Do I get any points for Somash :: Shamash, Sumerian god of the Sun?
Paul Anderson:
> Joerg comments:
> >which [story] is the real one? This question might be irrelevant....
> I couldn't agree more. This is one of the things that makes Glorantha feel so
> nearly authentic.
Well, as Adams would say, What do we mean by Real? Do we mean: Which `actually happened' during Godtime? (Potentially completely meaningless and indeterminate.) Or: What do Gloranthans believe happened? (Different people may believe different things.) Or perhaps: If we `visit' the Godplane now, by HeroQuesting, what do we `find' there? (Need I mention the God Learners, miscelleanous prior HQing, and multiple versions of myths?)
Sandy:
> Look at Lokarnos -- true, he has the
> Light Rune, but I think that's more a courtesy than anything -- he
> doesn't even have Command Salamander of his own self.
How many Light gods do? None, that I can think of.
> [Me:]
> >I reckon Yelmalio (and this myth in particular [Hill of Gold]) is
> >pretty atypical of Psolar Psychology.
> But not of Yelmalio psychology as influenced (strongly) by the Solar
> philosophies. It's time for me to go on a tirade in defense of the
> Solar worshipers (not necessarily directed at you, Alex).
As my tuppenceworth towards the Statement of Recognition, I think it's hard to decide who's the more Just, or Generous, or anything, really, between the two, given the substantial differences in their value systems, not to mention how they differ from our own. A Yelmite's idea of Justice is strict adherence to (and enforcement of) written laws, as well as keeping his word. Orlanthi believe in keeping one's word, and a much vaguer idea of `natural justice', and wooly stuff like that. Naturally each thinks the other is a decadent pit of corruption. Similarly a solar worshipper would consider getting reasonable share by the Yelm Method to be an illustration of his leader's generosity, while a storm worshipper would say the whole basis was inequitable.
Nepotism: doubtless this occurs in both (not to say all) societies. There may be a difference in how it operates in the two cultures, however: Solar types are likely to base their biases on what to believe the correct Divine Order to be, while Stormies are going to be more influenced by Love/Loyalty to Kin, to generalise hopelessly.
I think that solar cultures tend towards a much stricter adherence towards strictly lineal heredity of Kingship (or anything, come to that), but at any rate, both have it. And neither, I think, would particularly take issue with the other in this respect, or see being led by a populist rabble-rouser or an omni-competent technocrat, given this doesn't exactly fit with the Sacral Kingship idea.
But while this debate neatly illustrates why Solar and Storm worshippers are found shaking each other warmly by the throat so often in Glorantha, it isn't really what I had in mind. My question was really: what emotional traits are socially characteristic of Solar and Theyalan peoples? (Culturally, rather than the particular `desirable cultic traits'.) Frinst, do we believe Sandy's suggestion that storm worshippers are collectively dumb-ass idiotically grinning West Coast happy-go-lucky optimists, while solar types are angst-ridden uptight East Coast Woody Allen clones, with a consequently pessimistic outlook? I think I paraphrase fairly. <gg>
> Remember that Yelm is a highly benign god -- much more so
> than the unreliable Orlanth. The good Solar king is just as generous
> to his followers as the good barbarian king, and he is a hell of lot
> more fair-minded.
Calling Yelm `benign', because he shines one everyone, worshipper or not is a bit dubious, too: one might as well say Orlanth was `benign' for not suffocating everyone. It should also be pointed out that the progress of the solar orb across the sky has been established as a cosmological fact by the Compromise, and is probably fairly independant of any actual sun-god worship. (Whether all Gloranthan sun-worshippers actually worship the same entity (Yelm by any other name, as it were), is also questionable.)
> >What is the thinking behind which cults give `Rune Lord DI', and
> >which don't?
> In GoG, 'twas pure arbitrariness on the part of Greg and myself, as
> to whether a particular cult "deserved" such an honor. Cults too puny
> or obscure didn't get d10 DI, because we decided that their rune
> lords or priests were just special initiates. If you like, it could
> be that the difference was our gut sense as to whether or not a
> particular deity possessed a Secret Power.
I think the oddest ones (that didn't) to my mind were Storm Bull, and to a lesser extent Waha. Maybe it's a Prax thing... I also found it perplexing the Uleria priestesses _do_ get 1D10 DI, especially when High Healers, also theoretically Rune Lords and having a similar cult structure, don't.
> >Humakt "Distrust Other Species" geas
> He still has these, though they were dropped from GoG's listing.
And the `full' writeup in TotRM, I think. What Gifts go with these? (The phrase Thingybanesword is sneaking into my mind...)
> >> Most retirees from Solar cults don't join Dayzatar. It's a very
> >> rare cult.
> >By why is it rare, if it's so `easy' to join? Granted it appears to
> >be a remarkably masochistic and pointless thing to do, but if it's a
> >surefire passport to Solar Heaven, why aren't the punters joining up
> >in droves? Or is it not this guarantee for the Lesser Lights?
> Gee, I don't know. Why didn't everyone in Medieval Europe become a
> monk once they were over 50 years of age?
In mediaeval Europe, you didn't need to be a monk to get to heaven. In Dara Happa, you _do_ need to (eventually) be a Dayzatar worshipper to get to Solar Heaven. (According to the rebirth myth, if I recall rightly.)
Interesting that Sandy should bring up european monks, who while they didn't account for huge amounts of the populace, were still on the order of 1% of the populace, who were mostly monks for life (or at least from adolesence until death), making them more prevalent than Dayzatar worshippers, at any rate.
> And no one ever said it was "surefire".
Granted. But if it isn't, it makes the `cycle' a good deal less neat. Lokarnos -> Dayzatar -> (dies) -> whoah, what am I doing back as a Yelornan (or whatever)?
> >My understanding was that the Yelmalion practise was
> >_modelled_ on the Dayzatar one, but wasn't actually _it_.
> My own belief was that they were real Dayzatar guys. They came up
> with this trick in Prax because they're NOT isolated from all other
> solar types.
I'm not so upset as the Paul Reilly's of this world about the Sun County/ Elmal discrepancies, though I'd be interested in hearing anyone's ideas for squaring the two. Perhaps Sun County was already more Yelm-influenced than the Dragon Pass Elmal worshippers (though I have no idea why), but only made the final transition to worshipping `Yelmalio' shortly after the Mongrogh/Dorasor/Varthanis thing. Whether this satisfactorily explains the Solinthor thing is questionable, though.
> I think there's been a
> heck of a lot more contact between Gloranthan cultures than they are
> usually given credit for.
I'm not disputing this, I'm talking specifically of Sun County, and The Solitude of Testing. How does Prax come into contact with Peloria, except via Dragon Pass, where allegedly the cult of Yelmalio was such a late development?
Roderick Robertson:
> In discussion with Greg, I brought up the idea that Yelmalio *as a
> name* was a Theyalan invention. Here is Orlanth storming around and
> ending up at the Hill of Gold.
I think I prefer the suggestion that the name (and possibly cult) of Yelmalio is of Aldryami origin, or alternatively that it was simply coined by Mongroth when he founded the cult, conflating Elmal and Yelm. The idea that the name could be of Orlanthi, Godtime origin, doesn't really fit with the Orlanthi later `inventing' the cult within Time.
Alex.
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