From: Nick Brooke (100270.337@CompuServe.COM)
Date: Sat 30 Apr 1994 - 12:47:41 EEST
Carl wrote:
> I for one would like to get one example of a Secret Power to clarify
> this. Some minor but significant god, say King Carmanos (revealed to
> have one in the History of the Lunar Empire).
If anyone works it out, write and let me know. I know a load of secrets *about* Carmanos, eponymous and deified First Shah of Carmania; I know his extinction as a deity meant there could be no more 'legitimate' Carmanian rulers in future (cf. the Blood Kings' Wars), as none of the Carmanian 'enthronement' rites would work any longer; but I don't know his "Secret Power" (or, indeed, his credit card number).
Jim De Gon is right: the fourfold Indian caste system (three ruling Aryan castes over a suppressed native population) was one of my models for the Carmanians. But there is more mobility within the top three social classes than you'd get in a caste system: more like mediaeval Europe (you would train with the knights, study with the wizards, and take the career your father or lord determines for you).
I greatly enjoyed reading Sandy's piece on the Vadeli, and am dumping most of my ideas here to complement them (I hope). The following notes are all extrapolations, and should be taken as MHO, not Gloranthan Truth:
The Vadeli are related to the Brithini like Cain was to Abel. Now, never mention this to the Brithini, but "Zzabur, Brother of the Devil" is more properly written "Zzabur, Brother of Vadel"...
The Vadeli know that a little bit of us lives on in our descendents, and have worked out ways of getting it back. Sandy has already mentioned the "material component" for the Vadeli Ritual of Immortality: a child. But if I'm right, it's got to be your own child...
I use the Vadeli as a dumping ground for hysterical blood libels throughout the ages: several good sources. Anti-Semitic (Phoenicians and Carthaginians in traditional racist Ancient History [cf. Bernal's Black Athena, Biblical Molochs, and, e.g. Flaubert's Salammbo]; Jews, esp. the Christian myths of Saints Hugh of Lincoln and William of Norwich, and Chaucer's Prioress's Tale), anti-Christian (from Marcus Aurelius' era: "Thyestean banquets and Oedipidean intercourse"; the fun stuff in "Young Nur and the Warrior Girl" from the 1001 Nights), anti-Pagan (the forged "Donation of Constantine") or just plain nasty (Elizabeth Bathory). Then I mix in a chunk of the dirty, stinking Tleilaxu from Frank Herbert's later DUNE books, for tempting possibilities (ghola/clone/homunculi??), and leave to simmer gently...
Sandy describes the traditional Kingdom of Ignorance. But what if Can Shu, the Glory of Ignorance, is in fact the insidious Doctor Fu Manchu, relying on propaganda like this to ensure that, whatever rumours of his nefarious master plans may be bruited abroad, everyone will dismiss them as "another nine days' wonder from the Kingdom of Ignorance"?
Or maybe he just *thinks* he is?
(I'm not serious, but it makes me wonder...)
"A brow like Jananin Heeraru, and a face like Wakboth"?
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