From: John P Hughes (john.hughes@anu.edu.au)
Date: Wed 15 Jun 1994 - 01:12:53 EEST
I originally posted this a month or so ago, as part of the games
discussion. It got lost in the aether, so here we go again...
GAMES II: THE FESTIVAL
Just as on our own globe, many of the
old Lozenge's games take place within the special atmosphere of a
festival. The following notes give some theory on designing festivals,
and then provide some examples from the Alda-churi New Flame
Festival, based on my long running (though intermittent) Ironspike
campaign. A history of the region is included. It's as much part of my
interest in giving substance to Gloranthan religion as to the games. Still,
a few plot ideas in this one I hope.
PART ONE: HANDS-ON FESTIVAL THEORY - DESIGN YOUR OWN On Glorantha, most festivals are directly connected with religious worship or have devolved from what was originally a religious event. Game playing of various sorts is at the centre of most festival activities. While the next few paragraphs are theory, I hope that they are practical enough to enable MLDs (Masters of Luck and Death) to design their own religious festivals, either Gloranthan or Terran. The main characteristics of festivals are the INVERSION of everyday life (the Rule of Fools, temporary abolition of moral rules, men dressing as women etc) as well as SACRALISING (making holy) of those same everyday activities. At a festival, people will do things they normally do not, they abstain from something they normally do, they carry to extremes behaviour normally regulated by measure and custom, they invert the practice of normal social life. It is the Rule of Disorder, the Kingdom of the Trickster.
The 'building blocks' that an MLD might use (in whole or in part) to construct a festival are:
CONSECRATION. The framing ritual that begins a festival will consecrate a space (field, temple, city...), modify its daily function and remove the normal meaning of time and space. An area is cleared, marked, blessed, adorned and forbidden to normal activity. In effect, the area becomes an Axis Mundi, with stronger links to the spirit and god planes. At larger festivals, this may mean that spirits can manifest or take 'solid' form, gods walk the streets etc. Time becomes 'time out of time' a sacred time, the most obvious example being Sacred Time itself.
Consecration often involves RITES OF PURIFICATION or cleansing centred on the elements of fire, water or air, or on the ritual expulsion of some sort of scapegoat carrying the 'evil' and 'guilt' out of the community. The same rites may seek to protect the boundary to keep evil out, usually by a procession of some sacred object or person around the perimeter.
RITES OF PASSAGE mark a transition from one life stage or state of consciousness to the next. They may be given special relevance by being included in the festival event. They include initiation, marriage, the taking of occupational, military or religious vows, heroquest beginnings, and the public execution of criminals (sometimes as sacrifices).
RITES OF REVERSAL simultaneously invert the social order ('Hey I can dress up as a man and give orders!') and prop it up by allowing disaffected elements to let off steam in a controlled fashion. Symbols of every kind are inverted - men dressing as women, women behaving as men, children ordering adults, stickpickers ordering feasts and being carried about by thanes. Even sacred and profane spaces (temples, abattoirs) may be used in reverse.
RITES OF CONSPICUOUS DISPLAY permit a community's most sacred objects to be seen and touched and worshipped. Shrines are opened, relics and magic objects are displayed, often provoking pilgrimages from neighbouring communities. Ruling sections of the community show off their symbols of wealth and power in public processions accompanied by music, decorations and banners, thereby propping up their authority and might.
RITES OF CONSPICUOUS CONSUMPTION & EXCESS involve food, drink and sometimes sex. Special and exotic foods prepared to excess are a wonderful way to represent and enjoy abundance, fertility and prosperity. (Unless you're a herd beast). Ritual foods may invoke cultic secrets and communication with the ancestors. Orgies and ritual love feasts break down the imposed barriers of hierarchy and law. In certain circumstances items of great material and symbolic value are ritually consumed, wasted or destroyed. Slaves or prisoners might also be sacrificed for the same reason.
RITUAL DRAMAS are the public recreation of myths, and often lead to ritual heroquests to ensure the prosperity of the community (e.g. the Sacred Time rituals against darkness). Their subject matter is often a creation, foundation or survival myth of the host community. Sometimes, the spirits of heroic ancestors may materialise to join in the ritual recreation of their feats.
RITES OF EXCHANGE express the ritual equality of community members. At a fair, money, spells and goods are exchanged. At a more abstract and symbolic level, information, gifts or hospitality may be exchanged. Public forgiveness of crimes, release from debts, or thanksgiving for prosperity may take place in various forms of redistribution sponsored by a public institution or private individual.
RITES OF COMPETITION typically constitute the cathartic element of a festival in the form of its organised games. They take many forms and encourage many skills, from athletics and dancing and storytelling and theatre to beauty contests and lotteries, agricultural and livestock displays. Games show how equality can be turned into hierarchy - 'winners' and 'losers'. RITUAL COMBATS, either individual or mock battle, form a special subset of this group. They may be fixed to a certain dramatic form and obligatory ending, or may take a more powerful though unpredictable turn when equals or near equals take various cultic roles to play out the struggles of cosmogony (Light vs Dark, Sun vs Storm) or community (Uz vs Human, Law vs Chaos, City vs Wilderness, Man vs Woman). They symbolise the re- establishment of power from the 'anarchy' of equality, so the most important contests always occur near the end of the festival, just prior to the re-establishment of normal life.
THE RITE OF RETURN closes the festival and re-establishes normal conditions. it is very similar to (though the reverse of) the opening Rites of Consecration and Purification. The sacred boundaries are abolished and the community returns to mundane reality.
REFERENCES ON THE FESTIVAL - 'Homo Ludens: A study of the Play Element in Culture' by Johann Huizinga (1955): 'Man Play and Games' by Roger Caillois (1961): 'Time out of Time - Essays on the Festival' edited by Alessandro Falassi (1987). My morphology of the festival has been adapted from Alessandro's introductory essay.
CONTINUED...
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