Bryan John Maloney:
>>>"Orlanth" as he appears now is the latest development of a
>>>Godlearner "Work in Progress" that got away from them.
Peter Metcalfe:
>>The trouble with this theory is that most of the Orlanthi lived
>>in regions that were well out of the range of the God Learners
>>like East Ralios
Philip Hibbs:
>Did the God Learners' mythical meddling only affect the areas that they
>could mundane-travel to?
Excellent point! The GLs effected Glorantha's mythic landscape much in the way RW humans today can use (and misuse) technology to affect ours.
RW analogies (actions in one region causing palpable and possibly disastrous consequences elsewhere) might be:
*acid rain from industrial areas affecting the lakes of northern Canada
*the toxic cloud from Chernobyl blowing over northern europe
*the theory that industrialised nations use of CFCs is contributing to a ozone
hole over the Antarctic, ultimately leading to island nations in the Pacific
ending up under the waves, glug,glug....
David Weihe, comments on Orlanth being Umath's littlest 'un:
>No, it is not very telling. The promotion of the youngest son to the highest
>rank is common in RW mythology, legend, and historical fact. Until their
>conversion to Christianity, many Germanic peoples practiced Ultimogeniture,
>where the youngest son inherits, rather than Primogeniture, where the
>eldest inherits the bulk of the estate. This is probably common to many
>other Indo-European cultures in their earliest forms.
The Turks on the other hand, practised the complete opposite, at least when it came to the Sultanate: inheritance passed to the oldest living (male) relative. Combine this with the fact that all such relatives were routinely imprisoned in a grim palace called 'The Cage' and may have been in there with only a few eunuchs for company for several decades before being released into absolute rule over a vast empire, and you can see why they had to put up with a succession of rulers who were raving loonies. (Ironically, the Cage was considered a merciful gesture, because the previous practise was to get out the silken bowstring and strangle all possible claimants to throne upon accession: the Sultan who instituted the Cage had all 19 of his brothers killed in this way.
Cheers
MOB
Australian Children's Television Foundation 3rd Floor, 145 Smith Street, Fitzroy, AUSTRALIA 3065 phone: +613 9419 0880 fax: + 613 9419 0660
email: michael.obrien_at_actf.com.au
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