Electricity and Silver

From: Peter Metcalfe <P.Metcalfe_at_student.canterbury.ac.nz>
Date: Sat, 14 Oct 1995 16:02:38 +1300


Justin Akkerman:

writes some good points why electricity should not be spoken of in Glorantha but a couple of comments:

>Our present idea construct
>(electromagnetism) does _not_ account for the observances of ball ligthning.

Erm, should this be 'we don't exactly know how ball lightning works'? We do have several valid models consistant with general physics but we don't know which one (if any) is correct.

The major reason, why I shy away from saying that electricity exists in Glorantha is that it becomes too modern sounding for my ears. Whenever possible, I try and use archaic terminology to evoke mystery. Thus instead of saying the dwarves use electricity, Phlogiston is a much better word to use (even though they are not the same concept in the RW). This has the added advantage of being able to come to grips with the fact that many things in Glorantha are only analogous to the real thing and consequently work by slightly different rules.

>The Chistian chruch tried to outlaw lightning rods and prevent insurers from
>covering lightning strikes. They reasoned that ligthning was the wrath of
>God.

Umm, source for this please? The Lightning Rod was invented by Benjamin Franklin. At the time (1752) the Christian church was no longer monolithic enough to worry about theological dilemmas like these. This sounds to me more like the rantings of a loony preacher if anything. The way I heard it was that it was reckoned (in 1500s, 1600s?) that Lightning Did Not Strike Churches because God Does Not Smite His Holy Places. So the Military used churches as a place to store gunpowder to ward against the possibility of ignition due to lightning. After several 'incidences' (ZingZingZing! KABBOOOMMM!!!), they became convinced that lightning strikes were a purely natural phenomena.

Andrew Joelson:


> If gold can be easily enchanted to bring out it's inherent
>'light' properties, what about silver? Does it glow red as the moon?

I think that the Lunars acknowlege the Redness of the Moon is an Imperfection. At the present the Moon is glowing 'red' hot and not shining full glory in the Silver Color that it should be. In holy places such as the Silver Shadow Satrapy, hints of the Moon's true glory shine through such as the silvery outlines of the shadows cast by the Moon. When the Servants of the Murdering God are finally subdued, the Moon shall rise higher, purged of her ungainly hue. The Stars will then glow brighter, until they make the light seem as day etc...

Thus I believe that silver can be enchanted to make it glow reddish, but most silversmiths would view this as a waste of perfectly good silver. One might as well get the Thanatari to tarnish it.  

I just had a thought about the Planet Shargash/Tolat whom we all know is Red. His metal is Iron (as a counterpart to the Silver of the Moon - - this is probably the origin of the Iron/Silver Duality in Elder Secrets) and in the Good Old Days he was Shiny White. Now during the Gods War, Shargash fought against the Great Storm God Umatum and took a direct hit. Thus he is rusty red like his earthly counterpart Mars with its Ferrous Oxide sands....

Loren Miller:


>I'd bet that ...silver can be enchanted equally easily to
>glow with several colors:

>1. Red for the red moon...
>2. Blue for the blue moon...
>3. Green (or Yellow) for the other primary moon color
>4. White for the white moon...

I don't like the application of Newtonian Optics to Glorantha. Colour is really a subjective phenomenon and if we extend this too far, we'll go apeshit in trying to map out the differences between pigments and hues. Furthermore, the concept of a Green Moon is aesthetically ugly and too remiscent of Green Cheese Jokes.

However the Blue Moon being a sister of the Red merely indicates to me that both are celestial female goddesses rather than an actual sibling relationship. The only planetary sibling of the Blue Moon is the Wagon Star Lokarnos according to the Yuthuppans. This means that the Blue Moon is not necessarily made of silver. Thus we don't have to worry about awful chaos monstrosities such as the Green Moon or Glowing Green Silver.

End of Glorantha Digest V2 #152


WWW material at http://hops.wharton.upenn.edu/~loren/rolegame.html

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