Pharaoh

From: Nick Brooke <100270.337_at_CompuServe.COM>
Date: 27 Apr 96 05:08:03 EDT



Paul asks:

> where did Pharaoh go? and from where did this matriarchal council
> spring that now governs? I wonder how this system of rule came into
> existance when the rule of Pharaoh was broken....

The Pharaoh came to the Holy Country early in the Third Age as a man called Belintar. When Belintar died, the greatest champions of the Holy Country found themselves participating in a magical ritual known as the Tournament of the Masters of Luck and Death. The soul of the victor of this ritual contest is liberated to a wholly angelic existence, while his body houses the spirit of the Pharaoh. (This "host" body ages faster than natural, due to the extreme demands placed upon it by Pharaoh's uncanny vitality).

Now, the Sixths of the Holy Country always retained their own rulers, who were tributary to the Pharaoh (who ruled from the magical City of Wonders he founded at the heart of the Mirrorsea). So Esrolia had its Queens of the Land, Heortland had its King, the Islands had their Admiralty, etc.

Recently, the spirit of the Pharaoh "disappeared". I don't think many Gloranthans know this, but what happened was that the Lunars (led by Jar-Eel the Razoress) interfered with one of his HeroQuest journeys: at a point where Pharaoh expects to meet and pass by the mysterious but useless Red Guards, they behaved differently and were able to overcome him.

The Tournament of the Masters of Luck and Death was held (to replace/reincarnate the Pharaoh), but there was no winner. There couldn't be, as Pharaoh's spirit was not free to occupy the body of the worthiest champion of the Holy Country. In the absence of a central ruler, the local governments of Kethaela came back to prominence, only with additional problems.

You see, as ruler of the Holy Country, Pharaoh had taken it upon himself to perform the rituals which preserved each of the Sixths of his realm. In Esrolia, he replaced the old sacrificial Year Kings who brought fertility to the land. Under the Shadow Plateau, his ritual acts held down the slain Only Old One. Likewise in the other Sixths (about which I'm less well informed). Of course, the Pharaonic rituals were more "potent" and required less ceremonial than the original ancient forms: Pharaoh was more powerful, more flexible, less constrained. Knowledge of the old rituals had been deliberately destroyed, to prevent challengers to Pharaoh's reign.

Which all means that the whole of Kethaela (under its constituent local governments, which *don't* work together all that well in the absence of the Big Cheese) is now heading for Hell in a hand-basket, unless the local rulers can "rediscover their roots", find a new solution to their problems, or bring back Pharaoh to do it all for them.

> I am once more hunting information, this time on locations in Prax.

Tales #14, the Praxian Special, includes a gazeteer of the Wastes and an article about Tada, but this doesn't answer your specific questions. Two I know about:

Monkey Ruins are the remnants of Gorilla City, built by (or for) the great baboon hero Gorilla in the Godtime, but ruined by Monkey, the baboon Trickster. It's a holy place for baboons: you can find worship of Monkey, Gorilla, Grandfather Baboon, Mandrill the Horny One, and other spirits.

Sog's Ruins are an ancient ruined Waertagi drydock, similar to those found in Sog City, Nochet City, and elsewhere around the lozenge. It would have been abandoned before the Jrusteli got to Prax. Probably holy to all manner of water spirits, Gorakiki-mosquito, swamp thingies, slime beasts and the like.



Nick

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