Re: Humakt, the broad monolith

From: David Dunham <dunham_at_pensee.com>
Date: Thu, 9 May 1996 08:57:25 -0700


Martin Laurie asked

> Is Humakt a broad church with many different views within a borad framework
> or a monolith of rigid ideals of behaviour?

I suspect the answer is "yes." Furthermore, this would be true for most Orlanthi cults.

Most temples would have pretty narrow ideals of behavior. "At the Shrine of Dried Blood, we expect all initiates to take the No Head Armor geas." Anyone walking around with a helmet would be snickered at, singled out for latrine duty, etc.

However, each temple is likely to be somewhat different, and there are really broad differences as you go great distances (in East Ralios, the cult was never called Humatharkat* -- they consider Arkat a traitor, not a hero). In some cases, the differences are so great that they're called subcults by the rules. Heck, in my campaign, in the Grazelands they don't even worship Humakt at all, but the Feathered Horse Queen has a loyal bodyguard of Hiia Swordsman initiates (all of whom can renew their rune spells at Humakt temples).

This shouldn't be too surprising, since one individual can pretty much dictate what goes on at only one temple. And there are no written standards. (I suspect many Dara Happan noble cults are a lot more standardized, though peasant cults like Lodril and Oria probably are just as divergent as Orlanthi cults.)

As always, it's useful to distinguish between Humakt the God (which has some sort of universal mythic reality, even if the Dara Happans might not recognize stuff like the Death rune and the Westerners might consider him a death-aspected sorcerer) and the Cult of Humakt (which is run by humans). There may be one true Humakt, but there is not one true Cult of Humakt. (Even Yelm's cult has changed radically over the years -- see The Fortunate Succession.)

Michael Raaterova asked

>Anybody care to post the original Humakti Hearts article?

Peter Michaels already did. It's worth a read, but the (searchable) archives are the way to do this.

David Dunham Pensee Corporation dunham_at_pensee.com Voice/Fax: 206 783 7404 http://www.pensee.com/dunham/

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