Pam has asked about otter and badger hunting in the gors and gallt. I offer my reply in addition to Michael's.
OUTRA WITH THE LUTRA! IMG (well, IMFP, In My Far Point), Otter stomping is an important part of the hunting year. There are several reasons. The most pertinent (tho non-game) reason is that I don't like the little blighters - they are second only to dolphins on my animal no-no list, and for the same reason: how can anyone respect a species comprised solely of raving extroverts? :)
(Otter- and dolphin- lovers, please address your hate mail to tarka_at_flat.squishy.com).
On a slightly more serious note: otters are quite common throughout Far Point, and in lowland areas such as Jaskors Hold they compete with humans for the food resources of the countryside - particularly trout and hell-salmon. They also habitually destroy fishing nets.
Therefore they are regarded without affection or sentiment. They are the aquatic counterpart of the fox - greedy, crafty, preying on the witless, not only in flowing water but also in stead fish ponds, where a pair of marauding otters can wreak utter destruction.
Otters are tricksters and are mythologically linked with Eurmal. Their high intelligence and game-playing are therefore no cause for amusement. Among the overwhelming evidence of their contrariness - they eat a fish head first and leave the tail. Solars curse them, Orlanthi despise them, and Odaylans... well Odaylans are strange anyway...
Perhaps one in a thousand otters is a 'striped otter' a wild shaman of high intelligence and utter capriciousness, who with her mate will wage unrelenting war on steads and fishing camps.
Because of their similar natures, foxes, otters and boggles will sometimes share the same holt. Otters are said to 'swim between two waters' - that is, have 'a foot in both camps.'
Only a trickster would adopt an otter as a totem. To attract an otter as a totem animal on the Gifting Way is a seen as a very bad omen in most clans, though some isolated upland Odaylans accept the otter as a valuable guide. It is rumoured that some Odaylans even use tame (collared) otters as fishing companions.
Otters are usually snared or trapped. Barbed tridents, two-pronged forks, or spears are used in the hunt.
Otter skins are an item of exchange. Tributes and loyalty offerings are often partially paid in otter skins, as an encouragement to hunt them. The skalds interpret their gifting value as among the 'barbed gifts' mentioned in the TarosKarla, being, "the skin of a common enemy".
Otter claws are commonly used as spell totems.
Their mythic status and fetid oil glands mean that otters are eaten only for ritual purposes. Once skinned, otter carcases usually go into the bucket for the stead enlo - alynx will not touch them.
However, it is unwise to exclude *anything* as an ingredient of sticklepick. Otter would be a relatively tame ingredient, at least according to the stories that circulate in the 'civilised' markets of Alda Chur. For instance it is rumoured that a Lunat trader witnessed...
BADGER HUNTING Badgers are below the dignity of a serious hunter.
Mythologically, the badger "lives on sleep and little else".
Badgers are hunted primarily by stickpickers and stead-holders for their grease and skin. On a moonlit night, purse nets will be placed over the entrance to a set.
Badger skin is used for shoe leather among lowland stick-pickers. A badger's (abundant) fat is commonly used in medicine.
One of my sources for otter and badger lore (and for the FP calendar), has been "The Hound and the Hawk: The Art of Medieval Hunting" by John Cummins, Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London, 1988.
Cheers
John
Powered by hypermail