Life-Span; Ty Kora Tek; Yelmalio

From: Nick Brooke <Nick_Brooke_at_compuserve.com>
Date: Tue, 15 Jul 1997 04:23:21 -0400



Jane writes:

> Average [life-span] for very primitive humans is about 35, isn't it?

Almost meaningless. Any "average life-span" figure is skewed terribly by the horribly high death-rates in infancy experienced in pre-modern societies, which play merry hell with the "average life" that's left. For example: if 50% of all children die in the first year of life, but the rest live to be seventy, then the average life-span for that group is 35.

Note too that the "Glorantha Book" tells us infant mortality isn't as bad in Glorantha as it is in the Real World. Again messing us around.

An e0 (life expectancy from age zero) of 35 sounds kinda high for very primitive humans in the RW. Though it doesn't mean that much, anyway. Besides, without all the additives and petrol-fumes and mortgage fears and other blessings of civilised life... :-)



Erik writes:

> When the earthers die, they go to the halls of Ty Kora Tek. Most
> folk just mill around staring at the walls, mumbling and drooling
> (think Hades).

I'd go older than that. Think of the Sumerian afterlife, where ghosts rustle around, drinking dust and eating clay, clad in black feathers like skeletal birds, inhabiting the Houses of the Dead. There is no joy there, nor merriment, for the laws of Ty Kora Tek are of Silence and Subservience.

The "Asrelian Fields" might be a nice thing to have -- except that I strongly doubt whether *all* rulers/priests/nobles would expect to go there post mortem. I think the gloom of Ty Kora Tek's caverns is only increased by contrast with this wonderful place, fit only for heroes.

Mummies would not appreciate being summoned back, 'cos it interrupts their Silence and Subservience. Speaking with the Dead, likewise, is irritating to Ty Kora Tek (who wants them to shut up), and she may get her "children", or "husbands", or "servants" (Esrolites are vague on the exact relation of these dark, whip-bearing enforcers to their "barren" goddess of the Underworld) to take it out on the unwary soul.

All very tasty stuff, except Uncle Albert's worms...



Alex on Yelmalio vs. ZZ:

> It's hard to imagine that the Yelmalians believe that ZZ not getting
> squished is any sort of good thing, nor do I recall anything about
> the structure of the myth implying this. Is this some sort of meta-
> mythic argument? (No-one believes it, but it's True anyway.)

Well, the myth, and art, and scripture, and catechism of the Yelmalion Sun Dome Temples (assuming for the sake of simplicity that the Praxian Sun Dome has worshipped a recognisable Yelmalio since the early Second Age), will describe the trollish treachery and how the enduring powers of the Son of the Sun enabled him to survive and succeed, greeting the Dawning from the summit of the Hill of Gold. And they'll also explain how this seeming defeat in fact brought countless boons to humanity, as the Fire Crystals of Yelmalio's Sacred Blood gave light to those lost in Stygian darkness. And they'll explain other things, in terms of this regrettable but real occurrence: virtues, and artifacts, and lessons to be learned, and so on.

It's not really "about Zorak Zoran not getting squished", any more than the story of Christ's Passion is "about Pontius Pilate not getting squished". (Though anyone wanting to read the apocryphal gospel which could have been sub-titled "The Revenge of Christ" is directed to the Gospel of Nicodemus, in which everyone implicated in the Crucifixion gets their just deserts). Zorak Zoran is a bit-part: could have been anyone wot dunnit. That's just the way the world is. Yelmalio never had a chance to squish him, any more than Yelm did when he was offed by Orlanth wielding Humakt. It wasn't anything *like* a fair fight.

But a Christian heroquester who, while reenacting the Stations of the Cross, decided to off one of the scourging soldiers, seize his gladius and use it to slay Pontius Pilate, Caiaphas, Herod Antipas, and sundry other ill-doers would generally be considered to have missed the point. We fight trolls because they are evil and wounded Yelmalio: we do God's work to prevent them ever again inflicting such wounds upon the faithful;  but we don't "wish it hadn't happened" and skew our mystery plays to misrepresent the original event: that's impiety and blasphemy. We regret that it happened, are glad for what it teaches us, and use our knowledge of the original mythic event to say, "Never Again!"

Again, I am annoyed at the dullness of so-called creative heroquesting. If everyone in Glorantha thought their priests were talking rubbish, and that their mythology was a poor second-best to what Yours Truly would have done in similar circumstances, the world would be a very sad place indeed.

Q: does anyone positing a "What if Yelmalio beat Zorak Zoran at the Hill of Gold?" heroquest also suggest a "What if Yelm beat Orlanth when they showed off their weapons?" heroquest? And if not, why not? Is it just because the latter is so obviously *silly*? (Note to moonie-baiters: I know about the Red Goddess's take on this. Don't waste our time with it. The Lunars are taking advantage of someone else's myths, not changing their own; the Red Goddess is not Yelm).

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Nick
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