> What's the derivation/origin of Monrogh, i.e. to make my question > clearer what's the source for him?
Monrogh was the cult founder and spirit of reprisal in "Cults of Prax". Everyone assumed he'd been around at the Dawn of Time (or thereabouts). In Greg's EPIC playtest game, Monrogh turned up as an Elmal-worshipping companion of the future King Tarkalor. Tark wanted to see elephants, so his hangers-on went off to Teshnos (I omit details of the route). In Teshnos, confronted by an alien sun-worshipping culture and different solar mythology, Monrogh experienced the "Vision of Many Suns". Whatever this was, it led him to "create" the cult of Yelmalio as it's now found in Dragon Pass, incorporating elements from his own Elmali faith and from "related" sun-cult traditions.
The most detail on this was in Greg Stafford's article "The Birth of Elmal: or why I screwed up your Glorantha". Key passages follow:
: While wandering through the Stormtime and Nowtime, I looked up
: and wondered, for the first time, "Who is the Orlanthi sun god?"
:
: I realised that the place of the Sun in Orlanthi myth, as reve-
: aled so far, was that of the enemy and foe, the Emperor. None-
: theless, there was the Sun of Life, which anyone can see and feel
: when they go out on a sunny day. Without that then the Dark Tribe
: would rule again. The Orlanthi knew it and surely acknowledged
: the Friendly Sun. I knew that, but even as Storyteller I did not
: know where this might be. It was complicated when I looked into
: the sky in the Lesser Darkness, and there were the Lesser Suns
: giving aid to humans.
:
: All speculation was laid to rest, as always, upon the ground of
: action and being. We heroquesters followed he path before us. We
: were our ancestors, we were our gods, we were children again. We
: were blessed by Luck to have our young lives attached to that of
: Tarkalor, the debauching prince of the royal Sartar house. And
: all around us, then, was the disintegration of our people and ways
: by the incursion of Lunar ideas and gods into our lives. Kings,
: princes, and princesses died to prove this, and no one could orga-
: nise the people enough to resist efficiently.
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Nick
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