> Just finished watching part of a show on creatures with shells. In
> talking about oysters and pearls, they said that some Chinese used to
> take tiny clay figurines of Buddha and put them into oysters. The oyster
> would do its usual thing, and then the people would harvest little
> Buddha-shaped pearls.
>
> It struck me that this would be especially cool for the East Isles, where
> each of the islands worships a different deity. Not all of them would do
> this, of course, but I could see hundreds of them putting images of their
> god into oysters, and then selling, trading, or giving away the tiny
> pearl icons.
The Haragalans use pearls and mother-of-pearl as money. Each tallship Captain has the right to make his own mother-of-pearl "coins", usually in a design which reflects the name of his tallship.
Obviously these "coins" are manufactured in the way Stephen describes. I immediately adopt this idea. Thanks!
A little draconic note as well:
Jeff:
>I'd just like to add my support to this view - I believe that this is the
>way the EWF functioned. I think the overwhelming majority of the
>population in the EWF continued worshipping their local dieties. A pyramid
>scheme, the EWF gave a tremendous amount of power to a small handful of
>people.
That is also exactly how draconic magic works in Kralorela where they know a thing or too about the left-handed way. Common people give worship to the exarchs who pass it on to the dragon emperor who is the focus of "all" the magic of Kralorela. So, the purpose isn't the same as in the EWF, but the method is too similar for it to be a coincidence.
End of The Glorantha Digest V5 #248
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