Re: Civilised Hsunchen

From: TTrotsky_at_aol.com
Date: Tue, 24 Nov 1998 18:32:58 EST


Thomas:  

 <<I always thought that Hsunchen meant worship bestial dieties and having a tight
 bond to your animal brothers. I didn't think that it has something to do with  being primitive and hunter gatherers.>>

      It would appear that one cannot maintain a tight bond to your animal brothers if you till the soil - this effectively restricts the Hsunchen to being either Primitive or Nomad in RQ terms. In Ralios and Ramalia we have examples of what can happen when a formerly hsunchen culture begins to adopt a more 'sophisticated' lifestyle (although the precise details have not been 'officially' fleshed out). This is supported by, for example, the Hsunchen write-up in the Genertela Players Book - although the 'What My Father Told Me' deals specifically with the Rathori, the remaining text deals with the hsunchen peoples as a whole, and is quite precise about them being huntergatherers  and strongly implies this is because their lifestyles haven't changed from the distant past.

      One can retain elements of hsunchen culture in a more sophisticated culture, IMO, but not the full range of magics (of course, you could get new ones). And some cultures have a strong tie to beasts without being hsunchen - the Praxians being an obvious example, and the worshippers of Yinkin a somewhat more obscure one. Similarly, the followers of the Path of Immanent Mastery are not hsunchen, even though they have supeficially similar magic in RQ terms.

<< That would mean that the pre Dawn Telmori were Telmori but probably not
Hsunchen, right ? >>

     If they had a 'barbarian' level of sophistication, yes. I'm not convinced that this has been proved yet. However, if it is true, I see no reason why they could not have worshipped a god they called Telmor who granted different magics than the Tergavi currently know. In fact, one wonders what wolves were doing intimately associated with an agrarian culture - after all, we are specifically dealing with wolves, not dogs, here.

<<And that they had some higher level of organization than average Hsunchen.>>

      This is entirely possible, even if they were not agrarian. The exact level of sophistication varies between different hsunchen peoples even today, IMO. The Uncolings seem to be among the most sophisticated, being similar to the Praxians in many respects.

<< I am somehow disturbed as how the hints in Dorastor (Wolf Fort, City of
Wolves) were read by you. Is there no chance that the Telmori had something like a kingdom, even if not civilized at all ?>>

     I see no reason why this would be impossible, although we wouldn't be talking the kind of highly structured kingdom that the Orlanthi have, frex. But some kind of overchief or widely recognised holy figure could well have existed, and been able to obtain cooperation or even obedience from many groups of Telmori. AFAIK, its agriculture that the hsunchen (or their deities) object to, and while that does usually have many knock-on effects there are ways round them, as David pointed out with reference to the NW American Indians.

Forward the glorious Red Army!

     Trotsky


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