damn maps

From: Steve Lieb <styopa_at_iname.com>
Date: Thu, 04 Feb 1999 22:06:34 -0600


>From: "Richard, Jeff" <Jeff.Richard_at_metrokc.gov> chimes in:
>>1)<snip> you can find [panoramic maps] as far back as Homeric art.
>Huh? I'm curious what you mean by Homeric art. Do you mean Minoan frescoes
>with nifty pictures of islands, dolphins and boats (closest analogy I can
>find in pre-Archaic Greek art that mit fit the bill for "panoramic map")?
You're right, that's what I had in mind and I *was* stretching a bit to push it back as far in history as possible. I do recall a Phonecian wall (fresco? seems too early - not sure of the media - I remember a b&w photo anyway) that had some of their settlements "mapped" - utterly nothing like where they really were. My point being that the "top down" view gives people an immediate an visceral understanding of how things relate to each other geographically, that wasn't necessarily available until flight. Yes, you *could* climb a mountain and look, but even a 5000-foot view isn't as general as I'm trying to convey...

>>2) proportion of fliers who would be doing such a thing: I have two
>>arguments for this.
>OK, when we are speaking of Gloranthan fliers, we are, in effect speaking
>about the Orlanthi. Other than an occasional Moon Boat, the Orlanthi are
>just about the ONLY flying peoples of Glorantha.
I'm sure the Brithini and other westerners, as well as a fairly significant number of Kralorelans would object to this.

><snip an examination of Orlanthi flying>
Agreed without dispute. If you are doing it as a religious ceremony you've better things to do than whip out the sketch pad, and my picture of Orlanthi flight is literally being picked up by the winds - not terribly conducive to drawing. BUT.
While some argue that it's just too damn modern to think of using such a mystical thing for such a mundane purpose, I find that Byzantine. If something has a logical utility, why would Gloranthans not use it to make life easier?

>Seriously, Orlanthi
>maps would be tend to be schematic things, emphasizing sacred hills and
>peaks over more prosaic concerns. Dara Happan maps if anything are even
>more schematic, with stylistic concerns overshadowing petty interests like
>accuracy. And so on.
>

Probably, but there are other cultures such as the Lunars, the Loskalmi, the Safelster city states, etc that I would imagine are a little more focussed on the substantial than the stylistic than a bunch of smelly sheep stealing hill barbarians and a subordinated city culture (he said, bracing himself for the torrent of counter opinion he thinks he may have unleashed....)

I did that on purpose, anyway :)

>------------------------------

Then, on the same subject, Alex continues:
>Steve Lieb, arch-advocate of the Glorantha Ordinance Survey, writes:
>>I must have been unaccountably lucky in my mountains, then. Looking
>at Sartar's orography, I'd say the easiest way to see most of it from
>5,000ft was to walk 5,000ft up the nearest mountain. Doing much
>more with magic should require a _lot_ of power/skill/effort/religious
>merit, not just some paltry little rune spell.
I'd say it's a matter of scale. Genertela is roughly the size of the continental USA.
Dragon pass is debateably the size of the "midwest" - if I had my book nearby, I'd give you a more specific area. How much of that can you map from standing on a mountain?
5000' is clearly not high enough.
Now, if you say that Orlanth has a problem with people going above what one might call "utilitarian" altitudes, that I'd be willing to buy. But I'm also NOT saying (and have never meant to) that every Sartar pub has a rack with local maps for sale. It's not a simple task, nor simple magic, to arrange to get this done. And it wouldn't be frequent. But IMO it *would* be done. The value of maps - accurate maps - is that high.

>inappropriate, I feel, the method 'seems wrong': one could hardly
>conceive of a more 'materialistic' application for _divine_ magic.
>Bordering on profanity, really.

Only if your viewpoint is that of (to coin a phrase) a smelly, sheep-stealing barbarian yokel. Hee hee hee. Now, if you are an enlightened Western Wizard, you may clutter it up a little less with dogma and see it for the utility it offers. :) [fightin' words cheerfully cast about]

>
>> Second, Glorantha is, by every measure, a magic-RICH place. They use
>> magic for practically everything.
>
>Glorantha is a very magical place, but that's not to say it's "cheesy
>magical effect saturated". If someone suggested that horseless
>carriages powered by Mastakos rune spells were a jolly addition
>to the canon, based on the 'magic-rich' argument, I doubt it'd get
>much credence. Magic, and theistic magic in particular, has to be
>not just obtained, but only _used_ in manner that's congruent with
>myth, and with the (vagueness warning) 'feel' of religion and culture.
You're right, and this is the most convincing point yet. Of course, one might say the same thing about, lessee: cannons, musket-armed dwarves, machines that produce magic swords, a grav car, submarines, a lead zepplin, or for that a race that looks like Donald Ducks. I suppose the idea of someone actually using fly to get a good look for a map IS beyond reasonable belief in such a setting...

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