>>>Since Voria is the goddess of young girls, it's logical that her >>>cult trains young girls in the skills they will use as women, >>>namely >>>sewing, etc. Where else do young Orlanthi girls learn these >>>skillsif not
>>>from the main cult devoted to them. >> >>From their mothers, not from the Vorian Temple. Voria has >>nothing to do with household skills. >> >>>I also wanted to contrast her to Voria as much as possible. Where >>>Voria stays home and is peaceful, BG leaves home and is a warrior. >> >>Voria does not "stay home and is peaceful". She is born in Hell >>and dances the rights of spring with High King Elf. She is >>closer to the pagan Easter Goddess than the Goddess of Needlework >>and Embroidery.
>So what function does Voria play in Orlanthi culture? What exactly >does
>one worship the Goddess of Spring for? Surely not just the start of
>Spring, because that has nothing to do with children. In a culture >where
>social functions are expressed through cults, a cult of children >must play
>some social function associated with children. I'm hardly >suggesting that
>Voria is 'the Goddess of Needlework and Embroidery', only that if >she
>takes
>children under her tutelege, such tutelege would involve the socially
>useful function of teaching them basic skills.
just a thought that may be appropriate here: has anyone checked out the similarities between voria and persephone? both spring goddesses, persephone alse conneted to... wait for it.. sewing.
persephone was sewing a veil for her mother, demeter the grain / earth goddess, when she was carried of by pluto into the underworld. the veil is supposed to represent the surface of things that is draped over the divine reality underneath - the veil is the solid, physical, material world of the senses. whilst sewing it persephone became confused, took the material, physical world to be the real thing, lost sight of the divine world underlying the fabric she was weaving, and so died (carried of by pluto). (this is a sufic interpretation)
then there is the business with the pomegranets and the earth pleading for her release or it will die, and she is released for half of the year. so she comes back in spring and departs in winter. usual stuff.
perhaps the sewing connection is not just the mundane household variety. is voria a manifestation of gloranthan fate, weaving out the destiny of mens' lives? or she part of the creation/destruction of gloranthan reality in way we haven't yet begun to appreciate? can anyone develop links between the myths of persephone & voria?
anyway, grist for the mills of others minds
guy
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