> Given that I've never seen this interpretation before, it's a bit
> much to accuse me of trying to jettison it.
Like quite a few other well-rounded interpretations, these have floated on and off the digest during the height of the RuneQuest Renaissance.
There is a great wealth of (yet) unprinted material from that time, well worth digging up.
Nick:
>>Your account is like saying that the Fronelans have never heard
>>of Arkat.
Peter:
> Well I don't see the Ralians or the Seshnegi having any
> meaningful role for Talor in their memories of the Gbaji
> Wars, despite the fact they have heard of him. Hence it
> is not a given IMO that the Loskalmi must give Arkat in
> a meaningful role in their mythology.
Arkat was the great adversary of Talor in his fight against the Bright Empire. IMO he was too important as a rival of Talor to be ignored.
AFAIK, Gerlant does get some small coverage in Akem. I don't know how much he interacted with Talor before the fall of Dorastor, but afterwards between these two (or rather the wizards and clergy following their banners) Malkioni Orthodoxy was defined vs. Stygian "heresy".
Nick:
>>Besides, even eliding Arkat, we still need to consider Gbaji...
Peter:
> Who is light despite your scheme and another prominent
> light god on the enemy side would be the Sun (halted
> famously at the Sunstop).
Gbaji is at least "The World is in Darkness" in terms of Harmast's Lightbringer's Quest, which returns Talor as embodiment of the Light from Hell (which he may have found behind the Gates of Banir).
> So I do not see how the early
> Loskalmi can portray Talor's struggle as a War between
> Light and Darkness.
The Bright Empire was revealed as masking the Greater Darkness of the Gods War - the ultimate foe, Chaos. This much of Heortling Lightbringer myth may well have rubbed off on Talor, who apparently led a following of Orlanthi to Oranor after witnessing the battle in the City of Miracles.
Nick:
>>Talor offers a template for struggles of Light (T) vs. Dark (A),
Peter:
> But he never struggled against Arkat.
They never met on opposite sides on the battlefield, but there is a reason why Harmast brought back Talor to right the mistake he made with returning Arkat.
I suppose they had at least a rivalry about who would face Gbaji in the final combat. In ruined Dorastor, Talor's followers fought against Gbaji, not for Arkat. IMO Talor disagreed with Arkat's methods in fighting Gbaji as much as Harmast did.
> A more serious nitpick is that I do not believe there
> to be such a thing as the Talorian church. IMO, I think
> there were a whole bunch of likeminded Loskalmi states
> each with their own distinct traditions, churches, caste
> laws, forms of government and so forth.
Likeminded state churches using a common doctrine was all 6th and 7th century christianity held in common. The Visigoth state church, the Langobard state church and the Frankish state church all were Athanasian, the Ostrogoth state church had been Arian. Peculiarities of the Frankish state church (mainly about investment, IIRC) have survived in the French catholic church.
Fronela was different from monolithic Seshnela in lacking a sufficiently strong direct rival to make a more monolithic church and kingdom necessary, one like Gerlant seems to have had after the Gbaji War in his unified Seshnela. AFAIK, Talor did not start out as a ruler either. He still is the most important Fronelan saint of this period. If Talor bestowed any religious teachings (IMO most likely through a literate followers biography), they are bound to be a main influence in Fronela. I see a great chance that his Lightbringer experiences would figure in this experience.
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