I've been meaning to write this stuff up for the GD for a long time. Having posted a quick and abridged version on to the Hero Wars group earlier on, it's time for me to present my case properly on this honourable and scolary podium.
(John Hughes jumped the gun on me a bit, but luckily my night job gives me some chances to steal away to a computer a type this up. I hope you'll apologize the poor structuring of this article. It's still very much a work in progress. )
I've always loved the elemental and mythical logic of Glorantha. This is not Terra. Glorantha works much more like the early people of Terra thought things work. RQ-2 had some truly great material on this. Unfortunately some of it was left rather fuzzy, and the later works focused on other things. RQ-3 had it's good points, but it lost a lot of the clarity of the earlier edition.
The RQ-2 book gives us the material to build upon though:
From page 101 we find this (incomplete) table of runic metals.
Element Metal
Darkness Lead Water Aluminium Earth Copper Fire/Sky Gold Lunar Silver
A nice start. RQ-2 also tells us that pure runic metals, unlike Bronze, wound werewolves (and presumably other magical creatures unaffected by normal weapons). Not only that, but when wielding something made of a pure runemetal, one can only use magic tied to that specific element, ie. that of their deity (iron, we are told, hampers the use of any magic). Rune lords are able to personally enchant their equipment so that these restrictions don't hamper them. "…The enchantment also suppresses the magic dampening effect iron and other Rune metals have on battle magic as well as his weapons."
But back to the elements and metals. We are told later that aluminium and quicksilver are actually two forms of the same metal in Glorantha. A skilled alchemist can transmute one to the other.
The original RQ-1&2 material focused much more on the runic connections of things. Originators and current holders of runic powers were of much interest. Also the Godlearner approach appeared less interested in the actual current god's than the primal runic powers behind them. This, I feel is a good approach when tracking the elemental assosiations of metals. Alchemy, afterall, seems like a rather western art.
An article that was published in the Elder Secret's book has caused a lot of confusion into this othervice fairly straightforward scheme: [it's currently 6 AM in Finland as I type this, and I can't find my copy of Elder Secrets, so no page reference, sorry]
Most, if not all of us are familiar with the article. It's a nice and atmospheric, "within the world" type of document. First written in the dawn age, and later commented upon by an early Godlearner. The article is poetic and folkloristic. What it is not, though, is GM material. It's basically a colorful thing to give to one's players as something their characters can come across.
This confusing article gives explanations for the newly introduced Gloranthan names of the metals. It talks of silver as the metal of Uleria, goddess of love, and offers a second metal for the element of fire, Tin. Tin is attributed to the rather obscure skygod Dayzatar. A little worshipped third brother of Yelm and Lodril. The article also attributes bronze to the primal storm deity Umath, talking of how this metal is the metal of war, and how Umath is an excellent wargod.
When faced with the huge and occasionally self contradicting mountain of material we have on Glorantha, holism and coherentism give us a way forward. One shouldn't leave anything out of consideration, but one should also try to fit the peaces together in such a manner that leaves the least amount of contradictions.
In this light I feel the above article should be viewed as folklore and analysis of said folklore. It goes too much against the grain of all the other sources.
***
But what of Umath? Or more relevantly, what of the element of Air?
God's of Glorantha gave us another look at the same table as the RQ-2 book:
Darkness Lead Water Quicksilver Earth Copper Fire/Sky Gold Air Silver Lunar none
The chance in water is easy to explain, it being no chance at all as noted earlier. But suddenly silver is the metal of air and the Lunar slot is left empty.
***
Let's try to put together a coherent version of all of this. Elder Secrets gives us very neat elemental effects for the pure, enchanted runic metals. Gold enhances light spells and actually glows softly on it's own. Quicksilver doesn't hamper movement in water; lead is good for crushing weapons, and so on.
My favourite example is the effect given for gold. The elemental metal, bones of the elemental gods if you take the theist view, enhancing the effect of the elements magic. Luckily the other effects are pretty much in the same vein. This kind of alchemical and elemental thinking seems just right for Glorantha, and is very atmospheric.
But unfortunately our elemental / metal scheme is still a bit confused. It seems the thought process behind this was never quite finished, or at least the end results were never published. No matter, we have enough clues.
One metal to one runic power would make the most sense. Historical alchemical systems have always been remarkably precise and clear. This also gives us the chance to figure cool and appropriate effects and uses on all of them, and resolve the earlier snarls quite neatly.
The Elder Secrets article named Bronze for Umath, but bronze isn't a very credible choise given the other variables. Bronze is the stock metal of Glorantha. A workingman's choise. There's always been the division between "pure runic metals" and alloys like bronze.
So let's start.
Darkness Lead Water Aluminium/Quicksilver Earth Copper Fire/Sky Gold Air Tin Lunar* Silver
(*I use Lunar here since it was in the earlier tables. I think it's appropriate for silver to be the metal of all the lesser celestial bodies. Stars, planets and moons. The quarrel of the cult of Yelorna the Starbringer and and of the Lunar religion over the use of silver fit's quite nicely in this.)
Bronze is not a pure runic metal by any of the schemes, yet it's often noted to be the metal of Orlanth. What gives? No problem. Orlanth, of course, is one of the young gods, and not a pure elemental power. Though he takes after his father Umaht, his mother is Kero fin, a mountain goddess. So Earth (copper) mixed with Air (tin), and this of course gives us bronze.
I like this especially since bronze (in the bronze age or in glorantha) is a remarkable metal. Two metals, each of the soft, creates something hard and resilient. This fit's well mythologically. The young god's weren't as elementally pure and powerful as the primal powers and elements, but they proved more resilient, fighting on as the primal powers succumbed.
Originally Orlanth didn't command the power of lightning, only that of thunder (a distinction that makes sense in Glorantha). Lightning was the power of Umath, claimed from his corpse by Yavor (a warrior of the fire tribe) and later from Yavor by Orlanth. So Orlanth's metal isn't (at least originally) tin as with the pure storm power of Umath, but bronze.
One of the keys to this insight was the reference in some sources, the
earliest being Plunder, of storm artefacts made of Tin (and diamonds!).
Plunder (and later Strangers in Prax) gives us lightning bands. Warrior's
armbands made of tin that store and release the fury of the storm, namely
lightning.
.
.
.
At this point I have to apologize and go sleep for a few hours. I'll
continue when I have recovered a little. I'd like to go through why I
still dwell on these things, when the paradigm of Gloranthan writing has
moved away from such details and specific runic powers. There are still
things to be gained from these lovely details, but I'll leave the
reasoning for the latter part of this essey. Also, the issue of iron, yet
to come...
-Adept, Finland: off to bed
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End of Glorantha Digest
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