Good point.
>Which means that you can forget this whole long bargaining of dowry
>and brideprice,
Agree here, too.
>Few go through second
>intitiation, and not all will go through first.
This I disagree with. Anyone who isn't initiated isn't really in the Storm Tribe and is, therefore, an outsider. I think pretty much all Heortlings undergo initiation (way more than the Orlanthi All), and get at least some benefit from the communal magic (the wyter, etc). They may get shat on, but at least they are part of the clan. I'm not sure about second initiations, but the first initiation is a communal event; since the clan is making the sacrifices, the stickpickers get a free ride. As a side effect, I doubt there are any Heortlings who concentrate their Common Magic, because that would mean leaving the Storm Tribe (Or would it? Surely some Heortling animists concentrate their magic, and Kolatings are in the Storm Tribe...).
>With all these forest meetings there is an exchange of
>gossip, and people get to meet each other, and marriages are usually
>arranged this way, with little to do with the alliances and tribes
>that the carls are so concerned with. So families spread in a
>different way.
Indeed, again. And they probably swap charms and runesticks and all that other stuff, but I doubt they build up societies in the way you're describing. If there were even semi-organized folk societies between clans, I think the carls would eventually notice and put a stop to it. What probably does happen, for those Call of Gloranthulu fans out there, is the lower-than-cotter types sometimes stumble on things they shouldn't -- remnants of earlier ages, unfriendly spirits, etc -- and they get a little power and a little more, then sheep start disappearing and the occasional cow, stickpickers from other clans get in on the act, and there is a cancer growing in the deeper woods....
>ancestors were great. Maybe their ancestors have to eat the smoke of
>swine or sheep instead of oxen and fattened cows, but they are still
>fed.
I think all the Ancestors get fed equally; it's not like you can tell most of them apart for long, anyway.
Peter Larsen
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