Again my unofficial and informal summaries:
Remember that at the dawn, the human population of Glorantha could probably have been counted in thousands (excepting maybe the east). The surviving humans in central Genertela joined with non-humans in a grand council, all basking in the fact that they were alive and actually apt to stay that way. Because populations were so low I don't think geographical boundaries were worried about so much back then, what mattered more was how many people of what abilities you had.
Population had climbed somewhat by the time Nysalor was created/born/ discovered/re-assembled/whatever by the 2nd council. The council that created him included a number of human peoples. One of them was a northern branch of the Orlanthi with a more mystical bent, and one of hte events of the first age was that their greatest priest tried to displace Orlanth (or so modern heortlings say). There are still remnants of those peoples along the south-west border of the empire. But their stronghold was in Dorastor, which is a valley in the mountains in the south-west, which you can find in the map of the lunar empire. Another of the human peoples in the empire were the Dara Happans. The "bright empire" ruled everything near there, conquered Dragon Pass, then what is now the holy country, then moved west along the southern coast. Arkat's army then did that route in reverse, leading to the final conflict between Arkat and Nysalor/Gbaji in Dorastor, which left it a chaos infested no-man's land.
The EWF (which sometimes stands for the empire of the wyrms friends,
but can also be interpretted otherwise), also started from an attempt
at a grand unity council. In the first age the council was
distracted by mysticism. In the second age by draconic powers.
Gradually the council became the EWF. Basically over time the empire
became more focussed on things draconic, more hated, and smaller
(eventually occupying just Dragon Pass). You know the story about
how the grand army from all the surrounding lands came to finally
crush it, only to in turn be eaten by dragons.
>
> As for Delecti, if when I talk with my players about what they want
if
> they answer "lots and lots of undead or dark forbidden magics from
a
> lost empire" I may come asking for more info on him. :)
My first extensive experience with Glorantha was in a (runequest) campaign run by Jeff Kyer, focussed on weird happenings in Delecti's domains (although we eventually managed to upset the lunar plans for Duck Point in the process). I don't think he really had any source material, but the advantage of playing in a zombie infested swamp ruled by an immortal vampire is that mood, atmosphere, fear, and plot hooks are plentifully available and recognizable to nongloranthophiles due to exposure of all those horror movies and suchlike.
-Bryan
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