Re: Girls will be boys and boys will be girls

From: Charles Corrigan <charles_at_...>
Date: Thu, 22 Jul 2004 10:57:41 -0000

• In HeroQuest-RPG_at_yahoogroups.com, Bruce Ferrie wrote:
  > I just find it interesting that nobody
  > feels the need to question whether
  > Vingans can marry, but they do for
  > Nandani, despite the fact that no
  > prohibitions are mentioned in the
  > writeup.
  >
  > Jane's point about Victorian attitudes
  > is, I think, very close to the mark,
  > though lesbianism is much more
  > acceptable as titillation these days.
  

In many ways, the Sartarite brand of Heortlings/Orlanthi are incredibly conservative. To the point of being radical conservatives, where they re-write their myths to invent a past that never was - i.e. while they recognise the historical fact of the Dragonkill, their myths are based on continuous occupation of their tula since the founding of the clan in the silver age (or so it often appears). However, this conservatism is _not_ the same as the (often religious) conservatism that we recognise in this world.

The Heortlings approach to sexuality is very different to anything most of us would recognise. To a large extent, this is based on two major factors where Glorantha is different to Earth. 1) lack of STDs (unless you count broos as an STD) and 2) most women can control their fertility through their own worship of Ernalda (or their mum's, their sister's etc.). The most obvious aspect of this is the Heortling approach to pre-marital sex (as much as possible with as many as possible as long as the other party is not of the same clan (OK, OK, I admit it, I go along with the "strictly outside the clan" interpretation of exogamy)).

However this is not the only big difference. Anyone that thinks that Heortlings are homophobic should carefully read the Heler write-up in Storm Tribe. That is not to say that no Heortling is hombophobic - where would the fun be if the Heortling's were _just_ a crew of politically correct Celts/Vikings that happened to like a punch up and were not too concerned with the theory of central authority?

The first time I heard of Nandan was when Greg told a myth of the (I think) Silver Age some Convulsions back. Basically, the clan were cursed to be barren. Nandan, a male, quested with his, male, lover and the result was that Nandan gave birth to a child. This broke the curse on the clan.

My memory of the Nandan write-up in Storm Tribe (I am in Bangkok, the book is in Singapore) is that it states that, in all ways, the Nandan worshipper is an Ernaldan, but in a male body. I cannot see why they would not be able to marry a man - after all Ernalda married Orlanth.

regards,
Charles