Re: Orlanthi - Ralians, Talastari, oh my

From: Jeff Richard <richaje_at_...>
Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2006 02:27:11 -0000

> My take is that a significant number of Ralian natives were sort
of
> preadapted to Orlanth and Ernalda worship, probably for a variety
of
> reasons (e.g. they worshipped a killing storm, they had once
> worshipped Orlanth but lost this in the Darkness, their Earth
goddess
> had traits similar to Ernalda, etc.).

Could be - everyone lost Orlanth and Ernalda during the Darkness (and pretty much every other god or goddess of distinction). I would be surprised if one band of Ralians had worshipped (or propitiated) a killing storm to get them through the Darkness, but I doubt that was widespread. For whatever reason, the Ralians learned from the Theyalan missionaries (unlike say the Pelorian horse warlords) and embraced the Orlanth religion.

> Another case of preadaptation seems to be Umathela, where the land
> itself was the site of all sorts of God Time doings by storm gods.
> When people showed up, it was thus easier for them to contact the
> Storm Tribe than the Fire Tribe.

Well, Umathela is more confusing to me. If I recall, the early Umathelans were folk brought from Slontos and Maniria to Pamaltela by the Waertegi - they had presumably already been in contact with the Theyalan missionaries.

Jeff