Sorry to pile on here. As best I understand it, though, there is no "standard mythology" to compare Glorantha to. Viking myths, Greek myths, and Hindu myths are all pretty different. At one point there was a movement to identify standard themes in myth, and come up with what might be called a unified theory of mythology -nbut that was a while back.
As to what would happen to an air goddess if enemies "killed" her air god husband; I suspect there is no real answer to that. She might die with him, either voluntarily or involuntarily {I can see this happening in a mythology modeled on Hinduism}. She might expand her authority to fill in the gap {I doubt that Hera would have died with Zeus}. Since Orlanth is not the only husband of Orlanth, it is possible that another of her husbands would expand to fill the vacuum. Finally, it is always possible that someone would go on a heroquest to bring Orlanth back, creating a newer and stronger possibly stronger Orlanth in the process. After all, that's what Orlanth did when he killed Yelm; and that's what the Seven Mothers did - by bringing back a newer and stronger version of the Moon Goddess.
My guess is that to some extent all of these happened when the Lunars managed to "kill" Orlanth. My guess is that the mortals who planned to kill Orlanth did not anticipate the possibility of a successful HeroQuest to bring him back. In my version, the Red Goddess would anticipate such an event, but would see it as her role to bring out about the rebirth of Orlanth. In a sense, the early stages of the hero wars seem to be in part about redefining the Red Goddess and Orlanth.
Thx,
Ray,
Jeff Richard <richaje_at_gmail.com> wrote: > Then Greg's Glorantha is in direct contradiction of standard
mythology. (Don't start the "he can if he wants" nonsense - of course
he can and of course if he does, we either adopt if we want to, or
laugh and ignore if we want to, same as any other won't-fit variation
from anyone else.)
Jane, what on earth are you talking about? As far as I can tell, you haven't a clue about mythology or mythological thought. Orlanth is inextricable linked with Ernalda, and vice versa. Both gods get much of their meaning and power from each other.
This is no deep hidden secret, but has been well-known and discussed for at least ten years. Heck, one of my complaints about how I wrote the cults of Orlanth and Ernalda in Enclosure 1 is that I didn't make that point more obvious.
And if it isn't obvious to you yet, I think the forthcoming Heortling Mythology book has several stories to that effect.
> The question is what Glorantha the OP is operating in (sorry, via
PDA I can't check who that was). I'm assuming the standard
as-published one until (s)he says otherwise.
OP? What the hell are you talking about? Are you analogizing mythology to a computer program?
Jeff
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