Re: Adept's questions on chaos

From: David Cake <dave_at_i1jogR-UbQSZm5nBFEcShnncPUv0uExM8Pwfnqpg4wv4tC0Sq3ZQhwdFVw42UamJ843XIdp>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 11:27:07 +0800


At 11:39 AM +1200 19/4/07, Peter Metcalfe wrote:
>At 11:16 a.m. 19/04/2007, you wrote:
>
>>On April 18, 2007 06:15 pm, Peter Metcalfe wrote:
>> > Krarsht: Movement, Stasis and Death.
>
>>And, while she may not have a chaotic runic association, the writeup of
>>Karsht that you quote from also describes her as one of the chaos
>>things that came into the world in the wake of the Devil.
>
>The Devil is not mentioned. And the first paragraph merely
>cites the fabric of the world being torn and illogical horrors
>seeping through. Which means that she could be from
>distant Pamaltela as far as anybody knows.
>
>And the all important statement about Larnste seeking to
>stamp her out because she's a chaos horror begins "It is
>thought...".
>
>>It also describes her as a target of Storm Bull
>
>Storm Bull fought a lot of people in the Good Old Days including
>one Orlanth.
>
>>and has Primal Chaos as an associated cult.
>
>So do the Seven Mothers and Nysalor. But I think she seeks
>to bring Chaos under her control rather a Chaotic Goddess.
>
>> As well, the Jaws of Karsht do get 'Sense Order' as a skill.
>
>A skill dependent on a Moorcockian battle between Law and
>Chaos, which is not gloranthan. Undoubtedly the skill exists
>in some form or another but I wouldn't read too much into
>the RQII version.

        When there are a lot of data points pointing one way (to Krarsht being chaotic), and apparently just one (runic association) pointing the other, and that one data point has been later revised, it probably points to that one data point being an error, by plain old Occams razor.

        This whole argument seems to rest on Lords of Terrors runic attribution, Gods of Gloranthas runic atttribution, being discarded in favour of Cults of Terror, even though those other sources are later and any major changes presumably being quite deliberate. And its not simply assuming that CoT is definitive here - its assuming that in the runic attributions CoT was subtly indicating that Krarsht wasn't really chaotic, while simultaneously describing the cult as chaotic in the text, deliberately misleading the reader.

        Now, I don't expect to argue Peter into admitting this might be a mistake. But I think its probably time to say that this theory i likely to have one single adherent, admit that Peter GWV, and move one. Its a novel theory, and has some interesting implications, but as its stands very hard to support. But it needs more to support it, rather than just dogmatic defense of a single data point.

> The same source which describes Dendara as an Earth Goddess
> (Runes: Light and Earth)?

        Of course, there is an explanation for that - which is that Greg did a lot of work on Solar mythology after the publication of GoG, and Dendara was explicitly revised. There is no such explanation for Krarsht.

	Cheers
		David

           

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