>I do think that the widespread and destructive God Learner burning
>has skewed the population somewhat in the favor of elves associated
>with trees that propagate better with fire.
Looking at the sources, I see that only the woods of Vralos were burned and that the woods of Enkloso continued to exist throughout much of the age.
>To me, these aren't really deviant elves. Unless the fact that they
>are raising a crop of pet humans makes them deviant.
Since I was the person that originally called them deviant, it would be much more constructive to acknowledge that I was criticizing their supposed tolerance for having their forests regularly burned down rather than contrive a fictitious excuse that they are deviant for having pet humans.
>IMO the Vralos
>elves are willing to let their pet humans practice a lifestyle that
>doesn't encroach upon the aldryami woods, since they are useful tools
>against Fonrit.
How is burning down woods a useful tool against Fonrit? The Fonritans would be all to happy to have the humans burn down trees on the grounds that it reduces cover for troops that might oppose them. Looking at the history of the Season Wars, I see it was the Fonritans that was doing the burning while the Orlanthi were busy using winter powers.
>They need enough pet humans to be able to raise
>armies, so they need to tolerate agriculture.
Except that the idea that the Elves would not tolerate agriculture is a strange one since they themselves practice agriculture of a sort. All that the Elves need humans to do would be to cast food song before they cut down a plant.
>Slash & burn is
>probably more forest-friendly than plowing, so they can allow this,
>within limits.
And here we come to the nub of the debate. David assumes that the choice is between slash-and-burn and plowing and so on "probable" grounds which he never specifies, the elves should tolerate slash-and-burning.
That the Umathelan Orlanthi do not use the plow is a reasonable one in light of the sources describing them as "primitive". It does not mean that they have to use slash-and-burn or even hunting-and-gathering. There is in fact a third alternative, which I have mentioned to David before, namely horticulture as practiced by the Highlanders of Papua New Guinea which sustained a population of about three quarters of a million in a mountain range before they were contacted in the 1930s.
Given that Umathela sustains less than twice that number of Orlanthi over a vastly larger area and given that the main crop of Umathela is peas, the idea that the Orlanthi would be horticulturists is to me to be a no-brainer.
>And Pamalt drove the forests out of the south, which is clearly
>different as well -- destructive burning as opposed to renewing
>burning.
There's no difference IMO and the Fonritans right next door exterminated the Kovano Elves through burning when they conquered the land.
--Peter Metcalfe
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