Re: Erenplose / Dara Happa connection ?

From: Peter Metcalfe <metcalph_at_znznwv12Sc1UrptE-YnnLZNvL4UT-toEzill5uo2FBVuxAEgC44HnhGNnDRUSVgKiEb>
Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2010 15:39:47 +1200

On 8/15/2010 3:24 AM, hcarteau_at_VQIX8cJ0-R_YFfo8lQjM6cX4zhMHzHcLU0YChfLJB0NJ0ha3bHPk7vn7fQAwKpMZJuV96JPEfLcRhA.yahoo.invalid wrote:

> I have been perusing an old tome which mentions the Iron Vrok is another name
> for the Roost of Tholm, the tenth piece of the Dara Happan imperial Regalia.

I don't think that's right. The Vrok is an Eagle while the Roost is a stick that it roosts upon.

Secondly the Roost, being part of the Imperial Regalia, is used by the Emperors at their enthronement and there's no indication that it has been lost.

Secondly Erenplose/Maniria is a different mythological region than Dara Happa. For the Roost of Tholm to have some connection there, we would expect to see myths about Dara Happa being active there in the Storm Age. It's like finding the Ark of the Covenant to be buried around Stonehenge.

> He burst out of the water riding the Iron Vrok,
> rushed to Nysalor and proudly presented it to him.

The text doesn't actually specify that Palangio rode it. It's a valid interpretation but not the only one.

> Later he was killed (by Arkat ?) and the Vrok / Roost was lost.

Palangio was killed at the Battle of Darnstiggi (Troll Gods p23) and he and his bird were cooked and eaten by Zorak Zorani.

> The Vrok itself is some sort of big iron bird
> that can fly its master everywhere, including to the other side. It also
> protects him from all attacks.

It is a big iron bird but I don't believe it flew its master anywhere.

In Dara Happan cosmology, every mortal has six souls with the Bird soul corresponding to the Intellect. Thus when the Emperors of Dara Happa used the Roost of Tholm to summon the Imperial Eagle, they were actually summoning their own Bird soul enflamed to heroic proportions by the backing of the Empire.

Palangio, originally being from the Bird Lands of Rinliddi, would have known about the summoning/manifestation of the Bird and regarded it as being the mark of a Hero. He is not summoning the bird portion of the Empire but his very own heroic bird soul.

So Palangio would take the form of a huge Iron Bird rather than ride it.

> My question : what is under the Mournsea that might have given Palangio a piece
> of the Dara Happan regalia ??

It didn't give him a piece of Imperial Regalia because Erenplose was not part of the Dara Happan Empire. Palangio may have found an Iron Vrok Statue and chose that to be the receptacle of his Bird Soul as part of his quest.

Now for the origins of Erenplose.

1. The Brithini connection comes from God Forgot because Prince Temertain of Sartar studies iron brithini statuary and God Forgot is the closest place for them. However the Malkioni settlements along the south coast in the Storm Age were by the people who followed Malkion into exile (ie they left because they weren't "brithini" enough). Hence the people of Erenplose would still have common cultural elements (ie the statuary) with God Forgot and other places but their precise philosophical orientation is undefined.

So according to this, Palangio dove in saw the Iron Statuary and chose the one that looked like a bird before leaving.

2) Erenplose could have been founded in the Flood being a city of the people who followed Worcha (an evil sea deity whom Vingkot slew). Since Worcha was made from an alliance of a hundred sea-going peoples including the Waertagi and the Trolls, Erenplose would have quite a cosmopolitan collection.

In fact looking further I see that one of the mothers of Worcha was the Osliran Sea which includes... Dara Happa (which was flooded at the time). So Palangio may have well found something Dara Happan in flooded Erenplose.

--Peter Metcalfe