Re: Quick Summary of Gloranthan Cultures Part Two: Westerners

From: David Cake <dave_at_8PRtNEbLflyTNqwWJElVk4yZILXLQ0Ax79OK4upg9QEBuiqsDlIeSexdgTjRf66mNlXEADr>
Date: Fri, 9 Dec 2011 03:04:48 +0800

On 09/12/2011, at 2:19 AM, Jeff wrote:

>>> But Seshnela has never left Glorantha! There has always been a
>>> "mediaeval" area of Glorantha which dominated the Western lands. Their
>>> entire mythology and magic were also different. However, I was not
>>> interested in portraying that at the time of RuneQuest's publishing,
>>> hence they have had little development.
>> 
>> 	Interesting to have it so explicitly confirmed that the idea that Western Genertela is like medieval Europe, so explicitly denied at almost every turn in Jeff's post, clearly originates with Greg. This isn't intended as snark or criticism, rather as an interesting observation about how much our ideas about the West have evolved.

>
> If you read those stories Greg refers to them, they are *far* less medieval than you might assume. Greg knows an awful lot more about medieval Europe since writing Pendragon than before that. Frex, in the early stories about Seshnela (I got them all), the Seshnelans were clearly a polytheistic peoples (no Invisible God back then!) with lots of lines like this:
>
> "Uthal is born to a well-off Brithini family, his father being a priest of Humakt. Just as his brother joined the priesthood as soon as possible (Imtalor, priest of Bakan), Uthal follows his father and is ordained a priest of Humakt when he is sixteen, ascending quickly to become a full priest. He is initiated into the cult of Argat at seventeen, and the cults of Malkion and Britha when nineteen. Under his brother's prompting he also joins the priesthood of Bakan when twenty years old."
>
> Now maybe I am wrong, but that really does not sound like medieval Catholicism.
        

        I never said Catholicism. Religion is just one aspect of life - other parts of it (eg armour, clothing) were always portrayed as quite similar to medieval Europe. The old RQ3 material on Western Genertela, for example, made if fairly clear that the Malkioni were not Catholics IMO - but did tend to portray the West as being like medieval Europe *apart* from religion.

        While we are on the topic, the Western churches are still even now described using a lot of terminology suggestive of at least Christianity, if not Catholicism specifically (Saint, for example). The idea that they are Catholicish certainly didn't spring from nowhere.         

	Cheers
		David