Yēlm-ašarēd

I don't know if we can presume that Illuminated philosophers are all eccentric gentlemen who cause a little social disturbance at the agora. Sure, they could be like Socrates, we generally as a society don't have a negative opinion of him. They could also be like Shang Yang, who is notable for his philosophical concepts like instating equality before the law (which is a good thing, but was radical to the Qin nobility), mass slavery through enslaving farmers who failed to meet quotas, forcing peasants to marry at a young age, and a firm belief in Li Kui's idea that people who knew of a crime but did not report it to authorities should be punished exactly the same as the perpetrator of the crime. In ancient China, this punishment could be as severe as clan extermination. Everything Shang Yang did made rational sense; if you have a manpower shortage, implement policies to make the peasants have more children, he also implemented policies to make Qin a more attractive place to migrate to. If you have a productivity problem, enslave people who can't meet your quotas, and enslave more people to make them work on the farms. That helps prevent famine and keeps productivity high, but I don't think many people here would say that it's a good thing to do that. Imagine, then, if you had someone like Shang Yang in Glorantha who was Illuminated. What would his solution to a manpower shortage be? I think the discussion in this thread would be close to his solution. But that thread didn't go the full way, because an Illuminate can see past the conflict of Law and Chaos, so he would use magics without regard to its origin, only to its efficacy. There are many other philosophers I can name whose ideas make sense but are abhorrent, and all of the ones I have in mind are within a similar time frame to Glorantha (bronze age to iron age). Philosophers in the real world can be very dangerous, even if they don't actually kill or harm anyone themselves (Shang Yang is an example of that): philosophers in Glorantha have the ability to be even more dangerous. To be clear though, I am not arguing for total philosopher extermination, but I will reiterate that these Illuminated philosophers are not all eccentrics. Some of them will be exceedingly dangerous and will know exactly what to say to get other people to agree with them.

I can recommend a number of papers, including The Religious Dimension of Copper Metallurgy in the Southern Levant by Nissim Amzallag; this tome proffers a lot of fertile ideas for metallurgical cults not just in Glorantha, but in any other bronze or iron age world you might be using or writing. Ahmad Al-Jallad's The Religion and Rituals of the Nomads of Pre-Islamic Arabia and his other works on detailing pre-Islamic Arab beliefs are also interesting. I also understand that not everyone likes to read dry books like these. Irving Finkel's lectures on ancient Mesopotamia are a valued resource. Here is a lecture on magic that you can potentially use for inspiration in rituals: Finally, from what I understand he has a historical fiction book set in ancient Assyria. I've not had the chance to read it, but that probably has a lot of insight too. Here's a link to it if anyone's interested.

Cleaning your teeth goes all the way back to Sumeria in 3,500 BC, where they used chew sticks. Semi-regular bathing has been going on for far longer, and since Glorantha is a Bronze Age to early Iron Age world, bathhouses are probably all the rage in places like Esrolia and Peloria (though it must be noted that Roman bathhouses were not clean places, but you can't win it all). I'd imagine the average Gloranthan would have fairly decent teeth, and would probably wash at least once a week. If the Lunars are anything like the Romans, they bathe a lot; the Red Emperor might even be bathing as much as two times a day! As for smelling bad, that's what the perfumes are for. I think any vampire that needs false teeth is probably in some pretty dire straits to get to that point. I'd personally go with enchanted iron and engrave on my teeth, both to make sure I don't lose them and as a statement of my allegiance and wealth. Any discomfort is just the price one has to pay to look good.

The Lunars as I see them are very interested in duels. The empires they have the most similarities to (Babylon, Achaemenid Persia, Rome) all had great duelist traditions. A Yelmite noble might duel himself, but usually he'll have a champion who worships Shargash, Polestar, or another war god in service to Yelm to fight on his behalf. For Alkothi this is probably ritualized where a Yelmite noble calls upon his Alkothi champion to fight on his behalf as Shargash did for Yelm against Umath, complete with painting his champion red (with either blood or paints) and presenting him with darts, a mace, and a spear to kill his enemy with. Most generals in the bronze and iron age did not duel each other and instead sent champions, but when you read heroic literature like the Romance of the Three Kingdoms or the Iliad it becomes the case that a lot of generals, or at least commanding officers, fight each other in duels. Glorantha tends to follow this model with how many people get killed in single combat, so I follow suit and have a lot of commanding officers fight heroically. Even a Yelmite who likes to delegate may have to get his hands dirty at some point, but if someone is meant to be cowardly, bookish, or more of a behind the scenes threat he'll have a horde of champions to throw at his enemies while he makes his retreat. I tend to keep these latter characters at the top of the Lunar command staff, though, and phase them out as the Lunar Empire loses to Argrath or anyone who replaces him. The people closer to the troops are more formidable, while high ranking officers are usually simultaneously both decadent and potent fighters. If a political appointee is too incompetent or too cowardly, he might find himself eating a surfeit of eels or participating in the time honored tradition of his soldiers killing him in camp and replacing him with someone else. Kralorela has a pretty strict caste system in Guide to Glorantha (in general I think there's a lot of interesting things going on with the worldbuilding there), but in my Glorantha there is some degree of caste mobility. Noblemen belong to noble clans which may have members across the empire. These nobles have lands given to them and taken away based on their merits, abilities, and the positions they hold in the imperial court or hereditary titles rarely given out by the Emperor and his magistrates. All of them are literate, and literacy is probably a prerequisite to holding noble status. Noble clans adopt others into them through sacred rituals, but are mainly expanded through marriages and births. A farmer who manages to be ennobled will usually be adopted into an existing clan, but these fortunate few sometimes found their own clans, or in rare cases retain their old clan name by adding the noble prefix to it. For example, if Han-ts'ao were not a noble but became one, he might decide to retain his clan name and call it 'Noble Chi'en' or something else, like 'Fortuitous', 'Uplifted', and so on. In their writing system this translates to adding a new character to the name, but since English doesn't have that feature it's more wordy for us. So you can always tell a noble from his or her clan name, because they don't share clans with commoners. If a noble is demoted to commoner status, he's ejected from the clan and either has to be adopted into a new one or found his own. There are probably a few ex-noble clans that retain close contact with their noble kindred and functionally act as an extended clan. Additionally, every noble clan of great standing has its own character associated with it, so even if you can't read or if you're semi-literate you'll be able to recognize it.

I definitely associate duels with Heortlings the most, but I think Orlanthi hillmen would do it a lot too, if only between each other. After all, Orlanth duels his fair share of gods. One thing I do to differentiate the different Orlanthi duels is think about how willing they are to perform abuscades and when an ambush can be declared dishonorable. Orlanthi fighting against Lunar occupation in Tarsh and further afield are, at least in my view, far more willing to perform silent ambushes than Orlanthi in Heortland or Sartar, who blow horns and make a lot of noise immediately before the charge, which has the added effect of demoralizing the enemy. Either way, I think any Western army led by Men-of-All is going to have a lot of duels before fighting, and I'd place them as the people who love doing it the most in my Glorantha. It's a similar situation with my player characters; the Orlanthi of the party don't really mind their foreigner compatriots (though one of them does not like the troll), but they have to deal with other Orlanthi who aren't so open-minded. I'm glad I could inspire you. There are also generation names which I used for inspiration for part of my Dara Happan naming scheme. My Kralorelans take the name of their clan as a surname, and there are registries of all recognized surnames in the empire. So if our Han-ts'ao from earlier is part of the Chi'en clan, he can rest assured that another Chi'en is related to him in some fashion, and that he can rely on some measure of hospitality from that distant part of the clan. If you are far along the Path of Immanent Mastery and can turn into a draconic humanoid, you'd fear very few men. In any case, I'd imagine that any Kralorelan demanding due obeisance from Orlanthi has a fair sized retinue. These sorts of diplomatic blunders can go any number of ways, from Kralorelan merchants and traveling nobles refraining from imposing their expectations on the Orlanthi to strained meetings, arguments, or open fights. The reverse of it is true too - there would be plenty of opportunities for Orlanthi to antagonize Kralorelan merchants by imposing their own cultural values or traditions on them.

Here are some more ideas I have for Kralorelans and other peoples that right and proper Orlanthi might be suspicious of or dislike: Kralorela has fairly complex etiquette, both inside court and outside of it. A peasant is expected to refer to himself in deprecating fashion when talking to someone who is superior to him in rank. There are different ways of speaking you need to use around superiors and inferiors, and there is practically an entirely different dialect used by inferiors to speak to superiors, and worshipers to gods. Saying "can I have permission to leave?" is straightforward in both Pelorian and Orlanthi cultures (though in Peloria you'd say something like "can I have permission to leave, O Eminence, thou who art like Yelm in wisdom?"), but for a Kralorelan it would translate into "can your most humble servant, who is as an insect before you, obtain permission to leave your august presence?". Mechanically I'd have this as a different knowledge skill, something like 'Formal Kralori', and something all Kralorelans would have at least 30% in. In practical terms, the Kralori version of that question would only be a few words in that language. The response would also be something to the effect of "I, whose radiance is great and whose strength is as a foundation, grant you my vassal permission to leave my great presence". This is effectively a change in etiquette from ancient China, where one had different words to display humility when speaking; the liege is expected to act arrogant and imperious toward his vassal, and act humble and meek before his own liege. Likewise, displays of submission are different depending on rank as well; as an example, a peasant meeting a marquis will only need to bow before him, and won't need to perform proskynesis unless he wanted to demonstrate his loyalty and base nature before him. But that marquis will need to kneel and bow before his lord, and his lord will need to perform increasingly demeaning displays of submission until you kòutóu before the Emperor and his top vassals. In an Orlanthi society, a Kralorelan noblemen expecting Orlanthi to perform proskynesis before him, or to kòutóu to a messenger of the Emperor, would lead to a lot of conflict. At the very least it's weird and demeaning, and at the very most it's demanding absolute submission from a people whose guiding principal is that no one can make them do anything. Likewise, the different ways of speaking would be strange, even alien, and might make an Orlanthi assume they are a servile people or an arrogant one. In either case he'd be sorely mistaken. Some Orlanthi could even make a connection between these displays of submission and those shown to Dara Happan Emperors, and assume that the Kralorelans are Yelmites in fact if not in name. Before battle, Kralorelans have ritual duels - this isn't out of the ordinary anywhere in Genertela. I have these duels occur as a matter of course unless both sides really hate each other, there's an ambush, or the other side knows it will lose the duel and doesn't want to risk a blow to morale. In Kralorela, the duelists and their commanders meet in the middle of the field, where the two warriors declare how many bouts they will take to defeat their enemy (a bout occurs when two enemies on horseback clash with their weapons. If a horseman leaves the clash, that's one bout). Both warriors fight from horseback, with the aim to either kill, maim, or force the enemy to surrender. The two commanders also determine whether the duel's outcome will decide the battle, and they declare how much they will give their champions if they win the duel. This can lead to bidding wars where each commander attempts to one-up the other in showing how generous he is. If the duel goes past the number of bouts each combatant declared it usually ends in a draw. Sometimes, however, the combatants keep fighting until one of them loses. Deciding to end it or keep fighting is not considered dishonorable, but it can be considered foolish, rash, or stupid. This concept could be used both to illustrate how different peoples treat dueling and how this might be perceived in other societies. Names Kralorelans have four to five sets of names: the courtesy name, the generation name, the art name and the milk name are those whose precedents are found in real life. The rune name, on the other hand, is different: as each day, week, season, and god has an associated rune, the rune name is a combination of the runes on someone's day of birth. Here is an example: Han-ts'ao was born on Godday, Stasis Week, Earth Season. Let's assume that Godunya has a holy day that week too. His rune name would therefore be written as , and would be placed next to his name on official censuses and family records. If we assume he was born in 1600, on official and household records that number would be next to his rune name. When he introduces himself to you, you can ask his rune name and you now know what day, week, season, and holy day he was born. This is helpful for rituals, religious ceremonies, and other interactions. If Han-ts'ao was a trader and went to far Esrolia, he might ask a merchant there what her rune name is out of the assumption that everyone else does it. It becomes more complicated if Han-ts'ao's birthday was also the holy day of another deity. Obviously Godunya will take precedent, so we might record his name as (the Man Rune standing in for the personal rune of that god), or we could leave out , as that simplifies matters. Certainly if his clan liked that god, though, it would stay in. If we assume something really out of the ordinary, like four or more deities having that as a holy day, the rune name could be pretty long, especially if it isn't cut down to just . The rune name is important in determining what days are auspicious for activities, and depending on clan, could inform someone's career. Han-ts'ao could find himself earmarked for a career as a priest because his birth coincided with the holy day of Godunya, even if he wanted to be a trader. Likewise, if he were a trader, he'd try to conduct business at least on every Godday, and would organize the most important deals to occur on his birthday. But his birth isn't as auspicious for that as it could be; if he were instead born on Movement Week, Wildday of that same season and year, and his clan either worshiped Issaries or their equivalent to him had that day as a holy day, then he obviously must conduct all important business on that day. In Genertela, Han-ts'ao's insistence on conducting his most important business on that day would be strange, but understandable; after all, you don't want to carry out your deals in Illusion Week, Wildday of that year; that's Eurmal's holy day, and is the best time to deceive or play tricks on people. Conversely, in the Lunar Empire, that's actually a good time to organize it because the Seven Mothers have that as a holy day. This gets even more complicated with Orlanthi in the Lunar Empire; now you have to decide if it's bad luck because it's Eurmal's day, or if it's good luck because it's the day of the Seven Mothers. Does the good luck and bad luck cancel each other out? Some clans certainly think so. But I would refrain from conducting all important business that day, unless it dealt with the Seven Mothers cult. Finally, Han-ts'ao would be able to consult the rune names of his ancestors, and would have vast records of all the ancestors of his clan. So his clan would treat with the ancestors on their birthdays, too, because it is auspicious to do so. Even if someone was born in Disorder Week, Wildday, Dark Season. Though if we assumed that was the holy day of some anti-god or even a Chaos god, perhaps the ancestor would be summoned on a different day. It may even be the case that, in the official records, this ancestor was born at a more pleasant time, like Fertility Week, Clayday of that same season. Conclusion I try to make use of all of this stuff in my own games, but as my players already have a hard enough time adapting to Glorantha's mythology, it's mostly relegated to the activities of NPCs or as flavor. Certainly if they encountered a Kralorelan, depending on the interaction, the rune name and the system of duels could be introduced. This immediately sets up Kralorela as a place that is very different from Genertela, even if it is only a side encounter or an NPC for flavor. The considerations for auspicious days is something I just handle for them. If they want to do a ritual or activity, I suggest the day that's most auspicious for them. It's only when time is a factor that they'll have to worry about whether it's auspicious or not.

I generally cleave closely to established canon, even with things I don't really like (such as ducks), but my Glorantha varies in some notable ways. Notable enough that it would've been a text wall to post it all here, so I'll just post some of my brief ideas and expand from there if anyone's interested in them: When referring to the Red Emperor or the Red Goddess, it is right and proper to turn in the direction of the Red Moon and bow if you can see it. Dara Happan nobles that act unlike Yelm too often or for too long accrue spiritual impurities that they must purify through a ritual bath. They likewise accrue these impurities when they associate too much with barbarians, their inferiors, and impure tradesmen like actors, prostitutes, miners, and so on. Dara Happan nobles have five names, while peasants have three. Nobles also try to time their births to be on the holy days of Yelm, the Red Goddess, or another household patron god. Peasants don't often have the luxury for this sort of planning, but some of them try to do it anyway. Pelorian nobles, generals, and kings have victory stelae built whenever they defeat an enemy. This usually emphasizes the importance of the gods in winning this battle, the absolute victory gained, and the moral and spiritual supremacy of the victors. Ashurbanipal's victory inscriptions are a good starting point for what I think a Pelorian stele would read like. Alkothi Demon-men are descended, at least in part, from demons. These marriages happened so long ago that they have lost their powers and are simply men with great size and physical strength. Heroquests can restore some of them to the power of their distant ancestors. Many Genertelan cultures practice reciprocal gift-giving. Orlanthi exchange arm rings, Dara Happans jewelry, Esrolians necklaces, so on and so forth. A gift must be matched with a gift of equivalent or similar value; a bejeweled spear worth 150 L must be met with a gift of around 150 L. If your gift is worth more than the one you received, it's perceived as lording your wealth over the first gift-giver; if it's worth much less, you'll be seen as greedy, poor, or insulting. It's considered in poor taste to give these gifts without advance warning, and they're given during certain feasts, meetings, ceremonies and holy days. Lunars practice an equivalent to Saturnalia where gifts worth not more than a few coins are exchanged, people drink alcohol in profuse amounts, and all social status is temporarily forgotten for a single day. Nobles mingle with commoners and everyone's worries disappear. Many war cults in Genertela bring out special idols of their gods and place them on chariots pulled by horses, sable antelopes, bison, or other animals to bring good fortune to the battlefield. People leave out offerings to local spirits to appease them. Usually this is leftover food, but more affluent or prosperous households prepare meals for these spirits. Bad luck can be warded off using hand gestures. In Kralorela, you must turn and bow toward the direction of the Emperor's palace when you speak of him. You must also avoid speaking his name and use titles such as 'His Majesty the Emperor', 'the Reigning Emperor', and 'Emperor of the Earth', among others. Kralorelan messengers sent by the Emperor speak with his authority, and all assembled before him must perform proskynesis as he reads the Emperor's message. In a military setting, you only need to kneel and bow your head. The messenger must always position himself so that those who hear him must bow toward the Emperor's palace. Orlanthi hate the practice of proskynesis and decry it as Yelmic tyranny. Orlanthi displays of submission are less ostentatious and demeaning. Orlanthi play games analogous to Brennball and other sports; these have rules that vary from place to place and are rarely formalized. Pelorians have formal ball games, while Pelorian nobles prefer board games similar to the Royal Game of Ur, Senet, Hounds and Jackals, and others. There is a board game called 'Ram and Sun' that is similar to hnefatafl. It's played in Orlanthi societies and is a particular favorite of Lhankor Mhy scholars.