Joerg

Nice catch. Esvuthil might basically be the land dedicated to Thilla. The old essay on horses in Glorantha had a special breed of sered horses associated to Yuthuppa, so there have to be sufficiently dry pastures in Esvuthil. Buserian is by his name and history the Sacrificer of Cattle, so it can be assumed that there will be cattle breeding in the neighborhood of the city. However, I strongly doubt that the Dara Happans have any cities predominantly relying on herds for their sustenance. Farming tends to yield more food per area. If you look at the other nurturers, none of these are associated with a personal grain. Dendara is anything but an agricultural deity, her role is that of wifely fidelity and giving birth to strong sons.

From the look of the Kadeniti section on the activities of the six tribes/founders, the problem arose when the city required an ordered society rather than freeform cooperation of the brothers of the tribes. For some reason tied to the strangeness that is the Menena caste and the Brithos cycle, I don't see an equal proportion of males and females in these original inhabitants of the Kingdom of Logic. According to the Brithos document, goddesses of the land or other features stand in as eligible mates. They inhabited only the capital of the Vadeli over-nation, so it could be argued they didn't form a nation in themselves. It is somewhat interesting that the Vadeli are segregated in nations rather than castes in the Brithos text.

I made two separate claims. One claim: in the Danmalastan cycle, the journey of Vadel would have fallen into the same Age as the Speaking Tour of the Kachasti or the adoption of castes by the Kadeniti. The other claim has the Vadeli as the children of Vadela, who is identified on p.528 as a goddess married by Vimorn. Vadel thus was a demigod - much like Ylream, the first Serpent King. Depends on how you define Golden Age, Storm Age, and their overlap. The Birth of Umath did not end the Golden Age - the slaying of the Emperor did. The Birth of Umath did start the Storm Age, which had the Vadrudi "wife-takings" of which Aerlit's marriage to Warera is an example of consensual congress after a stormy start. Finally, I stress the fact that the Vadeli are pre-existing in Brithos when Aerlitsson arrives, autochthonous population. Much like the Likiti in Seshnela. While the arrival of Aerlitsson clearly is Storm Age as per the definition of my previous paragraph, it probably also is Golden Age as per the definition before that. RM states that the abode of the Blue Vadeli atop Dora's Hills became the Vadeli Isles. (RM p.25) The text states that before the Great Darkness the Blue Vadeli were exterminated except for a few survivors on Dora's Hills. The war went on: The death of the Brithini King would have been what made Froalar and his followers emigrate to Frowal, leaving his brother Hoalar to rule Brithos uncontested. What exactly defines Brithos? The land goddess Britha. Nothing in the definition requires Brithos to be an island. (Unlike Thinobutu, which started out as an island in a region that was mythically all dry land before the children of Sshorg attacked.) I could agree with this. Kachasti and/or Enrovalini. The God Learners had a third text as their truth, the Abiding Book, which also recounts these events. It specifically mentions the Enrovalini as the folk living with Zzabur. Note that the Malkioni are not the descendants of the people who followed Malkion on his Expulsion Walk - all Dawn Age Malkioni settlements are exiles of Zzabur's Brithos. With the possible exception of the Ingareens, who may have been followers of Malkion who lost faith when Malkion faced Death. However, the Danmalastan cycle (RM p.14) states that the masses of peoples were all changed, and divided into two monster armies. Only the Brithini lands were spared. I see three separate texts - one with Zzabur the Erasanchula as the mastermind (the Danmalastan cycle), one with Zzabur the son of Malkion the Founder as a major agent, but not acting independently from the Brithini King (the Brithos cycle), and the Abiding Book with its own text how Malkion created the world, with Makanism firmly entrenched. The texts have different temporal focus and scope - I think we are in agreement there. The Danmalastan cycle stays silent about goddesses like Britha or Vadela. A major difference IMO. Once cycle has Danmalastan as its setting, the other Brithos. Zzabur speaks way too much in either cycle. The Brithos stuff has all the henotheist mixing and mingling with goddesses that the Danmalastan Zzabur Says ignores. That's referring to the "Father of the Castes" myth, which exists in a number of versions. Zzabur says places Zzabur way above the progenitors of the other castes, claiming Malkion of the Second Action as his progenitor, Malkion of Third action as his brother, and Malkion of the Fourth Action as his nephew. While Zzabur is the only one of the four caste archetypes still alive at the Dawn, they (like Froalar's father, Talar) are regarded as the same generation, and the Zzabur encountered by Hrestol is expected to heed the decisions of the ruling Talar of Brithos. Zzabur Says doesn't indicate even a single consultation with others. In other words, post-Dawn Zzabur of Brithos is a mere shadow of the Mary Sue of Zzabur Says.

Find someone sufficiently high in the Lunar hierarchy to warrant a bodyguard and convince that person that she has urgent business near Dorastor, then act as the bodyguard. Or for way more fun, enlist as dart competition black ops team in exchange for passage.

I think we have left the relevance for Fonritian culture, so here's a new thread. Kumanku lies roughly on the diagonal from the Spike/Magasta's Pool to the southwestern corner of the earth, so yes, this corresponds to the extent of the Vyimorni lands in the Danmalastan mythic cycle. I used to argue that way, too, but I was told by Jeff that this material still is canonical and true. Malkion Aerlitsson and his marriage to Britha to father the Dronar caste/race still is a mystical truth that could be encountered in Godtime. Hence my concept of two separate nevertheless true mythical cycles. The Danmalastan cycle does lead into refuge at Brithos, though well past the Storm Age, after the Ice Age, whereas the Malkion Aerlitsson stuff is early Storm or late Golden Age, before the ice came. Note that the geographical detail gives a good position for the Vadeli Isles in relation to Brithos. I am aware that RM offers a map where Vadeli from Endernef move into Enrovalini Zerendel, so they might have occupied those lands during that phase of their conquest of Danmalastan. I don't think that the island of Brithos that was present until the Closing contained either the Citadel of Thought or the Kadeniti City. It was a highland refuge for the survivors of the Zerendel rout, before Zzabur sent his blast and sunk all the lost lands. There is also another issue - in the Danmalastan cycle, we get a Zzabur who claims to be an Erasanchula. In the Brithos cycle, we encounter Zzabur son of Malkion, or more specifically, son of Malkion the Founder, the epitome of the Malkioni sorcerer/wizard caste. Zzabur the Erasanchula is a Rune Owner, on par with the Greater Gods (whom he calls False Gods) of Glorantha, if maybe not quite on par with the gods of the Celestial Court (who would be Second Action entities - forms and shapes etc.). The Zzabur rune is not one of the core runes of Glorantha, and Zzabur is notable for using Malkion's Law Rune from among the Core Runes to access his magic. Zzabur the Wizard Caste ancestor is an aspect of Zzabur, born to Malkion as one of three sons of that wife (according to the Brithos myth, which gives Britha as separate mother of Dronar), or as one of four sons of a single wife. The footnote 3 on p.8 of RM states that these are the peoples' stories, all of them magically true and valid (up to a certain extent of dissection, which is where we are maneuvering here). The Brithos cycle is relevant because it is the cycle that Froalar and his emigration group and the other groups from the same period carried to Seshnela and Fronela, The Waertagi stories are similar, but stress e.g. the caste-less status of Waertag, a notion that is absent from the Brithos cycle. The Invisible God is a catch-phrase including the Brithini concept of (Malkion) the Creator. This doesn't mean that the Brithini use this catch-phrase, or that they agree with it. The Zzabur text on the Danmalastan cycle has a quite different target audience than the introductory texts of the Guide, and avoids the "aerial view" generalisations that characterize the Guide with its intention as a complete, canonical and universal introductory document, if only at that distant level of generalisation. This implies less well-defined use of catch-phrases, and if these catch-phrases are absent from documents going into deep details, my assumption is that they aren't useful any more at that level of discussion. Brithini spokesman; "We acknowledge the Creator, the First Cause. We don't venerate it, and we wouldn't accept it as a god, whether visible or not. Gods are erasanchula who failed ..." "Zzabur is responsible for shaping the essentials of Western thought" - he set down the logical syntax through which the Brithini and their mortal successors analyze the worlds. "and determining the way in which Malkion and the Invisible God were originally understood." Malkion - a devolving entity, shedding aspects of the Absolute while attaining more and more definition. Zzabur the Erasanchula can perceive the First World of unicates, collectively called the Erasanchula, and he can perceive a stage of Malkion causing this, and a stage of Malkion within this framework, more defined than the previous stage. Malkion is the Agent, the Cause, and what happens are the Actions. Malkion in the First Action is the Creator, and becomes something else through the Action. The Zzabur text doesn't name this Creator entity the Invisible God, but Ferbrith, then Kiona, or Sevey. The Guide is written for people who have not (yet) read stuff like Revealed Mythologies or other deep explorations, even though a considerable portion of the initial buyers had done so before. "The Invisible God" is possibly the least confusing description for a pre-entity not known by that name by the Brithini, or possibly anyone else. All stages of the Agent causing the Action are Malkion in his devolutions - even the Agent prior to the First Action. Which may mean that Malkion is a word for "The Agent", and his position between the Actions is indicated by epithets like "the Seer" which applies to the Erasanchula stage in the First World, before Danmalastan. "All Malkioni schools of wizardry are ultimately derived from Zzabur's sorcery." Which details the hows and whys of the magical domination of the material world. (Revealed Mythologies does mention the Invisible God. After it first mentions Makan, in connection to Serovos of Jrustela and the revelation of The Abiding Book.) So: Brithini philosophy is Zzabur's philosophy. It has a world view which is described as Materialist (even though it is mainly obsessed with intellect and energies rather than with matter, unlike the Mostali philosophy) and Humanist - all the Actions are centered on the Agent who doubles as ancestor of the Westerners, and since they are humans, this ancestor is an elevated part of humanity, too. The First World is a primeval realm of concepts and shapes, aka runes, without duplicates. One description is as an intellectual space of concepts, but that is likely little more than a projection of that realm onto something mortal minds might grasp at. Danmalastan is the realm of Duplication and Multiplication, and starts out as a philosophical state as well. In the HQ1 canon, this started out as a purely essential realm before colliding with the Theist/Animist complex, whereupon it becomes a place on the earth of Glorantha that interacts with its neighbors. The HQG canon doesn't exactly state whether, when and how the philosophical realm of Duplication and Multiplication and homeland of the Westerners became such. We learn of the existence of Six Tribes of Danmalastan, among these the Waertagi, one of three tribes moving out of Danmalastan, at least partially. The Waertagi take to the ocean off to the west, the Kachasti enter into Gennerela/Genertela, and one of the Vyimorni, Vadel, enters Bamatela. Tadeniti, Kadeniti and Enrolvalini remain in place in their assigned sixths of their triangular realm, Now we can map places on the surface of Glorantha's earth (or its sea-bottoms) to locations on Danmalastan. A few of these can be identified on a modern map of Glorantha, like Magnetic Mountain on Curustus in Jrustela, or Mt. Ladaral as the foundation of Sogolotha Mambrola in Fronela. Hence the possibility of identifying at least parts of Kumanku with the fringes of the Vyimorni lands on Danmalastan. There is the possibility of correspondence. The strange thing about the Vyimorni is that they disappear from the record even before the Golden Age, except for the offspring of Vadel. It is almost as if they are a thought construct to justify their presence in the philosophical realm of Danmalastan. Caste is strangely almost a side-issue in Danmalastan. The Six (minus one) Tribes are way more prominent in defining the proto-Brithini activities (or lack thereof). The tribes start of as six Green Age to Golden Age defining activities: Writing (Tadeniti), (planned) Building (Kadeniti), Reasoning (Enrolvalini, and huh?), Sailing (Waertagi), Speaking (Kachasti) and Discovering (Vyimorni). Like everyone else, their archetypal ancestor each is named a son of Malkion, only to be forgotten among his folk, with the sole exception of Waertag. (Some Real World Gloranthan scholars have their suspicions about the Speaking and Writing founders...) The first of any caste-defining names (other than Zzabur) mentioned in the text. And note how carefully Zzabur places himself outside of that command. The caste definitions follow a page later, only in the Kadeniti context, past the founding of the Land of Logic and giving command over it to Talar. There is no indication that this concept applies to the other tribes in the same way at this point, and the Guide gets explicit that Waertag never was affected by this even though he did spend some time in the Kadeniti city (verbatim: "at the courts of Danmalastan"). Horal appears outside of the presentation of the Kadeniti castes as defender against the Mostali retribution against theft of the Energy Prison, who pushed the mostali forces (which may have consisted of mostali constructs rather than actual mostali - they sound like the very definition of gremlins and gobblers) back into Mostal's Mountain. Only on p.15 - well into the Storm Age - we learn of three of the castes among the Kachasti, in the Vadeli war. In fact, we never learn whether the Tadeniti had castes, or whether the Enrovalini were subject to castes. From their tribal description, they all would have been philosophers, hence treading zzaburi territory. Or both Vadel's and the Kachasti expeditions predated most of Zzabur's wars. The Kachasti Speaking Tour leaving Danmalastan for Gennerela is mentioned for the Golden Age activities of the Six Tribes. Do you have any reason to assume that the expedition of the hypothetical Vadel the Vyimorni into Bamatela was significantly later, after the war of the Directional Lords aka First Rebellion? p.11 - Vadel Fights Bamat - holds quite a few gems, like e.g. the mindless victims of the Energy Complex encounter which staggered away all across the world, spreading terror. (Reads like a good fit for YarGan...) In his fight with Bamat, Vadel still acts as the long arm of Zzabur - he receives the Energy Prison copy of the Mostali device through Zzabur's intervention, and this device became his main weapon in this prolonged conflict. One might say that Maseren Vadel in this myth is but an aspect of the Paseren Zzabur dealing with the southern Directional Lord in the course of the Early Rebellion. Who exactly put an end to the Vadeli lording over Chir (equated with Fonrit) and Poto (possibly the Tarien side of the Nargan Sea)? Poto is sufficiently far south that the sky spill may have burnt it away. The fact that the Dawn Age population of former Chir were the Blues makes it likely that the Veldang somehow overcame whichever Vadeli presence might have been left, possibly with help from allied Chaos powers.

This feeding for rebirth looks quite a bit different from what I sort of expected - that the queen would dislocate her lower jar grotesquely and swallow the rebirthee more or less whole. But then the rebirth brings back only part of the previous entity, so getting chewed up may be good enough. I wonder what she does with the bones.

So you are one of those people who confuse "martial arts" with "unarmed combat"? Musashi was a martial artist. The Kralori ones wield weapons, too, check the illustrations on pages 265 and 266.

Froalar was a Brithini, and so was Hrestol, when they emigrated to what became Frowal. It isn't quite irrelevant how they had their state organized. The Abiding Book "wrote itself" by a hand of magic after there had been deliiberations and debate among the wizards and monastic orders of Jrustela, in a time when the homeland their ancestors two or three generations ago had left in imitation of Froalar was ruled by vile Tanisorans, under the influence of the Stygian Autarchy. Would I be very wrong if I said that the previous activity and the conclaves summoned that Hand of the Invisible God? Through their sorcery? Actually, I don't. I am basing this on the same sources Nick and David used when designing that Malkioni sect. The outcome is more or less the same, though. There are no published sources how the Seshnegi practised caste before the Abiding Book except for the short legend below the depiction of King Ylream, which does mention quite a few characters and their ranks from early writings on the West. Parts of my source have been published since, others (the novella part) still haven't, and probably won't see widespread publication, either. Arkat was not your typical student, but a prodigy - he mastered the Horali trade in years rather than centuries. "All the crafts" is the equivalent for "trade of the farmer". As a Horali with years of training and campaigning under his belt, I don't expect him to have to do little more than demonstrate his ability there. I am more concerned about his acquisition of the noble arts (like e.g. horsemanship). But still, the early companions of Hrestol spent a few years before qualifying as men-of-all, too. I don't have information when exactly Hrestol himself started on his concept. Horali may not be any kind of ruling nobility, but they are one of the three minority castes. Samurai, yeomen, hirdmen, Some of the chosen few privileged for their contribution in their field, just like wizards or judges. The Horali soldiers saw little if any mention in the Hedenveld (sp?) text. That Sir Hedenveld was a petty talar-class Rokari noble rather than a Man-at-Arms. The text is pretty clear about the Horali caste roles - some are medium cavalry, the others are heavy infantry and/or missile troops. There don't appear to be mounted missile troops in Tanisor, but I expect those in Ralios - javelins at least, possibly bows. The text tells us nothing about ownership of a warrior's equipment, housing, or who exactly provides their food. Property laws in general aren't clear. I learned about the Valkarist hereditary caste practices in this section of the Guide. For God Forgot we have meagre information about their apparently ageless zzabur caste. The Esvulari are detailed later, as three endogamous castes without a Horali caste - all Aeolians are warriors when needed, pretty much like the theists around them. Serfs are mentioned only rarely elsewhere in the Guide, too - describing Vendref, indentured Carmanian Lodrili, and a comparison of elevated Fonritian slaves with serfs in "barbarian lands". There still is a difference between affluent and influential burghers and drudging field workers. We don't know who owns and assigns this access to arable land, housing, animal husbandry, tools, or even clothes. Concepts of property wiil differ from our modern experiences. Getting this across to players and narrators might be the biggest "Bronze Age" hurdle.

I wonder how "Malkioni" the Tanisorans are in their ancestry, and how well that preserves their (rather diminutive) stature, when there are so many Hykimi and Chthonic influences. The Malkioni schools entering into the Hero Wars are all heavily modified versions. The Waertagi version might be the best approximation to an original version that includes worship or veneration rather than atheism. Zzabur appears to have demonized all forms of veneration (except possibly of himself). Brithini Talars have been in charge of Horali operations since before Time. An observation about the need for a warrior caste - does this make more sense for the Late Golden Age, or for the onset of the Storm Age? This comes down to the question what business does a general have on the front line? Leadership by example is the job of Horali champions or Men-of-all. Only by the dissolution of the Men-of-all was the opener for the Kshatriya combination of noble and warrior. I am thinking about kshatryan cavalry here rather than anything European middle ages. I wonder how closely related the Tanisorans are to the Brithini who first settled Frowal and expanded from there. There is a chance that descendants of emigrants to Jrustela during Nralar's reign returned to the area during the Return to Rightness crusade, but otherwise I would expect the majority of the population to be descendants of the people of the Vampire Kings and of the Enerali. When Old Seshnela drowned, a majority of the original families will have been hit before they could seek refuge on higher land, and I guess that side effects like tidal waves drowned many more. The old, pagan-tainted places in the western highlands appear to have been sparsely populated at best, and for some reason or other these lands appear to have been abandoned even after the lands stopped sinking. The former eastern fringe became the new heartlands of Seshnela. The last wave of Brithini emigrants appears to have gone to Jrustela rather than Seshnela, so that this blood refresh was lost in the Closing and the drowning of Jrustela. So how comes that the Seshnegi remained so short? Can't be their diet, from the text I get the impression that Seshnegi peasants eat better than warriors or bureaucrats in Peloria. I really like how you make the Rokari wizards' celibacy an admission of their inadequate ancestry. I wonder how much they select their wizards in training for physical characteristics... Yes - seeing the Rokari way presented as the standard way goes a gainst my grain, and then some. But then I probably spent too much time thinking about henotheist Malkioni in Ralios and elsewhere.

Who does so? The Lunar sieges and assaults focussed on ramps or grapples to overcome the walls, and to negate the spirits inside which might have hindered the climb. No city walls were destroyed at Runegate, Boldhome, Whitewall, Karse, or anywhere else in Fazzur's campaign. The Seshnegi conquests in Ralios might benefit from such things, but again, no major city or castle had its walls destroyed this way. Neither do any Ralian condottieri appear to use such equipment. The Kralori have a choice between technology and dragons, They choose the more efficient approach - dragons. Fonritians use Vadeli sorcery or elephants. The Ballista is well-documented in the Dragon Pass and Zola Fel area - basically a horizontal bow, the one in Harpoon upscaled in the EWF/God Learner era. It is an anti-ship or anti-monster weapon, not a siege engine, though.

Triremes are a quite advanced form of rowed ships, and rowing is quite a progress compared to paddling. When it comes to seaworthiness on the Atlantic, primitive oxhide on a wicker frame carried Irish monks to Iceland, and St. Brennan to the Islands of Youth. Venetian galleys made reliable voyages across the Atlantic to Brugues, and Phoenician biremes maintained contact with the tin and gold mines of Cornwall from Cadiz. The ship shape of the Hjortspring boat dominated naval travel in the northern Atlantic and the Baltic for possibly two millennia, if those rock engravings in Scandinavia were dated correctly. (Beats me how you date such engravings, btw.) Those things were paddled just like the outrigger dugouts of the Polynesians. The so-called cross-bow as wielded by Brithini horali and possibly their distant Malkioni kin. Scaling up is hard. I don't think that there are siege engines using torsion. The trebuchet is an up-scaled staff sling, but I don't know which culture would use those. Wall-destroying siegework is done by magically powered rams, or ramming by giants or giant animals, and most commonly by liberal use of earth elementals for sapping. I haven't seen evidence for Glorantha, either, with the possible exception of the Mostali. We know of the Cannon cult (but we don't know how many cannons this cult tends to) as a weapon capable of damaging a stone wall, or the devastating hail of moonrock summoned by the Crater Makers. The most efficient anti-fortification unit are the Earthshakers with their exotic magic in the Dragon Pass boardgame. Depends on how they are conserved. Rhyming provides excellent mnenonics and preserves such oral traditions quite faithfully. At least that's what Snorri Sturlason based his use of skaldic quotes in the Heimskringla. I doubt it. They could have preserved the knowledge in Linear A, and neither we nor any of their descendants could make sense of that. Without a living tradition, the purpose of these structures becomes irrelevant to the successors. They may assign such places or items a new meaning in their lives - apparently that is what happened to the more durable astronomic tools like the Sky Disk of Nebra or the stone rings of Stonehenge. Certain megalith dolmen were covered with dozens of small votive pits (in the roof rock), probably used as votive altars, in the local Bronze Age. Mound graves became fairy hills, whether in Slavic Germany or in Ireland. All these new uses had meaning, but none had the original meaning. The decimation of the mound builders may have been so bad that those structures may have been regarded as cursed, and therefore abandoned and wilfully forgotten. Much like the Nebra Sky Disk was buried after its second period of use simply as a display of power, without regard to the astronomical meaning which had made the artifact so valuable to its creators, and even that display fell sour at some time, or sacrificing this to the gods was regarded as more helpful than continued display of the item. If the people survive in sufficient proximity to the location, their tales will tell at least a variant of the original purpose, unless they choose not to talk about it any more.

Wandering swordspeople are among the lowest regarded, whereas martial mystics receive the utmost respect. How do the Kralori determine the difference?

Western Culture: A strange mix of generalizations and specifics about the Rokari, with occasional mentions of the Loskalmi doing things differently. Neither fish nor fowl, really. Looking at the population numbers for westerners, it appears like the Fronelan Malkioni outnumber the Seshnegi and Ralian Malkioni combined by a small margin, but I guess that these numbers are more or less simple summations of the populations of countries that have at least some Malkioni groups, especially when it comes to Fronela outside of Loskalm. On the other hand, probably less than half the Ralian Malkioni are orthodox Rokari, and in Seshnela there are occasional holdovers of pre-Rokari Hrestolism, not just in the Castle Coast, but also in Pithdaros. Ralian Arkati places appear to have been left out of those numbers, too, as are the East Isles Valkarists who are mentioned later. “The talars are the rulers, administrators, governors, generals, and merchant-princes. They are trained in horsemanship, combat, wrestling, music, and poetry ...” I have no problem at all with the first sentence in that quote, but the second sentence is wrong about the combat training as far as Malkioni in general are concerned. Talars trained in combat goes against the principles of Malkionism. Talars serving among the military trained for self-defence risk their immortality (at the price of possibly prolonging their mortal lives) among the Brithini, even if they restrict themselves to bashing scepters and throwing crowns (aka maces and throwing stars). Why not add trident “jousting standards”? Anyway, traditionally the talar caste has no business taking up weapons. In the old Hrestoli school, they were encouraged to become men-of-all, though, combining the horse riding privilege of the Talar caste with the combat skills of the Horal caste, the magic of the Zzabur caste and the horsekeeping skills of the Dronar caste. Qualification as a Man-of-all was socially mandated by any vigorous ruling Talar, and opened the way to the mock-martial world of tournaments and the martial realities of warfare as elite fighters. The Rokari reforms changed that. They did away with the special status of “Man of all”, encroaching on the Zzabur caste privilege of mastering sorcery. In order to win the Talar caste, they granted them all the other privileges of the Men-of-all per default, and did similarly to the Horal caste elite who also provided significant numbers to the Men-of-all in the older Hrestoli ways. They elevated the Horali to a warrior nobility, and even allowed then to join their cavalry, although much less protected, or to wear the heavy protection of the traditional Horal caste as heavy foot soldiers, in turn supported by peasant auxiliary with light or improvised weaponry and armor at best. The treatment of the old, pre-Rokari Hrestoli ways which forms the basis for all Malkionism outside of the Kingdoms of Tanisor and Loskalm as “the old God Learner ways” is misleading and in many cases wrong. Caste rigidity: Apart from Siglat’s “progression through the Castes” or the old Hrestoli ways of becoming a man-of-all, Malkioni castes are for life, once they have been assigned. The Rokari school of Malkionism has destroyed most hereditary wizard orders within their reach. I wonder what the hereditary wizard caste families did when Bailifes supported Mardron in abolishing the Zzabur caste as a self-perpetuating caste. It isn’t entirely clear how the old Brithini castes were assigned, or what the ancient Menena mating rules consisted of. It appears that the Dawn Age Malkioni had a hereditary wizard caste, possibly with a “breeding group” with comparably low magical responsibility and an adept group with reduced breeding (and training) duties but strong magical involvement. If we look an non-orthodox Malkioni, we find hereditary wizard castes both in almost-Brithini style God Forgot and among the Esvulari, and among the Valkarists. I would bet that this applies to the Castle Coast as well, and that something like this is tacitly practiced in southern Tanisor, Nolos, Pasos, and particularly Pithdaros. Rokari wizards appoint suitable candidates from other castes. I have the suspicion that many southerners obeyed the words of Rokari laws by assigning their former non-specialized breeder cast members into a cosy non-wizard subcaste and choose their successors practically exclusively from this breeding pool, whereas the orthodox and zealous Rokari of Rindland and northern Tanisor practice the only other form of “meritocracy” besides the Loskalmi system and the men-of-all when testing prospective Zzabur caste members for ability regardless of their paternal castes. I wonder whether they can afford to override Rokari Talar caste offspring for a wizard career – possibly only with second, third or even later sons. It isn’t quite clear whether such Rokari Zzabur caste appointees retain their house names and allegiances. If they do, the Talar houses would have a vested interest to push at least a few of their boys into a wizard career in order to have inside influence in the matters of Zzabur caste decisions and information. On the matter of stature - I suppose that there may be some magic involved, also in growing the appropriate beard. The Dronar caste in Rokari society appears to be split into enfranchised urban citizens amassing wealth through respected trades who take an active role in decision making, and impoverished serf peasants, bereft of any influence or voice towards the other castes. If you want to be cynical, the Loskalmi Dronar caste is similar, with some Dronar caste folk actively (and predominantly) training for advancement while other Dronar caste folk jjust do their drudge work without any perspective to rise in the ranks of New Hrestoli Idealism. The old way instituted by Malkion had descision-making as both privilege and burden of the Talar caste, and the Talar caste only. However, reading Revealed Mythologies, this was led ad absurdum by the conduct of Zzabur. The Malkioni of Danmalastan and the Brithini of Brithos appear to have had a caste of Talar bureaucrats administrating the whims of the Sorcerer Supreme, rather than a caste of Talar rulers who directed the wizards to their tasks, specifying the magics to be employed. (Which is, of course, an organizational nightmare closerly resembling modern day as well as historial forms of government.) The Sorcerer Supreme appears to have had unlimited budget and judgement. Possibly advising his Talar appointee exactly when to authorize exactly what activity. (Yes, Minister…) Reading apocryphal texts on Greg’s early ideas on Malkionism, it isn’t exactly clear when Froalar and his family and followers left Brithos. Prince Hrestol has referred to Talar as his grandfather, suggesting that he and his sister had a long “youth” as Brithini before emigrating into the mortal world. If so, Dawn Age pure-blood Malkioni may have had life expectancies of centuries, barring attrition through warfare (a frequent occurrence) or diseases and hunger. It is therefore hard to say when and how the early Malkioni settlers before the Dawn may have changed their caste and breeding behavior vs. the Brithini practices like in Arolanit or on Brithos proper. Froalar’s marriage to Seshna Likita and the subsequent dynasty of Serpent Kings appears to have initiated a wave of adoptions and conversions of previously non-Malkioni into fully assimilated Seshnegi caste members, whether of Pendali lion man stock, Likiti earth folk stock, or even theists frum further away. There also appear to have been more magical marriages to goddesses of the land or the forests (nymphs or dryads) in order to establish sovereignty. This may have been mitigated by the earlier Kachisti having been absorbed by the beast- or deity-descended humans of the Genertelan west either fleeing from the Vadeli uprising, or released from Vadeli servitude when e..g the Bull folk of Pelanda destroyed Yargan. Malkioni skin coloration: while several of the old texts describe the Brithini in the hues of the rainbow (hence the castes’ color correlations), other texts especially dealing with Second Age migrations from Brithos to Seshnela and Jrustela, or the encounters of Aftal the Waertagi with people supposedly of wester descent, describe these folk as pale-skinned. Must voluntarily participate - is this scathing sarcasm, or just unlucky phrasing?

IMO the Arc transforms into the city of Yuthuppa. Sure, the major representative buildings still need to be erected from fired mud bricks, but the overall layout and function based on a reflection of the sky world may already be a feature of the Ark's hull as it falls or lays down providing the layout for the city. Thilla is mentioned under minor deities, alongside fairly heavy weights like Dendara, Entekos and Erissa. She is the Keeper of the Earth, not quite a land goddess/sovereignty goddess. But then, Brighteye (young Yelm when he usurped Emperorship from the White Goddess) did away with all that stuff linking the women to sovereignty. Brighteye takes his authority from the sky, and burns dissidents away. That icky fertility stuff is left to the urban orb deities like Raibamus, Alkor or Yuthu and their consorts, or to Lodril and Oria off in the fields, and it has nothing to do with the principle of Measured Command from Above, the literal translation of Denseb, the Dara Happan term for Justice (and by extension, soverignty). On the Gods Wall, Thilla is another name for Oropum on 1-25, one of three deities in the same costume in the top row (at the end of it), besides a separate mention as position 12 in the third row (and heavily criticized in the comment). Looks like Plentonius was confused about this. Herustana doesn't appear on the Gods Wall, and how should she when her husband Anaxial doesn't, either. GRoY has lists of its poleis "bessed by <male deity>, nurtured by <female deitiy>". Yuthuppa first appears in Anaxial's Septopolis, inserted on the Oslir River between Raibanth and Verapur, and receives Buserian as the blessing deity and Thilla as the nurturing goddess. Note that the blessing deity is a much heavier caliber than the orb of the city god. Antirius gets to hang overhead Raibamus, and Shargash overshadows Alkor. Thilla is mentioned in the company of Lesilla, Avarnia, Dendara, Gamara and an unknown goddess for Elempur.

Despite having been told not to read forward, I had a look at the Fonrit places, and I have come to the conclusion that pulling the Pujaleg kalkus who demand significant amounts of human sacrifice from ruling parts of Banamba and replacing the Eunuch Priest of Ikadz as ruler of Goan (also relying on Pujaleg mercenary guards), nothing the Wolf Pirates can do for drunken fun can be any worse than the current regime, not even a full-fledged rage of the bear god. So, to the majority of the people in Laskal, Harrek is a volatile but distant ruler whose activities have freed them from the ongoing predation by vile Pujaleg rites. While the Masarins may be moaning about their comforts being taken by those uncouth foreigners, many of them had been suffering from the reigns of the kalku worse than that. On the whole, Harrek's reign over Goan and the huge territory of Banamba (easily the size of Kethaela and Maniria outside of Ramalia combined, and a population the size of the Lunar Provinces) can be seen as benevolent just by comparing to the previous regime if he doesn't do anything but punish anyone taking something away from his possession. Having a population of better than a million people at his beck from whichever palace in Goan he might decide to grace with his destructive presence is a good way to spend time between plundering the surrounding lands. A raider's paradise, especially when comparing to his previous abode on the Threestep Isles.

Bronze Age societies didn't have triremes or multiple sail rigging on their masts. The horizontal bow isn't that far away from the ordinary bow, and that was found in the late mesolithic hunter culture of the Ahrensburg reindeer hunters, a little more than a millennium after their introduction of an atlatl-like harpoon-thrower device (and that was used shortly after the glaciers gave way in that region of northern Germany). Little surprise - the Evangelists came from a culture that had experienced two centuries of hellenistic Seleucid rule, in addition to their Hebrew traditions. They wrote their holy texts in Greek. If I look at the literature I had to read in order to learn Latin I am not surprised that Hesiod's theories were familiar to the authors of the New Testament. Why would this seem odd when a significant portion of the technologically most advanced civilisation on this planet calculates the age of this world by summing up the years of the biblical fathers since Adam, not allowing for generational overlap? Makes me wonder whether we should add another 9 months to each of these life-spans for a death-bed conception of the next generation... This form of biased thought experiment is mistaken for science even by people who should know better, having a so-called scientific education, and not limited to Creationism but to other fields of science. It may be a side effect of P-value worship... I find it quite amusing that debunked early theories like the Phlogiston-theory or Ether as the medium in space find a return into serious science in the shape of energy equals mass times the speed of light squared, or vacuum energy and dark matter. If you have read "The Science of the Diskworld", you will be familiar with the concept of "lies for children". As we progress through our understanding of scientific phenomena, we constantly change the narrative explaining the how and why. Allegories from myths are as good a starting point for this journey as are false parallels - and you will encounter more of those when explaining natural phenomena than you will describing Gloranthan cultures using historical cultures from our world. A good story makes a good mnenonic. As an educational tool, this is invaluable. However, it is as invaluable to teach critical thinking, questioning the narratives you have been served, comparing them to your observations. One way time travel forward, only. Basically a myth of hibernation, found in other myths as well. How long did Odysseus enjoy the company of Circe, a full year? How long with Calliope? Seven years passed in the outer world, but in effect their affair may have been quite timeless. The sleeping king or hero is a common trope, whether Artus, Friedrich Barbarossa, or Tannhäuser, and probably countless others. Likewise the Einheriar of Asgard. Few magical traditions of Glorantha rely on written documents. Rites remaining unanswered may fall out of practice, but may still remain in the oral tradition lore. Which gods exactly were fed to that rite? Was it a local effect, like the slaying of the God of the Silver Feet which entrapped Fronela into the Syndics' Ban, but only Fronela, or like the Windstop that didn't affect the Solanthi or the Talastari Orlanthi at all? All we have is one cryptic document in King of Sartar, and a thoroughly vague local future history that mentions Cliffhome and Nochet, but no other lands outside of this range. For all we know, Genert's Garden could be in full bloom just across the Zola Fel River, and Prax could be a Redwood savannah at the time of Zin writing and receiving his letters. The continued existence of Nochet suggests that at least some form of record-keeping survived even through the Illiteracy.

Herustana presumably was in charge of feeding the people and beasts on the Ark during the Flood, and her magics might still apply for the confines of the city of Yuthuppa. I read some of the passages from the Ark myths in GRoY that the Ark had an arboretum, and possibly a garden of potted plants as well. This would mean that the metropolis of Yuthuppa may have some horticulture terraces atop lower tier roofs of vaguely ziggurat-like domicils. Thilla does fulfill the land goddess tasks - from the text I would guess for significant parts of Peloria in general, and for the surrounds of Yuthuppa in particular. Given its position smack-dash in the rice-growing area of Peloria, I expect paddies with a few dam ways in between, interrupted by canals for boating, and a few broad roads that may even accommodate gazzam (even though Yuthuppa is the newest of the three Tripolis metropolises - Raibanth has roads that have trembled under the footsteps of Gazzam carrying howdas or heavy loads).

Possible, but I would rather have Alkoth's otherworldly interior adapt to spatial needs than its imposing outside. Given the martial nature of the city, there will be training or at least mustering grounds inside those walls, too. The Green City might even have pleasant parks around its huge bonehouse enclosures, which I suspect extend deeply underground and into the Underworld of the Shadzoring demons who ruled much of the surface world during the Darkness and the Gray Age. If we are to believe the Enclosure magazine write-up, the interior of Alkoth qualifies as not quite of the Surface world. While the metropolis has a semblance of normal surface world life, there may be initiation rites to undergo upon entering the city, at least for first-time visitors, which basically are a ritual death. The outside has areas reserved for martial training and as open fields of fire in case of sieges before giving way to the rice paddies of the normal folk of Henjarl who hold their ruling metropolis in a mixture of awe and fear. Alkoth has been besieged for a significant fraction of its existence in Time - in sum at least a century - but never been taken by military means (or by starvation).

Think spokes on a wheel, or the framework of a yurt, with concentric circular roads and radiating roads. The Dara Happans classify their sky this way, and since the city of Yuthuppa is supposed to reflect the sky framework on the ground, this description captures that celestial layout quite well. (I am not sure whether the stars of the celestial city obey such a pattern, but that may just as well be a reflection of the emperor's court protocol rather than an arrangement of buildings.) The city wall of Alkoth is a perfect circle of green jade, presumably the armring of Shargash. This means that the size of Alkoth has remained constant throughout the ages. The walls of Raibanth are broken in three places by the rivers joining here. Yuthuppa should have a circular wall for the reasons above. Glamour probably has a semicircular wall, with its back to the Crater.

Zzabur claims that the Vadeli are a Malkioni offshoot in the Danmalastan mythic cycle of Malkionism. The Brithos mythic cycle which names gods as ancestors has the Vadeli as autochthonous population of Brithos when Malkion Aerlitsson arrives and creates the Castes through his marriages and sons. (There are two quite distinct origin tales of the Malkioni, and both are true. The Brithos mythic cycle is that related e.g. by the Waertagi, and it integrates the gods with their names known in the west with their origin. Those names were used as the "False Gods" in the old Prosopaedia, and they turn out to coincide with the names of the Ralian pantheon, also referred to by Bertalor in his unabridged essay on the metals of the gods.) The Vadeli are clearly tied to the history of the Brithos-descended Malkioni of Fronela and Seshnela. They inhabited roughly the same place, or rather a southern region of the same place. The Brithini don't refer to the Creator as the Invisible God. Given all this Makan/Malkioneran/Irensaval stuff, I sometimes wonder whether the (mortal) Malkioni do. That's if they were sharing the same ancestry as the other five tribes in the Danmalastan myths. Sure. And the same single Vadeli will tell you different things every time you interview him or her. Would you trust any Vadeli to tell you the truth? Nope? In the Danmalastan myth, Vadel passes back and forth between Bamatela and Danmalastan without having to cross a single sea, and likewise, at the same time, the Kachasti into Gennerela. Given that both Neliom and Sshorg first enter directly after Umath's birth, with Sshorga reaching Dara Happa at the height of the Golden Age, Vadel was clearly around in the Golden Age. By the Storm Age, Vadel served as writing material/literature. His offspring squared off with the Zzabur-led tribes of Danmalastan, leading to fun interaction like the annihilation of the Tadeniti (who were presumably instrumental in transforming their ancestor into a blue book) and the eruption of the Nidan Mountains. In the Brithos myth, the children of Vadela were already present there when Malkion Aerlitsson (by necessity a product of the Storm Age) arrived in Brithos and founded the Castes. Anyway, the activities of Vadel in Bamatela - imprisonment of a Big Spirit - bear some similarity to the murder of Langamul. Back to Fonrit, the Chir and Poto slave coast myths clearly are Storm Time, and affect both Doraddi and Artmali. Sure, Vadel is the Sorcerer Supreme, at least some of the more unpleasant aspects thereof. (The more pleasant aspect Zzabur laying claim to the Shattering of the World and the Implosion of the Spike...) Noruma is the supreme magician in the Pamaltelan (non-Fiwan, non-Thinobutan) myths. To me the "Vadeli Legacy" stating that all Fonrit was conquered in the Fonritian culture section (p.46) came a bit as a surprise. From Missing Lands (p.87) I associated the Vadeli conquests with Umathela (1585 ST) rather than Afadjann and Kareeshtu, both of which have been portrayed as an unbroken rule of the Janns, who aided the Vadeli in their conquest of Kareeshtu 1587 ST as allies rather than as conquered vassals. While this alliance may have established Vadeli enclaves in Afadjann port cities, there doesn't seem to have been a conquest here, or further south around the Koraru Bay. Jraktal the Tap is explained much later in the Guide. Garangordos is credited with breaking Jraktal's shackles, usually on Ompalam, but at least once the shackles are on Fonrit as a whole. (Another point in favor for my theory of a PTSD or even Darkness Survival Mode status of the Blues for the entire Dawn Age.) I am a bit perplexed about the Fonritian languages, being mutually unintelligible though related. Are they in any way related to the dialects of the Doraddi of the Veldt (such as Arbennan or Tarint) or Thinobutos? To the Vadeli language (as inheritance of Fonrit having been Chir)? Especially since one logical source of difference, the language of the Blues, is preserved only in traces in backwoods Mondoro. Fonrit had a lot less time to develop divergent languages from their heavily mixed population than e.g. the Doraddi of the Veldt. Is there something like the development of Jamaican Patois going on here, a language similar enough to the masters but strongly divergent, then taking off as the former masters (e.g. Jrusteli, Vadeli) had gone? Or are there influences from former Fiwan who had been assimilated into the slave states without much ado?

Not so much as a moon as in "lunar, cyclical", but as in "brightest light of the night sky". Tolat is reddish = less luminous, and Rufelza is more an absence of darkness than a light. Mastakos/Mercury and Entekos/Venus? Lightfore might be the most coveted piece of stellar real estate. Dayzatar went after him when he disappeared. Lightfore traces the journeys of the Young God (Yelm, Brightface) through the Night Sky. Now you tie him to the low brother Lodril (or at least one of his aspects) as well. Sedenya and Shargash are notably absent from this list. Kargzant and Antirius both occupying Lightfore leaves the question whether there were two such bodies before the Sun Swirl. But then, this event may have ignored the night sky and affected the day sky only - in which case which of the two did Lightfore trail before? As I said before, there is this Orb of Light Hanging Overhead trope that Antirius, Yelmalio and the protectors of the Dara Happan cities (Alkor, Raibamus etc.) all share, and which is copied by Rufelza, too. Not all of these orbs may be visible to the naked eye. Another way to view the Hill of Light dichtomy between Yelmalio and Antirius (on his quest alongside Manarlarvus) is that their existences/instances were separated here, much like Elmal and Yelmalio, too. The firestick is the entirety of the Gods of Light, all three (or four, if you count Arraz/Lux) brothers in one. Idovanus is not Turos, but Turos might be Idovanus' tool. Another way to look at this is as integration, dismemberment and ongoing re-integration. We'll discuss this when we come to the Copper Tablets, with the planetary son absorbed by Yelm, Antirius used to be the solar deity of the second tier of Dara Happan society - too pure for the lower ranks, but just within reach of contact for the Seconds. Turos in his role separated from fiery mountaintops is indeed a lot less polluted than earthy Lodril. Turos is not a rebel against an order, but the origin of order. He might be the missing Pelorian parallel to Calyz, the Fire of Man, in the Teshnan pantheon. Dara Happan Lodril is too thrifty to be a direct parallel of Solf, but if we separate Turos, the distance is lowered considerably.

Cynically, as a random separation of the Void into Being and Not-Being. With no intrinsic worth other than itself. A set of randomly occurring rules and principles that change and diversify as the universe proceeds to the state where it interacted with the Vadeli. The only thing that matters to the Vadeli is the continued existence of the self, if possible in comfort and power, with just as much of the universe that is necessary to sustain the self. We have only very indirect stories about the Vadeli, and from the most biased sources we can imagine, Zzabur, and countless unwilling subjects. We know that Pamaltelan humans were enslaved in Chir and Poto, in western Pamaltela, south of Mt. Thakarn. These were quite likely members of the urban civilization that the mortal drinker Agimori developed and spread all over the places not occupied by inimical plant growth but instead by friendly lineage plants, as the Artmali migration had turned east initially. But then, there may have been other disembarkations from Veldara and other celestial objects in other corners of Pamaltela. We still haven't agreed about the connection between the Fonritian Veldang and Jarkaru's empire. Yeah, forget about the Garangordos mention - this transformation through murder by Bolongo was what I wanted to suggest. What if Vadel was identified with Bolongo, as the instrument creating Ompalam from the Spirit Before?

Ho hum. Fire-hardened wood is appropriate if we look at the Log brotherhood in Entekosiad, but Lodril is also the father of the Lowfires, including the smithy fire. Peloria is probably the least problematic in terms of medieval confusion - we're rather stuck with Roman, Macedon and Old Persian parallels. I agree that it is more a demand for Measured Justice From Above than any sense of altruism or similar. Becoming more divine through appropriate bearing. Or rather - Herustana is the mistress of the land within the city confines, as she was of the Ark, while Thilla is the nurturing goddess of the lands around? Enverinus - god of the sacrificial fire? We find similar "brothers of Mahome" among the fire husbands of Ernalda's handmaidens in Thunder Rebels. The Lunar way, on the other hand, encourages literacy. If you include the Pelandan Turos craftmanship, I wonder whether these fall under the Lodrili label, or whether they have a different standing. Greg's readings from his Lunar novel and passages in the Entekosiad simply used cardinal numbers to designate the social rank of a Pelorian person. Agreed. Especially with the differentiations of both Lodril and Turos, through sons or aspects, or even daughters (as in the Ten Sons and Servants plus Mohenjar, displayed on the Gods Wall). The treatment of the gods is perhaps the weakest aspect of the Guide. Sure, the companion volume was planned then, and probably still is planned. Lots of names are dropped, with less information than makes a very short Prosopaedia entry. One could make an index of deities mentioned in the Guide and get quite interesting information out of that. The sections we are discussing this week and last week are only portrayals of the over-cultures, of course. We could create another companion volume just by providing similarly sized discussion of smaller cultures, or separate aspects of dominant cultures like the various Earth Walker/Fire Within/Worker deities that have to do with Lodril. Nice one. A derivation from Idovanus would be somewhat welcome, too. Lightfore (now that Harald mentioned him) fulfills very much the role of the silver moon in many of our world's dualist sky entities - the weaker night light chasing the sun (if you neglect the phases). I wonder whether Lightfore is (or used to be) sufficiently luminous to provide as much light as a half moon in our world. I don't really see either Antirius or Yelmalio prancing around the Sky Dome. A good Dara Happan city (or metropolis) is supposed to have a radiant orb overhead, guarding the city and providing some local light. Antirius brings me to two possible Indo-Germanic roots - "ante", as in "before", or "antara", perhaps the only Sanskrit term I know, "against" or "opposed, from below" (in Organic Chemistry, at least - the root is related to Greek "anti", I guess) . On the matter of Yelmic nobility down on their luck: I won't put any convenient fiction past Plentonius when it comes to glorify Khordavu (like Khordavu's Division of the World after Argentium Thri'ile), but the "nobility in ignoble occupations" has significant story and background potential.

Anywhere they can approach and depart without much interference, really. Think Barbary pirates in the North Sea, before the USA waged their first extra-continental war. Slave-hunting is just another form of piracy, and has a long tradition, kept up by whichever culture sailed the seas in armed ships. Island and river dwellers are paticularly in danger of being snatched up in sudden raids. Given the complication of the Ritual of Opening, I see a possibility that the naval crew starts with their rites as soon as the slave hunters have disembarked, ready to take up the returning hunters and any captives upon their return. The Blues were described as peaceful and somewhat broken. There were ruins. I wonder whether there may have been elephant Fiwan. Having all these variant trunk- and tusk-bearing beasts captured in the wild and forced to work does feel quite appropriate for the Fonritian mind-set, but doesn't feel like something the Veldang would have done. I wonder whether the Veldang truly were awakened from their Darkness trauma. They certainly suffered from cultural PTSD. This may have had to do with their active use of and allegiance to Chaos in the Gods War. The Veldang and the Vadeli appear to be the only humans siding with Chaos who came out alive out of the Gods War, and neither in good shape in the Dawn Age. Perhaps their Greater Darkness "cultures" interfered with the Awakening. Rather than a single guild, I would expect rivaling clans with their own secrets. There are numerous "chemical industry" trades appropriate for Glorantha. Perfuming (with a side branch for incense and intoxicating fumes), poisoners/apothecaries, herbalists and distillers, dyers, glassmakers, and metallurgists. All of these have ties to Alchemy/Sorcery - they are knowledge-based industries changing the fabric of the world according to their will. Umathelan sorcery is God Learner sorcery, or descended thereof. Any previous exposure would have been Vadeli sorcery. The God Learners clearly were in control of at least southernmost Fonrit in order to be able to start the Six-Legged Empire in Jolar. The Guide states explicitely that neither Umathelans nor Tarien Doraddi ever reached the remote fringes of the Enkloso forest. The forest of Vralos was much reduced in that time, though, so the Six-Leggers may not have required river access to the Koraru Bay. I wonder from where they imported their horses - Prax, Safelster, or just the West? Do we have a date when the Six Legged Empire started? Once the Vralos forest was in decline, it didn't need naval domination, so its earliest efforts may have predated Tanian's Victory. The joys of auto-correct. Is this tied to the Seseine cult? I wonder whether this is tied to the deities worshiped by the Pujaleg of Laskal and Banamba. I guess we'll return to this when the Fonrit chapter gets discussed. The Krarsht identification is one possibility, but it shouldn't be the only one. Maran Gor is a hungry goddess as well, so is the Black Eater, or the Maize deity (note that I don't suggest that maize is grown in Fonrit, but millet has quite a few similarities to maize). The God Learners don't appear to have been concerned that much with the Theyalan hate of Chaos. Ikadz sounds like a perfect tool to break the resistance of the Irensavalists. Veldang in Peloria are still only a hypothesis. I have seen no proof to the contrary, but neither have I seen (or provided) actual proof. There are Veldang race people like the Zaranistangi who don't claim descent from Artmal or his tribes. Worship of the tides is found in Kethaela and Maslo as well, But it doesn't take the Veldang to have blue-skinned people introducing Ikadz and Seseine to Pelanda - the Vadeli might work just as well. I thought the Vadeli don't acknowledge the Invisible God mystery of the Logic devolution? While they might be aware of the energy form of Solace, I doubt they name it that way. The Pamaltelan equivalent is the Creator, Langamul. Who, like Garangordos, is murdered by one of the Seventeen, and who returns in altered form. The Fonritians have no use for any form of caste system, whether Malkioni or Thinobutu-inspired - their pyramid of slavery does this job remarkably well. This can get problematic, like when Pujaleg shaman-warlords take a seat on top of those pyramids, or when Harrek and his armada replace the Pujaleg, but then the self-centered interests of Fonritian politics means that Afadjann and Kareeshtu don't care much who rules in Laskal, as long as trade and proper suppression are observed.

Hardly - the Seshnegi have ancestral and historical ties to Aerlit. Aerlit and Seshna Likita probably were their main theist cults in the Serpent King era. Much of this was discussed back in 2011: https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/WorldofGlorantha/conversations/topics/15400 Personally, I don't think that there are any Pamalt-worshippers who aren't descendants of Dorad or from the same generation or earlier as Dorad. Dolorofey is the biggest gap in the Fensi mountains, and with the extermination of the Greenwood of Jolar opened the way for further expansion. But then, that's food for the Fonrit discussion. There are Agimori created by Pamalt, Balumbasta, Varama, Nyanka and Faranar's clay, and then there are Fiwan and Thinobutans similar in appearance but of different origin. And the Thinobutans not that similar... in 1624, Harrek and Argrath are accompanied by Hunralki, who is described as a "claimant from Jolar". We know that Harrek did give Laskal his special attention, so they could have met there. The Pithdarans were trapped on the Other Side for about 250 years of history. They were suspiciously easy to convert to Malkionism. Makes you wonder how those 250 years must have felt. These war societies look suspiciously like Hykimi practices, but probably thoroughly non-Hsunchen ones. There was this "Consume and Integrate Your Enemy" theme suggested for Malkionism, e.g. for the Carmanian lion hunts, and possibly alluded to in Rikard "Tigerhearted" as well (although there are precious few tigers or tiger-walkers west of the Wastes). Malkioni celebrate the superiority of human will and intellect over the world. Exerting ones will over a rather mindless magical one-trick entity might look acceptable to their self-image, after all the Dronar/Dromal caste has among others the task of exerting mastery over their domestic beasts. As long as they stay away from intelligent entities, no harm done to the Logical order of things, right? I agree. The Horal caste has a much harder time to justify harnessing spirits to their purpose, On the other hand, they are masters of weapons, and they may treat the spirits available to them as such. Treating these as magical weapons wrestled from ancient foes, or possibly as ancestral weapons inherited from the Dawn Age, might be their mode of bypassing the exclusivity strictures imposed by the Zzabur caste.