Darius West

Fine, where is it SPECIFICALLY WRITTEN in the canon that heroquesters and deities are dead merely because they are in the underworld? Because if they aren't separated from their bodies, then death has not overtaken them. Greg has Gregged himself before btw, and that is just another reason why the whole notion of canon carries its dangers. Even Greg can't be right about all things in all parts of Glorantha at all times, and nor should he be made to be, it's kind of unfair on him to expect that. According to what you are saying you see, what happens when a heroquester in the underworld has sever spirit cast on him? Nothing, because according to "canon", they are already dead. In fact, if two negatives result in a positive, you might even be forced back into the land of the living.

Agreed. I remember reading (in Wyrms Footprints perhaps?) that the EWF experimentation was performed by Delecti in his "stitched zoo", and that the centaurs he created this way were in constant pain and hence called Pain Centaurs, and that Ironhoof subsequently heroquested to restore his people to their status as true centaurs from before time. Obviously this is not true of the minotaurs so much, as sons of Stormbull and new minotaurs are still being born such as Morak from Cults of Prax. Ducks are long term allies of Beast Valley (Do they count as Beast Men?). Other races of Beast Valley include Elurae (Fox women), Anstanabli ( "little people", probably like sprites, who have a feud with the "winged folk"), manticores (cross between human, lion and scorpion), fauns (term used synonymously with satyr) and probably others.

I am saying that such a ruling makes little to no sense, and that there are precedents within the collected lore that seem to contradict this notion as being as iron clad as many seem to think it is. On close inspection, you will find that the notion of always being "dead" if you are in the underworld introduces a series of logical contradictions which I have outlined previously. The primary contradiction is this... There is a MAJOR difference between (a) entity who is killed by another entity and sent to the underworld, and (b) one who goes there as part of a hero quest, entering the underworld while still alive. (a) is involuntary, (b) is voluntary. If (a) happens you are stuck unless someone does (b) to get you out. Of course things can go wrong during (b) and they might become actually dead and therefore unable to return, but they are NOT otherwise actually dead... For how can you be dead if you are not separate from your body? It flies in the face of what has been established by spells like resurrection and sever spirit, not to mention cults like Daka Fal to say that a person who has not been separated from their body is dead, even if they ARE in the underworld, except as some spurious theoretical and factually incorrect "ritual notion of death attached to entering the underworld", developed by cult theologists but having no practical bearing on what actually happens. There is also as more precedent for LIVE mortal heroes of various Earth mythologies within the underworld as there is for them being notionally "dead", especially if we are drawing from the Greek, Celtic, and Norse traditions, which are the main mythological traditions on which most heroquesting is based. To make the ruling "you are always dead in the underworld" dogmatically "part of the canon" is rigid and absurdist fundamentalism, and also, when you look at it in practical terms, unworkable, as it creates more problems than it solves. It is certain that SOME cultures assume that you are dead within the underworld even when you were alive going in, but there is "no way in hell" they ALL think that, and the ones that do probably have major gods who died.

I don't want to be deliberately obtuse, but are you saying (a) that the corporate part was "alive" without the discorporate part to animate it (before time)? If so, why would the discorporate feel cheated by being separated from their still alive bodies? Surely "Death" would become the gift of being able to travel the spirit world freely as a shaman does if the separation didn't involve the actual loss of direct ego control of the corporate, the corporate ceasing functions such as breath and pulse, and ultimately the corporate part decaying to nothing ? If the corporate and discorporate were simultaneously alive after death Before Time, surely people would hold Humakt up as a gift giver and the grand teacher of the shamanic path and Horned Man would be out of a job. Or (b) There was a Humakt induced "shaman plague" brought about by death, with newly liberated spirits hijacking other people's bodies, while their own bodies went on living like Brithini (i.e. without spirits)? Because in such a case there were plenty of bodies, because death wasn't really death as we understand it, but merely the alive corporate being separated from its alive discorporate. Because apart from some stronger spirits getting better bodies in the deal, it isn't as if any spirits were truly without homes to go to. Daka Fal would have been rounding up the homeless dead and allowing them to choose from the spiritually empty but alive bodies that could host them. I imagine that under such circumstances you might well wind up with POW being equal to the SIZ +STR+DEX+CON/4 of the conquered host, as each spirit finds its natural physical level of body ownership based on its spiritual energy. On the other hand, we have a problem, as two spirits can live in the same body, it is a process we have spirit possession rules for. Or (c) If the corporate ceases to function and begins to decay to nothing, leaving the discorporate howling in the hostile alien darkness of the Near realm and being dragged inexorably to the underworld, you might understand why the newly discorporate and "corporeally disinherited by death" wanted a better situation that the one they just had forced upon them, and consider death a bad thing. Perhaps we need to invoke "The Princess Bride" here and consider a gradation of exactly how dead we mean? Now the notion of death before time is problematic. If there is no Time, then death is sort of impossible. Under such circumstances it is perhaps prudent to think about the space the entity occupies rather than their actual "death". So "death" becomes tied to place. For example, "I am dead in Sartar but not dead in Tarsh and Far Point... or... I am dead in Prax, but thanks to Chalana Arroy I live again in the Stinking Forest and I was never dead in Dara Happa", with all the intrinsic mythic implications that may mean for a deity, while proto-mortals only get the single territory that is their habitat to be "alive" in before time and death but subsequently have that attachment ruined by the ubiquity of death in the Lesser and Greater Darkness and After Time. This also lines up with the "Many gods in the Lands of Dawn, few gods in the Land of Dusk" notion of how the further West you go, the fewer deities there are because at Dusk is the Gate of Death. On the other hand, perhaps Time as we understand it in Glorantha is actually entropy? Obviously "Before Time" things happened, but without time, is action even possible? Everything is static and there can be no story because nobody can move, or speak or act without a time dimension. So do we view the world before time as having movement or was it actually a static meaningless frieze that Kajabor put into motion with by introducing new dimensions? No, we must dismiss this heresy. Clearly the world was like a comic book or a run of friezes like the God Wall, where the Observer could superimpose their notion of meaning, process and narrative onto static panels, but the Observer is located within time looking backwards in a form of retro-relativity i.e. you only appear to move because I am moving. This model fits with the idea of the Gods giving up free will and having no ability to really change within time, except there is no meaningful "Great Compromise"; that is merely the explanation for why things are the way they are, and if fresh deities come into existence, they distort the static pre-Time reality into themselves and engender an entropic quasi-karmic backlash. As to the Chalana Arroy 7 day skill loss rules for resurrection, sure, I have no problem with that, in fact I like it. A pity in some ways that Glorantha doesn't have a River Lethe to cause them to forget their skills, nor does Glorantha really have a solid mechanism for Bad Karma clouding the memory of the reincarnating spirit (to explain the ignorance of babies etc.) as one finds in the Bardo Thodol. Instead we have something akin to an entropic process of memory decay in the discorporate, more akin to a notion of brain damage due to oxygen deprivation becoming irreparable after 7 days as opposed to 15-30 mins.

So... are you suggesting that the dead when resurrected by spells aren't in the underworld? Isn't the Near spirit world largely coterminous with the mundane world but a spirit version of the same, with slightly different features that can be seen with the Spirit Sight spell, and only the Far Spirit World is really the Spirit plane? I prefer to read Virgil's version, "The Georgics" Book 3 in Latin thanks.

I have never come across this. What is your source please? I would argue that the separation came when death came to the world from the underworld and bodies and spirits were first separated. Daka Fal according to Cults of Prax is judging who is living and who is dead and helping his cult engage in body swapping hi-jinks before the beginning of time. You say he is definitely Grandfather mortal? Good. He'd know. You are not "dead" merely because you are in the underworld. You are dead if you die in the underworld, and the underworld is inimical to life, which means staying alive is much harder down there.

Lol, planning a holiday are you? Definitely book in with Thurkan Clubfoot at the Lokarnos temple. For a small donation he can arrange Sun County Travel papers and even get you booked into accommodation at Eiskolli which is the closest "major" settlement near the Painted Wall. Shamans can also make their own travel arrangements through the intercession of the Larnste spirit subcult of Trivago Wheelpincher. Also remember how hard it is to get bookings at this time of year, and try to complete your arrangements in advance. I would definitely not consider a trip out there except in Sea Season. Fire Season is out of the question and may actually get dangerous, not to mention that Eiskolli's accommodation is booked solid around the Yelmalio high holy day, but you might be lucky if everyone has gone to the Sun Dome to celebrate. Merry Sacred Time.

Flesh Man was the Light Bringer, Grandfather Mortal is not Flesh Man. Grandfather Mortal was killed by Humakt, and according to Cults of Prax page 14 disappeared from myth at that point. Subsequently Daka Fal emerged to be the Judge of the Dead, and may or may not have been Grandfather Mortal. Now while Flesh Man is the descendant of Grandfather Mortal he is not the same entity. As to whether Grandfather Mortal left his body behind? The fact that Daka Fal is a shaman cult that deals with the separation of the Living and the Dead based on who owns which body is a salient point, as is the Humakti Sever Spirit spell. Clearly bodies get left behind by dead people, and periodically, if they are lucky or know how to heal themselves from spirit form, they can come back from the dead by healing their bodies and re-establishing their spirit within them. As an important aside, consider the Brithini. They cannot resurrect because while they have a connection to the Infinity and the Magic Rune thanks to Zzabur, they have no connection to the Spirit Rune. Brithini are expressions of the Man Rune without access to the Spirit Rune. They have no means of retaining identity after death. As a cultural aside note, this would mean that Brithini don't have ghost stories. Incorrect. Orpheus gained the lore of where a gate to the underworld was in Thrace, and learned that he needed to pay Charon not only the 2 obols for entry but with a sprig of mistletoe as payment on the return journey. Of course Hades could have kept him in the underworld, Hades is after all the ruler there, but Orpheus moved Hades and Persephone with his musical lament for Euridice. Later heroes in Greek myth learned from Orpheus and his failed "hero quest", Odysseus in particular who also uses the mistletoe trick.

Really? Less canon than Lost City of Eldarad and Daughters of Darkness? That hardly seems fair, those AH products were the nadir of RQ material ever, having not only bad editing and atrocious art, but crappy generic scenarios. Say what you like about Mongoose, their editing definitely isn't up to scratch for example, but the art is better than AH products (it could hardly be worse), and the production value of the printing and binding is of good quality. Having seen at least Eldarad, I am certain that Glorantha Second Age products, while not brilliant like Sun County, Griffin Mountain or Borderlands are at least of a standard equal to Apple Lane and Snakepipe Hollow. Are there problems vis canon in GSA: Pavis Rises for example ? Yes, but they are small problems and a work-around is eminently possible. The "Blood of Orlanth" supplement is, perhaps surprisingly, quite good, and incorporates how Orlanthi Traditionalist, God Learner or EWF parties face different challenges as the story unfolds so a GM could potentially pit 3 parties against each other in the same scenario and watch the fur fly as they try to resolve an Orlanth vs Dragon hero quest to their side's favor. Is the GSA: Jrustela supplement up to scratch? Well, if a 6 paragraph gloss about a city is better than a 2 paragraph gloss about a city which has long since fallen into the sea by the 3rd Age, then yes. On the other hand the strength of the GSA Jrustela supplement is the Hwarosian God Learning 101 lecture, which is darkly humorous, and completely within canon. Could the GSA products have used much better editing? Yes, without doubt. Are they ALL badly edited? Actually no, but some are definitely dreadful and I didn't buy many of them because of it. I am not pretending that these supplements are all "of excellent quality and deserve an honored place in everyone's collection", but by the same token I think that some of the supplements deserve a bit more objective criticism than I think they have received. The notion of playing Glorantha in the Second Age is fun, because it was an age when "munchkins ruled Glorantha" and horribly abused the underlying system in that minimaxing way that rules lawyers do. In short, GSA was obviously pitched at AD&D player in the hopes of winning converts, and Glorantha needs converts. Could it have been done better? Well it's no Griffin Mountain, but it is definitely better than Lost City of Eldarad.

Some of the images are no doubt carved onto the surface and filled in with pigment. Later additions are more likely to be pigment alone, but a shaman may well decide to spend time carving and pigmenting the image of a favored entity. No doubt the shamans are also quite well disposed to performing running repairs on any damaged images they know, or reporting such damage to an allied shaman with investment in that entity. As to weathering from sun and dust, well, neither Yelm nor Stormbull is enamored of destroying the site as it would reduce their power, and the lesser entities have even more reason to protect it. As Stormbull winds come out of the East, the cliff is sheltered from them, and as Yelm sets in the west, only weakened rays strike the face of it. On the other hand, many of the images are very old indeed. It is however a "broken" wall, and there is the impression that the shamans are struggling to maintain a damaged tradition. As to the spaces between figures, well, that is where new heroes, spirits and ancestors will be included, and if their power grows, they may gain more prominent representations. Others like Ronance who was a Green Age big shot in the area are now looking worn. The wall is a little like a "top 100 pop chart" for the Hidden Traditions (i.e. Shamaic traditions) of Prax, in that there is a slow adoption of the useful new and a simultaneous but slow discarding of the less useful old. So perhaps a top 100 pop chart that plays out over human generations and centuries rather than a weekly update. I actually quite like your ideas Byll and my comments are obviously only suggestions based on the way I have GMed shamans in the past. Obviously YGMustV so use whatever you feel offers the best explanation for what you have already established.

Without question I think you can have both a guild structure and one based on personal loyalty and ability. The two things are far from mutually exclusive, especially when the organizations tend to be small. Who is the criminal boss likely to promote in this "black market merchant guild" if not someone of high personal loyalty and ability? The notion of a guild structure is to organize a trade so that it is able to exert political influence, and for an illegal activity, this is a matter of life and death. Guards need to be paid off, palms need to be greased and favors traded, information needs to be bought and contraband needs to be shifted. Now whether you call your immediate boss an oyabun, a made man, or a master thief, matters little. What is important is that the organization has a hierarchy. For example, I doubt that the Lanbril cult issues you with your "journeyman papers" in a robed ceremony at the guild hall. It is more likely to be "hey kid, good work back there, buy me a drink after this and you just made journeyman."

That is an interesting idea. The problem with 1939 is that the Simplon Route where Horror on the Orient Express is set doesn't take you through any actual Nazi occupied territory. Remember that the entire Orient Express experience took 3 days IRL. The Simplon line doesn't go through Germany, instead it take you through Fascist Italy. WW2 suspended the international service and though the Germans tried to start it up again during the war it was interrupted by partisans. On the other hand that doesn't mean you can't have NAZIs using the service on their way to Constantinople from Paris or Milan. Though the temptation is to make the Nazis into cultists, you could go down a more World War C'thulhu approach and make the Nazis potentially even more appalled by the mythos than the players' characters. Hehe, you could even make the player have to take Nazi characters, innocent idiots, babe in the woods boy scouts who think they are the good guys and history is on their side because Hitler is the messiah and the mythos is obviously some sort of Jewish plot. Just a suggestion, but it potentially ups the ante in terms of horror by pointing out that Nazism is an entirely human evil and that the thing they face is much worse even than Nazism. Of course it would take mature players to get the cosmicist implications. It sounds like you want to go down a more Pulp C'thulhu sort of route though.

To which Tindalos fairly says... The separation here is that Heortling clans raid and steal from other Heortling clans. A thief in this context is someone who steals from their in-group i.e. from members of their own clan. This sort of practice isn't very sensible in a small close-knit rural style of society where everyone knows everyone else's business, hence the outlawry clause. Of course it is a trusim to say that population is key, and the more transactions that are performed, the better the chance for a thief that their activities will go undetected. It is worth pointing out that the Heortlings are among the most populous and urbanized Orlanthi societies, and it was a short distance to travel to Esrolia with its large cities. There is only 1 entry for Lanbril in the Guide and that is page 241, featuring the mention of powerful Lanbril gangs operating in large Esrolian cities. Where Lanbril is different to Orlanth and Trickster, (or Gagarth, Tunoral, and Finovan, ) is the spirit of professionalism in his larceny. This is not simply a one-off trick or adventure, nor a raid, but a dedicated pattern of parasitism on urban social order as a lifestyle choice, and with the same dedication and organization as one would find in a professional organization like a guild. This notion goes back to Cervantes' novel "Riconete y Cortadillo", set in Seville, where criminals undergo the same system of professional advancement as any other guild in the city. While there is no overt evidence to suggest any historicity to the idea, such ideas must come from somewhere... There are quite a few possibilities here. We really don't know how technical the Esrolian Lanbril cult gets, so it is possible that all the interesing gizmos are entirely a Pavic thing. On the other hand, I imagine that they could have their origins with the God Learners if not the Mostali, as I can think of few places more conducive to a deity like Lanbril than God Forgot with its Casino Town. Lanbril despises and steals from other Gods, so why not hide out in a place that other deities don't even remember? Does that sound like a use of Divination Block on a grand scale to you? I mean obviously it is probably a byproduct of the destruction of Zistor or the weird local Brithini, but it would also be immensely convenient. And remember, if you master Luck, you can let some other sucker master Death, just stay lucky and don't let him catch you.

Why narrowly assume that this Inanna myth model is correct. Consider the "Orpheus in the Underworld" myth as an alternative to Inanna in Egreshkigal's Court" example. Orpheus in the myth is a living mortal in the underworld and what a man can do, a deity can do with bells on it. Many Greek heroes go to the underworld, in fact Hercules defeats Cerberus in the underworld, Odysseus goes there, so does Theseus. Of course there is also the Norse version... A journey by the hero Hadding from the History of the Danes (Gesta Danorum) by the medieval Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus features a description of a very similar notion of a subterranean underworld. Here summarised by Old Norse scholar E.O.G. Turville-Petre : "While he was living with Ragnhild, Hadding had another mysterious experience. A woman appeared bearing some herbs. Wishing to know where such herbs grew in winter, Hadding went with this woman under the earth. They passed through mists, and then through sunny, fertile regions, where the herbs had grown. Then they came to a raging torrent, flowing with weapons. Crossing by a bridge, they came upon armies of fallen warriors, locked in eternal battle. As they pressed forward, a wall stood in their way; they could go no further, but the woman tore off the head of a cock, which she happened to have with her, and flung it over the wall. Immediately the cock came to life and crowed." The chicken being thrown over the wall of the underworld (variously called Helgrindr, “The Fence of Hel,” Nágrindr, “Corpse-Fence,” or Valgrindr, “The Fence of the Fallen”) is worthy of particular note as it demonstrates a notion of threshold between life and death that others would later symbolize as "the veil of life and death". On one side the chicken is dead, but cast to the other it is dead to death (-X-=+), and that means alive. I am sure that any Jrusteli would have a field day playing with that one. That is before we begin to look at any examples of other myth cycles. Here is a link to the Wikipedia entry on underworlds that can serve as a jumping off point on the subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underworld The conception of a subterranean world inhabited by the dead is surprisingly common in world mythology, even in cultures that practiced cremation or ritual dismemberment instead of burial or entombment, so the obvious link to burial is not so straight forward as one might think or hope. The notion that the Journey to the Underworld is something that only a hero can accomplish remains a constant however. It is in many ways the quintessential Hero Quest.

Except that the EXACT example here compares Yelm's death to that of Grandfather mortal. When Grandfather Mortal died, he left behind his body, and his spirit went to the underworld. Apparently Yelm's death copies this death by implication. This is qualitatively very different to what the Lightbringers do. As to the King of Sartar Lightbringer Quest, there is clearly a quantifiable difference between going through the gate the way the Lightbringers did and the way Grandfather Mortal and Yelm did. Does it say that the Lightbringers then cut their wrists, lost their bodies and stepped beyond the Gate of Dusk? No. And here's the rub. If the Lightbringers wanted to do that they could have killed each other at the start of the quest and saved themselves the journey to the edge of the world in favor of the shorter route. So I would argue that the Lightbringer journey is more like that of Orpheus than that of Inanna. Orpheus was physically present in the underworld. I would also argue that what happens to Orlanth after the Fall of Whitewall is the style of death that Yelm suffered that ushered in the Lesser Darkness. Not a mere entering of the underworld, but an actual separation of spirit from body. Clearly there is something very qualitatively different between the alleged "death" of Orlanth during the Lightbringer Quest and what happens to him after the Fall of Whitewall. During the former Orlanth's Ring dips below the horizon. During the latter it doesn't rise again, and the result is a bit like the Lesser Darkness, in that the world is very altered. I argue that is because journeying into the underworld is not ipso facto, death. Clearly Rausa did not entirely understand the process as she had not gone beyond the Gate and come back, while Trickster had, so Rausa makes the mistake of thinking that those who pass the gate are dead, but Trickster knows better for he not only died but came back on his own steam and brought death back with him for a bit of a joke.

And who determines the canon? You? Greg Stafford himself has said he didn't like the idea of getting stuck in a canon. Are you preserving or ossifying and killing a legacy? Regarding Tunoral the Raccoon god and Vanchites being thieves you said... No, the worshippers of Tunoral are no doubt proud of their successful thieving and outsiders are quite correct in thinking that Vanch as a culture with a thieving raccoon as a major local god, are thieves. Is everyone in Vanch a Tunoral cultist? No. But the attitudes of Tunoral affect the way they think and act in different situations in the same way religious mythology permeates most cultural attitudes. Therefore ALL Vanchites will be more likely to steal, because respecting private property isn't something they are trained to do, in fact they are trained not to, because that is how their god and their ancestors survived Before Time. I disagree. Death is the separation of body and spirit... hence the Sever Spirit spell. If the body has not been separated from the spirit, then death has not occurred. Similarly, resurrection spells re-establish that connection. What is true for humans is true for gods; as above, so below. At what point in the Lightbringer Quest does it say that the seven give up their material bodies upon entering the Gate of Dusk? By way of comparison, Yelm died when Orlanth used death on him. Where unity of body and spirit persists, life persists, even in the land of the dead. If that unity does not persist, then the underworld claims you. The underworld has not claimed you before the point that your body and spirit are separated.

As it turns out, no. The Vanchites are raccoon worshiping thieves. Thanks Jajagapa. In terms of the mythology of Lanbril these are a thumbnail sketch at best. So in truth, nobody knows. And yet they also don't stay there, because they aren't dead. How did they die? Were they ritually murdered as part of the HQ? No. Just being in the land of the dead doesn't make you dead, any more than going to a cemetery makes you dead (unless there is a cholera epidemic or some such). This is not shamanic self resurrection hit point by hit point, this is giving Diros the boatman 2 obolos for the entry fee and a sprig of mistletoe as payment in advance for the return journey. Conversely, if you die in the Underworld, you don't suddenly spring back to life in the land of the living. The point is that Trolls were an underworld LIFE form. The point for me is that when someone dies within Glorantha, their SPIRIT goes to the underworld, their body just gets buried. Now when heroes go to the underworld, they go there physically, not as mere spirits. Shamans of course are the exception, as they separate from their bodies. It is an alternative HQ strategy. Trolls were alive in the underworld and had bodies there, and those bodies came to the world above intact. That is why they are alive and not a plague of ghosts. Now this is not to say that a living bodied human in the underworld cannot die there, it is a dangerous place after all. Now what is true for a human hero is more true for a deity. When Orlanth goes Lightbringing into the underworld he is the living breath of Glorantha, and if things go badly he might not be. And when that 14 day cycle is broken because Orlanth is actually dead as a result of the fall of Whitewall, then Orlanth is actually dead, not otherwise. The Lightbringers went into the underworld as living gods, they were living gods IN the underworld, and they left the underworld alive too. Yelm by comparison was destroyed in the living world and had no living body to return to the living world in until after the Lightbringer Quest resurrected him. The Yelm in the underworld is like a ghost, albeit the ghost of a god, but clearly unable to renew the connection to the world of the living on his own for want of the divine equivalent of a working body. As above, so below.

I remember well when Gary Gygax, fueled perhaps by cocaine addiction, went all-out to try to make AD&D canonical. I was a teenager at the time and the ridiculous authoritarianism of it was one of the things that turned me off AD&D. Are we REALLY going down THAT road guys? I mean, shame on you. Greg Stafford has said that he himself is not the final authority on Glorantha, and there are occasions when he has contradicted himself, often I suspect on purpose, to short circuit exactly that sort of nonsense. You aren't doing Greg or Glorantha many favors. On the other hand, I am pleased to know that the Vanchites ARE thieves because of their local Raccoon god Tunoral. Thanks for the info Jajagappa. I wonder if that is the same Raccoon deity the God Learners used to torment on HQs? Seems a bit far north and central for them I guess. As the saying goes, any deity called Mr. Raccoon deserves what he gets.

So HOW do Sun Hawk shamans use them to enhance their ceremonial magic? Inquiring minds want to know the details!

I think it is pretty obvious that, as M Heldson says, Apuleius was before the Tale of Genji, and I don't know why his comedic story "Metamorphosis", (obviously read for pleasure, which is how I define a novel), isn't considered a novel, and which Lit Crit panjandrum decided the point and gave it to Murasaki Shikibu. Also, aren't we forgetting the God Learner Empire? The first novels in English, Spanish and French all appear around the early imperial period, and the Jrusteli Empire went a long way past that in terms of knowledge, magic and technology. That being said, we don't know much about Jrusteli written culture, and the notion of reading for pleasure might have eluded them. Perhaps an obscure Vormaini court lady has already written the first novel in Glorantha in the First Age? Or perhaps none of the literature has survived? Simply put, we just don't know... And as you say jajagappa, maybe it has yet to be? Also I think it is fair to say that some parts of Glorantha are a lot more bronze age (a la Earth's bronze age) than others. I think I agree with scott-martin, and the point is well made. To be certain, many Gloranthan societies will not have novels, and where novels do exist they will be a luxury of a literate elite.

(1) Many people are mercenaries in Glorantha, many are pragmatic, but few have a reputation as thieves. (2) In truth we have precious little backstory on Lanbril, or Vanch for that matter. Lanbril has to come from somewhere, so why not Vanch? I hear there is a whole hill of gold. (3) That isn't even true of mortal hero questers like Sir Ethilrist, much less for deities. Also, where do trolls go when they die if what you say is true? As denizens of the underworld according to your logic they cannot die. (4) So when you visit a grave are you dead? When you keep a graveyard are you dead? When you raid a tomb are you dead? A deity can visit the halls of the dead without dying, much like a human can visit the Valley of the Kings without dying. Not to say that either is without potential risks. (5) Yes. But they are not dead BECAUSE they are in the underworld, they are in danger because the underworld is potentially dangerous. (6) True. And relevant. If Orlanth's Ring only drops out of its cycle when Orlanth is dead, then obviously Orlanth wasn't dead at other times. (7) True. But there were clear winners and losers. Yelmalio lost his fire powers because he keeps losing at the Hill of Gold. The real winner IMO was Zorak Zoran. (8) Man cannot live by canon alone. YGMV.

You are utterly ignoring the part where it says that the Vanchites are MERCENARY and PRAGMATIC, and worship any god they think will aid them. These are not very honorable people, they sell out their principles to the highest bidder. No doubt thievery is merely a manifestation of that mercenary pragmatism. We don't know what the agriculture and trade is like in Vanch, but the suggestion is "not great", as poverty is a good reason for thieving to start. Vanch may well be the home of the Lanbril cult, as Lanbril myths do mention contact with the Solar cults, and it has to start somewhere. The fact is that Storm and Sun cults manage to exist elsewhere without resorting to calling each other thieves over division of spoils etc, PLUS there is the issue that it isn't one group or the other who have the reputation, but ALL Vanchites, Storm, Solar Lunar whatever... they all have the reputation. Non-Vanchites think Vanchites are thieves, not because of their cults and their practices, but because many Vanchites steal things, probably even from their supposed allies, when the opportunity presents itself. THAT is how you get a reputation as thieves. So what you are saying is that all trolls are undead because they come from the underworld and if you are in the underworld you are dead by definition? Immortals can enter and leave the underworld as they please if they know the way, and are only forced to go there if they actually die. The Lightbringers didn't die, they physically entered the underworld voluntarily under their own power as deities. Nobody killed them. When Sir Ethilrist or any other hero quester go into the underworld, they aren't dead unless they get killed. Now Orlanth will get into dire trouble after the capture of Whitewall, but not on the Hill of Gold.

If people have a reputation as thieves it is inevitably a well founded accusation. They may not ALL be thieves but thievery will be a well established cultural practice. You see, many people may throw around an accusation against their neighbors, but when it sticks, it is likely to be substantially true. The Sartarites and Praxians raid for livestock, but they don't get called thieves for doing so, despite the fact it is definitely a form of thievery. Why not? Because it is within culturally acceptable and understood definitions. Apparently the Vanchites have annoyed enough people over the centuries to gain a reputation, and travelers would be well advised to listen. ORLY? Orlanth died? So, that whole Lightbringer Quest... Never happened? Yelm is still in Hell too apparently. What about Zorak Zoran? Did he die too? That means that Kajabor is still out there and the Great Compromise never happened. Silly Sun worshipers.

The source is page 339 of the Guide to Glorantha. It says that Vanchites are mercenary and pragmatic people who worship any god who can aid them, and that they have a reputation as thieves. Think about it. If your neighbors aren't of the same pantheon as you, why wouldn't you steal, and why wouldn't they steal things back? It becomes a local sport that annoys non-competitors. LOL! A "Solar" holy place? Most humorous. The Hill of Gold is where Orlanth kicks the tar out of Yelmalio, then Zorak Zoran drinks his blood and gains his fire powers. Given it is a place where gods of Storm and Darkness regularly come to ritually humiliate and whallop Yelmalio into submission, it is a funny thing to say that it is solar. On the other hand it is a very Yelmalio local community, all as dedicated as football fans of a team that never wins. Perhaps it is a solar holy place, given that the "gold" of the Hill of Gold is the copious flow of Yelmalio's blood? A sad, humiliating commemoration of a defeat that is repeated over and over again.