Minlister

Yet another way to try to explain the many local sun gods referring to the same celestial body. And once more not an attempt at finding the truth/solution but just an idea to develop cultures, cults and philosophies in Glorantha:

the ancient Greek optical science hesitated between two explanation for sight. Was the image we see the result of something entering the eye from the exterior or was there something sent from the eye to "touch/probe" the exterior reality (in which case sight would be a little bit like touch, or even a sonar)?

Some people in Glorantha could have accepted this last idea and consider that there is indeed only one sun but every man (and, collectively, culture) sees something different in the sky, explaining the various sun gods and their adaptation to local realities. In a way the real sun god would be a mirror-like being and this would be its Great Mystery. Maybe it would be "defined" by these people as linked to  Fire and Harmony runes?

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But I don’t it solves the regional sub god problem. 

What I meant is that some people (I don't mean us, but the happy Gloranthians!!) could "rationalize" the problem this way as it allows them to understand how various local gods could all relate to a single celestial manifestation. Obviously, their god would have been born from the heart, head or genitals of Orlanth's victim, while the neighbors' sun god would have been born of a foot, the entrails of other disgusting part...  For the more "ecumenically oriented", they could even envision the relation between all this regional Sun gods on the model of the many-handed sun disk of Akhenaton, one and many at the same time.

Actually I am not trying to find a solution but only to imagine various possible cultural models for the sake of confronting the players with them. it is always nice to stage a theological debate in game (before hacking and slaying the heretic to loot his corpse obviously). 😀

Thanks for all the intel Joerg, all this is fantastic stuff.

I just recently discovered Glorantha thanks to 7Tigers' posts on a French RPG forum and I am absolutely enthralled !!

Sorry for a slightly heretical question/suggestion:

has anybody considered the possibility that the death inflicted to "Yelm" by Orlanth could have been a dismemberment ? In which case the "soul" of the sun god could have descended to Hell and his various body parts been dispersed by the violence of the event. Lingering energy in the various limbs could have resulted in local sun deities. The reascent at the Dawn would be the return of the "common soul" (the sun disk) of these various sun gods, whose relation would be in the way similar to the one between the various persons of the Trinity. 

Actually in a way, it would fit well with Ian's proposal, with Yelm resulting from the "stitching" of the formerly autonomous body parts!

(Sorry if it isn't clear, English isn't my first language)

That's beautiful work, Baelor, thanks a lot!

Thanks everybody for all the wonderful material given here. My own take on Elmal/Yelmalio would be the following (as far as I understand the existing material as I am quite new to Glorantha).

I would see Elmal as an avatar/mask of Yelmalio dedicated to the protection of the Heortling during the Great Darkness and the result of compensation, in a proper Orlanthi justice way, by Orlanth to his former actions against Yelmalio. He left him unharmed, delivering him defenseless to the violence of other enemies, resulting in Yelmalio's limping gait.

In need of Yelmalio's light to protect his stead as he left for the lightbringers' quest, Orlanth would have compensated his victim giving him back his arms (hence the full Fire rune  of Elmal) and his mobility through the mariage with Redalda, in exchange for his service. The gift of arms and horse is the proper way to create a bond between an housecarl/thane and a chief, as far as I know.