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Entekosiad and the Five Goddesses


Qizilbashwoman

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On 8/29/2019 at 9:37 AM, Tindalos said:

Bisos is the son of the bull god KevTavar, and of the cow mother Esus. So if anything he's more like Waha. (For sufficiently wide standards of "like")

 

The Guide to Glorantha explicitly equates Bisos and Urox in at least 1 place (p. 327), though they are distinguished elsewhere (p. 325).  So, I suspect either interpretation is viable (though I personally prefer Bisos to be different from Urox, since Urox doesn't seem to have Bisos' leadership skills).

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On 8/29/2019 at 8:19 AM, Sir_Godspeed said:

Good catch.


I was thinking that GanEstoro might be associated with the Greater Darkness of the Gods War (either as Chaos or Darkness) - but I'm not sure how these things line up chronologically (as mentioned above, I sadly don't have the text on me - but all of this appears to be before the Daxdarian age, so I guess it's during the Storm Age sometime).

I guess the association with "Lies" fits fairly well with how a lot of theistic societies view sorcery/materialism. Sorcerers lie about how the universe works and perverse the faithful with their atheist/dystheist ideas, after all.
 

I have a lot odd thoughts about the Bad Gods of the Entekosiad.

GanEstoro / Estoro / Ganesaturus

  • IMG, GanEstoro is a version of Turos.  He is "Gan Turos," associated with the Gan Hills.  Both Turos and GanEstoro talk to worshippers through cracks in caves, and GanEstoro is called the God Who Gives and Takes, which suggests a capriciousness that would fit with how Yelmites talk about dirty dirty Lodril (who is Turos).
  • GanEstoro is a version of Turos that supports human sacrfice.  We know that some of the High Gods secretly kept getting human sacrifices after Idovanus / Idoman / Gartemirus banned the practice.
  • The idea that a version of Turos that is associated with human sacrifice and the Gan Hills would explain the Spolites, a Northern Pelandan culture who are defined by their "enthusiasm" over human sacrifice.
  • Ganestoro is known in Fronela as Ganestos, "an underground god... who stole the secrets of the dwarves" (P. 225)
    • Based on this, I would argue that there is some sort of a relationship between Ganestos & the Third Eye Blue tribe of the Brass Mountains

Yargan 

  • While I can understand a reading that sees King Blue and Yargan as different people, I equate them, along with Guide to Glorantha (P. 317)
  • EVERYONE hates Yargan: 
    • Jernotius defeated him, Daxdarius overthrew him, Urvairinus the Conquerer dismembered him, and Bisos killed him and then resurrected him as the God of bountiful harvests.  
    • Given that Yargan has strong underworld & death associations in some stories, I'm not terribly surprised that death is a temporary inconvenience to him, and then he's redeemed as a god of harvests (which is kind of has an association to life & death)
  • Yargan has a blue spear from the corner of sky.
    • Between this, and Ganestos stealing the secret of iron from the Mostali, I would suggest that The Later Blue Peoples were Kachisti who worshipped Ladral / Lodril / Ganestos.  The Kachisti were also allied with the Weartagi for a long time before the Dawn.  Yargan's invasion was therefore a western invasion to "liberate" a version of Turos from the "tyranny" of earlier blue peoples who followed Listor, the Poralistors, and King Oronin.  I realize this is a radically different understanding of them compared to what some people here have said.  However, I think this fits the Entekosiad and the Guide to Glorantha, and it explains the Third Eye Blue Tribe.
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Oh, and another Bad God: Oh, also?  Daak is Daxdarius.

One is a thief in the night who ruined the House of Virtue and raped the virtuous queen.  The other is a warlord who insists that the world is defined by war now, and the fall of the sky & sun proved his point and allowed him to become a High God (for a while)

 

Saying that is a great way to get killed by a phalanx in Pelanda & Oronin :)

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49 minutes ago, Nevermet said:

The Guide to Glorantha explicitly equates Bisos and Urox in at least 1 place (p. 327), though they are distinguished elsewhere (p. 325).  So, I suspect either interpretation is viable (though I personally prefer Bisos to be different from Urox, since Urox doesn't seem to have Bisos' leadership skills).

Bisos is a bad fit for Urox, but is an equally bad fit for Waha the Tracker. He doesn't have any history with hsunchen, although there's no specific reason he wouldn't work well with them given the tribal situation of Prax, but he also has no known-to-us footprint outside of Prax with some bleed into Kerofinela. I guess the Bison Riders could have brought his worship? His hatred of the Zora Fel and its worshippers seems on point.

Learning that the Entekosiad was originally written using the Monomyth names which were then retroconned into local words just makes this work more frustrating lmao. I'm still swinging and missing on most of this stuff.

Edited by Qizilbashwoman
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2 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Bisos is a bad fit for Urox, but is an equally bad fit for Waha the Tracker. He doesn't have any history with hsunchen, although there's no specific reason he wouldn't work well with them given the tribal situation of Prax, but he also has no known-to-us footprint outside of Prax with some bleed into Kerofinela. I guess the Bison Riders could have brought his worship? His hatred of the Zora Fel and its worshippers seems on point.

Learning that the Entekosiad was originally written using the Monomyth names which were then retroconned into local words just makes this work more frustrating lmao. I'm still swinging and missing on most of this stuff.

Oh, it's an extremely aggravating text.  Everyone has 2-4 names, the narrators are ALL unreliable, and its really unfinished ("you must tell me about Gartemirus & Natha!  NOW!!!")

And I agree that Urox is a bad ft for Bisos.  One of my (gentle) criticisms of the Guide is that it sometimes feels like they wanted to simplify the mythology by removing unique, local gods.

(or perhaps thats my twisted love of Maniria talking there)

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1 minute ago, Nevermet said:

Oh, it's an extremely aggravating text.  Everyone has 2-4 names, the narrators are ALL unreliable, and its really unfinished ("you must tell me about Gartemirus & Natha!  NOW!!!")

And I agree that Urox is a bad ft for Bisos.  One of my (gentle) criticisms of the Guide is that it sometimes feels like they wanted to simplify the mythology by removing unique, local gods.

(or perhaps thats my twisted love of Maniria talking there)

what's worse, that or the fact that a text that is explicitly about how Entekos is Dendara constantly divides them into separate divinities appearing at the same time as distinct beings

also, who is Natha in the Monomyth, I haven't dragged myself far enough out of the East to figure that out.

Edited by Qizilbashwoman
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1 minute ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

what's worse, that or the fact that a text that is explicitly about how Entekos is Dendara constantly divides them into separate divinities appearing at the same time as distinct beings

also, who is Natha in the Monomyth, I haven't dragged myself far enough out of the East to figure that out.

I honestly have no idea what the Monomyth thinks about Natha.

But yeah, the Entekosiad is a real mess in part because of how gods are  blurred.  Turos is ViSaruDuran, the son of ViSaruDaran, and an internal aspect of ViSaruDaran.  ...you can find this sort of embraced complication in real world polytheistic religions (Meso American cultures like the Aztec come to mind), but my God... it makes me want to drink.

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10 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Bisos is a bad fit for Urox, but is an equally bad fit for Waha the Tracker. He doesn't have any history with hsunchen, although there's no specific reason he wouldn't work well with them given the tribal situation of Prax, but he also has no known-to-us footprint outside of Prax with some bleed into Kerofinela. I guess the Bison Riders could have brought his worship? His hatred of the Zora Fel and its worshippers seems on point.

If Bisos is a parralel to Waha as some have suggested, it might not require one having migrated to the other, but rather that they have a common origin somewhere south of the Rockwoods. Maybe the sunken lands between modern-day Kethaela and the Spike.

I have no idea if indeed Bisos is a parallel of Waha, and the exact geography is a bit irrelevant, but the point is the potential for a common origin outside of the places where the respective gods are worshipped now.

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1 minute ago, Nevermet said:

I honestly have no idea what the Monomyth thinks about Natha.

But yeah, the Entekosiad is a real mess in part because of how gods are  blurred.  Turos is ViSaruDuran, the son of ViSaruDaran, and an internal aspect of ViSaruDaran.  ...you can find this sort of embraced complication in real world polytheistic religions (Meso American cultures like the Aztec come to mind), but my God... it makes me want to drink.

We don't have to go that far - Christian trinitarianism is a headscratcher in itself.

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I've done a fekkin 180 on the early E, so let me know what you think. PLEASE let me know what you think. This is a rabbinical quorum. Bring your inner imam. Tell me I've got it backwards and why. I feel getting some of these pieces in the first chapter are key to getting some other bits sorted.

Also, in review, who the eff is Entekos, she's basically a female Orlanth if you read this

  1. Benbeng “Bell” [Gata?]
  2. Alk "Green, the color; she is the power of all that out there, on this side” [Ernalda]
  3. Beseda “Plenty” [Oria=Esrola]
  4. Addi “Stick” [Entekos]
  5. Karanda whose name means "The Striped One” [Eiritha]

Why is Benbeng Gata?

The text now says: Jeda Benben is the Hearth god and she both makes and keeps the fire burning there. She is the god who dances with bells. She delights in the chimes of metal, but comes to the sounds of the clay bells. Her daughters were many and include:

  • Eth Elo Da Tanno She is our Grandmother, whose children are the Light and Dark. [“First Light and Dark”, no idea.]
  • Kap Eth Sur Eria She is the Umbilical Grandmother, who flows to us through our blood kin. [Asrelia?]
  • Tanno Aya She is the one who sees in the dark. No secrets are kept from her. [“Seer in the Dark” Ty Kora Tek]
  • Alk Eria She is the one without fault, who is perfect, who all strive for but no one attains. She grows all around us. [Alk]
  • Bisel Eria She is the source of all Beauty, of pleasure. [Pleasure/Beauty Woman]
  • Nenan An arrow-head shaped dart. [?]

Why is Alk Ernalda?

 

The daughters of Alk included

  • Aron Baka [Aldrya]
  • Est Bratha  "our enfolding Mother, who shields us from harm.” [Babeester Gor]
  • Orogeria
  • Esus

Why is Beseda-Besadesa-Besed Eria Oria (Esrola)?

The text tells us. The footnote says, "the life force which gives us abundance so we do not fear about starving and have time to play."

Why is Addi/Bara En Deddi Entekos

It's the literal entire point of the book. Her daughters are:

  • Dum "Drum"
  • Hertha Voga “Sky Flyer” (the [first?] shaman!)
  • Deddi "Council"
  • Firadelsi "Forest"
  • Ded Addi "She who holds the Council Staff"
  • Nansha & Naquasha

Why is Karanda Eiritha?

This one is a guess, but:

"Her daughters were all of the important Mothers of old times. They are named Bus Enari "Cow Mother," Verg Enari "Sow Mother," Ertel Enari "Bear Mother," Kes Enari "Apron Mother," Mem Enari "Nursing Mother," Ses Enari "River Mother," and Vorgetala."

Who is Vorgetala, the erased god?

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Trying to map up the army of goddesses in the early myths in the Entekosiad is an exercise in madness, and I sympathize with your efforts.

 

Just to let you know, trying to map out and compare families trees to make a unified genealogy does not save one from madness.

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11 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Also, in review, who the eff is Entekos, she's basically a female Orlanth if you read this

Girding my uh "lions" for a full-force engagement with the text but in the meantime I wonder if it helps to follow the Plentonic conclusion that some of these entities map onto two or more foreign gods in different phases or interpretations. We know, for example, that someone who initiates to either DH Entekos or Dendara can "participate fully" in the Pelandan rite but Pelandan priestesses moving into the binary upstairs girl / downstairs girl DH system have to choose which goddess to keep and which to leave behind. A paradox only if we assume that all deities are the same size.

In previous readings I decided Entekos, Dendara and the mysterious Endeddi were all phases of the same goddess as planet, fertility and weather . . . the parts that are basically a female Orlanth remain with Entekos (folding in Endeddi) while the parts we would associate with an "Ernalda" or other lifegiver spin out as a separate Dendara at some point. These might also have been three separate cults in the never-never who got conflated but the text is mostly silent here. (That said I like the theory that Dendara came from / rose in the east along with her immediate family.)

I am not sure Entekos maps onto the Addi, which I always read as one of the accoutrements of shamanic or at least magical consciousness, the magic wand or signifying stick who takes pride of place among her sisters. Maybe all woke women are daughters of the Addi but not all daughters of the Addi participate fully in the Entekos. But we go with the travel we get.

I think Valere is reaching a little in attributing the mysterious Vorgetela to IV.19*, which throws off the perfect sky count if we assign it a number and a name. I'm cool with breaking the sky count but the Plentonists would have kittens. Karanda's children are stripy but I don't know if all Finger Goddess are stripy, all horizontally divided entities on the Wall are Karanda's children, all of Karanda's children make it onto the Wall or even if Karanda's children are really identical to the Finger Goddesses (I must be missing a cite), which reduces the urgency of assigning a Wall spot to someone invisible and ineffable. 

Of course this begs the question of what IV.19* is instead and also fails to address what sublime state the Vorgetala represents. She might simply fill out the octave in a numerically pleasing way. On the other hand, if there is an esoteric link between the Finger Signs and the Enari then yeah, they would need the numbers to match. But Vorgetala may not be her real name.

 

singer sing me a given

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1 hour ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

also, who is Natha in the Monomyth, I haven't dragged myself far enough out of the East to figure that out.

Natha's an incarnation of the Red Goddess, which is the Lunar "in" to Pelanda.

1 hour ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Also, in review, who the eff is Entekos, she's basically a female Orlanth if you read this

  1. Benbeng “Bell” [Gata?]
  2. Alk "Green, the color; she is the power of all that out there, on this side” [Ernalda]
  3. Beseda “Plenty” [Oria=Esrola]
  4. Addi “Stick” [Entekos]
  5. Karanda whose name means "The Striped One” [Eiritha]

Well, Entekos was given as a name to the First Rebel before it was given to the goddess (GRoY 14)... So I mean, if you wanted to have fun you could say she's Vinga Thunderous.

When making my own notes/summary of the Entekosiad, I'd noted FaElsor/Karandra/Feder as the Ernalda equivalent, as the mother of animals and people. I'm guessing Vorgetala may be the mother of spirits (specifically ones of the earth. This is likely the same being as earlier editions had as Talosa, goddess of snakes and earth elementals, and the God Learners would probably have dubbed "Queen Gnome" to match with King Undine)

Of course, FaElsor was also identified with Lesilla (in the footnotes of FaElsor and the Serpent, page 10) and it could be possible to identify her sisters as other incarnations of the goddess (Arira as Zaytenera, Proveria as Verithurusa, and Koveria into Gerra, with that myth following the Lunar cycle.) Especially with snakes being associated with Sedenya's form of immortality (Entekosiad 33)

8 minutes ago, metcalph said:

The finger goddesses are phases of the Moon with Vorgetala being the Black Moon phase goddess. 

Ooh interesting. I'm assuming ErtelEnari would be Orogeria, with MemEnari as Lesilla, and I could see a case for SesEnari and Natha (as SesEnari represents the viewpoint of anger) but the others?

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1 hour ago, Nevermet said:

Trying to map up the army of goddesses in the early myths in the Entekosiad is an exercise in madness, and I sympathize with your efforts.

Just to let you know, trying to map out and compare families trees to make a unified genealogy does not save one from madness.

we're all mad here

7 minutes ago, Tindalos said:

Natha's an incarnation of the Red Goddess, which is the Lunar "in" to Pelanda

You can't incarnate a goddess before she exists.

7 minutes ago, Tindalos said:

Well, Entekos was given as a name to the First Rebel before it was given to the goddess (GRoY 14)... So I mean, if you wanted to have fun you could say she's Vinga Thunderous.

Or I could be really fun and point out that Entekos appears long before Orlanth does and call Orlanth "Bro Entekos".

I wonder if any of the spawn show up on the Storm Gods list in the theogony?

7 minutes ago, Tindalos said:

When making my own notes/summary of the Entekosiad, I'd noted FaElsor/Karandra/Feder as the Ernalda equivalent, as the mother of animals and people.

Karanda, Karanda, Karanda. The first mother, the Feder hand-shaped from earth, Fa Elsor.

She's giving me fits a little. Eiritha makes sense literally, as mother of herds, but elsewhere we see Fa Elsor is the Water Wife, who bears the children of the Poralistor. This is Ernaldan. Ernalda bears all the bébé by all the husbands. I just hate that she's in the list twice, as Alk and Karanda.

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15 minutes ago, Tindalos said:

Ooh interesting. I'm assuming ErtelEnari would be Orogeria, with MemEnari as Lesilla, and I could see a case for SesEnari and Natha (as SesEnari represents the viewpoint of anger) but the others?

I really like the idea of Gerra as Vorgetala... I'll have to add that to my Spolitism info.

 

The problem with SesEnari as Natha is that Natha is explicity the granddaughter of BaraEnDedi / Addi, as she is the child / union of Nansha & Naquasha.

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Is it possible that Ulurda's masks are Orogeria and Eirithia? When her planet disappeared, maybe that's why She lives underground? The shift from hunter to mother of herds is honestly not that big.

I'm only asking because Ulurda has no history and Orogeria has only weird unclear ones: Fa Elsor-Oria, who we all think is partially Ernalda.

And Eirithia is Ernalda's daughter.

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16 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

You can't incarnate a goddess before she exists.

But the Red Goddess/Moon Goddess did exist in the Godtime with several incarnations (Gerra, Natha, Orogeria/Ulurda, Verithusa, Lesilla). The problem with her is that she was left in a limbo state when the Great Compromise was agreed to. 

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17 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

I just hate that she's in the list twice, as Alk and Karanda.

The other option there is that Alk is a feminine incarnation of Flamal -- parent to the tree goddess. Of course her description as the nature goddess -- and as mother to Esus (who's also given as Ernalda on page 327 of the guide!) -- could make her the Lady of the Wild(s) (who just to confuse matters, has also been given as a title of Orogeria)

Which of course makes more fun, as the Lady of the Wild was the mother of Odayla with Orlanth, which would make Orlanth and the Red Goddess a couple at one point... so probably not best to mention that.

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2 minutes ago, Tindalos said:

The other option there is that Alk is a feminine incarnation of Flamal -- parent to the tree goddess. Of course her description as the nature goddess -- and as mother to Esus (who's also given as Ernalda on page 327 of the guide!) -- could make her the Lady of the Wild(s) (who just to confuse matters, has also been given as a title of Orogeria)

 

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Which of course makes more fun, as the Lady of the Wild was the mother of Odayla with Orlanth, which would make Orlanth and the Red Goddess a couple at one point... so probably not best to mention that.

 

I really think a lot of the work is done by looking at the godspawn here

like i was chewing about the six daughters of Jeda Benben and thinking real hard about whether the six daughters of Asrelia fit, because I'm on the struggle bus with this stuff

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40 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

Or I could be really fun and point out that Entekos appears long before Orlanth does and call Orlanth "Bro Entekos".

I wonder if any of the spawn show up on the Storm Gods list in the theogony?

Several months ago I proposed that Entekos was basically the Pelandan version of Orlanth, just feminine and with the "barbaric" aspects reduced to a minor attendan (Buburstus or whatever he's called - the thunder guy with a club, iirc). This never really catched on, so I proposed that she might be an hitherto unnamed sister of Orlanth, but I couldn't find any precedent for that. Lately I've been reading the Book of Heortling Mythology, however, and it introduces Serenha, the daughter of Umath, whose myth mentions that she arose in the "wake" of Umath's movement. She is not given a mother.

There are things to count against this: her only real function in the Heortling pantheon seems to be to provide us with an explanation of where the breath-spirits that Kolat uses came from (Ha, He, Ho, etc.), and she is so obscure in Heortling mythology that I'm hesitant to believe that Greg would write a massive tome centred on what seems like a throwaway name. Additionally, there is not implication of her being associated with anything Dendara-like in the small snippet I've read.

Someone also suggested the Entekos may be a sister or aspect of Umath, but I have to admit I'd prefer if we only had one Primal Storm/Air, if only for some semblance of simplicity.  

40 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

You can't incarnate a goddess before she exists.

But, like, the Red Goddess has ALWAYS existed, so there!

23 minutes ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

origins, not role. we know what she does, we just don't have a solid role in any pantheon for her.

Is Orogeria a cognate/parallel of Velhara, the Lady of the Wild?
If so, Heortling myths present as the daughter of Kero Fin.

I'm tempted to say that this might mean that each "Land Goddess" has a daughter/incarnation that acts as a regional "Lady of the Wild" and/or "Huntress", much like they have grain daughters and herd daughters. The tamed and untamed aspects of the Earth Mothers. This would make Orogeria a daughter of Oria/Pelora or whichever is the most relevant entity.

Pure speculation, of course. Always trying to impose patterns on the unpatterneable.

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1 minute ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Always trying to impose patterns on the unpatterneable.

except we know a significant portion of it is in fact patternable. it's just the monomyth with local names replacing the monomyth names afterwards. not all of it is neat - it's messy and trails off and isn't linear - but it is, in fact, not a random collection. it is in fact the monomyth.

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