Please explain the Ignorant/Blood Sun religion to me.

[Sir_Godspeed]

This is something I'm quite ignorant of (heh). I'm getting the general vibes that it's about an alternate perception of the God Time many suns stuff, and I think there's something parallel to the Vithelan myths of the demon who takes over heaven (Helespur?) and maybe Shargash is related to the Blood or Black Sun or something, but overall I don't really understand it. 

Both explanation and reading suggestions would be much appreciated.

[jeffjerwin]

1 hour ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

This is something I'm quite ignorant of (heh). I'm getting the general vibes that it's about an alternate perception of the God Time many suns stuff, and I think there's something parallel to the Vithelan myths of the demon who takes over heaven (Helespur?) and maybe Shargash is related to the Blood or Black Sun or something, but overall I don't really understand it. 

Both explanation and reading suggestions would be much appreciated.

I think it may be related to one or all of the following: Bijiif or Karzkurtum (which I think is related to Zorak Zoran), and Basko (the last may be canon). Basko interrupts in a ritual manner the Ten Tests.

[metcalph]

1 hour ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

This is something I'm quite ignorant of (heh). I'm getting the general vibes that it's about an alternate perception of the God Time many suns stuff, and I think there's something parallel to the Vithelan myths of the demon who takes over heaven (Helespur?) and maybe Shargash is related to the Blood or Black Sun or something, but overall I don't really understand it. 

Both explanation and reading suggestions would be much appreciated.

I'm not sure I see what your problem is.

Quote

Jorazzi Redhand was another prophet who rose to enliven his countrymen by instituting blood sacrifice to strengthen their god. They called this new aspect the Blood Sun and believed the god would stay strong as long as he received fresh blood. In an amoral way, this was acceptable before Death entered the world. When the blood victims no longer rose and regrew their ripped bodies, though, the worshipers of the Blood Sun grew worried. Their god was blood and blood was life. They saw their own end if Death were allowed to gain the upper hand against Blood. They entered into a frenzy of self-consumption that sapped the land of life.

RuneQuest Companion p63

I get an Aztec vibe.  Greg intended an Aztec vibe (ToTRM #7 letters).

As for the Cryptic Verses of the Yellow Calender, I assume the mention of the Blood Sun therein are actually references of the Red Moon and the Lunar Empire.

Shargash is related to the Solar Storm IMO (or to be more technical, both are seen as Gods of the same planet).

 

Edited January 23, 2020 by metcalph

[Sir_Godspeed]

13 minutes ago, metcalph said:

Jorazzi Redhand

Who? 

13 minutes ago, metcalph said:

his countrymen

The ignorants? 

13 minutes ago, metcalph said:

by instituting blood sacrifice to strengthen their god

Which god? When? 

13 minutes ago, metcalph said:

Cryptic Verses of the Yellow Calender,

What? 

13 minutes ago, metcalph said:

Solar Storm

The what now? 

 

As you can see, I am totally blanking on this. 

EDIT: Basically all I know is that Bliss in Ignorance used to be populated by a culture of humans who worshipped the Sun(?), but at some point started mass sacrifice from stepped pyramids (subtle). Then something bad happened, and we get a succession - or prophesized succession? - of different Suns, and something about a war in heaven (or am I crossing wires now?) and then there are some trolls moving in who either conquer and take over with some Darkness Sun or something, and then something about trollkin and humans and Kralori and oh dear I appear to have gone crosseyed. 

So feel free to treat me as if I'm a newborn babe on this one.

Edited January 23, 2020 by Sir_Godspeed

[metcalph]

Just now, Sir_Godspeed said:

Who? 

The ignorants? 

Which god? When? 

What? 

The what now? 

 

As you can see, I am totally blanking on this.

I give up, 

[Sir_Godspeed]

1 minute ago, metcalph said:

I give up, 

I apologize if I'm coming off as rude - that was not the intention. I am not being facetious, I have very little understanding of what these references are.

[metcalph]

1 minute ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

I apologize if I'm coming off as rude - that was not the intention. I am not being facetious, I have very little understanding of what these references are.

What references have you read?  Where are you getting the Blood Sun name from?  What I said was fairly basic information in the Guide but you haven't read that.

[jajagappa]

5 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

I apologize if I'm coming off as rude - that was not the intention. I am not being facetious, I have very little understanding of what these references are.

You are not, and unfortunately the responses you got were not helpful.

I think a good starting point is to indicate what sources/references you have at hand.  There's useful tidbits in the RQ Companion that help shed light here.

And perhaps @GianniVacca can provide his thoughts and insights on the Kingdom of Ignorance.

[metcalph]

2 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

You are not, and unfortunately the responses you got were not helpful.

He was rude and I fail to see how my first response was "not helpful" even going so far as to quote the relevant section of the RQ Companion that you suggested he look at.  But when someone asks to explain the Ignorants after previously talking about Herespur, one gets the feeling of being jerked around for amusement.

[Sir_Godspeed]

1 hour ago, metcalph said:

He was rude and I fail to see how my first response was "not helpful" even going so far as to quote the relevant section of the RQ Companion that you suggested he look at.  But when someone asks to explain the Ignorants after previously talking about Herespur, one gets the feeling of being jerked around for amusement.

My knowledge of Glorantha is skewed in an unusual way since I'm not really a tabletop roleplayer, so I don't really have any RQ or HQ material. My view into Glorantha is largely literary and due to my fascination with worldbuilding and anthropology.

I know of Helespur from Revealed Mythologies, which to the best of my knowledge, does not mention the Ignorants in any signicant capacity.

I'm working on assembling a complete collection of the Stafford Library, but there's a limited amount of money I can spend on stuff atm (recently unemployed looking for work). I've got a few of those, plus the Sourcebook, and I do in fact have the Guide! I bought it in 2017 back before I went off to India for studies, to have some interesting to read. Anyway, I had to find and boot up my old PC to retrieve the PDF, so now it's with me and available for reference again! (I guess it's possible to download the document from Chaosium again if you need it - I admit I've never tried to do so.) 

So, I'll take @metcalph's initial advice and re-read the passage on Chen Durel in the Guide, and then make a new post with hopefully more informed question.

Edited January 24, 2020 by Sir_Godspeed

[jajagappa]

1 hour ago, metcalph said:

He was rude and I fail to see how my first response was "not helpful" even going so far as to quote the relevant section of the RQ Companion that you suggested he look at.

Sorry Peter, but "I'm not sure I see what your problem is." and "I give up" are not very helpful statements. Why not ask first if he has access to the Guide and suggest relevant pages?

The passage was fine to quote, but it doesn't provide a lot of context if you're just trying to work your way through one of Greg's Stafford Library texts.

[Sir_Godspeed]

So, I've done my due diligence (hopefully) in reading through the Chern Durel section in the Guide again (I'd forgotten a lot, but in fairness it doesn't necessarily explain a whole lot either - bird's eye view of the Guide and all that). 

What I'm getting is that Chen Durel was at one point in the Golden Age a Solar civilization, clearly at least partly urban, although I'm unsure whether it was actually united politically or just shared a common culture. 

The culture has some stereotypical mezoamerican touchstones, such as stepped pyramids and human sacrifice, but the human sacrifice is explained to be an innovation at some point, not necessarily originally there (you'll have to forgive me for being confused by the name Jorazzi Redhands - it sounds so incredibly like the names we get with the Orlanthi that I begun questioning whether this was some Orlanthi adventurer in time or something - but he appears to be local to the region.). 

I still have some questions about this stuff, and hopefully they are more articulated this time around: 

1. They're a Solar civilization. This is interesting since so are their immediate neighbors to the east of pre-Flood Vithela (including pre-Kralorela which is not yet Draconic at this point) as well as their eventual western neighbors in God Time Peloria/Empire of Brilliance. Moreover, they have stepped pyramids, which conjures images of Dara Happa. While the ziggurats of Dara Happa are quite lanky, the stepped pyramids of Chen Durel are almost always explicitly stated to be squat, still, an interesting parallel. Additionally, and apochryphal, Six Ages features Dara Happans emerging from under the Glacier in the Storm Age who are illustrated with very clearly Mezo- or South American clothing and even physical features (see here). In many ways, Chen Durel is located between the Solar Empire/Empire of Brilliance/Dara Happa, and the eastern solar empire, Vithela/Abzered. Do we consider the Ignorants - at this point still in the Golden Age - to have been associated, or under either of them? I know that the question is essentially unanswereable since mythic politics is so malleable and loose (ie. if Vith is associated with Aether Primolt, and Yelm with Govermanen, we essentially have two different Solar Imperial Complexes, on either side of the Ignorants, perhaps minus some Genert's Garden butting in a bit along the west. Anyway, this direct association while always difficult, is super interesting to me). 

2. They have a prophecy. This is deeply interesting to me since prophecies are generally somewhat rare in Glorantha, but moreover they seem to have been more forewarned than other Solar civilizations of the Golden Age. This makes them kinda special, doesn't it? The question is also - why did they start assuming that the sun would change? Others here have argued elsewhere that the Sun or Yelm is an office taken over by god after god. Could this be another perspective on that? We're in deep foil hat territory, obviously.

3. The different Suns are, initially, associated with the phases of the sun's path across the sky. Early Light (Dawn), Rising Orb, Victorious Zenith and Solar Storm. You know what's bizarre about that? The sun did not move in the Golden Age. So this leaves me with some thoughts: Either a) they were actually remembering something from the Green Age when it's possible that the Sun in fact moved around the sky along with a white moon and other celestial objects, b) it's a set of metaphors for imperial-divine power of the Sun in the Golden Age that are weirdly prescient of what is to come, c) it's a part of a grand perspective of the entire God Time from Blue Age, to Green Age, to Gold Age, to Storm Age - the later suns provide for the Greater Darkness, and this pattern is then at least partially reproduced and "fixed" for the Sun's path within Time (clearly very validating to whoever was left worshipping sun in Chen Durel at the Dawn). It's also possible it was all composed in retrospect, which is a nice nod to RW religious practices, but feels a bit cheap, worldbuilding-wise.

4. The four different suns so far: can they comfortably be associated with Pelorian sun Gods, or Vithelan Sun/Ruler gods? Ather or Vith as Early Light or Rising Orb? Yelm or Govmeranen as Victorious Zenith? Shargash or Tolat as Solar Storm? I know other mentioned this earlier, but I'm trying to formulate some thoughts of my own before I mix with others' perspectives. 

5. At some point human sacrifice started. This summoned an aspect of the Suns called the Blood Sun. The Blood Sun is actually not its own phase of the lineage of the Sun gods as I previously thought, it's apparently an aspect of all suns.  @metcalph quoted earlier that initially the sacrificed would return to life (ie. Golden Age), but then stop to do so (ie. Storm Age, post innovation of Death). The parallels to human sacrifice of the kings in the Entekosiad is interesting, but perhaps not directly related, since the sacrifice of the Red King (iirc) is a Green Age tradition, whereas the Chen Durel is a Golden Age innovation. I am interested in knowing why the Ignorants thought they needed to increase the strength of their sun god during the Golden Age though. Storm Age I could understand (things are getting dicey), but paradisical (if totalitarian) Golden Age? There seems to be something we're not privy to here. Strengthening against the Seas, maybe? Internal divisions? Morevoer, the Guide puts the paragraph about Redhands' innovation after paragraphs of Solar Storm's reign ending, which at least structurally gives the impression that the human sacrifice thing happened during the Storm Age. This makes more sense with regards to the need to strengthen the sun, but not so much when taken together with the above quote on how sacrifices would initially return to life just fine. This might just be an artifact of text formatting though, and not actually the text's intention. I'm not sure. 

6. Solar Storm is said to have been given a third eye and turned placid and enlightened. Does this mean that Shargash or Tolat has Illuminated aspects, or illumination myths? This was done by Emperor Shavaya, which is apparently late Storm Age, so that checks out at least. EDIT: This is assuming that Solar Storm can even be associated with the Red Planet, which is arguable to begin with, I don't rightly know either way.

7. And so the trolls arrive. They are preceded by a prophet called Shadow of the Storm. It is at this point that we get the prophecy of the Suns to Come, which means that I was wrong in thinking that the Suns to Come had to do with the Early Light, Rising Orb, etc. The prophecy of the Suns to Come relates to EVEN MORE Suns. Shadow of the Storm claims that the Black Sun is the (or one of the) prophesized Suns to Come. It is explicitly called a black or dark fire, which makes my mind go to Zorak Zoran - but even here Shargash is not entirely off the table. And then there is Bijiif, Yelm's underworld aspect. Kazkurtum is similarly a term which could be applied to aspects of Bijiif or Shargash (but perhaps less so ZZ) and even Chaos. I believe the actual, local name used for the Black Sun is Basko, and they are consistently differentiated from ZZ in the Guide, and moreover stated to "ostensibly be of the Sky pantheon". 

8. And then... at the tail end of the First Age, this craziness all just sort of... ends? Okay, well, not really, there's more to Chen Durel, but from then to at least the Hero Wars, the native multi-Sun, Black Sun cult and mythos is supressed by Kralorelan draconic ministers and governors. The troll ruling class is largely purged or pacified. The local commoners and traditional priesthoods continue more or less as usual, but with the imperial might of a (beleaguered) essentially "colonial" Kralorelan government on top. There's a brief interlude during the New Dragon ring, but it doesn't strike me as immediately relevant to our discussion here. 


So, that sums up my understanding this far. Do people have some thoughts about this stuff? Some corrections, some help or just a desire to spin on a fun yarn together?

I also acknowledge that the usage of strict "Ages" in the God Time is artificially constrained, but I needed some level of framework around which to base my thoughts, or else it would just turn to soup, so feel free to poke holes in that if you want to.

EDIT: Damn it, I forgot to include the stuff from Revealed Mythologies about the Sky Tyrant and Herespur and such, but I don't quite have time to do that before tonight. Input greatly appreciated.

Edited January 24, 2020 by Sir_Godspeed

[Eff]

One way of looking at the myth of Solar Storm becoming enlightened is that, if we accept that Solar Storm is another face of Shargash-Tolat-the God of the Red Planet, that this is also a Kralori myth. Where Dara Happa created a mythology around the binding and semi-willful submission of Shargash to the proper authority of Yelm/Murharzarm/Antirius, the Kralori version is one where Shargash is tamed via his enlightenment, which points to the differences between the cultures involved and how they conceive of ideal behavior. In turn, the Ignorant exist in a kind of discourse where they define themselves as contrary to Kralori enlightenment and so accept that their god, the Solar Storm, was enlightened and so failed, proving the limitations of worshiping the Sun. (And thus they turned to the cold, probably Sedenyic light of the Blood Sun and the colder light of Basko the Black Sun.)

But from another perspective, Shargash descended into the Underworld and came back out again. Of course he's enlightened. That's why he knows that Death brings Life. (Which is also the secret of the Blood Sun, and the Hon-eel maize rites, and perhaps the Goddess of the Reaching Moon...)

[Sir_Godspeed]

8 minutes ago, Eff said:

colder light of Basko the Black Sun.

Unless he is synonymous with the dark heat that emanated from the Underworld, as it's stated in the Guide. That would make sense with the "black" part. Cold light is usually associated with Lightfore (or, I guess, the Moons), which I don't think is the case here. 

9 minutes ago, Eff said:

But from another perspective, Shargash descended into the Underworld and came back out again. Of course he's enlightened. That's why he knows that Death brings Life. (Which is also the secret of the Blood Sun, and the Hon-eel maize rites, and perhaps the Goddess of the Reaching Moon...)

This is more or less my own take on him as well, and something I hope to eventually put into text for my own heretical Shargash myth. 

Also - thanks for explicating what exactly makes the Blood Sun relatable to these other deities. Sacrifice for agricultural purpose, or world stability, and burning down to open for new growth. Good parallels.

[davecake]

There is also the idea that the Black Sun, and the Blood Sun, both have Illusion powers. The Herespur cycle gives way to Avanapdur, the Lord of Illusion, and Illusion in Eastern myth is a misunderstanding/perversion of mystic insight. Mysticism teaches that reality ultimately is an Illusion (if Illusion is temporary reality, then conversely reality is just an Illusion that lasts longer), and real truth is something deeper. Avanapdur and other illusionary antigods then say that therefore, Illusion is reality, and they then deny that there is a deeper truth. The Black Sun cult says that their Illusionary Life is Life. The temporary healing of the Blood Sun is still real. 

I think thats the core of the Black Sun/Blood Sun from an Eastern mystic perspective. They follow Herespur etc, and when he submits to Avanapdur a tradition of Solar blood sacrifice is changed/made more powerful by his Illusion powers.

[soltakss]

All from memory, Basko was a Sun God who thought he could become Emperor after Aether Primolt retired. So he dressed in fish tails and waited to challenge Yelm when Yelm came to be Emperor. However, he was so overwhelmed by the glory of Yelm that he soiled himself and fell over, so that Yelm didn't even see him as he passed by. Basko then dried up in shame and became a little seed that was forgotten. In the Lesser Darkness, the people of the Land of Ignorance found the seed and worshipped it, revealing the Black Sun, which may be a shadow of Yelm. The Blood Sun is more of a sacrificial way of feeding power to the Black Sun, I think, but I could be wrong there.

The Trolls of the Kingdom of Ignorance fed power to the Black sun, as he was a Solar god of Darkness. When the Kralori kicked a load of people out, they went to the Kingdom of Ignorance and resettled it. they might even have kicked the trolls out and forced them further north towards Valind's Glacier.

So, the people of the Kingdom of Ignorance worship the Black Sun and the Blood Sun. They give blood sacrifice to the Blood sun to strengthen it and it has become a greedy god, wanting ever more sacrifices. As such, they have a Mesoamerican feel, sort of like the Aztecs, with pyramids with Priests atop them, ripping out hearts and draining blood down the sides.

I think that Elder Secrets had some information about the Kingdom of Ignorance and the Black/Bloody Suns. Peter has given a reference from the RuneQuest Companion. The Guide to Glorantha probably has a lot more information, but I might have skipped over that.

Interestingly, the Red Emperor HeroQuests as Basko when he opposes Sheng Seleris's nephews when they try to become Emperor. He dresses in fish scales and kills them. this is important because the Red Emperor knew the myth and changed the outcome, so instead of soiling himself and escaping Yelm's attention, he killed the opponents. He could do this, of course, because he was the Emperor, so he was Yelm and could win the contest. HeroQuesting is fun.

[Joerg]

Taking a look at Revealed Mythologies, I stumbled over the first appearance of Ignorance in Vithelan context as a power wielded by Martalak the Sorcerer Sheradpara, p.73.

One amusing tidbit here is that Martalak released the power of Ignorance as a naked bird flying towards Vith. (Amusing to me, that is, with me looking into the possible connections between the Ratite Empire and the Kingdom of Ignorance.)

 

The Guide names Sekever (the antigod leader for Kralorela, Teshnos, and possibly Vormain) the Black Sun (p.476). It does so in the history section of the East Isles, though - not the place you would naturally look for information on the Kingdom of Ignorance.

So, is Basko identical to Sekever? Is one of them chaotic?

[g33k]

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

...

One amusing tidbit here is that Martalak released the power of Ignorance as a naked bird flying towards Vith. (Amusing to me, that is, with me looking into the possible connections between the Ratite Empire and the Kingdom of Ignorance.)

...

I would presume this to be an allegorical account of the same facts, or maybe a record of some sort of vision/oracle/etc (which so often comes in allegory).

[dumuzid]

3 hours ago, Joerg said:

So, is Basko identical to Sekever? Is one of them chaotic?

Without getting into other aspects of the question, among the roll of great Uz battles against Chaos in Troll Lore is a fight named "Black Sun's Glory."  According to the trolls, some of them found Basko when they rose to the surface at the start of the Lesser Darkness, and added him to their pantheon.  Their Black Sun led them to defeat a chaos army in a battle where both trolls and chaos monsters formed up into orderly ranked and fought a set-piece battle, the first such chaos monsters are known to have fought.

No idea whether Basko and Sekever are the same, but according to Troll Lore at least Basko is probably not chaotic.

[soltakss]

2 hours ago, dumuzid said:

Without getting into other aspects of the question, among the roll of great Uz battles against Chaos in Troll Lore is a fight named "Black Sun's Glory." 

Oh, I forgot that, thanks.

[Akhôrahil]

19 hours ago, Joerg said:

a naked bird

Unlike regular birds, which are clothed?

[Joerg]

2 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Unlike regular birds, which are clothed?

in feathers, yes.

[Sir_Godspeed]

Wow, it's really cool to see these different references come together. 

Clearly there's some kind of Black Sun Complex going on in eastern Glorantha, but @soltakss also noted that apparently there's a Pelorian/Dara Happan perspective on this, (from the same RQ Companion that @metcalph and @jajagappa mentioned?) that quite deviates from the Guide version of things, and of course an Uz perspective (which makes sense, given that modern Ignorant religion is a mix of a fallen Solar mythology and Uz mythology). 

It seems to be that Basko is a preexisting Sky deity that was adopted by the Uz when they emerged from the Underworld, and then also spread to the Ignorants. This also seems to coincide with a wider "demonic" (Chaotic or just Darkness?) takeover of much of modern-day Kralorela-Vormain-Teshnos (Sekever), as well as possibly a general darkening of the Sky (Herespur? Someone else?). There is also an implication or association with the Illusory powers that we see mentioned a lot in Vithelan/East Isles sources but which is largely absent outside of that region. The Blood Sun Effect is potentially Illusion magic of some kind, though probably not Dream magic specifically. There is potentially an overlap or parallelism of theism (Blood Sun, Illusion deities) and mysticism (False consciousness mystics) here, but I might be reading too much into that. The area of the modern East Isles didn't really have a "Darkness" in the conventional sense, due to the "illusion empire" of Avanapdur and associates, so direct connections might be a poor attempt, but conceptual similarities might be possible.

@Joerg also mentions that the "missing" Sky civilization connector between Peloria/Dara Happa and Ignorance & the rest of the East might have been the Ratite Empire. It's possible that this polity stretched over parts of modern Pent in the Golden or Storm Age, and ideas and myths might have been transferred - and even cultural traditions such as feathered headdresses, stepped pyramids and the like. 

Lots of threads to pull on, which I like, as it makes the Ignorant religion feel less like an isolate (which was partly what made it so hard for me to "get" to begin with, it just felt so different form everything surrounding it).

[GianniVacca]

To the Kralori, anything non-Kralori is "demonic". In my Glorantha, Basko is definitely Darkness [anyway in East Genertela the main opposition is not Chaos vs Anti-Chaos, but Ignorance vs Splendour, and Nightmare vs Anti-Nightmare].

 

The Basko-Sekever relationship is more complex. It could be a Kralori construct (i.e., anything anti-Kralori is labelled "Sekever", just like many Christians label as "Satanic" anything non-Christian). TBH there might also be a web of reciprocal influences.

[Sir_Godspeed]

3 hours ago, GianniVacca said:

To the Kralori, anything non-Kralori is "demonic". In my Glorantha, Basko is definitely Darkness [anyway in East Genertela the main opposition is not Chaos vs Anti-Chaos, but Ignorance vs Splendour, and Nightmare vs Anti-Nightmare].

 

Yeah, the term "demon" doesn't help us a lot anywhere in Glorantha, really. It's really just a generic term for a hostile entity (and sometimes not even particularly supernatural ones, f.ex. trolls). There is somewhat of a trend for the term to be associated with Darkness, but that's definitely not a hard rule in any sense. As you mentioned, the Kralori seem to use the term for foreign hostile influences in general. 

The consensus seems to be that Basko is a Sky deity, with a Darkness nature, so that checks. The rest is difficult to verify, but fun to ponder. 

There's also the time Yelm hooked up with the goddess of the night sky, so maybe there's some origin story there - or as has been mentioned, Basko represented the otherwise hidden "shadow" of Yelm, which implicated Kazkurtum as the "Shadow Portion" of Yelm's disintegrated soul (and possibly a metaphor for foreign occupiers and/or the collapse of Yelmic urban norms? Question mark?) But Kazkurtum is so many things (much like your example of Sekever/Satanic above, the Dara Happans seem to refer to Sheng and possibly Arkat/Argrath too as Kazurtum, iirc.), so it's always a bit daunting to associate it with any specific deity, to me at least.

Edited January 29, 2020 by Sir_Godspeed