Long-distance communication between shamans

[Scorus]

A shaman assistant PC in my game has struck up a relationship with a shaman from a distant tribe and culture. How easy/difficult would it be for the two of them to meet up on the spirit plane?

I am contemplating the two of them having a spirit baby. Or perhaps "twins" with one of them birthed on the material plane and the other on the spirit plane.

[PhilHibbs]

Interesting idea. Whilst I don't think it's the general case that it's easy for shamans to communicate over great distances, as in if they just set out to communicate with a specific individual that they are separated from, I'm sure it does happen. Chance encounters, spiritual correspondences between distant physical places, a bit like "magic roads". So, a kind of spirit plane magic road, a way of crossing great spiritual distances easily.

[jajagappa]

3 hours ago, Scorus said:

How easy/difficult would it be for the two of them to meet up on the spirit plane?

The "narrower" the place or directions, the more likely they could meet up.  If they agree to meet up at the "Great Herd" on Fireday of Harmonyweek, there's probably so many spirits and the "herd" is moving along (like the flow of a lava lamp perhaps), that it would be very difficult.  If they agree to follow the "Old Path" past the Well of the Silvered Fish to the Assembly of Small Spirits and meet there when the Dew is fresh, and they both make Spirit Travel rolls, then I'd say they could meet up.

[PhilHibbs]

As to the spirit baby... maybe that's what a fetch is? Your spiritual twin, born at the same time as you, and raised in the spirit world.

[David Scott]

17 hours ago, Scorus said:

A shaman assistant PC in my game has struck up a relationship with a shaman from a distant tribe and culture. How easy/difficult would it be for the two of them to meet up on the spirit plane?

As easy as you want it to be. Depending on how you want to drive the story. You could even have the distant shaman "haunting' the other in their dreams (a common theme), communicating messages that way. Of course they could meet up on the spirit plane. Hopefully in the inner world.

17 hours ago, Scorus said:

I am contemplating the two of them having a spirit baby. Or perhaps "twins" with one of them birthed on the material plane and the other on the spirit plane.

Another common shamanic theme. There's loads of good inspiration to be found in 

Shamanism - Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy by Mircea Eliade (https://archive.org/details/shamanismarchaic0000elia/). For example read the section on The Shaman's Female Tutelary Spirits, and there's loads more for inspiration:

Quote

every Teleut shaman has a celestial wife who lives in the seventh heaven. During his ecstatic journey to Bai Olgan, the shaman meets his wife, and she asks him to remain with her; she has prepared an exquisite banquet for them. "/ My darling young Ram! she sings] / We shall sit together at the blue table . . . / My darling husband, my young kam, / Let us hide in the shadow of the curtains / And let us make love to one another and have fun, / My husband, my young kam!" " She assures him that the road to the sky has been blocked. But the shaman refuses to believe her, and repeats his determination to continue his ascent: "We shall go up the `tapti.' (the spiral groove cut in the shaman tree) / And give praise to the full moon" / 27 (an allusion to the stop that the shaman makes on his celestial journey to venerate the Moon and the Sun). He will touch no food until he has returned to earth. He calls her "My darling, my wife," and adds: "My wife on earth / Is not fit to pour water on thy hands."  The shaman is assisted in his labors not only by his celestial wife but also by feminine spirits. In the fourteenth heaven dwell the nine daughters of Ulgan; it is they who confer his magical powers on the shaman (swallowing hot coals, etc.).

[Scorus]

An interesting turn: the two have decided to marry (one year bed marriage, at least for now). They will tie the (non-Gordian) knot at the Ulerian Temple in Apple Lane and I'm figuring that their spiritual connection with each other through their vows and their connection to the location will give them a place they can more easily find and rendezvous.

Did I mention the bride is Telmori? Your reference to the full moon is apt, @David Scott. I shall most definitely read that source!

[jajagappa]

10 hours ago, Scorus said:

An interesting turn: the two have decided to marry (one year bed marriage, at least for now). They will tie the (non-Gordian) knot at the Ulerian Temple in Apple Lane and I'm figuring that their spiritual connection with each other through their vows and their connection to the location will give them a place they can more easily find and rendezvous.

Sounds good!  And I'd allow the Love (individual) passion to be used to augment Spirit Travel to find each other.

[Note: this all reminds me a lot of the use of Tel'aran'rhiod in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series.]

[davecake]

On 4/5/2021 at 11:56 AM, Scorus said:

Did I mention the bride is Telmori?

Telmori generally consider sex with non-Telmori to be essentially like bestiality - humans look the same, but are a different race. It generally is regarded as a serious crime. 

Of course, shamans might get away with it for weird shaman reasons if you want them to. 

[Scorus]

11 hours ago, davecake said:

Telmori generally consider sex with non-Telmori to be essentially like bestiality - humans look the same, but are a different race. It generally is regarded as a serious crime. 

Of course, shamans might get away with it for weird shaman reasons if you want them to. 

Really? Well, I missed that and the ship has sailed now. I thought that Telmori bred with both humans and wolves. If it is only fellow Telmori then you'd be looking at some serious inbreeding, I would think!

[Joerg]

12 hours ago, davecake said:

Telmori generally consider sex with non-Telmori to be essentially like bestiality - humans look the same, but are a different race. It generally is regarded as a serious crime. 

They were willing to make an exception for the House of Sartar. Both of Terasarin's (legitimate) daughters married their cousins and bodyguards, sons of Kostajor Wolf-Champion, and Salinarg married a female bodyguard of his about a dozen years before he became Prince.

[soltakss]

On 4/13/2021 at 7:25 AM, davecake said:

Telmori generally consider sex with non-Telmori to be essentially like bestiality - humans look the same, but are a different race. It generally is regarded as a serious crime. 

Some extremists may think that. Most might prefer mating with Telmori, as only Telmori understand Telmori mating. However, some might think that mating with humans is fine.

I'm generally not that keen on blanket statements.

[davecake]

12 hours ago, Joerg said:

They were willing to make an exception for the House of Sartar. Both of Terasarin's (legitimate) daughters married their cousins and bodyguards, sons of Kostajor Wolf-Champion, and Salinarg married a female bodyguard of his about a dozen years before he became Prince.

Yes. So there obviously are exceptions. I agree that there was probably a special exception for the House of Sartar, with it being adopted as Telmori ceremonially somehow. And there may be some adoption rite or similar. But it seems likely to be very damn rare, and possibly necessarily magical in nature (such as involving the intervention of a Telmori deity). 

11 minutes ago, soltakss said:

Some extremists may think that. Most might prefer mating with Telmori, as only Telmori understand Telmori mating. However, some might think that mating with humans is fine.

Well, Your Glorantha Can Vary significantly if you want. 

But the official write-ups, both RQ3 and forthcoming, say it is considered bestiality and carries the death penalty. Obviously there is some way to get around it, but I don't think is simply a matter of personal preference. 

The Dorastor RQ3 writeup, for example, says (under spirits of retribution) that it is considered one of the worst possible crimes, worse than murder or cannibalism (which merely merit exile and excommunication) and equivalent to murdering a chief or rune lord, and merits being hunted down and killed, with the magical assistance of Telmor to increase the tracking skills of the hunters. 

28 minutes ago, soltakss said:

I'm generally not that keen on blanket statements.

Sure, and I get that in your games players often play pretty fast and loose with significant cult tenets, and no reason you can't find a reason to sidestep the rule for individual situations in this case too (as happened with the House of Sartar obviously), or vary your Glorantha, I'm just pointing out what the cult tenets are. 

[metcalph]

The actual statements about the Telmori and outsiders are:

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Marriage with an outsider is considered to be bestiality and forbidden on pain of death.

Dorastor: Land of Doom p120

Packs avoid marriage with people who are closer than second cousins, but do not marry outside the Telmori, which would be ‘bestiality.’

The Coming Storm p126

Note what is forbidden is not sex with outsiders but marriage.  The death penalty can be considered a Dorastran punishment rather than a Sartarite one (as the latter have a pretty well-known counter-example).  

[davecake]

On 4/14/2021 at 5:29 PM, metcalph said:

The actual statements about the Telmori and outsiders are:

You missed an important one

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Only two crimes are punishable by death, and those are bestiality (having sex with anyone not of the Telmori)...

Dorastor: Land of Doom, pg 122

On 4/14/2021 at 5:29 PM, metcalph said:

Note what is forbidden is not sex with outsiders but marriage. 

So no, that interpretation (which would be a stretch anyway) is explicitly counter to the text. 

(and same exact text in the 2019 Gods  book draft, not just for the Telmori but the Basmoli too)

On 4/14/2021 at 5:29 PM, metcalph said:

The death penalty can be considered a Dorastran punishment rather than a Sartarite one (as the latter have a pretty well-known counter-example).  

So rather it seems that its intended to be a universal hsunchen principle, including all hsunchen tribes everywhere. Obviously there are other examples of hsunchen intermarrying with humans (the Pendali descendants of Seshnela, etc) but I think the hsunchen special magic is lost in such unions, and some curse may remain. I think it more likely that the House of Sartar is a special example, having been magically adopted as Telmori in Sartars time. Perhaps Sartar used his Larnsting magics to secretly demonstrate transforming into a wolf? 

[Joerg]

8 hours ago, davecake said:

So rather it seems that its intended to be a universal hsunchen principle, including all hsunchen tribes everywhere. Obviously there are other examples of hsunchen intermarrying with humans (the Pendali descendants of Seshnela, etc) but I think the hsunchen special magic is lost in such unions, and some curse may remain. I think it more likely that the House of Sartar is a special example, having been magically adopted as Telmori in Sartars time. Perhaps Sartar used his Larnsting magics to secretly demonstrate transforming into a wolf? 

Not himself, but his (Balazaring?) companion Ostling Four-Wolf. And it is possible that only Ostling's offspring (from Telmori mothers) would have been exempt from such a penalty, which would have made Salinarg's Telmori wife another royal cousin from the hairy side of the family, or at least descended from a cousin of Kostajor.

Young Harsaltar could have become the first Telmori-blooded Prince of Sartar... His father was the first Prince of Sartar not descended from the first Feathered Horse Queen, Temertain was the second (and last).

 

But yes, the prohibition may be in place for all Hsunchen, and the adoption of Kachisti after the Nidan/Vadeli Uprising may be the reason why the Hykimi of the Greatwood lost most of their shapeshifting abilities, and need incredible amounts of Rune Magic to alter their shape.

On the other hand, some atavistic lion shape-changing ability survived in Greymane despite generations of intermarriage with other Orlanthi and probably Malkioni. The Praxian Basmoli have a different reason, ,their divine ancestor (who may have been "a son of Basmol" rather than Basmol in his entirety) allowed himself to be killed and skinned by Tada.

Safelster appears to have been a hotbed for interbreeding between Hsunchen ancestors and Enerali or Malkioni, if the Ancient Beasts Society is a measure. The Seshnegi warrior beast societies are a different expression of this same trend, but it isn't clear whether their magic is by descent, or from taking skins or other organs (hearts, as in Tiger-Hearted?) and extracting the magic like the Wolf Runners serving Argrath after 1628 as the replacement for the Telmori bodyguard of earlier Princes. This may very well be a Rokari influenced magic, or have some Tada heroquesting behind it.

Another way to lose your beast nature is to adopt civilization. The majority of the Kralori are descendants of Hsunchen who succumbed to the lures of civilization.

For Pamaltela, we lack data. It looks like there are a few pastoralist Fiwan peoples, the Wildebeest, Eland and Tanuku (milk-antelope) people are pastoralists similar to the Praxians, except they don't herd any animals not of their totem (they still hunt those). The hippo people of Laskal are even sedentary village dwellers. So are the Sofali, but coastal and riverine people have less reason to migrate, see also the Rathori of Rathorela or the beaver folk of Saug. Gregarious cave dwellers like bats or gophers allow some sedentary lifestyle, too. Followers of totem beasts laying eggs often need to be sedentary during breeding time.

 

Strict endogamy rules rarely survive slavery.