Adopting an outsider to an Orlanthi clan?

[DucksMustDie]

Any ideas what an adoption rite/ceremony would look like if any exists? Or would the outsider just give gifts, the clan would vote on it, and that would be all? I'm  not talking about a marriage, just adopting a single outsider. Thanks 🙂

Edited October 20, 2021 by DucksMustDie

[French Desperate WindChild]

seems to me it is easier to be adopted in an Orlanthi culture than in other (as the storm tribe welcomed some gods from others tribes)

So probably a ritual, where the outsider comes with a sponsor

1) The sponsor introduces the outsider, explaining what are the feats the outsider did for the clan / tribe / god / ... (even if everyone already knows that)

2) the ring asks for the outsider's motivation, the story, etc..

3) the ring asks if someone (the clan / tribe / ...) has something to add

4) if needed, some divination (gods, ancestors, ... to validate any issue raised by the people)

4) the ring asks who will adopt (clan / bloodline / family) the outsider

5) the leader of (clan / bloodline / family) explains what position/status the outsider will take in

the (clan / bloodline / family)

6) if needed, an inititation to a god

7) in all cases, an initiation to the wyter(s)

8.) some gifts to the clan, from the clan

 

I may have some mistakes, but I would play it like that, the initiation to the wyter may be a scenario too (some tasks to do, kill some ennemies, hunt to feed the people, etc...)

Edited October 20, 2021 by French Desperate WindChild
8.) not 8)

[Akhôrahil]

I’m unclear on whether clan tattoos appear magically or have to be applied by a tattoo artist, but either way, the new members need to get them some way!

[HeartQuintessence]

I like the idea of of the tattoos being applied magically (broad strokes perhaps are applied(and visible if a magical ritual going on) but to have them show on skin they must be applied manually

[French Desperate WindChild]

43 minutes ago, HeartQuintessence said:

I like the idea of of the tattoos being applied magically (broad strokes perhaps are applied(and visible if a magical ritual going on) but to have them show on skin they must be applied manually

I would consider that the first step is the mundane tattoo (the community accepts the person as a member) and maybe... depending how the magic rituals perform, there is too a "magical" tattoo (the other world entity accepts the person as... someone)

 

And that's work in the other way: magical tattoo but not mundane one

 

for example I like the idea of a person, without mundane tattoo from the cult (aka no priest managed the tattoo ritual)

But, for some reason, the god itself choose the person.

That means a mundane scan will see nothing, so the person would be rejected or something like that by the community, until a priest (or a shaman) will "secondly" sight there was a mistake and this untattooed one is in fact a holy person. After that, what would do the shaman  / priest is another story

[JonL]

Another variable would be just how foreign the newcomer is. 

Allied Clan < Neutral Clan < Hostile Clan < Heortling from outside Sartar < Orlanthi but not Heortling < Theyalan but not Orlanthi < Non Theyalan Human < Human-Adjacent (Wind Children, Hsunchen, Kitori, Men-and-a-Half) < Elder Race.

The farther afield you start out, the more track you'll need to lay to get the Ancestors & Wyter on-board.

[Joerg]

One established method is to marry in. (yElmalio)

Or you follow a leader inside the clan, and then go native over time.

[Sir_Godspeed]

One might adopt an entire bloodline, of course, but in the case of individual adoption, it probably involves establishing new family bonds. Perhaps your sponsors become your new, adopted parents, for example. Or perhaps the Chief takes the job. 

This is important because in a culture that often lacks abstracted laws, concrete family ties helps everyone understand how to relate to you, and what your obligations and privileges are. The exact degree to which it is done mostly as a formality or more personal is probably on a case by case basis, but you're probably going to have to prepare to treat your new parents with due filial respect, at least.

EDIT: I'm going by the experiences of a few fellow anthropology students. A couple went to Melanesia, where they were adopted into families, as this helped everyone know how to relate to them. This was not a painless process, at least one of them had a very mixed experience of the complex and demanding social tasks this involved, including babysitting her "nieces" and "nephews", and behaving submissively to her "father". Now, I'm not claiming Orlanthi are similar to RW Melanesians, but it's as good an angle as any to look at it from.

Edited October 20, 2021 by Sir_Godspeed

[coffeemancer]

11 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

One might adopt an entire bloodline, of course, but in the case of individual adoption, it probably involves establishing new family bonds. Perhaps your sponsors become your new, adopted parents, for example. Or perhaps the Chief takes the job. 

This is important because in a culture that often lacks abstracted laws, concrete family ties helps everyone understand how to relate to you, and what your obligations and privileges are. The exact degree to which it is done mostly as a formality or more personal is probably on a case by case basis, but you're probably going to have to prepare to treat your new parents with due filial respect, at least.

EDIT: I'm going by the experiences of a few fellow anthropology students. A couple went to Melanesia, where they were adopted into families, as this helped everyone know how to relate to them. This was not a painless process, at least one of them had a very mixed experience of the complex and demanding social tasks this involved, including babysitting her "nieces" and "nephews", and behaving submissively to her "father". Now, I'm not claiming Orlanthi are similar to RW Melanesians, but it's as good an angle as any to look at it from.

Hm, I think you are on to something. I am thinking of the event in KoDP where two strangers approach the clan asking for shelter and you can ask for someone to sponsor them as guests (or take them as guests in the chiefs household) and later you can adopt them (if you offered to adopt them in the first meeting).

 

[soltakss]

On 10/20/2021 at 8:47 AM, DucksMustDie said:

Any ideas what an adoption rite/ceremony would look like if any exists?

It can be a reenactment of a Myth of someone being adopted into the Clan.

Elmal and Heler are two examples that could be used.

Alternatively, it could just be a series of oaths and promises, for the clan to support the new member and the new member to support the clan.

On 10/20/2021 at 8:47 AM, DucksMustDie said:

Or would the outsider just give gifts, the clan would vote on it, and that would be all?

That could happen as well.

In Dorastor, the Risklands, or Renekotling, Clan accepts outsiders, as long as they prove themselves useful and have a sponsor from within the clan.

 

[Alex]

On 10/21/2021 at 8:51 AM, coffeemancer said:

Hm, I think you are on to something. I am thinking of the event in KoDP where two strangers approach the clan asking for shelter and you can ask for someone to sponsor them as guests (or take them as guests in the chiefs household) and later you can adopt them (if you offered to adopt them in the first meeting).

That's an interesting question, what's someone formal status if they've been "Greetinged" up to "Duty".  That being restricted to "only those who would sit close to me, in my family".  Now doubtless this might mean the duty to do the washing up, or similar to the way Lightbringer's Challenges and the like work.  To which of course the answer is likely "formal, schmormal".  But if you're de facto "adopted" by a particular family, then you're also kinda-sorta in the clan too, until somebody with more clout says otherwise.  Which could happen very rapidly, if someone feels the newcomer is out of place, is an economic burden on others, or the adopting family have overstepped the mark, etc.  If they don't, work your way up in formality from there.

Some milestones would be...

• Is this person an adult human, according to Orlanthi custom?
• Cult initiation may not be required as such, but if yes, and their initiatory status is magically valid, then this pretty much takes care of the previous matter.  If not, then why not -- some sort of wandering layabout slacker and drifter, or what?
• The newcomer wishes to do something pretty specifically only open to a clan member, like say vote in the wapentake.  They'll want to have either tidied away some formalities by that point, or else made it so thunderingly obvious that their right is approved by acclaim.
• Initiation to the wyter -- as FDWC very correctly says, that's a pretty clearcut in-or-out thing.  So the question is, at what point can and at what point must this occur?

And as Jörg says, marriage is a possible parallel and precedent.  Do husbands and wives participate strictly "in the right of their spouse", by way of the ritual formality of the marriage itself?  What then if they're widowed or divorced, and remain on-tula (for whatever political, social or practical reason).  Is there a process for them to "re-up" to the clan?

[Jeff]

Outsiders join clans all the time and I wouldn't be surprised if in many clans only a minority have biological kinship. It typically involves someone swearing loyalty to the clan ring, placing themselves under its protection and promising to support the clan against all outsiders. The new member is brought into the local cult and becomes at least a lay member of the local cult of Orlanth and Ernalda, and pledge themselves to the clan patron deities and spirits. This places the member within the magical protection of the clan spirit, but also opens them to retribution if they betray their oaths. If the outsider merits it, they might be given land or other rights. If not, they are expected to be the tenant of someone else.

This stuff is likely very flexible and seemingly not very official - until those pledges and oaths take place. And then every hair on the back of your neck stands up, spirits watch what is going on, and it is obvious to everyone that this is something of importance and danger.

Edited October 25, 2021 by Jeff

[Joerg]

In recent RuneQuest publications, we see almost exclusively female NPCs born in the clan they live in. Granted, quite a few are unmarried (another "unnatural" state to be in as an adult), but the seven types of Orlanthi marriage which leads to one marriage partner living in a clan other than their birth clan are hardly reflected.

Take the sample characters Vasana and Yanioth. They both are Ernaldori clanswomen, through their mother. Did their mother only have Esrolian marriages? Temporary ones?

[Akhôrahil]

On 10/25/2021 at 10:35 AM, Alex said:

That's an interesting question, what's someone formal status if they've been "Greetinged" up to "Duty".  That being restricted to "only those who would sit close to me, in my family".  Now doubtless this might mean the duty to do the washing up, or similar to the way Lightbringer's Challenges and the like work.  To which of course the answer is likely "formal, schmormal".  But if you're de facto "adopted" by a particular family, then you're also kinda-sorta in the clan too, until somebody with more clout says otherwise. 

This makes sense to me - you could have someone staying at your stead and working as farmhands for you for the longest time, and while they wouldn’t actually be clan members, after years and years they wouldn’t exactly be strangers to the clan either (if we’re comparing to Athens, they’d be metics, or in the modern world, non-citizen residents).

How acceptable would this be? Would they get thrown out eventually, or given an “in or out?” ultimatum? That probably depends on the clan and its circumstances. (It’s even conceivable that some landholders would prefer to have their lands worked by outside contracted farmhands with few rights, especially if the clan is low on labour, something that would surely cause all kinds of social issues.)

Edited October 26, 2021 by Akhôrahil

[PhilHibbs]

I would say that mostly, tattoos are applied the normal way. Magical appearance of tattoos during initiation would be taken as a great omen, and this might occasionally be faked.

[Alex]

52 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

This makes sense to me - you could have someone staying at your stead and working as farmhands for you for the longest time, and while they wouldn’t actually be clan members, after years and years they wouldn’t exactly be strangers to the clan either (if we’re comparing to Athens, they’d be metics, or in the modern world, non-citizen residents).

Or somebody sofa-surfing or sub-renting (in a contractually questionable manner?), to look at it another way!

 

52 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

How acceptable would this be? Would they get thrown out eventually, or given an “in or out?” ultimatum? That probably depends on the clan and its circumstances. (It’s even conceivable that some landholders would prefer to have their lands worked by outside contracted farmhands with few rights, especially if the clan is low on labour, something that would surely cause all kinds of social issues.)

I don't think it's a common, large-scale or economically significant thing.  Once it becomes such, we're edging towards another social system entirely.  (Mind you, western Maniria or Ralios, who knows?  Might well be the sort of mechanism we see where one thing starts to shade into the other.)  I was imagining it happening among relatively low-status people having some mild-to-moderate personal disaster and being generally a temporary thing.  Eventually someone gets the gumption to formalise (or terminate) the arrangement.  If it's some high-status or notably culturally or individually outlandish person, or a large number of people (On Jorri sitch!), then someone repeats the Greeting ritual on them to 'escalate' matters.  At which point they're invited with high honour and elaborate courtesy/peremptorily dragged to see the chief to bring matters to a head.

I can imagine it being particularly fuzzy (pun intended, wait for it!) in some areas.  If some herders and especially hunters dwell in remote locations according to their occupation rather than being on-site "renters" of the steadholding classes, then who really knows what they're up to?  Never mind counting sheep, it might be more like herding cats.  "Wait, did we used to have this many Yinkini cottars?"

Ultimately it'll be completely clear-cut as and when it needs to be.

[Akhôrahil]

16 minutes ago, Alex said:

I don't think it's a common, large-scale or economically significant thing.  Once it becomes such, we're edging towards another social system entirely.  (Mind you, western Maniria or Ralios, who knows?  Might well be the sort of mechanism we see where one thing starts to shade into the other.) 

Yes, that was my thought. It’s clearly not what we have on a large scale in Sartar (although the same mechanics were in play when some collaborators adapted Lunar-style slave farming), but it’s also the way society might go if the slow rise of the nobility continues.

[Alex]

15 hours ago, Joerg said:

In recent RuneQuest publications, we see almost exclusively female NPCs born in the clan they live in. Granted, quite a few are unmarried (another "unnatural" state to be in as an adult), but the seven types of Orlanthi marriage which leads to one marriage partner living in a clan other than their birth clan are hardly reflected.

Take the sample characters Vasana and Yanioth. They both are Ernaldori clanswomen, through their mother. Did their mother only have Esrolian marriages? Temporary ones?

Or none?  <shocked gasps>  Yeah, it does look a little like a wish to avoid unpacking the details of how the patrilocal (or conversely matrilocal) thing works in any detail, or to avoid the possible 'look' if we have a sudden swathe of semi-detached-seeming women (N)PCs.

Mind you, the sample character are adventurers.  That's a) a state far more "unnatural" than any of the aforementioned, and b) the unmarried kinda tends to go with that territory!

[HeartQuintessence]

1 hour ago, Alex said:

Or none?  <shocked gasps>  Yeah, it does look a little like a wish to avoid unpacking the details of how the patrilocal (or conversely matrilocal) thing works in any detail, or to avoid the possible 'look' if we have a sudden swathe of semi-detached-seeming women (N)PCs.

Mind you, the sample character are adventurers.  That's a) a state far more "unnatural" than any of the aforementioned, and b) the unmarried kinda tends to go with that territory!

 That is an excellent point.

Maybe that's something to be considered. Adoption is highly likely in a world where community ties mean life or death.

My little personal clan's existance owes to this: Lunar, Orlanthi/Esrolian, Grazelander, the tribe forms because a bunch of unattached  women come together. Some are mothers, others are warriors, still others are herds and  keepers of hearth.
 

Why must women being 'unmarried ' be unnatural?
Though it does bring up the whole Matrilocal and patrilocal concept , if you are an outsider who becomes your new family and where do you live?

[Alex]

24 minutes ago, HeartQuintessence said:

Why must women being 'unmarried ' be unnatural?

To be fair, I'm fairly confident Jörg was saying it's "unnatural" for adults generally, not women specifically.  As in, in the opinion of the several-hundred older relatives you live with giving you "advice" to that effect.  Unasked.  Unrelentingly.  Unswervingly.  "When are you going to settle down and marry a person of your preferred sex/gender combo, and give the clan numerous vigorous children, whether natural-born or adopted, within the family model of two parents and a village, according to the famously god-blessed sworn bond?"

 

24 minutes ago, HeartQuintessence said:

Though it does bring up the whole Matrilocal and patrilocal concept , if you are an outsider who becomes your new family and where do you live?

Different questions with different answers in the first instance.  The -local clause in the marriage vow and the local customs that predispose your clan to one or the other determines where you live.  You remain a member of those own clan, though with a pretty clearly defined place in the new one, possibly to be consolidated as actual membership when you choose to assert that as your primary permanent identity (one of the things that's never really been spelled as, as observed up-thread).  Sartar trends patrilocal, Esrolia matrilocal, but all Theyalan cultures that we know of have a suite of options, that the couple and the two clans have available to them.

[Sir_Godspeed]

3 hours ago, PhilHibbs said:

I would say that mostly, tattoos are applied the normal way. Magical appearance of tattoos during initiation would be taken as a great omen, and this might occasionally be faked.

Borrowing from the RW, the "mundane" application of tattoos might also be a magical act in itself. I'm sure this doesn't fit with how rules in RQ are set up, but I don't really see the two are necessarily opposed, unless you strictly define "magically applied tattoos" in a way that precludes a tattooist. 

It's a sacred act that changes someone's social status and ties them to the clan spirits and traditions. Pretty magic already.

[Akhôrahil]

1 hour ago, Alex said:

To be fair, I'm fairly confident Jörg was saying it's "unnatural" for adults generally, not women specifically.  As in, in the opinion of the several-hundred older relatives you live with giving you "advice" to that effect.  Unasked.  Unrelentingly.  Unswervingly.  "When are you going to settle down and marry a person of your preferred sex/gender combo, and give the clan numerous vigorous children, whether natural-born or adopted, within the family model of two parents and a village, according to the famously god-blessed sworn bond?"

Join Humakt and this will finally stop!

[Darius West]

Adoption rituals historically are quite interesting.

Often it would involve a symbolic birthing ritual during which the adoptee would be passed between their new mother's legs.

The Blood Oath  (Sharing of blood though a cut between two sworn friends to make them 'blood brothers") can be seen as a form of adoption ritual.

I would imagine that in Glorantha if a clan wants to adopt an outsider it would involve a ceremony wherein the outsider is introduced to the clan's Ancestor ghosts, possibly by them sitting an overnight vigil in the graveyard.  Of course they would not be alone, and would likely have a Humakti and a Grandfather Mortal priest watching over them so the ancestors don't decide to snack on the newcomer's spirit.  They may need to give up a point of POW to form a connection to the clan's ancestors and wyter.

[Alex]

27 minutes ago, Akhôrahil said:

Join Humakt and this will finally stop!

Or at least, formally change to demands to talk to your line manager about the quality of your Lunar-slaughtering and neighbour-menacing work!

[Joerg]

 

9 hours ago, HeartQuintessence said:

My little personal clan's existance owes to this: Lunar, Orlanthi/Esrolian, Grazelander, the tribe forms because a bunch of unattached  women come together. Some are mothers, others are warriors, still others are herds and  keepers of hearth.

And that's a great premise, based on a certain expectation being challenged.

 

9 hours ago, HeartQuintessence said:

Why must women being 'unmarried ' be unnatural?

Only as unnatural as are unmarried able lads. Unmarried strapping lads are like having a price bull never brought to breed... at least in your own herd.

 

As described in King of Sartar, marriage and/or responsible parenthood is a second step of adulthood in Orlanthi society, making you eligible for office.

9 hours ago, HeartQuintessence said:

Though it does bring up the whole Matrilocal and patrilocal concept , if you are an outsider who becomes your new family and where do you live?

Your target community would usually place you in one of its households, or as a follower of one of its influential members if your status and abilities warrants that. Basically, the point of adoption is that you take on a role in your new community, with a primary set of contacts, and the rest just in the background.