Burial (or other funeral customs) Empire of the Wyrms Friends

[Bren]

I want to have my players discover an item from the Empire of the Wyrms Friends. I was thinking they could find it in a tomb. Then I realized I don't know if the EWF had tombs.

What were the funeral customs in the Empire of the Wyrms Friends?

I suppose some might have turned into dragons of some kind, but surely the vast majority were unable to do that. I suppose Delecti might have grabbed some, but surely that too was an unusual result. So what did the EWF do with the bodies?

If this is covered somewhere and my google-fu missed, sorry for the repetition. For those interested the burial customs of others, I found these posts were helpful.

 

[metcalph]

There is a EWF temple-tomb that plays a role in the RQ Gamemaster Screen Adventure so the EWF did make use of tombs.  The highest honor IMO would be being devoured by a Dragon.

[Bren]

57 minutes ago, metcalph said:

There is a EWF temple-tomb that plays a role in the RQ Gamemaster Screen Adventure so the EWF did make use of tombs.  The highest honor IMO would be being devoured by a Dragon.

That doesn't sound like something I'd want my friends to do to me -- So the dragon says to the priest, "Why don't come to my place for dinner?"

 

While it dates to the Second Age I think the tomb predates the Empire of the Wyrms Friends.

Spoiler

The Queen’s Tomb is the resting place of Orgorvale Summer, the demi-goddess daughter of King Vingkot and granddaughter of Orlanth. She was the God Time ruler of these lands. Her cult died out in the Second Age, after the dream dragon Yerezum Storn was summoned here by draconic magic. Yerezum Storn has recently reappeared and resides within the Queen’s Tomb.

 

Edited January 9, 2022 by Bren

[French Desperate WindChild]

On 1/9/2022 at 7:04 AM, Bren said:

That doesn't sound like something I'd want my friends to do to me -- So the dragon says to the priest, "Why don't come to my place for dinner?"

I will encourage you to split your tongue, you will understand your mistake    (no no no don't do it, please I have no money for a lawyer 😛 )

The dragon did not says what you wrote, but someting like ... "Ouroboros". that is not a question of food, but a question of merging

 

On 1/9/2022 at 7:04 AM, Bren said:

While it dates to the Second Age I think the tomb predates the Empire of the Wyrms Friends.

Yes I agree with you. I m not sure there is any tomb with corps from EWF, but you may have tomb as place where you find artifact, text, etc.. No bodies, just "In memory of" stuff.

And it is what I understand of your example: the tomb was before a "traditional" tomb, but became a place from EWF memories. The EWF did not destroy the previous burial (politic ? fear ? no reason ?) but tried to transform the goddess to a draconic one, so add EWF stuff and remove traditional stuff

[Bren]

So perhaps a First Age site converted to EWF use and then blasted to ruins during the Dragonkill War? That might work.

I was also thinking of something odder like a buried egg shaped structure designed to aid an EWF person in trying to ascend to Dragon-hood. The eggs shape is in imitateion of the eggs that Dragonewts hatch out of in their various incarnations.

 

On 1/10/2022 at 5:22 AM, French Desperate WindChild said:

I will encourage you to split your tongue, you will understand your mistake    (no no no don't do it, please I have no money for a lawyer 😛 )

The dragon did not says what you wrote, but someting like ... "Ouroboros". that is not a question of food, but a question of merging

Do dragons in Glorantha have split tongues?

[Kloster]

3 hours ago, Bren said:

Do dragons in Glorantha have split tongues?

I don't know for dragon (just failed my 'draconic lore' test), but humans need to have their tongue split to speak Auld Wirmish, so I suppose dragonewts have.

[French Desperate WindChild]

 

speedy Kloster !

just they need to split their tongue to have more than 25% in Auld Wirmish

 

Not sure if I failed or succeed (clearly not critical success) my lore, but I think dragons have the same tongues than serpents

[Kloster]

25 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

just they need to split their tongue to have more than 25% in Auld Wirmish

Correct.

25 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

Not sure if I failed or succeed (clearly not critical success) my lore, but I think dragons have the same tongues than serpents

Logical, but as I said, I failed my roll.

[Baron Wulfraed]

8 hours ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

just they need to split their tongue to have more than 25% in Auld Wirmish

Count me out... How long is one on a liquid diet while the two sides of the split heal? I wouldn't think any healing spells would help as they should see the split itself as the injury and rejoin the edges.

[Alex]

10 minutes ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

Count me out... How long is one on a liquid diet while the two sides of the split heal? I wouldn't think any healing spells would help as they should see the split itself as the injury and rejoin the edges.

Old jokes about meddling in the affairs of dragons and ketchup spring to mind.

Maybe healing magic would work if you "bind up" or otherwise physically separate the halves in the process?  Or maybe the patience and suffering involved in natural healing is a desirable or necessary part of the process.

[Joerg]

24 minutes ago, Baron Wulfraed said:

Count me out... How long is one on a liquid diet while the two sides of the split heal? I wouldn't think any healing spells would help as they should see the split itself as the injury and rejoin the edges.

Sorcery is your friend for this: Accelerate Healing. Dreadfully overpriced spell, but a wound like that probably takes your head location down 1D4+1, which with a good constitution will take you a week to recuperate from. Possibly a strip of fresh willow bast to separate the two halves.

This probably should be done to you while you are in deep meditation anyway, and possibly for days.

[Alex]

22 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Sorcery is your friend for this: Accelerate Healing. Dreadfully overpriced spell, but a wound like that probably takes your head location down 1D4+1, which with a good constitution will take you a week to recuperate from. Possibly a strip of fresh willow bast to separate the two halves.

This probably should be done to you while you are in deep meditation anyway, and possibly for days.

Ermagawd eXtreme physical austerities!  (Or whatever the old Greg jargon for that "misapplied" mystical path was.)

[French Desperate WindChild]

no spirit, no runic, no sorcery

incomprehensible draconic surgery

[Alex]

21 minutes ago, French Desperate WindChild said:

no spirit, no runic, no sorcery

incomprehensible draconic surgery

But no magic other than spirit, rune, and sorcery!  So, some incomprehensible mixture of those (and some "time me, gentlemen!" quack with a dragonbone saw).

[Squaredeal Sten]

On 1/8/2022 at 11:04 PM, Bren said:

I want to have my players discover an item from the Empire of the Wyrms Friends. I was thinking they could find it in a tomb. Then I realized I don't know if the EWF had tombs.

What were the funeral customs in the Empire of the Wyrms Friends?

I suppose some might have turned into dragons of some kind, but surely the vast majority were unable to do that. .....

 

I would simplify the answer; EWF was a political structure imposed on top of the existing populations after the birth and defeat of Gbaji, not a completely different civilization.  https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/gloranthan-documents/glorantha/genertela/a-brief-history-of-dragon-pass/

So all known burial customs would be found somewhere, and no burial custom would be followed by all. 

For example: As trolls were part of the EWF at the beginning, they would eat the dead.  Not so much for anyone else. 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 12, 2022 by Squaredeal Sten
spelling, my nemesis.

[Darius West]

On 1/9/2022 at 4:04 PM, Bren said:

What were the funeral customs in the Empire of the Wyrms Friends?

Dragonewts make a point of completely destroying their bodies so that their spiritual progress cannot be retarded by people wearing their skins and drawing on their magic.  This is just one part of the Sacred Utuma ritual's meaning however.  

For this reason I would suspect that EWF disposal of bodies would involve a ritual dismemberment, followed by cremation in the Orlanthi fashion, possibly with especially honored individuals having their funeral pyres lit by draconic fire.

[EricW]

On 1/12/2022 at 2:28 PM, Bren said:

I was also thinking of something odder like a buried egg shaped structure designed to aid an EWF person in trying to ascend to Dragon-hood. The eggs shape is in imitateion of the eggs that Dragonewts hatch out of in their various incarnations.

Most such artefacts would be an abuse of the draconic path. Blood of Orlanth (not sure if its canon anymore) has an example of a perversion of right action which dragonewts hate but human EWF subjects find unspeakably tempting.

Quote (Blood of Orlanth)

 

Telektios Ascendant

The Man Who Became A Dragon

This cult does not yet exist in Glorantha – it springs into being only if Telektios Ashbringer successfully merges with the mythic representation of the dragon Sh’kaharzeel during the HeroQuest.

The cult is effectively a short cut to draconic illumination and preaches that men should behave as rapacious, power- hungry dragons and take what they desire. Most initiates of the Wyrm’s Friend Empire try to find the draconic nature within their own souls; the cult turns this around and says that one’s soul already has draconic nature and it is only by unfettering the soul and acting on one’s own emotions and desires that this draconic nature can be expressed.

The Cult of Telektios is seen as a hideous aberration by the dragonewt allies of the Empire. Dragonewts behave in strange, random ways but always in accordance with Right Action (see Dragonewts: Guide to the Eravsshar). Humans have no such conception of Right Action – and this bizarre cult claims that all human desires are Right Action. To those humans who struggled with draconic illumination before, the cult’s easier way proves very appealing.

 

The God Learners left behind dangerous artefacts, why not the EWF? Perhaps the right action is to destroy the artefact rather than yield to temptation. The destruction of the artefact could lead to dragonewts appearing, and beckoning the players to join them on the hero plane for a meeting with a dragon, who will guide them on a step towards true enlightenment.