What is your idea of Kazkurtum. The 'Empty Emperor'?

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

Notice I didn't say 'Who'. 

I believe it is as much a concept. Death taken to its ultimate, annihilation? A lack of all Virtue? 

 

Is it 'worshipped' by Dara Happans? 

Worshipped to keep it away [what is that word?!] ? 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 7, 2022 by Orlanthatemyhamster

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

Placatory worship, I think? 

[Shiningbrow]

1 hour ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

Worshipped to keep it away [what is that word?!]? 

Propitiation.

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

3 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

Propitiation.

Thanks a lot, I know it, I can just can't keep in mind. 

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

No one knows anything about Kazkurtum?

 

I am surprised at that. 

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

Kazkurtum was/is a part of Yelm, his Other? So is it everything bad about centralisation and hierarchy? The cult of Stalin and Mao? Beyond socialism and communism. Or the caste system of India at its worst? Both? 

Edited February 7, 2022 by Orlanthatemyhamster

[Ironwall]

1 hour ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

Kazkurtum was/is a part of Yelm, his Other? So is it everything bad about centralisation and hierarchy? The cult of Stalin and Mao? Beyond socialism and communism. Or the caste system of India at its worst? Both? 

Would make sense. I don't know much about Kazkurtim but could he represent an emperor without an empire, Because didn't he reign during the great darkness?

Edited February 7, 2022 by Ironwall

[jajagappa]

16 hours ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

I believe it is as much a concept. Death taken to its ultimate, annihilation? A lack of all Virtue? 

Is it 'worshipped' by Dara Happans? 

From GRoY you can find multiple meanings:

p.4: the truth of those materials which have survived to us from the ages before the Kazkurtum.  - here it represents an age or period of "time"

p.16: The shadow of Yelm, which was left behind when everything else was gone, coalesced as a limpid, wavering flicker of black fire. Kazkurtum,76 who had been nothing
before this, fed it and cared for it, and made it important. - it is a being who tends or nurtures the shadow of Yelm

p.16 fn: Kazkurtum. Death and Lord of the Dead. Gods Wall IV-23. - as stated, it is Death, and thus may equate with either Humakt or Daka Fal

p.31: After Shargash had slain everything came the Rule of Kazkurtum, the Empty Emperor.  Nothing Just was alive and so a being crept to the throne of the Emperor and ruled there with Dead Justice. Useless Sacrifice was its God. This was the Dead Time, for it was impossible to separate the living from the dead; the dead walked and spoke. Those who were sentient could not tell for sure whether they themselves were dead or alive. Monsters lurked everywhere, and innocence only attracted evil. - it is both a time period when nothing existed or was alive, or could separate living from dead.  It is also a being that ruled with "Dead Justice" - presumably without justice or morals.

p.47: Polaris was the first celestial body to return to the dark sky and destroy the darkness of Kazkurtum. - it is a darkness without light.

p.56: Parts of Yelm: Vrimak: I-14. Antirius: I-18. Bijiif: IV-24. BernEel Arashagem: I-15. Enverinus: II-17. Kazkurtum: IV-23. - it is part of Yelm, his shadow or Other.

p.63: Kazkurtum: The Empty Emperor, the Worthless Ruler, the God of Nothingness. This is one of the Portions of Yelm. - as it reads, a god of Nothing or Emptiness.

p.74: Kazkurtum and Star Time: A period existed in which no stars or celestial bodies of any sort were known, remembered, or contacted. - an empty time period.

p.75: the cockroach image sitting upon the ziggurat. - could easily represent that which devours the remains of the world.

p.84: [Shargash] threw down Kazkurtum and instead of slaying the evil god Shargash cut him into pieces and placed guards and magics over each part. - a being that is dismembered and cast down (reminiscent of destroying the Devil).

Kazkurtum is thus the opposite of all that is Yelm (the Other), and opposite of all that represents the Golden Age.  Both being (or non-being) and empty time.  Death, Lord of Dead, and also Nothing.  So, yes, as much concept as anything else.

Is it worshipped?  No, there is nothing to worship as it is an empty concept - not even anything to propitiate.

3 hours ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

So is it everything bad about centralisation and hierarchy?

No, I think it is easier to equate Kazkurtum with nihilism.  The absence and destruction of all, the meaninglessness of everything.  This is not order, or an excess of order - it is the complete absence of order, hierarchy, justice, law, etc.

[Orlanthatemyhamster]

@Ironwall Yes, his/it is the period just before Time was created when things were at their Darkest. So just before the Great Compromise et al.

@jajagappa Thanks for these, do you have the PDFs? If not you are amazing! Good anyway. 🙂

Yes, the answer was there [in the three Staffords] all the time, I just needed to do a thorough index search. 

Thanks once again.

[jajagappa]

4 hours ago, Orlanthatemyhamster said:

Thanks for these, do you have the PDFs?

Yes, the pdf's make searching and referencing much simpler! 🙂 

[Loch]

On 2/8/2022 at 2:41 AM, jajagappa said:

Empty Time, a symbol of death, and darkness, and evil - were I God-Learnering, I might say -

Kajabor?

 

[davecake]

An obscure fact about Kazkurtum - the artwork used for the image of Kazkurtum in The Fortunate Succession is based on Australian Indigenous rock art. It is both ancient, and part of a living culture, and I’ve seen the original. The original is not a malign entity. An important positive spirit and important ancestor called Namarrkon the lightning man. But to the Dara Happans, he would represent some terrifying things - he is also the spirit of a sort of grasshopper, with some features that are a bright electric blue (and comes out at the right time of year for summer storms). 
So that image has a grasshoppers head (an insect associated with Darkness), and is holding his long (electric blue) antennae that are also the lightning (Storm).

Not shown in this image, but often in other images of Namarrkon, are the big flint axe stones he ties to his elbows, and clashes together to make the thunder. Also, his extremely impressive outsize genitals. Two more things to alarm Dara Happans. 

Did Greg know all this? Probably yes, you probably wouldn’t be familiar with image unless you visited the site, which I think he did after the trip to the first Melbourne RuneQuest Con. I think the choice of image was deliberate.