Aldryami eating habits / cannibalism?

[AndreJarosch]

Aldrami are vegetarians. 
Aldrami bodies are plant matter. 
I am sure there are conflicts between different Aldryami groups/forests (now or in the past). 
Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?
Would an Aldryami KILL an enemy Aldryami for food?
 

[jajagappa]

1 hour ago, AndreJarosch said:

Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?

We might actually consider the aldryami as "soil" eaters in which case it would be the black elves who eat the corpses of other aldryami (and trees) and produce the soils for aldryami to consume.

 

[Bill the barbarian]

1 hour ago, AndreJarosch said:

Aldrami are vegetarians. 
Aldrami bodies are plant matter. 
I am sure there are conflicts between different Aldryami groups/forests (now or in the past). 
Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?
Would an Aldryami KILL an enemy Aldryami for food?
 

Change Aldryami for Human and Vegetarian for Omnivore...

2 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

in which case it would be the black elves

Is Black Elves is a misnomer... I believe that they are not Aldryami.

[Richard S.]

2 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

Aldrami are vegetarians. 
Aldrami bodies are plant matter. 
I am sure there are conflicts between different Aldryami groups/forests (now or in the past). 
Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?
Would an Aldryami KILL an enemy Aldryami for food?
 

Probably not. An Aldryami eating plants is no more cannibalistic than a human eating meat.

[JRE]

First response, without reflection. Most vegetable matter is difficult to digest or metabolize. Different Aldryami will have different requirements, probably related to the degree of leaf cover. However I would say elves (human looking with limited leaves, down to non-existent, will need energy supplements. So they can eat all vegetable matter, but they will focus on energy intense vegetables, so fruits, roots, tubers... I am sure there are plants that produce growth that is specially suited to the elfs needs. It is likely they are also well liked by humans. Runners and other associated species will be self-sufficient with sunlight, except if they do a lot of activity, when they will need to supplement with food. 

As they say above, eating another aldryami would be mainly to make a point, and probably means you are an outcast, not for nourishment. I would expect corpses of rival Aldryami will go into the compost pile.

[Joerg]

3 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

Aldrami are vegetarians. 
Aldrami bodies are plant matter. 
I am sure there are conflicts between different Aldryami groups/forests (now or in the past). 
Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?
Would an Aldryami KILL an enemy Aldryami for food?
 

Are obligate carnivores cannibals? No.

Aldryami bodies are both - meat, and plant matter - especially the "bones" and the chromophores in the skin

Aldrya's Woe led to the destruction of the Greenwood of Jolar, so yes, different groups and forests have been at each others' roots.

Marching Aldryami (elves, runners) will eat mulch, regardless of its origin (so it might contain composted elf), and they eat fresh re-growable parts of plants, like leaves, fruits (including grass seeds, cereals, nuts), and possibly also rhizomes or tubers - stuff that will be eaten by strict vegetarians who would not eat roots or onions. They will eat nectar (pixies predominantly).

Aldryami don't normally eat meat. Thus the question whether they would kill to get at the meat of other aldryami is pointless.

Aldryami might pluck leaves or similar from hostile (living) aldryami and munch on those, but that's as far as "cannibalism" may go.

All IMG.

[soltakss]

5 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

Aldrami are vegetarians. 

Aldryami are typically described as Vegetarian Cannibals.

I treat this in the same way as Humans are Mammal Cannibals, i.e. we eat mammals and Aldryami eat plants.

5 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

Aldrami bodies are plant matter. 
I am sure there are conflicts between different Aldryami groups/forests (now or in the past). 
Would an Aldryami eat the corpse of an other Aldryami?

Normally, I don't think they would, unless they were starving and had no other possibility and, even then, it would be rare.

"Look, I only ate one foot".

5 hours ago, AndreJarosch said:

Would an Aldryami KILL an enemy Aldryami for food?

In Hellwood, sure, all the time.

Outside of Chaos Aldryami Forests, probably not.

It does happen, though, I vaguely remember an Elf having a name that strongly implied that he ate other elves, but I can't remember who it was.

 

[JustAnotherVingan]

15 minutes ago, soltakss said:

Aldryami are typically described as Vegetarian Cannibals.

I treat this in the same way as Humans are Mammal Cannibals, i.e. we eat mammals and Aldryami eat plants.

Normally, I don't think they would, unless they were starving and had no other possibility and, even then, it would be rare.

"Look, I only ate one foot".

In Hellwood, sure, all the time.

Outside of Chaos Aldryami Forests, probably not.

It does happen, though, I vaguely remember an Elf having a name that strongly implied that he ate other elves, but I can't remember who it was.

 

Maybe Korvan Sawtooth.

The link says he was a meat eater but a renegade elf who works with trolls sounds like a good candidate.

[Ian Absentia]

As I've stated elsewhere (the Your Dumbest Idea thread?  The How Does Your Glorantha Differ thread?), I'm smitten with the Bosmer of the Elder Scrolls series, who are strict carnivores.  I don't doubt that the developers were influenced by the Aldryami (as so many other elements of Tamriel are).

Back to Glorantha, though, would an Aldryami eat another one?  I'd tend to think not.  Certainly not an elf eating another elf.  But a runner, maybe?  We humans eat monkeys with little or no moral consequences.  However, they'd eat other plants, and probably perform some sort of ritual akin to the Peaceful Cut if there's a higher order of conscious spirit involved.  And many plants offer edible parts that regenerate, which are likely part of a compact of mutual aid.

As @jajagappapoints out above, it's our mysterious friends, the Black Elves, who complete the cycle at the basest level (quite literally), in the digestion of all dead things -- Plant, Man, Beast, even Earth after a fashion.  And in my book they get permission carte blanche in that regard.

!i!

[JustAnotherVingan]

9 minutes ago, Ian Absentia said:

As I've stated elsewhere (the Your Dumbest Idea thread?  The How Does Your Glorantha Differ thread?), I'm smitten with the Bosmer of the Elder Scrolls series, who are strict carnivores.  I don't doubt that the developers were influenced by the Aldryami (as so many other elements of Tamriel are).

Back to Glorantha, though, would an Aldryami eat another one?  I'd tend to think not.  Certainly not an elf eating another elf.  But a runner, maybe?  We humans eat monkeys with little or no moral consequences.  However, they'd eat other plants, and probably perform some sort of ritual akin to the Peaceful Cut if there's a higher order of conscious spirit involved.  And many plants offer edible parts that regenerate, which are likely part of a compact of mutual aid.

As @jajagappapoints out above, it's our mysterious friends, the Black Elves, who complete the cycle at the basest level (quite literally), in the digestion of all dead things -- Plant, Man, Beast, even Earth after a fashion.  And in my book they get permission carte blanche in that regard.

!i!

Foodsong appears in The Red Book of Magic and is a 1 point spirit spell

[Ian Absentia]

1 minute ago, JustAnotherVingan said:

Foodsong appears in The Red Book of Magic and is a 1 point spirit spell

Right!  I knew I hadn't come up with that one on my own.  Thanks.  I don't reckon an elf gets to intone the Foodsong ritual over the corpse of anther elf, though.

!i!

[Ironwall]

20 minutes ago, Ian Absentia said:

Would green, brown, or yellow elves view each other as the same species?

[JustAnotherVingan]

4 minutes ago, Ironwall said:

Would green, brown, or yellow elves view each other as the same species?

I think what would matter is that they are all Aldryami. Now Sea Elves and Black Elves aren't.

[Ian Absentia]

1 minute ago, Ironwall said:

Would green, brown, or yellow elves view each other as the same species?

Oof...that's where the rubber of taxonomy really starts to touch the runway.  In general, I'd assume that "elves", united under the lineage of Aldrya, would view each other spiritual equals, and the taboo would hold across forest types.  They might extend the taboo to other sentient and motile plant types (Murthdryami and Vorolani, as suggested above).  I think the moment another plant can consciously and eloquently make its case to not be eaten, an Aldryami begins pumping the brakes.

!i!

[Eff]

33 minutes ago, Ironwall said:

Would green, brown, or yellow elves view each other as the same species?

Within the fiction, these are external descriptions meant to classify elves according to the trees they resemble by the basis of their sexual habits, and elves themselves don't assign much (if any) value to those distinctions. And in addition, the appearance of a given aldryami will vary far more within these groups than between them, because different aldryami are more hominid or more arborid or more virgultumid in accordance with their particular aptitudes/assigned roles within a forest community. 

So yeah, they are supposed to view each other as the same kind of person, and mostly differentiate each other on the basis of the forest they belong to. There are of course holes if we take it overly literally, but I would say that "forests" aren't automatically contiguous. Plant reproduction can be very baroque and I would think aldryami are in tune with that reality on an instinctual level, such that they can accept that a dozen scattered groves are all part of the Stinking Forest politically, even if their roots are disconnected, etc. 

 

[svensson]

Aldryami do indeed eat plants. LOTS of plants prey on other plants, ivy and kudzu for just two egregious examples. In the Aldryami world view, there's very little difference between the act of chewing and swallowing and stealing another plant's soil nutrients and access to sunlight. Just because they're vegetarians doesn't make them immune to predation.

A great many things in RPGs default to 'Earth standards' unless otherwise noted. Among these are 'gravity always pulls down' and 'for something to live, something else must die'.

[svensson]

7 hours ago, Ironwall said:

Would green, brown, or yellow elves view each other as the same species?

Quick answer: Yes.

Green and Brown Elves often work in concert in mixed woodlands, so it is no stretch to include Blue and Yellow Elves. Red Elves are a somewhat more complicated matter, as they are descendants of fungus, rather wood /reed /lichen based 'Aldrya-plants'.

[AndrewTBP]

Red Elves (slorifings) are associated with ferns and mosses. You’re thinking of Black Elves (voralans) which are associated with fungi. 
https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/gloranthan-documents/greg-sez/information-about-elves/

[svensson]

1 hour ago, AndrewTBP said:

Red Elves (slorifings) are associated with ferns and mosses. You’re thinking of Black Elves (voralans) which are associated with fungi. 
https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/home/gloranthan-documents/greg-sez/information-about-elves/

You're right. Whoops.

[Ali the Helering]

Returning to the OP, I don't think an Aldryan would kill another for food, but rather because they are an enemy.  I don't see any reason to believe they would waste good nutrients afterwards.

[Joerg]

3 hours ago, Ali the Helering said:

Returning to the OP, I don't think an Aldryan would kill another for food, but rather because they are an enemy.  I don't see any reason to believe they would waste good nutrients afterwards.

There are still different modi of recycling those nutrients - giving them to plants which are in need of them without being in the immediate food cycle is acceptable behavior, while chewing on meat probably is seen as highly aberrant.

[RHW]

I'm pretty sure one of the dirty little secrets of all the Elder Races is that they're cannibals.

Uz are open about it. Dragonnewts occasionally randomly cryptically just wtf eat some people. Mostali have their canned food of mysterious origin.

IMG Aldryami are more "waste not want not" types happy to consume "organic matter" that's "fallen to the forest floor." Also, they regularly fertilize their dryad trees with "protein rich nutritional sources."

As far as eating other Aldryami, you know, sometimes there's... let's call it "unrest" in the forest. Trouble with the trees. You get these situations where the maples want more sunlight, and the oaks ignore their pleas. 

Worst case, that can result in hatchet, axe, and saw. After which...

Waste not want not.

[dumuzid]

8 hours ago, Joerg said:

giving them to plants which are in need of them without being in the immediate food cycle is acceptable behavior, while chewing on meat probably is seen as highly aberrant.

except maybe with Yellow Elves, who are supposed to like a little actual flesh with their greens

[Baron Wulfraed]

12 hours ago, Ali the Helering said:

Returning to the OP, I don't think an Aldryan would kill another for food, but rather because they are an enemy.  I don't see any reason to believe they would waste good nutrients afterwards.

Images of a troupe of Aldryami digging their toes (or equivalent) into the bodies of the dead on a battle-field...

[Erol of Backford]

Spoiler

Let us say the elves from Betrayers' Ravine at the Biggle Stone or the Voralans in the Munchrooms were really hungry...

If a Zorak Zoran Saucier prepared Elf Torso like in the Thunderbreath Menu but with a impala butter mushroom gravy in lieu of the choice of dressing, don't you think they'd eat it?

 

Edited March 2, 2022 by Erol of Backford