Where do Demibirds come from?

[Darius West]

So, we know that Demibirds are not found in the wilds.  They have solid bones and only exist the property of the Dragonewts, and are thus unlike any other bird in Glorantha.  Are they related to the Bird Goddess known as Verk (p8 Fortunate Succession)?  Are Demibirds somehow tied into the Dragonewt path?  When you think about it, they're pretty mysterious.  Does anyone have a clue as to how demibirds emerged in Glorantha?  If the answer is that we know nothing solid, let's propose some answers in case someone else starts asking this question.

[metcalph]

Perhaps they are related to Pteranodons; Dinosaurs that have realized their own fallen nature and have reborn themselves to return to the Draconic Way.

[Joerg]

35 minutes ago, Darius West said:

So, we know that Demibirds are not found in the wilds.  They have solid bones and only exist the property of the Dragonewts, and are thus unlike any other bird in Glorantha.  Are they related to the Bird Goddess known as Verk (p8 Fortunate Succession)?  Are Demibirds somehow tied into the Dragonewt path?  When you think about it, they're pretty mysterious.  Does anyone have a clue as to how demibirds emerged in Glorantha?  If the answer is that we know nothing solid, let's propose some answers in case someone else starts asking this question.

Dragonewts have one of the oldest cultures in Glorantha, and may have domesticated these birds as soon as the first dragonewts evolved into the warrior stage, or possibly as soon as the first warrior dragonewts strayed from the draconic path and degenerated into dinosaurs.

There are, or at least there were feathered dinosaurs in Glorantha (after our real world science learned that our own picture of scaled dinos may have been overdone by Industrial Light and Magic). At least when it was suggested to Greg that the Dara Happan gazzam may have been feathered he wasn't against the idea, and the Maran Gor Earth Shakers include both reptilian and furred species, so why not feathered ones.

I don't see the dragonewt-related saurians as feathered, though - dragonewt wings are the typical chiroptera (bat)-like hands with skin in between rather than just the fourth fingers of pterodactyls. The wings are an extra pair of limbs anyway. Thus I don't think that the demibirds are closely related to dragonewts. They may be children of Earth and Sky (to inherit the feathers), and of the ancestral beast dragons Hykim and Mikyh.

There probably are myths about how the demibirds came about, but those belong to the dragonewts and happened in a distant early Godtime that normal human visitors of Godtime cannot access. Dragonewts may remember everything, but communication with dragonewt has been haphazard even during the EWF.

Demibirds were named alongside the extinct (however permanent, given Rinliddi experimentation) augners and the Praxian ostriches, as ratites.

The Ratite Empire was an early Solar empire that covered the (then temperate) northeast of Genertela, starting in Rinliddi and covering all of North Pent and those parts of Pent not part of Genert's Garden. The Rinliddi people say that they are the heirs of the Ratite Empire, and children of bird gods, but I see a fair chance that the original ratite riders were humanoid birds rather than  ordinary humans, and that there were more than just augners and demibirds in the range of the runners who crossed the savannahs of the Green and early Golden Age.

[French Desperate WindChild]

mm I m not sure of the english sense of demi (if there is ?)... but in french "demi" means "half"

 

so from my perspective, demibirds could be "demidragonewt" or those who failed so much than their eggs broken for ever and were born like any beast (after all, same rune or about, isn't it ?)

Of course far from the dragonewt cycle, the actual demibirds are not the original "broken" dragonewts but their progeny, with a bird life cycle

 

or just the 0 level (or even -1 level) of dragonewt ?

But i prefer the first option, "just" beasts. When human beings have herdmen, Dragonewts have herd-dragonewt

then maybe demi = herd in auld wyrmish ? 😛

[soltakss]

10 hours ago, Darius West said:

So, we know that Demibirds are not found in the wilds.  They have solid bones and only exist the property of the Dragonewts, and are thus unlike any other bird in Glorantha.  Are they related to the Bird Goddess known as Verk (p8 Fortunate Succession)?  Are Demibirds somehow tied into the Dragonewt path?  When you think about it, they're pretty mysterious.  Does anyone have a clue as to how demibirds emerged in Glorantha?  If the answer is that we know nothing solid, let's propose some answers in case someone else starts asking this question.

They are draconic in nature, so could be devolved Dragonewts, but I find that a bit boring.

Maybe they all hatched from immature Dragon Eggs, like the Dragonewts, but the eggs were bad.

[Baron Wulfraed]

4 hours ago, soltakss said:

They are draconic in nature, so could be devolved Dragonewts, but I find that a bit boring.

Maybe they all hatched from immature Dragon Eggs, like the Dragonewts, but the eggs were bad.

Maybe a situation similar to https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.1993.0059 ?

[svensson]

Well, Timmy, when a newly hatched Beaked Dragonewt like your brother Wally wrecks the old demibird because he got Newt Rage at a crested that can't use Right Action to cross the eff'ing street, Mommy and Daddy Dragonewts have to go the Awesome Ouroboros's Used Bird Lot..... 😆

[I'd tell you I'm sorry, but the plain fact is that would be lying.]

Edited July 1, 2022 by svensson

[Darius West]

This was an especially in depth and interesting post Joerg, thanks.

19 hours ago, Joerg said:

Dragonewts have one of the oldest cultures in Glorantha, and may have domesticated these birds as soon as the first dragonewts evolved into the warrior stage, or possibly as soon as the first warrior dragonewts strayed from the draconic path and degenerated into dinosaurs.

Obviously on Earth we know that saurians and avians are pretty close, so the moa-like demibirds could effectively be saurians and never avians.  They have solid bones, not hollow avian after all, and that indicates to me that they were never fliers and were likely never meant to be.

19 hours ago, Joerg said:

There are, or at least there were feathered dinosaurs in Glorantha (after our real world science learned that our own picture of scaled dinos may have been overdone by Industrial Light and Magic). At least when it was suggested to Greg that the Dara Happan gazzam may have been feathered he wasn't against the idea, and the Maran Gor Earth Shakers include both reptilian and furred species, so why not feathered ones.

Too true.

19 hours ago, Joerg said:

I don't see the dragonewt-related saurians as feathered, though - dragonewt wings are the typical chiroptera (bat)-like hands with skin in between rather than just the fourth fingers of pterodactyls. The wings are an extra pair of limbs anyway. Thus I don't think that the demibirds are closely related to dragonewts. They may be children of Earth and Sky (to inherit the feathers), and of the ancestral beast dragons Hykim and Mikyh.

Fair enough.

20 hours ago, Joerg said:

There probably are myths about how the demibirds came about, but those belong to the dragonewts and happened in a distant early Godtime that normal human visitors of Godtime cannot access. Dragonewts may remember everything, but communication with dragonewt has been haphazard even during the EWF.

Can we say with certainty that demibirds existed prior to the EWF as dragonewt mounts?  I mean, what if they are recent?

21 hours ago, Joerg said:

Demibirds were named alongside the extinct (however permanent, given Rinliddi experimentation) augners and the Praxian ostriches, as ratites.

Yes.  This is where things get interesting.  I had bumped into this in the Fortunate Succession, but it all gets very interesting when you chase down this rabbit hole.  You meet the augner clan of Esrolia, the god Veng aka Ghevengus who created avilry (avian cavalry), the Ostriches and of course the Riskesting Empire.

21 hours ago, Joerg said:

The Ratite Empire was an early Solar empire that covered the (then temperate) northeast of Genertela, starting in Rinliddi and covering all of North Pent and those parts of Pent not part of Genert's Garden. The Rinliddi people say that they are the heirs of the Ratite Empire, and children of bird gods, but I see a fair chance that the original ratite riders were humanoid birds rather than  ordinary humans, and that there were more than just augners and demibirds in the range of the runners who crossed the savannahs of the Green and early Golden Age.

The info you have provided is all solid. Of course how you wind up with Dragonewt Avilry based on thick boned moas (demibirds)?  As an aside, moas incidentally have bones like demibirds, but obviously evolved from avians.  Did the Dragonewts learn avilry from the Ratite/Riskesting Empire?  Presently we don't know.  It seems fair to suppose that this is likely the best fit of when the Dragonewts might have learned avilry though.

[Qizilbashwoman]

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Obviously on Earth we know that saurians and avians are pretty close

avians are a kind of dinosaur, and both are closer to mammals than to reptiles

[Joerg]

7 hours ago, Qizilbashwoman said:

avians are a kind of dinosaur, and both are closer to mammals than to reptiles

Getting off-topic here, but mammals are synapsida, while reptiles, dinosaurs and their sub-clade avians are diapsida.  The giant synapsids that peceded the dinosaurs as the dominant land animals like dimetrodons are more closely related to (the ancestors of) mammals than to reptiles (contemporary or otherwise).

To make this Gloranthan again, Maran Gor's Earth Shakers probably include both ancient synapsids and overszed reptiles outside of the dinosaur family proper.

[Darius West]

14 hours ago, Joerg said:

To make this Gloranthan again, Maran Gor's Earth Shakers probably include both ancient synapsids and oversized reptiles outside of the dinosaur family proper.

It is certain that Glorantha needs more taxonomic mythology to account for some of the odd creatures out there.

The way in which Maran Gor, Hykim and Mikyh and the Dragonewts tie together to produce Gloranthan dinosaurs is far from explained.  We know that de-pathed dragonewts become dinosaurs (allegedly), somehow losing connection to their eggs, but it is not explained how this causes them to fall into the orbit of Maran Gor, and what her connection to dinosaurs really is.  We probably need a specific topic to cover this too, assuming one doesn't already exist.

Edited July 3, 2022 by Darius West

[Shiningbrow]

Where do Demibirds come from?

it's when mommy Demi Moore meets up with daddy Birdman, and they love each other very much....

[Manunancy]

In my opinion, some mythical oddities comes from Arachne Solara's nets - as she pulled the bits and parts of the world together, some anihilated mytholgocial bits were replaced with similar bits surviving from mostly destroyed myths. So even after the Compromise and with time going, there's still some frankenstein-style stitching to be found if you look closely enough.

[Darius West]

42 minutes ago, Manunancy said:

In my opinion, some mythical oddities comes from Arachne Solara's nets - as she pulled the bits and parts of the world together, some anihilated mytholgocial bits were replaced with similar bits surviving from mostly destroyed myths. So even after the Compromise and with time going, there's still some frankenstein-style stitching to be found if you look closely enough.

I think if we are talking about Frankenstein and stitching of mythology we need look no further than the God Learners and their vandalism of the mythic landscape in the 2nd Age. YGMV.

[JRE]

As the Dragonewts are, IMG, more conservative than Brithini, and the Dragonewts we have now in Time are the worst of the bunch (supposing Dragons have not been making new immature eggs within Time), I do not see the Dragonewts learning avilry from someone else. I would expect they actually taught or inspired others, back then when you still had innovative and creative dragonewts (there may be a few left, but I suppose they are priest and above by now, or Dinosaurs).

On the other hand, I expect the First Council spread many good ideas from the Silver Age all over Genertela, so demibirds may be relatively new for most Dragonewts outside Peloria, as the interaction of avilry makes it likely that even not knowing who was the first, it is likely it all happened somewhere and others thought it was a good idea.

My own explanation is that they are a gift from Daruda, when he replaced the Inhuman King as ruler of Kralorela Dragonewts, part of the Resistance in Strength. Other Dragonewt cities received the eggs as gifts and found they fitted with the Dragonewt cycle, as some actions are better done by others. What other Dragonewts do not know is that Daruda tainted the eggs of Dragonewts that did not accept him as Dragon emperor, so they give demibirds regularly rather than their proper Dragonewts. That is also why the kralorelans distributed eggs out of Kralorela, to minimize the risk of the Inhuman king and his priests returning from those eggs. 

My demibirds therefore come from altered Dragonewt eggs. Rather than a reincarnating dragonewt, they produce a demibird according to how advanced was that egg's dragonewt, from once a season to once a week.