Divorce among Lunars? Yelm and Yelmalio worshippers?

[Jeff]

12 hours ago, Darius West said:

In Yelmic communities obviously only the Pater Familias can initiate a divorce, and it will be conducted against his wife's father.  The Father will be required to retrieve the daughter at his own expense, and the issue of how much of the dowry is forfeit will be measured by her level of transgression or unsatisfactory performance of her duties, by a third party in a court.  Failure to do so may result in penalties up to and including the sale of the wife into slavery, as an otherwise non-productive asset.  There will be occasions where a wife escapes, and he will be required to send out a party to capture his wayward livestock wife, while making a case against her father for her misbehavior.  Any children of course belong to the Pater Familias.  A permanently escaped wife becomes a blot on the character of the Pater Familias and he may need to seek an assassin to remove her with an 'honor' killing.

As to what happens in the new Lunar society, let's just assume it is a lot more egalitarian and reasonable.  While I doubt they have no-fault divorce, they likely have measured grounds for complaint and recompense, with both parties recovering the assets they brought to the marriage, and splitting joint assets according to a legal formula.  Obviously infidelity will be grounds for divorce, but the penalties are not likely to be all that high, given the favor given to the Red Goddess' famous promiscuity.  Amicable divorces will be favored, and the legal costs involved will be far lower than for adversarial ones.   It may be that noble marriages are arranged as contracts to begin with with all the clauses and codicils pre-determined by family consent.  As to children, there will be no alimony required by either party as the state will not be bothered with enforcing such claims, and it is likely that children under the age of 10 will automatically go with their mothers, but those at or above that age will be allowed to choose.  Hopefully the matter will not be allowed to degenerate into a dart competition.

As an aside, there is nothing "new" to the Lunar Empire. Lunar Society has been around for almost four centuries, and Dara Happan aristocratic resistance was broken three and a half century ago. For more than a century, that Dara Happan aristocracy is almost entirely Lunarized. So although there are no doubt many families that insist that they are Old Traditionalists and proudly insist that their women refuse to initiate a divorce, legally all a woman needs to do is join the dominant cult in the Lunar Empire, that just happens to be the main pillar of the empire, and is headed by the Red Emperor himself. 

[FlamingCatOfDeath]

On 8/23/2022 at 1:41 AM, Rodney Dangerduck said:

On Earth, we usually have these types of marriages.  Would you describe Earth divorce as "straightforward and easy".  Now add the fact that the gods are definitely real and can do you significant and immediate harm if you cross them.

Divorce is hard because of all the paperwork, legal implications, and the fights over property. Having the prenup is built into the marriage contract simplifies things. In the real world their have been societies where divorced was easy, take Ibn Battuta found a new wife every place he stopped and then divorced them when he continued his journeys.

[Rodney Dangerduck]

32 minutes ago, FlamingCatOfDeath said:

Divorce is hard because of all the paperwork, legal implications, and the fights over property. Having the prenup is built into the marriage contract simplifies things. In the real world their have been societies where divorced was easy, take Ibn Battuta found a new wife every place he stopped and then divorced them when he continued his journeys.

This ignores human emotions like love, desire, jealousy, and hate.  Which, to me at least, are far more interesting than marrying some shepherd girl with wide hips from the Swabdish clan, so that your clan can have better access to their well.  One could argue that my approach is too "modern" or "romantic", and they'd probably be right.

This explains why my favorite Glorantha superhero is Jar-Eel.  She seems to be the only super-hero who loves anybody other than herself.

[MOB]

On 8/24/2022 at 11:59 PM, Eff said:

I'll set Yelmalio aside because I think Yelmalio is so frequently a subcultural tendency in a broader cultural zone that it's hard to say anything definitive or universal. 

But we do know that divorce in Yelmalio society is not only permitted but sometimes obligatory, as described by Biturian Varosh in Cults of Prax:

Quote

As the Yelmalions prepared their circle, one of my fellows, a High Llama warrior named Gorali, spoke to me, explaining that the five men and women in the circle were husbands and wives, ordained five years before, and now their religion demanded that they give up their marriages for the priesthood.

Or as it explains in the cult write-up: "...if they (Light Priests) have spouses who are Initiates or Rune level in any Earth Cult, they must divorce them exactly five years after they take their priestly vows. This symbolizes the sundering of Sky and Earth when Air tore them apart."

From this, I infer that divorce is a commonplace thing in Sun County, you just need to find an Orlanthi as a co-respondent. 

[Nick Brooke]

8 hours ago, Rodney Dangerduck said:

This explains why my favorite Glorantha superhero is Jar-Eel.  She seems to be the only super-hero who loves anybody other than herself.

My preferred reading of WB&RM's Best Friends rule is that Harrek the Berserk loves Gunda the Guilty. (Gunda, of course, can't love him back: it's a tragedy). And we can reasonably suppose that, at least some of the time, Androgeus loves the Tarsh Twins (cf. The Rising of Tarsh scenario). Of course, the text only tells us that they're Best Friends. But it's fun to extrapolate.

[Nick Brooke]

Chatting with Chris Gidlow about this the other day: another disconcertingly "modern" aspect to Lunar divorces is that their courts will place paramount importance on doing what's in the best interests of the children. If neither parent can provide for them appropriately, the Seven Mothers cult runs orphanages, as do various private providers. (Not all of whom are Taloned). I refer the gentle reader to my earlier observations on the clash between ideal and reality in this or any other legal system. 

[Darius West]

14 hours ago, Jeff said:

As an aside, there is nothing "new" to the Lunar Empire. Lunar Society has been around for almost four centuries, and Dara Happan aristocratic resistance was broken three and a half century ago. For more than a century, that Dara Happan aristocracy is almost entirely Lunarized. So although there are no doubt many families that insist that they are Old Traditionalists and proudly insist that their women refuse to initiate a divorce, legally all a woman needs to do is join the dominant cult in the Lunar Empire, that just happens to be the main pillar of the empire, and is headed by the Red Emperor himself. 

I was drawing a distinction as you say, between Solar and Lunar marriage and divorce.  Yes, 350 years is a long time, but Solar traditionalists will disown and disinherit their daughters if they disobey.  Some will break with tradition, but most won't if extreme religions in our own society are anything to go by.

[Jeff]

3 hours ago, Darius West said:

I was drawing a distinction as you say, between Solar and Lunar marriage and divorce.  Yes, 350 years is a long time, but Solar traditionalists will disown and disinherit their daughters if they disobey.  Some will break with tradition, but most won't if extreme religions in our own society are anything to go by.

Solar traditionalists who disown their daughters because they joined the ruling cult in the Lunar Empire - which is headed up by Yelm's Supreme Priest who happens to be  Yelm's grandson!!!! - are not going to be a very significant factor in 8th Wane Heartlands.

[Darius West]

14 hours ago, Jeff said:

Solar traditionalists who disown their daughters because they joined the ruling cult in the Lunar Empire - which is headed up by Yelm's Supreme Priest who happens to be  Yelm's grandson!!!! - are not going to be a very significant factor in 8th Wane Heartlands.

Solar worship has not vanished from Dara Happa, which is its heartland.  The hinterlands are still farmed primarily by Lodrili peasantry who owe their loyalty to Yelm, not the RMG.  While Yelm might not presently be trendy, it will inevitably re-assert itself.  Look at the Gods Wall; the RMG has risen before time and died and gone away before, and Yelm has risen again as before.  The day/night cycle is more frequent than the lunar cycle.

[Joerg]

2 hours ago, Darius West said:

Solar worship has not vanished from Dara Happa, which is its heartland.  The hinterlands are still farmed primarily by Lodrili peasantry who owe their loyalty to Yelm, not the RMG.  While Yelm might not presently be trendy, it will inevitably re-assert itself.  Look at the Gods Wall; the RMG has risen before time and died and gone away before, and Yelm has risen again as before.  The day/night cycle is more frequent than the lunar cycle.

Moonson is the Yelmic emperor, and heads the lesser Yelmic priesthood conducting all the religious services for the rural population, even those of Lodril and Oria. (Holy people from those cults are involved in the rites, but Yelmic priests conduct them.)

There may be some rabidly patriarchalic lesser Yelmite families whose ancestors did not join Jannisor's rebellion or sided with Sheng Seleris's Dara Happa on Horse, but without a firm outward stance supporting the Red Emperor and his Lunar empire, it is unlikely that they would have kept their lands in the aftermaths of those conflicts.

The Dart Competitions don't require Lunar magic to succeed, but straight-laced Yelmic magic only is not going to win a Dart Competition against a house drawing on the magical expertise of the Imperial College of Magic. There are some alternative sources of powerful magic useful in Dart Competitions, but none of those are Yelmic - say the mysteries of Surenslib or the Spolite ways both studied and suppressed by the Imperial College.

When Sheng Seleris will be returned, there will be Yelmic families joining his cause again. Possibly because they don't want to join the then openly and badly chaotic ways of some of his Lunar opposition. Sheng at least looks somewhat like a human, unlike Ralzakark.

[scott-martin]

8 hours ago, Joerg said:

When Sheng Seleris will be returned, there will be Yelmic families joining his cause again.

This really is a great thread. Maybe all this "plentonian" revivalism is actually emanating from the near future.

Of course even yelmic marriage in the historical past has gone through phases no matter how static people facing the inside (the administrative elites) want it to look to people on the outside. I like the idea that in various phases dayzatar renunciation was the real goal . . . the devout would accept the transient shame of marriage in order to achieve the greater glory of burning the attachment later. Then in the grand arc of time the monks and nuns became more of a separate vocation, with convents and cloisters being chartered and broken up for various infractions real and imaginary. At one point, Deezola may have eclipsed Dendara as the model of a modern independent woman of the Arcos Valley and beyond . . . but now, not so much. All we need for MGF is for a historian to assign all these moments onto the fortunate succession and watch the patterns play out.

[Qizilbashwoman]

10 hours ago, Joerg said:

say the mysteries of Surenslib

i always wondered if Monsoon being eaten by a Weeder goddess was a Dart asasassination

[FlamingCatOfDeath]

On 8/26/2022 at 2:08 AM, Nick Brooke said:

Chatting with Chris Gidlow about this the other day: another disconcertingly "modern" aspect to Lunar divorces is that their courts will place paramount importance on doing what's in the best interests of the children. If neither parent can provide for them appropriately, the Seven Mothers cult runs orphanages, as do various private providers. (Not all of whom are Taloned). I refer the gentle reader to my earlier observations on the clash between ideal and reality in this or any other legal system. 

This makes sense from an institutional interests point of view. If their parents can’t provide for them they are likely to turn to crime or begging whereas if the seven mothers get them they will be trained to be useful to the lunar empire. (And hopefully personally loyal to the person who runs the orphanage)