The nature of Gloranthan rivers

[Joerg]

I posted this on Facebook, but I find this forum more suited to my kind of discussion:

Rivers in Glorantha have a headwater - the furthest place from their to which their inland crawl proceeded in Godtime - and a "source" beyond their estuaries, their connection to the Heart of the Seas.

Rivers and sea currents are similar in nature, but sea currents never leave their element, whereas rivers ultimately do so, invading a territory that is alien and all too often hostile.

Sshorg was the First River, a tendril exploring the land after the Togaro Sea had risen above ancient Keetela in the southeasternmost corner of the Lozenge. People called her a serpent or called him a dragon as it made its way past the Spike and north towards Dragon Pass, and then beyond.

The tendril arched high above the land surrounding the initially shallow bed carved by this entity. With its head it would savor the riches of Earth and Soil there for the taking, sending down the delicious stuff back to its source through its interior, dropping out detritus when the good stuff between it had been digested and enriched.

Sshorg spawned many children, including mighty Seolinthur, the river that entered Genert's Garden, and spawned children of its own, of whom Zola Fel is the greatest, but also the Teshno River entering that land, and branches further northeast.

On its approach to Kero Fin, a bunch of other rivers had parted their currents from the parent current, tendrils of their own semi-merged with the parent tendril. These were the greater and lesser rivers of Kethaela, remaining behind when Sshorg had overcome the upland that would form the watershed between Kethaela and Peloria. Sshorg's head had proceeded all the way to the northern edge of Peloria when its back was broken across that watershed. Essentially, it had become beheaded, a truncated tendril no longer exploring inland, although its spawn still did, to the south of Kero Fin. North of Kero Fin, what remained was a head and neck just within reach of another lead to the Heart of the Seas from which its parent Togaro had risen, although this one led through the Hudaron waters and its child Arcos. The re-connected Sshorg turned inward to itself, its head climbing back the way it had descended.

The children of the rivers were tendrils of their own, interwoven with the parent river and sea currents where the parent current separates from the currents of the seas when reaching back to the Heart of the Oceans, but separating more and more until finding a bed of their own.

Sky River Titan's battle leading to the Skyfall, and then Magasta's call to all currents (including the rivers) to lend him their strength to contain the Chaos Rift in the center of Glorantha caused the rivers to change their nature. Rather than bulging high out of their beds, they now have mainly flat surfaces and stay rather deeply inside their beds, and normally only the seaward current that used to be their inside remains somewhat strong. These currents still retain some sense of identity when tributaries join greater rivers, and then seas, all the way to the Heart of the Seas where Magasta draws on their strength to keep the rift contained. When crossing coastal flats, these currents may disperse into rather flat bands, or possibly even split up for a while before reuniting on their way to Magasta's Pool and beyond.

 

[Darius West]

So what about the River anomalies which break with the structure you have discussed here Joerg? Such as...

Praxian Serpents, that seemingly appear and vanish overnight, having no obvious headwater?

Or rivers that flow the wrong way?

Aren't some rivers birthed from Mostali settlements outflow pipes?  What does that mean mythologically?

[Ironwall]

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Aren't some rivers birthed from Mostali settlements outflow pipes?  What does that mean mythologically?

Powerful water spirits and gods enslaved by the mostali.

[Joerg]

8 hours ago, Darius West said:

So what about the River anomalies which break with the structure you have discussed here Joerg? Such as...

Praxian Serpents, that seemingly appear and vanish overnight, having no obvious headwater?

Praxian Serpents are sort of "undead" or hibernating rivers. Many have headwaters in the Indigo Mountains or the Stormwalk Mountains. Others come from cacthment basins inside of Prax where the parent river has died or is hibernating, too. Having lost their connections to the Heart of the Seas, the Praxian oases are ersatz-headwaters for the Praxian waters, available for the River Horse to visit.

The exact function may remain a mystery for the time being.

 

8 hours ago, Darius West said:

Or rivers that flow the wrong way?

You mean downhill?

The Syphon is the only river I know of that has retained its active shape and its uphill course, running to the big void of Chaos at its head. It and the Sounders River (flowing downhill from the Storm Mountains into the Good Canal dug by Waha, then quenching the buried Devil) are riverine heroes who fight Chaos.

The Erinflarth cleansing at the Densdam in Dorastor is a river miracle, too.

 

8 hours ago, Darius West said:

Aren't some rivers birthed from Mostali settlements outflow pipes?  What does that mean mythologically?

Pollution of waters is a sad but known fact. The Nidan River and the Dwerrow River are the main wastewater channels for the main Genertelan dwarf colonies.

To the dwarfs, rivers on the surface are a sad side-effect of the Breaking of the World. If Somelz is a re-creation of the Earth surface as it was meant to be, then rivers don't deserve any protection by the repair crews of the World Machine.

To the Water tribe, polluted rivers are the sad proof of the enmity of the dry folk against the waters.

[kr0p0s]

How many rivers are offspring of Heler and possiblly aligned more to the storm tribe as opposed to water? I'm especially thinking about rivers in Maniria.

[Joerg]

2 hours ago, kr0p0s said:

How many rivers are offspring of Heler and possiblly aligned more to the storm tribe as opposed to water? I'm especially thinking about rivers in Maniria.

Rivers that only trace their ancestry to Heler are those cut off from the Oceans, feeding inland basins. In Genertela that would be eastern Pent, feeding the Hot Lake. Otherwise, there are three famous rivers that did not crawl in from the Seas but jumped down from above, the Creek, the Stream, and the River. These rivers were part of the waters that invaded the heavens rather than the dry earth, siblings of Lorion and hence children of the Manthi, and as they re-awakened their tributaries by re-spawning their connection to the Heart of the Seas they became the (adoptive) parents of these rivers (mainly the lesser rivers of the Quivin Mountains). 

Most other rivers crawled into the land with their source from the surface oceans, primarily Togaro spawning Sshorg (the first river) and Hudaro (with Neliom parenting e.g. the Janube).

 

[kr0p0s]

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

Rivers that only trace their ancestry to Heler are those cut off from the Oceans, feeding inland basins. In Genertela that would be eastern Pent, feeding the Hot Lake. Otherwise, there are three famous rivers that did not crawl in from the Seas but jumped down from above, the Creek, the Stream, and the River. These rivers were part of the waters that invaded the heavens rather than the dry earth, siblings of Lorion and hence children of the Manthi, and as they re-awakened their tributaries by re-spawning their connection to the Heart of the Seas they became the (adoptive) parents of these rivers (mainly the lesser rivers of the Quivin Mountains). 

Most other rivers crawled into the land with their source from the surface oceans, primarily Togaro spawning Sshorg (the first river) and Hudaro (with Neliom parenting e.g. the Janube).

 

The Gorphing River at the border of Esrolia is a river goddess described as a blue skinned daughter of Heler. She flows to the Mirrorsea. The Gorphing and also the Volior, Noranior and Tigronior start high up towards the Mislari Mountains and flow to the Mournsea. The Mislari Mountains contain Storm Mountain, described as near Ditali lands, where Orlanth recieved homage from Heler in the God Time. Interestingly the Noranior and Tigronior are described as having superseded the Nimistor, possibly through God Time conflict?? It was at this time that Heler joined Orlanth and helped drive back the Water tribe. The Tigronior doglegs right at the coast and crawls across the land through a fen to get to the sea, almost reluctant to reach the ocean.

Could these rivers not have invaded from the heavens when Heler joined the Storm tribe to aid Orlanth?

Edited March 2, 2023 by kr0p0s

[Joerg]

2 hours ago, kr0p0s said:

The Gorphing River at the border of Esrolia is a river goddess described as a blue skinned daughter of Heler. She flows to the Mirrorsea. The Gorphing and also the Volior, Noranior and Tigronior start high up towards the Mislari Mountains and flow to the Mournsea. The Mislari Mountains contain Storm Mountain, described as near Ditali lands, where Orlanth recieved homage from Heler in the God Time. Interestingly the Noranior and Tigronior are described as having superseded the Nimistor, possibly through God Time conflict?? It was at this time that Heler joined Orlanth and helped drive back the Water tribe. The Tigronior doglegs right at the coast and crawls across the land through a fen to get to the sea, almost reluctant to reach the ocean.

Could these rivers not have invaded from the heavens when Heler joined the Storm tribe to aid Orlanth?

These rivers were "normal rivers" in the Godtime, when they crawled inland, until Sky River Titan (Lorion, later aka Engizi) was wounded fighting Chaos, and sent his lifeblood to support Magasta's struggle to contain the Void inside the place where the Spike used to be prior to the Breaking of the World. Only from that moment onward did the rivers flow down to the seas. (Note that the Faralinthor sea south of Genertela had been dried up in the course of the Storm Age, quite some events after the Flood had been beaten back.)

[kr0p0s]

On 2/24/2023 at 9:30 AM, Joerg said:

I posted this on Facebook, but I find this forum more suited to my kind of discussion:

Rivers in Glorantha have a headwater - the furthest place from their to which their inland crawl proceeded in Godtime - and a "source" beyond their estuaries, their connection to the Heart of the Seas.

 

Real world headwaters tend to be fairly arbitrary, fizzling out into tributary streams unless sourced at a spring.  Would Gloranthan rivers have a fixed, defined head such as a holy pool or be anchored in the Earth to give the appearance of a spring? In Glorantha you can summon River Horses to carry you to a rivers headwaters. So where would you be carries to?

[Joerg]

50 minutes ago, kr0p0s said:

Real world headwaters tend to be fairly arbitrary, fizzling out into tributary streams unless sourced at a spring.  Would Gloranthan rivers have a fixed, defined head such as a holy pool or be anchored in the Earth to give the appearance of a spring? In Glorantha you can summon River Horses to carry you to a rivers headwaters. So where would you be carries to?

Possibly to the place where the river gains its identity. Which doesn't apply to major joinings with some shared or changed identity downriver, like the confluences of the Creek or the Stream with the River, or the Martof and Minthors confluence, or the shared estuary of the Esrolian Mesopotamia.

The old symbol for a headwater was a pool or a lake where the water emerges from elsewhere, usually from underground. Placing these pools near mountain tops might indicate a glacial melt-off. And possibly a myth somewhere where the advance of the rivers was stopped by Inora.

[DrGoth]

Rain is still a thing, but that might be parts of water that follow the path into the sky rejoining the water with a connection to the Heart of the Seas. The headwater being an important place where they come together.

[kr0p0s]

On 4/6/2023 at 11:53 AM, DrGoth said:

Rain is still a thing, but that might be parts of water that follow the path into the sky rejoining the water with a connection to the Heart of the Seas. The headwater being an important place where they come together.

Some rivers headwaters (eg Missouri in the US) begin at the confluence of lesser streams. This could be represented, as you suggest, as the place where the waters of Heler connect with the waters of the Sea.