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Yelmalio/Elmal again


g33k

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50 minutes ago, svensson said:

Are we flogging the dead bolo lizard again? Some more? Still?

The Elmal / Yelmalio schism is one of Glorantha's oldest arguing points. Since King of Sartar appeared, it has raged on. Greg even wrote an essay as to why he did it (The Birth of Elmal - now forty years old!).

Fortunately newcomers will read the upcoming prosopaedia and read "Elmal was worshiped by the Orlanthi at the Dawn, until contact with solar cultures revealed him to be another name for Yelmalio." and just accept it as that. They may notice that there's a small Elmal group mentioned in the GM screen pack and hopefully think as I do, that's cool, an enclave of people worshipping an old god.

Personally, I've never had this whole Elmal / Yelmalio schism affect my games. I still find it's influence a bit weird, and can honestly say as a friend of Greg's, he did too. It fits into my list of trigger words for Glorantha fans:

  • Elmal / Yelmalio
  • Illumination
  • Arkat
  • Storm Tribe / Cults of Sartar
  • Sorcery
  • (I'm sure there's a few more)
  • Heroquest (even though we've had rules for it in some printed form for years)

All of these topics usually produce an outburst of posts about who, how, why and this is the way, etc.

(standing back now)

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3 minutes ago, David Scott said:

The Elmal / Yelmalio schism is one of Glorantha's oldest arguing points. Since King of Sartar appeared, it has raged on. Greg even wrote an essay as to why he did it (The Birth of Elmal - now forty years old!).

Fortunately newcomers will read the upcoming prosopaedia and read "Elmal was worshiped by the Orlanthi at the Dawn, until contact with solar cultures revealed him to be another name for Yelmalio." and just accept it as that. They may notice that there's a small Elmal group mentioned in the GM screen pack and hopefully think as I do, that's cool, an enclave of people worshipping an old god.

Personally, I've never had this whole Elmal / Yelmalio schism affect my games. I still find it's influence a bit weird, and can honestly say as a friend of Greg's, he did too. It fits into my list of trigger words for Glorantha fans:

  • Elmal / Yelmalio
  • Illumination
  • Arkat
  • Storm Tribe / Cults of Sartar
  • Sorcery
  • (I'm sure there's a few more)
  • Heroquest (even though we've had rules for it in some printed form for years)

All of these topics usually produce an outburst of posts about who, how, why and this is the way, etc.

(standing back now)

I find it weird as well. 

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3 hours ago, Ironwall said:

I'm not going to lie I usually find the bolo lizard floggings to be entertaining and informative 

Welcome to the "weird corner", then! On that weird end of things, of course, we have the thirty-year-old essay on Elmal:

"I am not dismayed by disagreements since then. (I am dismayed, instead, by people’s hurt over this change.) I am glad that the Yelmalions insist that their god, Yelmalio, is ancient with history stretching from before the Dragonkill War. They insist that we brought back Elmal by our heroquesting.

I expect them to swear by this, and to proffer artifacts and tales to prove that it is Yelmalio who was the original sun god for us. To them Monro, perhaps the most honorable man I have ever met, preserved the original form of our Godtime worship and maneuvered to remove the last of his True Believers from among our corrupting influence. I do not disagree with this, and am proud of my little part in liberating them from us."

Or to put it another way, in 1993, Francis Gregory Stafford seemed to believe in some kind of compatibilist vision- the Gloranthas without Elmal and those with Elmal were in some sense equally "true", equally grammatical statements in the Glorantha-language. I am sure he recanted this later, and revealed that there was, in truth, a true Glorantha that mere mortal players varied from in their weakness, rather than the disturbing grim vision of Glorantha as a series of objects constructed by playing games. 

But in the weakness of compatibilist anarchy, a deeper trap lies- if the "discoverer" could be wrong- why should we give his words and thoughts particular credence? The hierarchy of source credibility, the vision of the holy canon assembled, trembles like a house of cards. Elmal is only the beginning- look into the origins of Caladra and Aurelion, and you might well go blind. Look long upon Balazar, and you might begin to hear a shrill whistling at the edge of perception. 

What was I talking about again? 

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 "And I am pretty tired of all this fuss about rfevealign that many worshippers of a minor goddess might be lesbians." -Greg Stafford, April 11, 2007

"I just read an article in The Economist by a guy who was riding around with the Sartar rebels, I mean Taliban," -Greg Stafford, January 7th, 2010

Eight Arms and the Mask

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4 hours ago, David Scott said:

Personally, I've never had this whole Elmal / Yelmalio schism affect my games. I still find it's influence a bit weird, and can honestly say as a friend of Greg's, he did too. It fits into my list of trigger words for Glorantha fans:

  • Elmal / Yelmalio

We played it back in the day that they were the same just the Elmali acted a little bit more reserved when visiting a Yelmalio Temple and apologized for their less than prude friends.

It involved lots of episodes wherein the PC's had discuss their behavior in advance of entering a more conservative Yelmalio area, sort of like when rambunctious kids are taken to a more upscale restaurant, you will use inside voice, you will not put your shoes on the seating, you will keep your cell phones and video games in the car, etc. it worked out great for our campaign and added nice team effort roll paying.

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5 hours ago, Jeff said:

Humakt is in general neutral towards most deities, except those that misuse Death or sanctify betrayal.

it seems to me that the root of both Humakt's and Chalana's hatred of the red moon Goddess is the same, and has nothing especially do with her chaotic links. it is that she came to be via what they both consider to be perversion of resurrection magic that broke the rules of what could be brought back. Sedenya was certainly dead for more than 7 days....

Humakti warriors barely tolerates resurrection at the best of times, when it is done within the bounds of the compromise. Some Humakti think all red goddess initiates would register as undead, if there were not illuminated. And, in truth, the illuminated lunar aristocracy adopting vampirism is indeed a thing that happens.

To Chalanan healers, the red goddess is not a wound in the world to be healed, or even a maggot infesting the wound that must be cleansed before healing can proceed. She is a rogue healer, one who takes one life in order to return another.

Every healer will have faced such demands to bring back someone who can't be brought back, from grief or political necessity. And they will know they are lying when they say it can't be done.  To a ghost, any intact and sufficiently fresh corpse will do.  There may be mental and spiritual trauma from coming back in someone else body, but that too can be healed. Or embraced, if madness is what you aspire to.

Teelo Norri missionaries will say that she consented to the procedure, and they have met her personally and confirmed that. Chalanan's will sigh and say that's not the point.

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10 minutes ago, Eff said:

 

No one's trying to change your Glorantha. Official publications do have a canon though, and that's primarily what this board is for discussing. Has that canon changed? Yes. Do you have to change your own? No. Play with the old material if you want, and edit the new to suit your campaign. YGMV remains.

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8 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

No one's trying to change your Glorantha. Official publications do have a canon though, and that's primarily what this board is for discussing. Has that canon changed? Yes. Do you have to change your own? No. Play with the old material if you want, and edit the new to suit your campaign. YGMV remains.

What on Earth are you talking about? 

 "And I am pretty tired of all this fuss about rfevealign that many worshippers of a minor goddess might be lesbians." -Greg Stafford, April 11, 2007

"I just read an article in The Economist by a guy who was riding around with the Sartar rebels, I mean Taliban," -Greg Stafford, January 7th, 2010

Eight Arms and the Mask

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Personally, I find the Elmal/Yelmalio "schism" or disagreements minor compared to the mix-up of Antirius and Reladivus/Kargzant (and whatever the world may have fogotten about Yamsur). The Bridling of Kargzant in the Dawn Age is a merger enforcing some sort of identity that wasn't there to begin with, creating a hybrid Lightfore. (Almost like a centaur - part man, part horse.) 

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Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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I think it's fun to introduce elements of different people worshipping the same god in different way and growing up with stories about different myths. My PCs (a group of Orlanthi from an isolated and conservative hill clan) hides in Pavis and participates in local Orlanthi ceremonies. They realize that the Pavis Orlanthi is much more hedonistic and outgoing than the grim and strict Orlanthi leaders that the PCs grew up with. 

The Catholic Church and the Amish worships the same Christian God. But the churches couldn't be more different.

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4 minutes ago, Eff said:

What on Earth are you talking about? 

On Earth, all matters Gloranthan are equally ineffable. We have no reliable way of knowing the truth of any of them.

However, in Glorantha itself, this is not so; some things are thoroughly effable. The current location of Boldhome is in a different category from the current location of Brithos.

Similarly, it is never going to be a deep and unanswerable mystery to any inhabitant of Dragon Pass whether Yelmalio and Elmal are the same or not; it will likely be a matter of the personal lived experience of someone they know.

So to me, it is a mistake to obfuscate the presentation of Glorantha to create artificial mysteries or controversies that can't exist in the setting. Like 'now it is 1627, who is the current prince of Sartar? What is their personality and reputation?'

Save that for the stuff Gloranthan's actually disagree about, like who was Arkat. Or 'who should we worship'?

 

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27 minutes ago, Eff said:

What on Earth are you talking about? 

5 minutes ago, radmonger said:

On Earth, all matters Gloranthan are equally ineffable.

Pun intended? And "equally ineffable" is the same as "equally effable". Also quite effable, otherwise we wouldn't be able to discuss any of this.

5 minutes ago, radmonger said:

We have no reliable way of knowing the truth of any of them.

Glorantha is an overarching myth composed of multitudes of more specific myths. The truth of myths is found in their resonance with the audience, the recipients.

 

42 minutes ago, Richard S. said:

No one's trying to change your Glorantha. Official publications do have a canon though, and that's primarily what this board is for discussing. Has that canon changed? Yes. Do you have to change your own? No. Play with the old material if you want, and edit the new to suit your campaign. YGMV remains.

H..as canon changed, or do we have different canons depending on publication period?

There are people out there who swear that Glorantha is not complete without rune priests of Humakt and rune lords of Issaries, Chalana Arroy or Daka Fal.

There probably are even players of White Bear and Red Moon or Dragon Pass or Oriflam's Le Guerre des Heroes who know a lot about Argrath and Sartar but who have never heard about Orlanth or Ernalda.

 

5 minutes ago, radmonger said:

However, in Glorantha itself, this is not so; some things are thoroughly effable. The current location of Boldhome is in a different category from the current location of Brithos.

"current" is an interesting qualifier. From the outside, even Gloranthan history has much in common with Gloranthan Godtime as the layered foundation of our narrative.

 

5 minutes ago, radmonger said:

So to me, it is a mistake to obfuscate the presentation of Glorantha to create artificial mysteries or controversies that can't exist in the setting. Like 'now it is 1627, who is the current prince of Sartar? What is their personality and reputation?'

While there might be a few names that could be correct answers for the question "who is the current prince" in 1627, the question about their personality and reputation has more answers than this forum has threads.

 

5 minutes ago, radmonger said:

Save that for the stuff Gloranthan's actually disagree about, like who was Arkat. Or 'who should we worship'?

Was Monrogh right? is a valid topic for disagreement, at least as much as whether a holy person of Lightfore should be allowed to wear women's clothing.

You are welcome to live in a 1990 bliss where Yelmalio was an uncontested and cool deity that kicked ass, with only Yamsur casting some doubt on his uniqueness as the lesser sun, and maybe a nagging doubt who that Ehilm flame guy might have been. And without any idea that Yelmalio had anything to do with the planet Lightfore bathing nightly Glorantha in about as much light as our world's half moon.

 

"Who should we worship" is a question that many players (and GMs) confuse with "Which cult should we initiate into". Most Gloranthan humans expect a list of names (or "The Invisible God") as the answer. Often with cult entities that are hostile to one another on the same list.

"How shoud we worship entity X" is another important question - should it be propitiation to simply ward off that entity's displeasure, or should it be some form of devotion in the hope of magical aid? And should that magical aid be wielded by the individual worshiper or by a cult official on behalf of the worshipers?

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Telling how it is excessive verbis

 

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1 hour ago, Joerg said:

Personally, I find the Elmal/Yelmalio "schism" or disagreements minor compared to the mix-up of Antirius and Reladivus/Kargzant (and whatever the world may have fogotten about Yamsur). The Bridling of Kargzant in the Dawn Age is a merger enforcing some sort of identity that wasn't there to begin with, creating a hybrid Lightfore. (Almost like a centaur - part man, part horse.) 

There's such a web of Sun Jr. entities- beyond the ones we've discussed, we've also got Yelorna, Sun Daughter, Halamalao, Metsyla, I believe there's an East Isles one, and who knows what's up with Galanin... I think you're just forced to, at some level, invent your own jigsaw pieces to make it all work. Or, alternately, insist the jigsaw pieces are actually all just the same piece...

 

1 hour ago, radmonger said:

On Earth, all matters Gloranthan are equally ineffable. We have no reliable way of knowing the truth of any of them.

However, in Glorantha itself, this is not so; some things are thoroughly effable. The current location of Boldhome is in a different category from the current location of Brithos.

Similarly, it is never going to be a deep and unanswerable mystery to any inhabitant of Dragon Pass whether Yelmalio and Elmal are the same or not; it will likely be a matter of the personal lived experience of someone they know.

So to me, it is a mistake to obfuscate the presentation of Glorantha to create artificial mysteries or controversies that can't exist in the setting. Like 'now it is 1627, who is the current prince of Sartar? What is their personality and reputation?'

Save that for the stuff Gloranthan's actually disagree about, like who was Arkat. Or 'who should we worship'?

 

Glorantha isn't real. When you say that "it is never going to be a deep and unanswerable mystery to any inhabitant of Dragon Pass whether Yelmalio and Elmal are the same or not", I can say that it is, and I have interviewed over 4000 Orlanthis as evidence, and we are both on the exact same ground- we are talking about something that is, in conventional definitions, unknowable, because it concerns something that is definitionally untrue.

We can talk about the contents of a given book or online essay or whatever and know things in those contents because those contents are a matter of truth, but there is no statement either way on that matter- even the revelation of the Many Suns appears to be a moment of mystical insight rather than a matter of reasoned argumentation, which might well suggest that it is a deep mystery that, within the imagined fictional universe we conjure up, cannot be approached rationally. Or maybe nobody noticed it until Monrogh had a snakes-biting-their-own-tails moment and figured out the structure of benzene.

Now, having said all that, what I am pointing to is not whether there is any such disagreement or not. The Greg Stafford quote is instead about how there are two (plus) ways of making Gloranthas, one where the Elmal material of King of Sartar is used and one where it isn't, and that these are both equally true. That is, there are multiple Gloranthas in which each one may or may not have any disputation about this status or not. That's the key factor here- at that unenlightened stage, there was no singular true Glorantha, there were many Gloranthas. There was nothing, to Stafford, higher than that which was produced through play, at that time.

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 "And I am pretty tired of all this fuss about rfevealign that many worshippers of a minor goddess might be lesbians." -Greg Stafford, April 11, 2007

"I just read an article in The Economist by a guy who was riding around with the Sartar rebels, I mean Taliban," -Greg Stafford, January 7th, 2010

Eight Arms and the Mask

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4 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Was Monrogh right? 

Really reading "How I Screwed Up Your Glorantha" again after a few years of only occasional surface review, it's interesting how the author (possibly only sometimes Greg and sometimes an unnamed visionary of Tarkalor's court) both hedges his answer to this question and blurs our received understanding of what exactly was going on behind the "Monrogh" revelations. 

As we know from the last weird pages of HHP, the people who inherit from Monrogh make significant effort to mediate their sympathy for Nysalor with a sensible loathing for the other entity, the one who did all the actual bad things, someone they call Gbaji. It's quite the flex when the Birth of Elmal literally has Arkat scribbled all over it . . . but then again, the author of that document is not Monro(gh) and doesn't actually endorse the Yelmalio interpretation of Multiple Suns. The important thing for this person is that Multiple Suns got Monro to shut the hell up, go over there to stop complicating the situation and even help wipe out lingering troll influences in the face of disorienting lunar insights from the north. 

The author's troll background is equally interesting but it is the author's nature to betray. The important thing is that we can give this person what they say they always wanted and meet them face to face as co creators. The alternative is to be loved to death. The author, for example, favored Orlanth. But it can be a big tribe.
 

singer sing me a given

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11 minutes ago, metcalph said:

The only unanswered question left about Yelmalio IMO is what's he like in Teshnos? 

<twiddle thumbs waiting for the Sky Gods book>

Now that is an interesting one - and ties in with the general downgrading of Lightfore in favor of Ehilm by the God Learners. Ehilm-Somash, Lodril-Solf,  and Aether-Zitro Argon are all easy to see, but Lightfore is hard to find there!

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1 hour ago, Jeff said:

Now that is an interesting one - and ties in with the general downgrading of Lightfore in favor of Ehilm by the God Learners. Ehilm-Somash, Lodril-Solf,  and Aether-Zitro Argon are all easy to see, but Lightfore is hard to find there!

Huh.  Guess I didn't understand Ehilm as well as I had thought.

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5 hours ago, Soccercalle said:

I think it's fun to introduce elements of different people worshipping the same god in different way and growing up with stories about different myths. My PCs (a group of Orlanthi from an isolated and conservative hill clan) hides in Pavis and participates in local Orlanthi ceremonies. They realize that the Pavis Orlanthi is much more hedonistic and outgoing than the grim and strict Orlanthi leaders that the PCs grew up with. 

The Catholic Church and the Amish worships the same Christian God. But the churches couldn't be more different.

This. Many times over. Roleplay the culture shock! Its fun! (perhaps not so much for the GM though!) 🙃

SDLeary

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My current thinking on Yelmalio in Teshnos: female.  She along with her female relations became alienated from the other Fire Gods there as a result of the Goddess Switch and is now a fringe religion there.  Elements of her worship has found its way elsewhere (points to Vega)

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On 3/2/2023 at 7:51 AM, g33k said:

I think Yelmalio vs Elmal are really mostly a societal/cultural issue.

"Elmal" in Heortling cultures is the allied god, a faithful ally.  They will cooperate with "taking a dip" (although not in such powergame-y terms -- they want actual faithfulness, worship, earnest regard from their Initiates).

"Yelmalio" will be much more stand-off-ish, lthe priests much ess likely to accept Orlanthi who come to them saying they want to Initiate...

Elmal is Orlanth's Loyal Thane.  Elmal never fought Orlanth on the Hill of Gold and as such he never lost his Fire Powers.

Yelmalio by comparison is an invented cult put forwards by the hero and Yelmalio spirit of retribution known as Monrogh quite recently in Gloranthan History that syncretizes elements of worship of the "little sun" from around central Genertela. 

The Lunars saw political advantage in using the Yelmalio cult to undermine the cordial relations between Elmali and Orlanthi ("divide et impera" and all that).   Frankly Monrogh's syncretism smacks of Godlearnerism.  These are similar but notably different deities of the little sun who have different myths and different names.  They should have similar magic, but they are fundamentally not the same deity.  This is not Call of C'thulhu "Masks of Yelmalio", even if there is some indication that one of the masks of Yelmalio might in fact be Thanatar.

For example, the So-called Yelmalios of New Pavis actually worship Tharkantus, the Ostrich folk worship the little sun as (only source) Khim the Rider, while the Balazarings call the little sun Balazar after their ancestor King.  Really only the Sun Valley worship "Yelmalio" as the little sun, and later Harvar Ironfist becomes the fanatical Yelmalio oppressor of Far Point, but he converted at Sun Valley imsmc.

It is very likely that after the Hero Wars, there will be a large backlash against the Yelmalio cult for their treachery, and a resurgence of support for Elmal the Loyal Thane.

Edited by Darius West
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8 hours ago, Eff said:

The Greg Stafford quote is instead about how there are two (plus) ways of making Gloranthas, one where the Elmal material of King of Sartar is used and one where it isn't, and that these are both equally true.

 

That's the great cycle of creation and play. Someone published something, people play it out in ways that vary. some of those people then go on to publish their own stuff. Those varying published sources confuse newbies. Someone finds a way to mostly reconcile the varying ways those things played out. Pavis in 1615 was like _this_, rural sartarite clans in 1621 were like _that_,, sartarite cities in 1625 are like _this_.

It doesn't really help anyone to say 'well you could run strike ranks in the rq2 way, or in the rq3 way, or you could make up your own way'. Those who understand don't need permission; those who seek understanding need clarity.

Once they are playing, then maybe they are playing at the scale where they get to decide what sartar in 1632 is like. Including maybe a future where the light of solar truth burns up the lies of the lunars. 

But the starting point of that play is one where the lunar armies were actually eaten by a dragon. and the sun dome templars are a military force that no Sartarite leader would wish to see on the other side of the battlefield.

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