Seven Mothers Initiates in the Alda-Chur confederation

[DrGoth]

Been perusing the Well of Daliath and just wanted to check some conclusions.

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/seven-mothers-in-sartar/

gives some figures for "ballpark numbers for the Seven Mothers in Sartar."

For Alda-Chur and its tribes it gives:

Alda-Chur 500
Dinacoli 500
Princeros 500
Vantaros 500

Interestingly, no separate figure for the Tovtaros, but there is a "Other Tribes 1200". So maybe 100 for the Tovtaros? So that would give a total of 2100. I assuming these initiates are spread amongst the tribes of the clans, not heavily concentrated in one or two clans.

The total in that article comes to 5500, which matches the 5500 from:

https://wellofdaliath.chaosium.com/joining-the-seven-mothers/

where it says "As of 1627, there are perhaps 5,500 Seven Mothers initiates in Sartar, the vast majority of them native Sartarites." So I'm assuming the first article is also talking about 1627.

The first thing I noted was that the second article said initiates. Not lay members.

The Guide to Glorantha, vol 1, page 173, gives a total population for the Alda-Chur area of 35k. That would be adults and children. Taking an admittedly rough 50% as adults, that would give 17.5k adults.  Which gives about 12% of the adult population as Seven Mother initiates.  A minority, but a not inconsiderable one.

I think it would be fair to assume that 12% is an average, and that some clans would have less and some more. In the latter case, possibly up to 20% of the adult population are Seven Mothers initiates, if I'm right in assuming a spread amongst all clans.

That would give an interesting political dynamic to those clans and tribes. And the play opportunities that would go with that.

[Darius West]

3 hours ago, DrGoth said:

Interestingly, no separate figure for the Tovtaros, but there is a "Other Tribes 1200". So maybe 100 for the Tovtaros? 

The Tovtari are chaos fighting heroes who will not tolerate the minions of Shepelkirt in their midst.  They have pity for those whose poverty drives them to tug their forelock to the moon for a bowl of red beans and potato bread, but Seven Mothers Initiation?  Well, its a novel form of suicide...

[mfbrandi]

4 hours ago, DrGoth said:

That would give an interesting political dynamic to those clans and tribes.

Do you mean intra-clan dynamic? There is this from Greg — owed to @Eff:

Quote

I just read an article in The Economist by a guy who was riding around with the Sartar rebels, I mean Taliban, who reports that in some clans half join the government and half join the resistance, so that whoever wins the clan will be fed.

THAT is a passion for family.

Edited April 3, 2023 by mfbrandi
whitespace

[Runeblogger]

 

  Quote

I just read an article in The Economist by a guy who was riding around with the Sartar rebels, I mean Taliban, who reports that in some clans half join the government and half join the resistance, so that whoever wins the clan will be fed.

THAT is a passion for family.

That's also what many samurai clans did during the Sengoku period, when caught between two powerful warlords. Half of the clan devoted themselves to one warlord, half to the other, so the clan would go on whoever won the war. It must have happened in other parts of the world as well.

[Jeff]

There's about 500 Seven Mothers initiates in Alda-Chur (not including the Lunar soldiers), another 1100 initiates among the surrounding tribes. 

Some of these initiates are transplants from Lunar Tarsh, others are people who have joined the cult since 1602, and especially since 1613 or so.

Remember that from 1610-1625, the city of Alda-Chur was ruled by a local tyrant who installed himself with the aid of the soldiers of the Yelmalio cult and the Vantaros Tribe. The Provincial Government viewed Harvar Ironfist as a useful tool.

[DrGoth]

19 hours ago, mfbrandi said:

Do you mean intra-clan dynamic? There is this from Greg — owed to @Eff:

Inter and intra

[DrGoth]

20 hours ago, Darius West said:

The Tovtari are chaos fighting heroes who will not tolerate the minions of Shepelkirt in their midst.  They have pity for those whose poverty drives them to tug their forelock to the moon for a bowl of red beans and potato bread, but Seven Mothers Initiation?  Well, its a novel form of suicide...

With them so tight with Lunars under Harvar are you sure it's impossible?  But if there are none in the Tovtaros, it doesn't effect the numbers much. In fact, if the rough tribe size in Alda Chur is 9k (I think that's right), then you 4.5k adults including 500 Seven Mothers Initiates (Plus their share of those in Alda-Chur). Still seems to wind out at about the 12% (at least for those three tribes). And that's a 1627 figure.

[Jeff]

20 hours ago, Jeff said:

There's about 500 Seven Mothers initiates in Alda-Chur (not including the Lunar soldiers), another 1100 initiates among the surrounding tribes. 

Some of these initiates are transplants from Lunar Tarsh, others are people who have joined the cult since 1602, and especially since 1613 or so.

Remember that from 1610-1625, the city of Alda-Chur was ruled by a local tyrant who installed himself with the aid of the soldiers of the Yelmalio cult and the Vantaros Tribe. The Provincial Government viewed Harvar Ironfist as a useful tool.

Outside of Alda-Chur there are about 500 Seven Mothers initiates in the Princeros, about the same among the Vantaros, and about 100 among the Tovtaros.

[Darius West]

18 hours ago, Jeff said:

Outside of Alda-Chur there are about 500 Seven Mothers initiates in the Princeros, about the same among the Vantaros, and about 100 among the Tovtaros.

Not for long.  It is now 1626.

[DrGoth]

1 hour ago, Darius West said:

Not for long.  It is now 1626.

Well the articles match for numbers listed in one as being 1627 and match with what Jeff just gave, so....

[Scotty]

I've moved the usual derailing Elmal / Yelmalio conversation to a new topic.

[DrGoth]

17 hours ago, scott-martin said:

Sacred Time IMG is a collective rite where everyone within a community comes together to recreate their sense of how they're all united and how they all fit together to make a larger world. For Lightbringer people, this starts with the LBQ and ends with the reweaving of the web of time in the compromise.

Scott-Martin posted the above in another thread (I Think I'm Going to Make Up My Own Elmal Cult).  But it got me thinking here. Let's take what he says as correct. It sounds reasonable to me. So going back to where I started this thread, with some figures from Jeff about Seven Mothers Initiates in Sartar. The numbers included some clans with 500 initiates.  I don't think they would be concentrated in a single clan.  So they are spread over a few clans, forming a not insignificant minority. So what happens with these clans come sacred time? Those clans are going to need some sort of Sacred Time ceremony where they come together as a community. At least if they want to stay a community.  Which I assume these clans do.

I find it unlikely that the Seven Mothers initiates are going to be welcome in the Lightbringer ceremonies (or want to take part). Maybe (big maybe to me) some are both Seven Mothers and Lightbringer initiates, but I actually find that unlikely. The Seven Mothers will obviously have its own Sacred Time rituals.  Which the Seven Mothers initiates will want to take part in.  And which, conversely, the Lightbringer initiates won't and won't be welcome at.

So for a start it looks like we have communities carrying out very separate sacred time rituals. That's not unheard of (at least, I don't think it is). Take clans with a big (say) Humakti population.  The Humakti Sacred Time rituals will likely be separate to the (majority) Lightbringer rituals.

But if we take Scott's position, the community still needs something to come together around. 

One option is that could focus on the Wyter, if the Wyter isn't directly tied one of the pantheons. The Wyter, afterall, is the spirit of the community. It's a big part of what makes it a community. Perhaps it's a local spirit.  Perhaps it's an ancestor.  Even if some people have switched to Seven Mothers, they are still all kin.  With the Wyter being (pun intended) agnostic to the split between the two pantheons, it remains something the whole community can congregate around.

The full community ceremony could be focussed on the ancestors, even if the Wyter isn't an ancestor.

Things may get trickier if the Wyter is (say) an Orlanth spirit. I imagine at least some of those clans would have had those? How is it going to react to these Seven Mother community members?  Maybe it's happy to accept their magic points. Maybe not.  Have some of these clans had to change their Wyter?

Any thoughts on what sacred time looks like for these communities, and how they mythically remain cohesive, are welcome.

 

[radmonger]

I think there are three options, which will vary per-clan:

1. the lunar way is supported; there is a shrine to at least one lunar cult in the clan temple, and their initiates have their own place in the sacred time ceremonies.

2. the lunar way is tolerated: 7m initiates are dual-culted, pay two tithes, and have to travel to somehow fit in two sets of sacred time ceremonies.

3. the lunar way is persecuted: 7m initiates are foreigners in clan lands, and travel home for sacred time.

There could be a 4th option, but we won't mention it for reasons of the orlanthi remaining plausible good guys.

The second option is kind of unstable, once the external incentives to get ahead by following the lunar way got themselves eaten by dragons. So is the third, if the option of consolidating as a single territory is available.

Replace 'lunar' with 'solar' and you have the story of Elmal and Yelmalio.

 

[DrGoth]

3 minutes ago, radmonger said:

1. the lunar way is supported; there is a shrine to at least one lunar cult in the clan temple, and their initiates have their own place in the sacred time ceremonies.

2. the lunar way is tolerated: 7m initiates are dual-culted, pay two tithes, and have to travel to somehow fit in two sets of sacred time ceremonies.

I'm thinking about clans that these two apply to.  That's how the Seven Mothers initiates get their cult specific sacred time rituals.  But what do these clans do for all-clan sacred time rituals?

[radmonger]

16 minutes ago, DrGoth said:

That's how the Seven Mothers initiates get their cult specific sacred time rituals.  But what do these clans do for all-clan sacred time rituals?

I wouldn't make the distinction. Being in the clan is being in the clan. if there were the numbers to be running multiple ceremonies at the same time (well, more than one per gender), you would be dealing with a city, and not a clan. 

So if the clan does _the lightbringers restore Yelm_ on one day, and the _seven mothers restore Rufelsa_ the next [1].  In one you may have a solo, in another you are just the chorus.  Maybe for some you are the symbolic opposition. an Orlanthi Rune Lord standing in for the Carmanian Emperor works at least as well as a British actor playing a Hollywood villain.

[1] if you think about it, it is insane how the Orlanthi make such a big deal about being responsible for bringing back the sun, but literally want to destroy the moon. 

[Squaredeal Sten]

37 minutes ago, DrGoth said:

I'm thinking about clans that these two apply to.  That's how the Seven Mothers initiates get their cult specific sacred time rituals.  But what do these clans do for all-clan sacred time rituals?

One possibllity: Other than worshiping the clan wyter one day out of the 14 in Sacred time, maybe they don't attend the rest of the "all clan" rituals.  They hold their own, at their own shrine and not the clan Ernalda & Orlanth temples.  This produces a split in the clan, yes -  but just like Yelmalians in a majority  Orlanthi clan, there is going to be some discomfort there.  It's a problem for the clan Ring.  It divides families.  It's a soap,opera in the making. 

[mfbrandi]

18 minutes ago, DrGoth said:

But what do these clans do for all-clan sacred time rituals?

Well if we take @scott-martin's “a community comes together to recreate their sense of how they're all united and how they all fit together to make a larger world,” it looks like we have at least two things in play:

• what each community member has in common with the others (shared experience): love , death , & the changing of the seasons
• how the elements of the community complement each other (individual gifts): some bringing balance others bringing necessary agitation

You could play it so that the cycle of the year is not raw change but balanced change — one tempering the other, everything in its right place: light/dark, heat/cold, storm/calm — or you could emphasize what the cyclic rotation of the wheel has in common with balanced spinning of the moon.

These are members of the same community, not sides in a civil war, right? So they don’t necessarily see themselves as at war just because their gods are: wouldn’t that show that they didn’t understand their own myths? And what is the nature of the gods’ war? The Godswar was a linear highway to oblivion, a war of final extermination. But the way out was to loop the conflict: not Yelm dies and the world ends, but Yelm is slain every evening and reborn every morning (which is better than 24-hour sunshine, too) — with weekly loops of lunar influence and annual rises and falls of solar and storm power (other elements, too, of course). It is only the crazies who want to have their deities in sole charge of the universe all the time. Rival sports teams need each other, else the leagues will collapse for lack of games/gate revenue. Cosmologically, these people — 7M & 7LB — have a lot in common. Do they really belong to different religions or do they all worship in the church of the IPL while favouring different teams and star players?

Now some will say that the GC was a stitch-up to keep Sedenya out, but one can easily play it that time (and chaos) were necessary for the return of the moon, that the 7 Lightbringers were the 7 Grandmothers. And you could play it that Arachne’s innovation was not to replace simultaneity with linear time but to introduce cyclical time (balanced rotation). So you tell the tales of the turning of the year and of how the spider’s cycles of time saved the world.

And then after sacred time, everyone can start playing up their differences and squabbling again.

That’s off the top of my head as proof of concept. You will come up with something better than I ever could.

[Joerg]

2 hours ago, DrGoth said:

So what happens with these clans come sacred time? Those clans are going to need some sort of Sacred Time ceremony where they come together as a community. At least if they want to stay a community.  Which I assume these clans do.

The typical clan-organized Sacred Time heroquest is a This World quest, with mask-bearers from the clan providing the ritual opposition to the chosen small band of Lightbringers (plus hangers-on acting as their weapon or similar). So, in a passion play way, the clan provides the ambience for the questers, possibly uses some caves for the scenes in the underworld, and at the same time has people out there guarding the stead and taking care of the minors and the ailing.

If the heroquest is like a LARP, the majority of the clan provides the Orga(nisation) and the NPCs encountered by the questers.

These extra roles don't require that the participants are Lightbringer cultists or anything like that. They require some identification, usually done on stage either by the mask-bearer themselves or by a commentator (either a voice out of the air, or maybe the Knowledge participant making his exposition.

These extras may be of any cult. Including the Seven Mothers.

[radmonger]

21 minutes ago, Joerg said:

These extra roles don't require that the participants are Lightbringer cultists or anything like that.

The experience of I Fought We Won is universal, at least amongst those who agree with the 'won' part. So for everyone except ogres, if you don't get to have your form of participation represented, then you are not fulfilling your cult obligations, at least in the context of the clan.

The duration of a sanctify spell is 'so long as the ceremony continues', so I would suggest that any shrine unused during Sacred Time would need to be resanctified. And remaining an active cult member without a shrine locally is difficult at best. so if you have an elmal shrine, your clan holds 'Elmal guards the stead'. If you have an Hedkoranth shrine, it holds 'Hedkoranth does the thing [details tbd]'. If it has a shrine to a sister of Ernalda that the Red Lady says is a mask of Jakaleel, it has a night that some of the women go off and do something mysterious and necessary for the renewal of the world.

The limited length of sacred time is ultimately what governs the number of shrines a clan can support. There are accounts that in earlier ages, before the last time the world was broken and remade, sacred time was longer. Things were possible then that were not possible now.

[Joerg]

35 minutes ago, radmonger said:

The experience of I Fought We Won is universal, at least amongst those who agree with the 'won' part. So for everyone except ogres, if you don't get to have your form of participation represented, then you are not fulfilling your cult obligations, at least in the context of the clan.

The duration of a sanctify spell is 'so long as the ceremony continues', so I would suggest that any shrine unused during Sacred Time would need to be resanctified. And remaining an active cult member without a shrine locally is difficult at best. so if you have an elmal shrine, your clan holds 'Elmal guards the stead'. If you have an Hedkoranth shrine, it holds 'Hedkoranth does the thing [details tbd]'. If it has a shrine to a sister of Ernalda that the Red Lady says is a mask of Jakaleel, it has a night that some of the women go off and do something mysterious and necessary for the renewal of the world.

The limited length of sacred time is ultimately what governs the number of shrines a clan can support. There are accounts that in earlier ages, before the last time the world was broken and remade, sacred time was longer. Things were possible then that were not possible now.

Few minority cults outside of the associates of the main clan deities can accumulate enough reguiar worshipers to maintain a shrine - that's a normal situation for speciality cults like Humakt or the Seven Mothers (outside of Lunar-dominated areas). Such shrines (or often rather minor temples) are found either in the Confederation city, Boldhome, and the occasional speciality clan temple a few clans further.

In a way, participation in the Sacred Time rituals takes place everywhere, and participants aren't shirking any of their specific cult duties attending to clan rites. They might be shirking clan rites when attending speciality rites at their cult's temples, but again that is acceptable and required by the clan, too - those specialists would be extremely hard to get otherwise.

Either form of absence will usually compensated for by placing votive gifts in the place where you cannot attend, providing a remote participation to help that community. These ought to count as worshipers in the rite. (And frankly I fail to see how else Uleria maintains a minor temple in Apple Lane.)

[hipsterinspace]

6 hours ago, DrGoth said:

So going back to where I started this thread, with some figures from Jeff about Seven Mothers Initiates in Sartar. The numbers included some clans with 500 initiates.  I don't think they would be concentrated in a single clan.  So they are spread over a few clans, forming a not insignificant minority. So what happens with these clans come sacred time? Those clans are going to need some sort of Sacred Time ceremony where they come together as a community. At least if they want to stay a community.  Which I assume these clans do.

I find it unlikely that the Seven Mothers initiates are going to be welcome in the Lightbringer ceremonies (or want to take part). Maybe (big maybe to me) some are both Seven Mothers and Lightbringer initiates, but I actually find that unlikely. The Seven Mothers will obviously have its own Sacred Time rituals.  Which the Seven Mothers initiates will want to take part in.  And which, conversely, the Lightbringer initiates won't and won't be welcome at.

In the material for the Red Cow clan from The Coming Storm and Eleven Lights, the 7 Mothers converts in the clan (and likely whole Cinsina tribe) share temples with the Lunar garrisons at the tribal center of Red Cow and intertribal city of Jonstown (a minor and major temple respectively). The Lunar Way is said to be more represented in the cities than in the rural clans, with temples of their own. In places where conversion was more widespread, I’d imagine it might be like parts of Tarsh, where the 7 Mothers rites are effectively syncretized and laid over their original Orlanthi cultural customs.

[radmonger]

2 hours ago, Joerg said:

Few minority cults outside of the associates of the main clan deities can accumulate enough reguiar worshipers to maintain a shrine - that's a normal situation for speciality cults like Humakt or the Seven Mothers (outside of Lunar-dominated areas).

Agreed; the shrines I am talking about are those associated with the main clan cult. This requires only 75-225 lay members, which shouldn't be hard to rustle up on the chief's say so.

i guess the objection someone will come up with is ''Jalakeel isn't an associated cult of Ernalda'. To which the clan members will reply "sorry stranger, but you are mistaken; here is her shrine, in the clan Ernalda temple. Would you like one of her initiates to demonstrate the magic they learnt at it on you?"

 

 

[DrGoth]

17 hours ago, Joerg said:

Few minority cults outside of the associates of the main clan deities can accumulate enough regular worshipers to maintain a shrine

As Radmonger says, according to the rules a shrine needs 75-225 lay members and initiates. If the tribe has 500 SM initiates, than I think a few clans around Alda-Chur would have Seven Mother shrines. 

Edited April 14, 2023 by DrGoth

[DrGoth]

16 hours ago, hipsterinspace said:

In the material for the Red Cow clan from The Coming Storm and Eleven Lights, the 7 Mothers converts in the clan (and likely whole Cinsina tribe) share temples with the Lunar garrisons at the tribal center of Red Cow and intertribal city of Jonstown (a minor and major temple respectively). The Lunar Way is said to be more represented in the cities than in the rural clans, with temples of their own. In places where conversion was more widespread, I’d imagine it might be like parts of Tarsh, where the 7 Mothers rites are effectively syncretized and laid over their original Orlanthi cultural customs.

That's where Alda Chur and Jonstown differ, at least according to Jeff's figures. The 'other tribes' total 1200 between, so not many in each clan. But tribes around Alda Chur have 500 each in addition to the 500 in Alda-chur.  It's a much higher number in the countryside there than elsewhere in Sartar,  Once you get numbers that high, how the clan remains a single community becomes an issue.  Do we have clans where being an initiate of one and a lay member of the other is just what happens?

[hipsterinspace]

59 minutes ago, DrGoth said:

That's where Alda Chur and Jonstown differ, at least according to Jeff's figures. The 'other tribes' total 1200 between, so not many in each clan. But tribes around Alda Chur have 500 each in addition to the 500 in Alda-chur.  It's a much higher number in the countryside there than elsewhere in Sartar,  Once you get numbers that high, how the clan remains a single community becomes an issue.  Do we have clans where being an initiate of one and a lay member of the other is just what happens?

The Coming Storm and Eleven Lights material is pre-Dragonrise, starting in 1618, so there hasn’t been the big exodus of Lunar cultists that happens after the Empire are ousted in 1625. I’d imagine it looks a lot different demographically when there’s a Lunar garrison in Jonstown of (at least on paper) multiple thousands.

The Emerald Sword, the clan used to represent the hated Dinacoli in The Coming Storm, are at the level where they have more Lunar cultists than Orlanth worshippers, with the biggest cults being Ernalda, Barntar (in place of Orlanth), and the Seven Mothers. They’re all part of the same clan, which probably papers over religious differences with the bonds of kin, but the chief and his household are majority Lunar cultists despite having a “Lightbringer ring”. Ironically, the only Orlanth cultist on their ring is the representative of Eurmal.