Book of Sires - Gorlois Ships?

[Atgxtg]

I'm really curious about where Gorlois' fantastic ships in the GPC are from. Ys? Hy-Breaseal? I think it has something to do with Ygraine's homeland, and I suspect that she is being made out to be a Faerie bride, but I can't pick up enough clues to figure out what the ships are supposed to be or from where. 

Could someone pass on a hint to the unenlightened?

[Morien]

Greg was adamant that Ygraine is NOT a Faerie. It is more of a Summerland type of thing, IIRC. People are human, but it is right on the edge of this and Otherworld.

I'll leave the rest for Hzark.

[Hzark10]

Morien is correct. Ygraine's homeland borders fae and this is where the ships come from.  I do not go into why Gorlois gets the ships other than what I have in the book, but there is a backstory to it.  How I see it may not be how everyone sees it, so settled on the bare facts and results. 

As to Ygraine, she is not fae.  That part did change as when I first wrote the book, she was.  But, Greg wanted her not to be, so that was an easy change.  Cornwall, overall, is closer to fae than the rest of Britain.  

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, Morien said:

Greg was adamant that Ygraine is NOT a Faerie.

Okay I follow that...

1 hour ago, Morien said:

It is more of a Summerland type of thing, IIRC.

until this. What the difference between Faerie and Summerland. Cadwy is "ancient beyond memory"  King who seems to be of Faerie to me. 

1 hour ago, Morien said:

People are human, but it is right on the edge of this and Otherworld.

What does that mean though? Ambiguous stuff like that might sound cool, but it  is very hard to GM correctly. I've been mostly avoiding Summerland until the Book of the Magician comes out for just that reason. 

[Atgxtg]

1 minute ago, Hzark10 said:

Morien is correct. Ygraine's homeland borders fae and this is where the ships come from.  I do not go into why Gorlois gets the ships other than what I have in the book, but there is a backstory to it.  How I see it may not be how everyone sees it, so settled on the bare facts and results. 

Okay so the ships are from somewhere in Faerie. That's cool. Gorlois somehow got the Fae to loan or give him some Faerie ships and he uses them to good effect.

1 minute ago, Hzark10 said:

As to Ygraine, she is not fae.  That part did change as when I first wrote the book, she was.  But, Greg wanted her not to be, so that was an easy change.  Cornwall, overall, is closer to fae than the rest of Britain.  

Sounds like you had a specific place of origin for her. Could you mention it? There are a lot of borderline Fae places in Celtic lore, that's what makes figuring out the origin of the ships so difficult.

This interests me a lot,  because I don't  know of any source material that went this route with Ygraine and Gorlois. With most of the chronology there are sources that a given story is based on. This is completely new to me. I'm not complaining, mind you, just intrigued.

[Hzark10]

There are various sources out there, some more credible than others, but the basic story that Greg was ok with was that Gorlois was shipwrecked, and while coming ashore, he sees Ygraine rising from the waters (one possible source of her being fae).  Ensuring her to be of noble blood required some thought as whose daughter she was.  Well, we know the basic kingdoms of Cornwall, and although we could fit her father amongst them, I decided to make her father the ruler of an island kingdom. It would strengthen the ship idea later.  

There was some give and take before the official line was settled on, and I keep it somewhat on the side so others can embellish it if they want to pursue a campaign set in Cornwall.

Does this help?

[jeffjerwin]

I was working on Cornwall with Greg.

Ygraine or Eigyr in Welsh legend was the daughter of Amlawdd, originally the Jutish hero Amlethus or Hamlet (with a dash of Anlaf Cuaran), but he was grafted onto a branch of the Cornish royal house. Saxo depicts Amlethus fighting for and marrying a British queen in his stories, which probably influenced (in their oral antecedents) the fragments of the Welsh story.

She also has numerous sisters, including the mother of Cador/Cadwy.

In KAP she was represented as coming from Ynys Avalon or the Summerlands in the Great Pendragon Campaign; I left it so her origins are unclear. I gave her a younger sister Yvaine so Cador, who is stated in print to be her kinsman, had a means of being so.

In the German romance Diu Krone, Ygraine is apparently the sister of one Enfeidas, Queen of Avalon. This suggests the Avalon connection isn't just a modern notion.

[Atgxtg]

Thanks guys. That helps, and give me a direction to look into. Since I'm running a campaign that will play though the Aurelius Period this could be more than just backstory for the PKs.

So an Avalon connection? Interesting. Especially the idea of it being a Kingdom and not just the center of the Ladies of the Lake. 

[Hzark10]

And Jeff's work could easily be adapted into mine or vice-versa.  The island kingdom could be just a "summer" manor and the real kingdom lies elsewhere, and/or Ygraine's family could be expanded as those areas I did not delve into.  Greg was happy with what I had, and it is only the surface. There is plenty untouched to allow a campaign set anywhere you like. If there is a second Book of Sires, those areas outside of Logres were going to be examined.

[Leingod]

My personal take on it is that Ygraine's father rules the Isle of Man and is a distant descendant of the sea god Manannán mac Lir/Manawydan fab Llŷr, who owns a boat called "wave sweeper" and a chariot called "water foam." That connection to the sea and the Otherworld helps explain away a lot of the weirdness around them, and Ygraine herself might have a Faerie mother to explain how she seems to age so slowly and why at least two of her daughters seem to inclined toward magic.

Edited May 24, 2019 by Leingod