Guide to Glorantha-any updates? (2012)

Submitted by RippedShirtKirk on Thu, 05/07/2012 – 15:16

Having purchased RQ6, Pavis-GtA, and the gloranthan classics collections, I am very interested in the Guide; I have a new group of players who are brand spanking new to Glorantha, and having a concise resource to share with them would be extremely appreciated!  Having so many Gloranthan sources running around is a blessing and a curse-there is a lot of information available, but at the same time, there is a lot of information available, if you get my meaning. Dumping decades worth of hardcopy and web sites on a new player tends to crush their enthusiasm.

Can anyone recommend some good, current sources for Gloranthan virgins? (not the Uleria temple…) I have a people interested in exploring almost every major culture in Genertela…Lunar, Sartarite, Praxian, and Western.

Cheers!

Oops! I have just re-read the OP and see what has happened. I did think it was an unusual and specific query, but I am used to unusual and specific queries from the various Gloranthan forums …

The web has a whole host of Gloranthan pages that provide useful and free information. It is generally all playable, but isn’t all canonical Glorantha, but I stopped worrying about canon years ago.

Simon Phipp

Submitted by Jeff on Sun, 15/07/2012 – 00:50.

The very best overview for Gloranthan for newbies, veterans, or writers will be the forthcoming Guide to Glorantha. Until it is out (later this fall), the best overview of the setting (short of buying the long out of print Genertela: Crucible of the Hero Wars boxed set on eBay, which becomes obsolete once the Guide is out) 

Jeff Editor-in-Chief, Moon Design Publications

Submitted by Herve on Fri, 06/07/2012 – 07:16. There are no virgins in any Uleria temple, by defintion 🙂 Get “Path of the Damned”, the Gloranthan comic. You can buy it from the TRADETALK website. Go visit the Glorantha wiki : every glorantha word you might look for is there. Find any back issue of TRADETALK or TALES OF THE REACHING MOON (ToRM) magasine. But don’t by the GENERTELA BOXED SET yet. Much of it will be in the future GUIDE TO GLORANTHA, with plenty of added stuff.

Submitted by soltakss on Sat, 14/07/2012 – 17:30.

Traditionally, Yelornans are a cult of virgins, women in the Unicorn Tribe of Prax are also virgins, Maran Gor worshippers used to be virgins, but a rewrite made Babeester Gori virgins instead.

I am sure that some other solar cults would have virgin nuns as part of their makeup.

Simon Phipp

Submitted by David on Sun, 15/07/2012 – 05:29.

A very funny misreading Simon, but worth continuing on your misread path…

There seems to be some confusion over the meaning of the word virgin. We are using it only in the modern sense without reference to its classical use which is more relevant to Glorantha’s bronze age societies. There are two meaning associated with virginity. The first is physical and the second is emotional and spiritual. Virginity, meant simply a person’s sense of self. If you think about virginity in a very ancient context, there weren’t restrictions on women to hold back their sexuality. Some very old cultures were very liberal on idea of sex and communing with the divine, and temples of prostitution were not all that uncommon.

Thus, a woman could engage in sex, with multiple partners, and still retain her ‘virginity’ by simply not giving completely of herself to them. In that regard, gaining a woman’s virginity wasn’t so much about being the first one to bed her but being the first one to touch her deeply: emotionally, physically, psychologically, spiritually.

Looking at Uleria’s temples, her followers are clearly sacred prostitutes and therefore could be considered divine virgins. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacred_prostitution

The other confusion appears to be over the word celibate. It has two meanings, that of unmarried and that of abstaining from physical sex. In my mind clearly related to virginity.

Babeester Gori only have to be celibate once they become initiates, so they don’t have to be virgins and could even have been married before joining. Once their Death rune gets stronger the chance of breaking that vow gets lower. Although they have the Earth rune, they clearly don’t have the lusty aspect. See Sartar:KoH.

Maran Gor has three runes in Gods of Glorantha (1985). She’s now consider only a minor goddess (two runes) and has lost her Death rune. With that goes the celibate Death rune connection. She does have the Earth rune, but clearly not the lusty connection as with Maran Gor. I see no reason for Maran Gori to be celibate or virgins. See Sartar:KoH.

The cult of Yelorna is clearly a strange construction from the old days of RQ2 (sister of Yelmalio and unicorns!). However they exist, surviving amongst the Unicorn Tribe of Prax. Pavis: GtA says:

“The Unicorn Women are not really a tribe, but a cult that rejects the restrictions placed on women by the traditional Eiritha life. They worship the goddess Yelorna, an aggressive and virginal celestial goddess. The unicorns ridden by the women are intelligent and magical. No Unicorn Woman may wed, and those who ride unicorns must be celibate.”

Clearly it’s for tribeswomen who want to break out of the gender restrictive way of Waha & Eiritha. So they may have been married and not virgins prior to this. I’m sure they have sacred rituals to purify newcomers and restore their virginity. As Yelorna has the Death rune, the celibacy aspect can kick in much like Babeester Gor. The Fire rune does have purity aspects (see HQ2)

From all of this I can clearly see that those tied to the Death rune will have celibate tendencies. Those with the fire (and by definition the Light ) rune will have a purity connection.

As for pure virginal cults, The Orlanthi have Voria and as Simon says certainly some of Solar cults might have virginal requirements. However the women of the Solar pantheon seem to get a bad deal in equality, so IMO so all forms of virginity are likely to enforced just as likely as being voluntary (you will lead a life of virginity vs I will lead a life of virginity.

Look what happened to Vestal Virgins when it went wrong: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vestal_Virgin Look at punishments…

David Scott

Submitted by RippedShirtKirk on Sun, 15/07/2012 – 23:29.

LOL! Gentlemen, apparently I have forgotten how hard irony is to convey in text (/irony?); the “Ulerian virgins” comment was supposed to be in jest…mea culpa! 😉 David, you win best reply of thread…your case of kvass is in the post… To be fair, I have been ‘out’ of Glorantha for a few years, but its nice to come back only to find it going strong.

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