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Lhankor Mhy and Literacy

Posted on July 29, 2020

The cult of Lhankor Mhy is responsible for teaching and training scribes. The princes of Sartar have traditionally been patrons of the cult, and literacy is surprisingly widespread, with libraries in each of Sartar’s cities and in some towns and temples. Despite all that, only about 10 or 15 percent of the population can read and write. Writing is mostly in the Theyalan scripts, the same syllabary used for Esrolian and Tarshite (but not New Pelorian); as a result, literate Sartarites can read Esrolian and Tarshite texts as easily as they can their own.
Thanks to the scribes of the Lhankor Mhy cult, there are thousands of different texts. The most common genres are annals, chronicles, mythological and historical epics, lyric poems, liturgical texts, wisdom and didactic literature, laws, historiography, and humorous literature. Private and official correspondence are also written by scribes.

Note that under the RuneQuest rules, 11%-30% is passably literate, and that most people know all the common Runes, regardless of their literacy level.


Jeff Richard

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