Skip to content
The Well of Daliath
Menu
Menu

The Breather Sisters

Posted on October 25, 2021

A random passage from the Boldhome booklet that I find interesting:

The most important cult within the city is that of Orlanth. The Prince is the highest priest of the Orlanth Rex cult in all of Sartar, a source of great magical authority. The cult of Sartar himself is a sub-cult of Orlanth Rex, whose priesthood is traditionally restricted to members of the Royal House. Boldhome is famed for its great temple to Orlanth, the largest in Dragon Pass. The temple has several buildings and holy locations, each dedicated to a specific subcult. The heart of the cult is the Flame of Sartar and Thunder Ridge, but the temples to Orlanth Adventurous and the various deities of Air are among the grandest Orlanth temples in the world. Most of the Orlanth temples were closed during the Lunar Occupation but were reopened when the city was liberated after the Dragonrise. Within the Pockets, Orlanth worship continued under the Occupation as the Breather Sisters, daughters of Orlanth whose dance circulates the sacred breath to deep within the earth.

So the Breather Sisters are worshiped – one at the East Pocket, the other at the West Pocket, and they circulate fresh air throughout the maze of rock-carved warrens that make up the Pockets. Their cult was hidden in plain sight during the Lunar Occupation, and as a result, even though the outer temples were closed by the Lunars, the Breather Within continued to be offered worship and sacrifice even during the evil year of 1621-1622.

So even though the Pockets are dwarf-made, they served as important strongholds of the Orlanth cult during the Occupation.

Jeff Richard

Next
Previous
Boldhome (large city), Sartar (cult)

Sections

  • Search Tips
  • Current RuneQuest Glorantha Publications
  • RuneQuest Glorantha Corrections and Q&A
  • Catalogue
  • References for Glorantha
    • Gloranthan Canon
  • Gloranthan Documents
  • RPG Systems & Versions
  • Gallery
  • About This Site
  • Get involved!

Latest Posts

  • Opposing Chaos
  • Halcyon in New Pavis
  • Argrath as RuneQuest Background
  • Sartarite Geography
  • Is the Man Rune always male?
  • The Sun Disk
  • Designing New Cults
  • Common Rune Magic
  • Cult vs. D&D classes
  • RQ Character Creation

Links

  • Chaosium
  • Chaosium’s RuneQuest RPG Wiki
  • Glorantha on BRP Central
  • RuneQuest on BRP Central
  • RuneQuest on Discord
  • Prince of Sartar Webcomic
  • Glorantha G+ Archives on Tapatalk
  • Search mailing list archive

Latest from BRP Central

  • The Gods of Fire and Sky not shipping from UK any news?
  • Playing in other places
  • What to do with the Feldichi Device from DLoD
  • Speculations on upcoming RQ & Glorantha publications
  • House Rules - spirit combat
  • Journey to Jonstown #78: Explore Distant Lands
  • Liberty, Post-Colonialism, and RuneQuest: the discourse of Imperialism in tabletop RPGs
  • Agimori Genealogy & Various Migrations From Pamaltela
  • The Elk clan of the Culbrea tribe
  • Bud Baird is the 2025 recipient of the Greg Stafford Memorial Award for Gloranthan Fandom

Popular Tags

Boldhome (large city) Chaosium Colymar (Sartar tribe) Contents Cult demographics Cults of Runequest (preview) Ernalda FRA Furthest (large city) G+ post GBR Gods Wall Greg Stafford Guide to Glorantha Guide to Glorantha (preview) index Jar-eel Lunar Empire Lunar Pantheon Magazine Malkioni pantheon Map Michael O’Brien Mongoose MRQ1 New Pavis (small city) Old Glorantha Q&A Orlanth Orlanthi pantheon Photo reference Population demographics Prax (homeland) Q&A RQ3 RQG Sandy Petersen Sartar (homeland) Spirit Cult Star Subcult Tarsh (homeland & Lunar province) Yelm Yelmalio Yelm Pantheon Youtube
©2025 The Well of Daliath | Design: Newspaperly WordPress Theme