Bronze-Age city-states and the gifts of their gods

[Agemegos]

Somewhere in the north-eastern part of the Bronze Age there is a broad and fertile plain. It is at least as big as Mesopotamia or Hungary, and although there are snow-capped mountains on one side, a dusty plateau on another, highlands cloaked in cedar on a third, and somewhere, far off, a vast complex delta of marshes, lagoons, and meandering river-courses, it is large enough, and foreign lands are distant enough that the inhabitants vaguely imagine the world as a giant bowl with mountains around the rim and a fertile plain in the bottom. The climate is mild and sunny; though there is a season of rains it is well worth drawing water from the many rivers of the land and using it to irrigate. This new scheme of planting crops has been working out terribly well for a few generations, and beer is a total hoot. We have specialist craftsmen now, and scribes, doctors, and priests.

The land is dotted with cities, each occupied by a tribe. The placement of the cities makes it plain that their founders were torn between the attractions of access to drinking water and irrigatable fields and those of staying dry in the floody season. Not every tribe got a bluff above a river. The members of the tribes no longer consider each other kinsfolk, perhaps for lack of daily contact with non-kin for a contrast, perhaps because the tribes are now so large that the details have got lost of most of the relationships. On the other hand, there is more to tribal membership than mere residency; an immigrant or even his children would be distinguished by their miasma of foreign-ness for a lifetime, perhaps generations. I don't say they are shunned, and I don't say they are embraced with raptures: it varies, but assimilation takes a lot longer than migration.

So far you are far from amazed, but the plain fact is that each of these tribes has a god. The gods are quite real, though you can't find them when they don't want to be found—and they usually don't. Each has a house in his or her city, and though few have been privileged to join them in their beds or at their boards they are known to lust, thirst, and hunger as we would all wish to if we were are as rich as gods. They have not yet been drafted all into a single heaven on some distant mountain, conscripted into a single family, or made into the demons of conquerors legends. They have not been appointed thematic department heads in a mythological bureaucracy, and least of all made slaves to the allegorical depradations of poets. In other words none of them is the god of anything in the way we post-Hesiodic types expect. Each of them is merely, and known as, the god of the tribe he or she has chosen.

Nevertheless, each of the gods has an individual character, and these include more interest in some things than others. Aster (Who Is Seen In Profile) is notably steadfast in difficulty; Galun is fascinated with the properties of herbs; Missu is susceptible to handsome lads, and weeps when her lover's face begins to line; Rold hates feuds; Walas despises thieves; and so forth. Each of the gods has a gift to give, to her lovers, or his priests, or all the people of the tribe. It is a simple gift, such as "health", and it is appropriate, somehow, to the character of the god. That is not to say that it is a single advantage in GURPS. But on the other hand the gods don't get to link together an arbitrary set of advantages into a gift just because the synergies would be cool. The gods don't get to choose what their gifts are, only to whom those gifts are given.

So tell me more about this country. Which of the gods do you know, and how would you build his or her gift in GURPS? Who does he or she give it to, and what are his tribe and city like?

[whswhs]

That's going to take a bit of thought. But in the meantime, I think of two books. One is a work of speculative nonfiction, Julian Jaynes's The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, which I don't propose as a serious scientific model, but which is wonderfully productive of sfnal ideas, perhaps as much so as the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis. The other is one of the novels it inspired, Harry Turtledove's Between the Rivers. I must say I was a bit torn between irritation at Turtledove's padding the story and admiration for his cleverly doing so by imitating the style of ancient works where every sentence was paralleled, but it didn't stop me reading it.

Bill Stoddard

[ErhnamDJ]

Ixi loves long lines of people. She enjoys watching many people walking along a winding road. She imagines them a snake twisting through a curving path, or as rivers or streams flowing peacefully down a mountain.

Her city is called Talak, which means "The city of tin." With the help of her blessing, which aids walking in groups over long distances, and the city's easy access to foreign tin merchants, Talak has grown into one of the largest cities in the region, boasting a population of more than ten thousand people. Most tin passes though Talak. Those who make an enemy of Talak find themselves melting sacred artifacts so they can forge arrows.

The blessing would be the Very Fit advantage with the limitation: (Only while walking on an established road and with more than one hundred other people). Ixi gives this blessing to whichever group happens to catch her eye from her perch at the top of the city's acropolis, from which Ixi spends many hours a day staring. Truth be told, she has the mind of a young child, and were she not a god one such as her would most likely be found on the streets begging, or drowned in the well as an act of mercy.


Am I doing this right?

[Agemegos]

Originally Posted by ErhnamDJ

Am I doing this right?

Looks good to me.

[Turhan's Bey Company]

Kodod is a mercurial god who revels in being away from the city. He blesses his people inside the walls as he does those outside; he is their god, after all. But it is beyond the walls and streets that he prefers to spend his time. He smiles on those who till the earth, but he particularly love those who race, swim, and hunt. To those who amuse him, he grants the ability to keep up, but it comes with a bit of divine madness, giving them some of his own enthusiasm.

Kodod's city is in the foothills of the cedar mountains, where the wilds are still a bit wild. It's a small city with elements of republican rule (ruling high priests are elected by popular acclamation for three years, then exiled for life), and the increasingly civilized people seem a bit estranged from their god. But the farmers and those not wealthy enough to live inside the walls claim to see Kodod quite often.

Kodod's gift to +2 FP, +2 Accute Vision, and +1 to Basic Move. However, it comes with Impulsive.

[combatmedic]

Rilgal from time to time may be found wandering his city beating men and beasts senseless, drinking much beer, and ravishing women in the streets.

He imparts his blessing of might only onto the sons he engenders upon the women he ravishes, and that in a haphazard fashion, for he is often drunk and forgetful. These boys are marked by their unusual size and strength and their tendency towards violence. Some enter his priesthood while others become soldiers in the city militia. Because the king of the city is a priest and chosen by combat, the sons of the god often sit the throne. Those kings not of divine origin may claim to be such, for political reasons. The gods has so many sons, even he forgets for sure which are his.

His city is named Keritu, which means ‘The Tower of Strength.’ The city proper stands on a high bluff over one of the winding muddy rivers, with fields and farmers’ huts spread out below the acropolis. Besides its unusual quantity of restless and strong fighting-men who may seek employ in other cities, Keritu exports a heady black beer. The brewers say that Rilgal spilled his divine seed into their fields on a night all the women of the city were in hiding from his lust, and so he blessed the soil with his vigor.


In GURPS terms, the sons of the god have boosted ST and either Bad Temper or Lecherous. If that's not enough, add some innate Brawling skill or something else suited to kicking butt in tavern brawls, beast wrastling matches, etc.

[Agemegos]

Imeldo and Bronn, twin gods of Beauty

Faroth stands on a neck of land between the River Carnatic (which floods with red silt in spring when the snows melt in the mountains of the East) and the River Ateric (which floods with black silt when the autumn rains fall in the highlands of the North). It is ruled by the twin god and goddess Imeldo and Bronn, who love the beauty of the human form. Artists are paid fat stipends from the temple treasuries, and Faroth is rich with statues of wood and clay. The costume of Faroth is both rich and alluring, for the gods of the place tolerate neither crass exhibitionism, nor that beauty should be concealed. Jewels and ornaments invented by the folk of fashion in Faroth travel far and wide in imitation and trade.

The gift of Imeldo and Bronn is that they grant the advantage Hermaphromorph to everyone in the lands of their tribe (of whom they are aware, of course) who either is of Attractive appearance or better, or who is at least Average appearance and has Fashion Sense, or who has any talent that gives them a positive reaction bonus for people who appreciate art. As a result of widespread ambiguity as to whether people are male of female, the law and custom of Faroth make no distinction between the two.

Imeldo and Bronn choose the most beautiful person in Faroth to be their joint chief priest. The chief priest by custom may demand any food or drink, clothes or ornaments to his/her personal use, but not to sell them or as gifts for others. The clothes and ornaments having been worn by the chief priest become sacred, and are displayed in a museum of fashion that is also the wardrobe of the chief priest. On the other hand it is taboo for the chief priest to sleep under any roof but that of the House of Imeldo or the House of Bronn, and if the chief priest should effect an erotic junction with anyone other than his/her jealous gods both priest and respondent would be stoned to death.

It is notable that chief priests don't live very long. They become sleepy, gradually lose weight, take on a pale and drawn appearance, then languish, sicken, and die. After a period of mourning and a beautiful funeral ceremony, the gods eat the corpse.

[Fionn The Otaku]

Sounds like the novel Between the Rivers by Turtledove, every city state is ruled by a god and some rule more directly than others.

[sir_pudding]

Nagil, The Lawgiver

Nagil is a stern, stoic god who loves law and hates chaos. He's given his people a simple and clear legal code to follow engraved on a basalt stele at the gate of his house. Otherwise he chooses to remain aloof and never leaves his house. No man can say what he looks like.

His gift is freely given to any who know his law and accept it by standing before the stele and speaking the laws (which end with an oath to obey them). It grants a talent for skills he deems important and the ability to enter into supernaturally binding oaths. However he requires steadfast obedience to his laws in exchange.

Nagil's Gift [0]
Nagil's Talent 2 (Pact: Honesty -10%) [9]; Extra Option: Oaths (GURPS Fantasy p. 147; all swearing parties need this perk) (Pact: Honesty) [1] and Honesty (12 or less) (-10)

Nagil's Talent: Administration, Detect Lies, Law, Leadership, and Teaching
Reaction Bonus: Law-abiding people and traders seeking honest deals.

EDIT: Nagil's city is Werk; located in the highlands astride the northern part of the River Ateric. Its walls are made of burnt brick, the streets are straight and clean, and the buildings are modest and orderly.

[combatmedic]

Jallu the Sow appears as an obese woman of vaguely porcine aspect with six rows of lumpy teats and a turned up nose. She wears dried umbilici plaited in her long, greasy hair, but no other adornment or and no clothing at all.

Her city, Kwerm-Jallu ( The Rolling Place of Jallu) consist of many reed or mud brick houses built atop hummocks rising from a large slough of the river X (Brett, put it where it fits your map). The pigs of the city are especially numerous, and the people eat a great deal of pork. Jallu taught the tribe to catch and tame piglets, long ago before the city was built. The people chose this spot to build when on three occasions men spotted Jallu rolling in the same place. The temple now stands on the spot, an enclosure built around a glorified mud patch.
Her gift is fecund wombs for sows of the herdsmen she favors and fecund wombs also for those women who meet her approval.

To gain her blessing, a man must collect the umbillicus of every piglet in his care and toss it into the mudpit at the temple. The pit never seems to get full of the rotting things. Missing even one cord risks enraging the goddess, and that man may find that his pigs run away, turn upon him in fury, or are struck barren.

For a woman of the city to gain the blessing of the goddess, she must be obese (Fat or Very Fat?) and she must bathe in the sacred mudpit during the time of her womanly bleeding. If she does so, and afterward keeps the rites, her fertility will be increased and her pain in childbirth lessened. The afterbirth of each child should be offered to the goddess as a sacrificial meal, by the simple means of throwing it to the swine.

High Pain Threshold (limited to childbirth for a very big Accessibility discount) with some level of Fat as a requirement, and perk for Fecund? +1 to HT rolls for bearing children? More?

The city population,both human and porcine, is growing a bit too fast for its resources, which has recently begun to cause trouble with other tribes and cities nearby as pigs and herdsmen intrude on the fields of others and befoul their irrigation canals.


Kwerm-Jallu's warriors carry stout shields of layered pigkin and wear helmets of sectioned tusks.