Mythology, Part 2

I’ve been doing a bit of work on the gods.  First and foremost, these deities need names.  One of my weaknesses as a GM is coming with cool and interesting names.  I also rather despise typical fantasy names, with all the weird apostrophes that end up looking like unpronounceable gibberish.  So, I steal.

Between Google and Wikipedia, I’m able to find the names of various gods from Greek, Semitic, Etruscan, and Canaanite sources.  Some sync up pretty well (I choose Adoni for my Fertility/Death God.  It’s derived from Adonis who was a dying plant god, and also means “Lord” in Canaanite), others I just grabbed because they sounded cool—I mean, come on, “Moloch” is just a bad ass name. 

Type	#	Portfolios	Name	Gender
Great-Power	3	Fertility, Mischief, Death	Adoni	Male
Great-Power	1	Competition	Calane	Female
Great-Power	1	Moon	Celene	Female
Great-Power	2	Magic, Agriculture	Cybele	Female
Intermediate	3	War, Fire, Mischief	Moloch	Male
Intermediate	2	Marriage, Prosperity	Vesta	Female
Intermediate	1	Animals	Valic	Male
Intermediate	3	Earth, Prophecy, Arts	Teleus	Female
Intermediate	1	Time	Aion	Male/ Female
Intermediate	3	Agriculture, Weather, Oceans	Dagon	Male
Lesser	1	Strength	Cratus	Male
Lesser	1	Fate	Atropos	Female
Lesser	2	Seasons, Nature	Varro	Male
Lesser	1	Prosperity	Aita	Female
Lesser	2	Death, Sky	Baal	Male
Lesser	2	Sun, Peace	Sol Invictus	Male
Lesser	1	Messengers	Lotan	Male
Lesser	1	Children	Aminth	Female
Lesser	2	Animals, Mischief	Silvan	Male
Lesser	1	Love	Astarte	Female
Demi-God	1	Rulership	Dardin	Male

Thanks to my well-developed case of apophenia, I start seeing some interesting patterns and themes among the gods, but I certainly don’t want to start detailing all of them.  Instead, I want to focus on the “Big Four” of my setting, the “Great Powers.”

Per the chart above, my found gods are Adoni—Fertility, Mischief & Death, Calane—Competition, Celene—Moon, and Cybele—Magic & Agriculture.  When I was coming up with names and genders, my first thought was to make them into two married pairs. But, then idea of a female triad was far more interesting. 

Adoni obviously fits the template of the Dying & Rising god.  The three others are a bit more interesting, but here’s what I’m thinking.  In fact, the most interesting is Calane, a Major God of Competition, which is something I’ve never seen before. 

So, what is competition, and why is it so important in this world? Well, obviously, competition implies struggle which results in winners & losers.  War, conquest, raiding, and the competition between nations and races are obviously under her purview.  But, competition is something more—there are boundaries in a competition, and rules one must follow.  This tells me she’s not the goddess of unbridled all-against-all conflict, but instead the goddess of boundaries and formalized competition. 

As I discussed before, this is a very class and caste based society—you are born a pig farmer, you die a pig farmer.  The only way out of your caste, and acceptance into a new one, is by competition, by earning your place in the new one through a test.  In fact, all of life’s major milestones might be a competition.  One becomes an apprentice and then a journeyman by passing a series of tests.  Major festivities are marked by games and contests—wrestling, boxing, running, etc.  Gambling is a common past time, as people bet on all sorts of thing, not just the winner and loser.  Even things like marriage have a competitive element—the groom and his groomsmen are expected to seize and kidnap the bride to get her to the temple, while she, her bridesmaids and their family seek to avoid them—they fight them off, the bride and her maids all wear the same outfits, etc.  It’s fun, and no one is supposed to get hurt and eventually the groom is supposed to win (the brides brothers and cousins will yell and scream and “fight” the groom for a few minutes before being “driven off”), but it’s how the groom proves himself worthy of her.  In fact, for a lot of young couples the “contest” lasts for weeks before the wedding, as each side tries to find what the other is up to and how to overcome it, while the old folks in the village laugh and place their bets as to who is going to do what, then they all meet at the temple and get falling down drunk.

This also tells me that dueling and trials by combat are a major part of the world.  Sure, trials (as we see them on tv) exist, and are themselves a form of competition, but one of oration.  Those found guilty can be sent on quests or crusades to “redeem” themselves, rather than facing execution.  Even artistic events are competitions—you don’t just see a play, but a week of plays and at the end one of them wins.  Or, maybe there are multiple awards for playwriting, acting, directing, sound effects, etc.  There might even be competitions where people perform the same play, or the same song, or the same poem, and there are judges who rate the best. 

So, if Calane is the goddess of Competition, but also Boundaries and Rules, this helps me figure out the three goddesses.  Cybele is the raw creative force, a mother of nature and creatures, whose offspring and creations overflow the world.  Her association with magic shows how dangerous and unpredictable her creations can be, and hers is a power many mages seek to tap into without performing the proper rituals.  Calane constrains her sister, sets limits on how far things can go, and establishes the rules with which the creations will interact.  Celene exists outside both her sisters, and is the goddess of the void, the black cold space that exists outside the world.  She is death, the one that brings an end to Cybele’s creations.  But she is not entirely cruel, for as she waxes and wanes, she shows the harmony that can come about with stillness, for she is also a protective goddess and one who gives the world a glimpse of immortality.

These three sisters are mirrored by, or actually are, the Fates, of whom Atropos is the most well-known.  

The Fates set out each creature’s life, determines its length, and the end it.  Even the gods are bound by their rule.  Well, all the gods, except Adoni.

Adoni is the one deity that exists outside the structure created by Cybele, Calane, and Celene.  In the Great War against the Old Ones (yes, I’m making room for Cthulhu in my world, naturally), Adoni was slain by his enemies and exiled to hell.  He was not a warrior who killed his way through the dark places, but clever and wise, who out thought and out tricked his enemies, and stole the key to hell from Hastur and threw open the gates, releasing the dead and turning them into his army for the final battle.*As the one who has conquered death, he is beyond the power of any other god, and rules now as the king of heaven.  He is also the most likely to disguise himself as a mortal, to walk around the world, testing mankind, and making time with particularly comely lasses.

*the ancient poems are a little unclear as the whether his happened at the dawn of time, or will happen at the end of days.  It’s rather irrelevant to most people.