Saturday 13 September 2014

Some Remaining Details Concerning Aeneas

Aeneas has a mixed ecology. Imported Terran oak and acacia, Llynathawrian rasmin and Ythrian hammerbranch grow beside native delphi and rahab. (The awkward names of the planet Llynathawr and its city, Catawrayannis, reflect the fact that the planet was discovered by, then purchased from, Cynthians.)

A delphi is described as "...low, gnarled trunk, grotto of branches and foliage."
-Poul Anderson, Captain Flandry: Defender Of The Terran Empire (New York, 2010), p. 76.

That grotto sounds inviting and Anderson's characters indeed make use of it. A man and a woman "...went into the moon-dappled grotto of the delphi. The luck [a pet] stayed outside, waiting." (p. 150)

When tinerans pass relics of La-Sarzen, the High Ones (Builders, Elders, Ancients, Old Shen, Foredwellers etc), they dismount from stathas, kneel, lift arms, chant, rise, cross themselves and spit. That last touch is a sacrificial act on the Dreary of Ironland as on Frank Herbert's Dune. This is entirely a pagan ritual except that they have incorporated the sign of the cross. However, the same author's Time Patrol series informs us that this sign was originally a Mithraic sun symbol. That origin would subsist across the timelines.

The king of a tineran band has to be of a certain family although not necessarily an eldest son. His women are chosen with a view to breeding and the heir apparent serves an apprenticeship in another Train. Individuals from different bands meet and marry at assemblies called Fairs. Kings, royal wives and concubines have orgiastic fertility rites in shrines and holy caves at the Fairs. Trains include Waybreak, Brotherband, Dark Stars, Gurdy Men, Magic Fathers and Glorious.

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