: This is why I pointed out that the Mythworld is very,
: very isolated, and an area no larger than Europe can
: qualify as the entire world. Hell, even different
: classes of the Provincials have different names, as is
: visible between the Warriors and the Bowmen.
: Back to the original analogy: In the Middle Ages of
: Europe, a time more advanced than even the Mythworld,
: however less in a few areas, a name like
: "George" would obviously go with England.
: "Johanna" is blatently German.
: "Ricardo" is either Spanish or Italian.
: "Jaques" is French. In the world today,
: there may be some crossovers. Myth is hardly the world
: today, however! It is painfully isolated from other
: regions, even with the World Knots. Therefore, a
: people as different as the Northmen will show
: themselves purely in every one of their foreign
: aspects, including their names.
But as you pointed out, Provincial names are extremely diverse. There are names of popes and heroes from all over Europe and the Mediterranean, good old English names, even backwoods American names. Not to mention uniques like Alric, Rurik and Kildaer. It seems a little premature to declare that "Andir" cannot be a Provincial name. Especially when we haven't seen it used by the Northmen either.
: Yes, homeland, exactly. The Mythworld is so isolated, it
: is going to be at least as incommunicative as the
: Middle Ages. In that time, most people didn't go three
: miles from their place of birth in their entire
: lifetimes! If the Mythworld is even close to that, it
: will be isolated enough for the name of
: "Andir" to be clearly Northman!
If I might ask, where did you see "Andir" as a RL Norse name? I've found the name used by Greeks, Turks, Balinese, and Russians...but not by the Norse. It *sounds* kinda Norse, sure...but so do "Rurik" and half the Dwarf names.
: Because they already did the other thing, and want to try
: something from a new perspective.
: You don't sound like a writer to me. A writer would want
: to portray things from many different angles to
: describe a more complete universe. You would have the
: events placed in the Province? Rubbish. It can be
: practically anywhere that people who are like Andir
: live.
We are confrontational today, aren't we? :-) Portraying things from many different angles is fine and dandy, but it has to be followed through with a connection to the rest of the story. If you want to have a new angle on the Myth universe, have Andir be a kid in the North and then have some part of the in-game story actually take place up there. Or at least mention Soulblighter's exploits in that area at some point.
People who are like Andir? Well, lessee...people who live to "bring honor to the King through hard work?" Who tell stories of Santa Ghôl? :-) Or consider Andir's knowledge of the Great War. The Light characterized as "small, ragged groups of mercenaries and volunteers." The only Great War characters mentioned (aside from Balor and Soulblighter, necessarily) being Alric, The Head, and Shiver in reference to her attack on Madrigal. An attack which didn't even succeed. Is this not a very Provincocentric view of the matter?
Or, if you look at it from a geographical angle--would a sane (okay, so most ten-year-olds aren't) boy spend a night outdoors in the Northlands, in the fall, in a year with an early frost? He'd be an Andirsicle by morning, Soulblighter or not. For that matter, Soulblighter almost certainly found the Summoner and started resurrecting Krids during a three-week ravaging of the southern Province; would he stop in the midst of that for a brief vacation to the Northlands to knock off a village or two?
: No, never. I would shoot myself before succumming to that
: kind of monotony in my writing.
Then I look forward to "Archer's Myth 4: An Elderly Maul in the Blind Steppes Hears That There's A War Going On Somewhere." :-)
: What we know about the Northmen: besides the zerks,
: NOTHING! Town guard? Where does it say that?
If we don't know any Northmen besides the Zerks, then we must use the Zerks as a model for the rest of them.
We do know that the other Northmen are so dang tough that, thanks to them, the Dark barely touched their lands during the Great War. (Something which Andir isn't shown as knowing, despite that fact that it's probably a pretty important element in their tales of the war.) That implies that the society as a whole is pretty militarized and sees a lot of combat. Heck, the Berserks themselves must do something to stay in practice when they're not fighting the latest Leveller.
So a town guard is a very reasonable supposition for a Zerk village; they probably need one, and even if they don't they'd have one for the principle of the thing.
: And If a witch burns, and wood burns, a witch must be
: made of wood. Wood floats in water. A duck also floats
: in water. Therefore, a witch must weight the same as a
: duck, and any woman that weighs as much as a duck is a
: witch.
: The same kind of horridly illogical reasoning is what has
: led to thousands of innocents being murdered over the
: centuries. I hope you realize that your own logic is
: just as flawed.
*cough* you just equated people who don't believe that Andir was a Northman with...witch hunters?
The Holy Grail was a work of fiction, by the way. :-) No one actually died in it (except Graham Chapman, but that was hushed up and his string-operated corpse went on to act in several more movies, to great critical acclaim.)
--SiliconDream
