Canonfire! Forums-viewtopic-Gods from Earth Mythology on Oerth

Wed Sep 19, 2007 6:47 pm Gods from Earth Mythology on Oerth - Little Help?

I know that actual Mezo-American (Aztec, Mayan etc.) gods show up in GH with respect to the Olman. I'm not sure any other gods from earth mythology show up on Oerth, whether in canon, the Gord books, 3x default products etc. Does anybody know if any do and where those references generally appear?

I want to swear that there are references to Odin and Thor in connection with the Snow, Ice and Frost Barbarians but for the life of me I can't recall or find the references I seem to recall.

Any help would be appreciated! Thanks in advance.
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GVD

Wed Sep 19, 2007 7:21 pm

Those refernces don't ring any bells for me.

There is always the possbility that the Norse gods are referenced as "In the World of Greyhawk, Odin and Thor are most likley to be worshipped by the Snow, Frost and Ice Barbarians." in some odd book or magazine article. There very well could be Norse god references in the Sagard books as well, but I don't have them and haven't read them.
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- Moderator/Admin (in some areas)/Member -

Wed Sep 19, 2007 7:51 pm

In Gary Gygax's original Greyhawk campaign, he used Norse gods. This was before he'd begun the GH pantheon. Also, keep in mind that a few of the Norse mythology giants have a place in Greyhawk (if I'm not mistaken), these being Surtur and Thrym.

FWIW, in the Castle Zagyg setting, we are using the "Tenoric Pantheon" of Gary's device, which is comprised of a huge list of Norse and Teutonic deities.

What tickles me is this: back in the early 80's, when I was running GH, I did not use the GH pantheon. I used the Norse pantheon from Deities & Demigods exclusively, as I was a huge Walt Simonson The Mighty Thor fan, and I sought to emulate themes from the comic. These days I use the GH deities and the Norse in my GH game (and would use the Aztec as well, if it came into play). So, in a manner, it's all come full circle for me . . . except that I can't play D&D every day (sometimes twice a day!) like I did back then. :)

Regards,
--Jeff T.[/i]

Wed Sep 19, 2007 7:58 pm

I recall reading in Dragon Magazine (it would ake a lot of searching to find the issue) that in Gary Gygax's home campaign he introduced Zeus as well, I'm thinking from early adventures in Castle Greyhawk. I believe the player was his son Ernie. I recall the article being a story Gygax was relating to the readers.
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Eileen of Greyhawk, Prophet of Istus, Messenger of the Gods

Wed Sep 19, 2007 8:06 pm

Somewhere on these boards there's a list of Greyhawk deities but darned if I can find it now that I'm looking for it. Join me in the search and I'm sure you can find what you're looking for.

Thu Sep 20, 2007 2:17 am

Notwithstanding appearances by Odin and Zeus in Gary's early campaign, here are the deities of which I'm aware that have real-world origins:

Thu Sep 20, 2007 4:09 am

In the Robilar and Co. article, Rub Kuntz states that Robilar pays homage to Odin.
Erac's Cousin managed to summon Zeus after he and the fighter Ayelerach were duped into releasing Frazz Urb Luu.

Scott

Thu Sep 20, 2007 5:55 am

Thu Sep 20, 2007 6:58 am

FN3 from Summer Breeze: The Urakan and Yorodhi of Sybarate, http://www.canonfire.com/cf/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=840

FN3: The mare’s head holy symbol is found in UK1 in the Palace of the Spires. None of the gods of Greyhawk has it for his or her holy symbol. A review of the module makes it easy to conclude that the symbol was taken from that of the Greek Goddess Demeter. Among many other sources, Legends and Lore describes her holy symbol as the mare’s head. The island is described pastorally as a place of endless summer, befitting a land perpetually blessed by the earth mother Demeter. The God Poseidon is sometimes displayed as having horns or a foliate head, and is himself, in this guise, a variant of the Green Man. In mythology, Poseidon is strongly associated with horses. The offspring of Demeter and Poseidon was a talking horse, Arion. The Oeridian collection of agricultures gods includes Sotillion, the goddess of summer. Notwithstanding her winged tiger holy symbol, her familial connection to the sea god, Procan, makes her a good candidate for utilization of the mare’s head horse symbol. Her candidacy is much strengthened in that she epitomizes the endless summer of the isle of Sybarate and, in her character, she is indeed a “sybarite” as that term is used meaning a person addicted to luxury and pleasures of the senses.

Rather than select Sotillion as a replacement, it could be argued that Demeter is canon.
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Plar of Poofy Pants

Thu Sep 20, 2007 1:01 pm

In the original "White Plume Mountain" to handle wave you had to be a follower of Greek God Poseiden. IIRC

Thu Sep 20, 2007 4:11 pm

Thanks to everyone for their help!
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GVD

Fri Sep 21, 2007 11:41 am

Fri Sep 21, 2007 8:50 pm

Sat Sep 22, 2007 1:01 am

Sat Sep 22, 2007 2:53 am

(from wikipedia)

Maglubiyet means "defeat" in Turkish, and the root word Maglub is probably of Arabic origin.

Sat Sep 22, 2007 6:04 am

Sat Sep 22, 2007 9:52 am

Sat Sep 22, 2007 11:50 am

Oh, Maglubiyet is definitely a real-world character. You see, one of my sister's friends set me up on this blind date once....

Oh, never mind. The memory is too frightening. And painful.

Tue Sep 25, 2007 2:37 am

Oh, lets not forget the obvious, Zagyg. Does this count as per GVD's criteria?

Tue Oct 23, 2007 5:20 pm

OT but smillan_31 GREAT avatar. I'm a HUGE Hellboy fan.

Mike

Wed Oct 24, 2007 10:03 pm

Wed Jul 16, 2008 2:58 pm

The Finnish god Ahto is mentioned in the Egg of the Phoenix supermodule (set in Oerth per the earlier Doc's Island). As Mortellan pointed out, the "god of elsewhen" that Fragarach was wrested from was probably the Celtic god Manannan Mac Lir. Wave from White Plume Mountain is possibly associated with Poseidon. The Gord books mention "Adonai" among the benevolent deities. Erac's Cousin was a worshipper of Zeus and Robilar was a worshipper of Odin. There's a portal to an ancient Greek world in the caverns of Tsojcanth. Iggwilv is the adopted daughter of Baba Yaga. The Norse jotuns Surtr and Thrym are worshipped by Greyhawk giants. The Green Man, explicitly part of the "British" pantheon and summoned to Oerth by a wizard, is described in Beyond the Crystal Cave. Nergal and Erishkigal were mentioned in Return to the Keep on the Borderlands. You could make the case that certain fiendish lords with the names of real-world gods (Baalzebul, Baalphegor, Tiamat, Charon, Ahrimanes) are those gods, too. The 1st edition Monster Manual mentioned Triton as the god of the tritons, though Monster Mythology replaced him with Persana.

That's all that I can remember off hand.

Wed Jul 16, 2008 7:49 pm

Speaking of Finnish gods I seem to remember some reference to Loviatar somewhere in GH. Yeah, I know she's in FR but I thought there was something to do with her and the Hanging Glacier or something like that. Maybe it was in one of the Gord books?

Wed Jul 16, 2008 11:06 pm

Mon Oct 06, 2008 10:13 pm

In the orginal Dieties and Demigods publication -- which I had in the early 80's, but no more -- several earth pantheons were used. Even Elric's pantheon of Gods appeared in it.

But I believe that was just to get the game "started," as it were. I think EGG always intended to be rid of it, once Oerth was fleshed out. He and the original gang had a great idea and ran with it, "fluff" could be filled in later. They just used the Gods they "knew" with the intent of creating their own Gods as the game developed.

Never had the pleasure of talking with EGG, as some of you had, so this is Just my Thinking. Confused

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Mystic's web page: http://melkot.com/mysticscholar/index.html
Mystic's blog page: http://mysticscholar.blogspot.com/

Wed Dec 03, 2008 3:16 pm

I always liked the idea of incorporating deities and demigods into greyhawk. I figure it this way at least for the 3.x edition you only have 3 pantheons other than the greyhawk itself. Norse, Greek and Egyptian all of which could be easily incorporated into Oerth somewhere. No harm done, possibly use them west of the sea of dust.

Idea

Jim

Wed Dec 03, 2008 6:05 pm