This post is not about the mythical origins of Glorantha but about how Greg Stafford began writing about it back in 1966.

It was shared recently on the Facebook Runequest group which counts among its members a fair few people who accompanied Greg on some of his early journeys and a few of the Chaosium staff, including Jeff Richards who posts many snippets of interest there. Recommended if you're interested in Glorantha.

This is taken from a Wayback Machine snapshot taken on )ctober 14th, 2018.

>How I Discovered Glorantha > >I HAVE BEEN FASCINATED with mythology for most of my life. > >My first mythology book that I recall reading is Manual of Mythology, by Alexander S. Murray (published 1935). I still have that old book. It is a thick tome full of the euhemerized versions of Greek myth, with many pictures of marble statues and renaissance paintings. > >Like most people, I was interested in the strange and interesting stories. I began reading other versions, like Bullfinch, which was not much different, really. And then other mythologies too — well, other mythologies readily available to a pre-teen with a library card. I was lucky in that by the time I was in sixth grade I had access to the adult library, too. > >Then I started reading books about mythology. I was convinced by every book that I read. If it was about how all myths are variants of Sun Myths, then I was convinced of that. Then I read one about how they were all Seasonal Myths, and they were that; or whatever subject the book was about. It didn't take too long to realize they couldn't all be right, that none were entirely right, and that mythology was something else. So I kept reading. Hero-With-a-Thousand-Faces-cover > >When I got into college I was delighted to find a huge section of even deeper books that I’d never had access to before and dove into those. We even had Joseph Campbell’s Hero of a Thousand Faces in one of my courses. > >But I always had loved reading the stories, and those were in short supply. That is, there weren’t any new. > >Now, at that time I’d never seen a book of fantasy fiction. I didn’t have that outlet, which was limited at the time anyway — we're talking 1966 here. > >So one day I decided, “I’ll write my own mythology.” > >I wrote one document, (reproduced below). > >Then I wrote a little story about a guy named Snodal fighting a demon guardian, and put some notes about what he’d be doing. And thought, well, I need to know where his people came from, and so I wrote some stuff about Loskalm. But then I had to know where those people came from, so made some notes about the destruction of Seshneg. And had to know where they came from, and so on and so on. > >The earliest materials weren’t as dense or sophisticated as the later ones. I didn’t have the breadth of knowledge to pack it in. It wasn’t until college that I started cramming on archeology, history sociology and religion. > >But I did start writing the stories of the earliest kings of Seshnela. The first was the reign of King Froalar, which begins at the dawn of the first New Year in the world. It is about how Hrestol broke the Seshnegi caste system and instituted the new order of knights in order to combat the Pendali barbarians at the gates of his land. the-hobbit-cover > >And so it began. I felt fantastic, documenting fantasy dynasties, enchanted realms, invented history, a made-up world. > >Then one day I came across a copy of this weird book called The Hobbit in a book store, and then found Lord Of The Rings. I read the cover blurb and thought, “Damn, I’m not the first guy to do this.” > >Ah, sweet innocence of youth, so long fled! > >As, wonderful ignorance, so long driven out… > >The First Glorantha Writing > >I wrote this one night in 1966, in a moment of creativity, and it bore me into Glorantha. I laer discovered hat this is the only remains of a log of travellers who were fleeing the destruction of Seshnela at the end of the Second Age by the Luathela, and they later were instrumental in the foundation of the kingdom of Fronela. > >Obviously, it was written in flet tip pen which has suffered slightly from some water, but it's still here!

!

Glorantha was first introduced to the wider world than Greg Stafford's circle of friends with the publication of the board game White Bear and Red Moon in 1975. The game featured a war between the Sartorites and the Lunar Empire in a region of Glorantha known as Dragon Pass.

Now Chasosium has taken us back to Dragon Pass (some of us never left) with the publication of the first book in the Lands of Runequest series. No doubt others will follow, and I'd guess Prax will be next.

The book has a history of the region and provides a gazeteer of Dragon Pass and some neighbouring regions including Tarsh and The Grazelands. There are regional maps and streetplans of some of the larger settlements, some sample 'typical' NPCs, details of some local cults, rules for creating additional types of PCs (newtlings anyone?), and additional bestiary entries providing details of creatures and other encounterable beings.

Different people would want different things from a book like this, but for me the level of detail feels about right. There's enough meat on the bones to give GMs plenty of ideas for adventures while leaving enough blank space for them to flesh out their own games.

The art and production values are glorious as is the norm with the current line of Runequest publications. Nice.

Because they don't have windows.

The salted egg yolk flavour does sound pretty good.

I did (not authentic 'cos I don't like fennel seeds) porcetta at the weekend for my lot and my wife's brother's family. A couple of notes: 1. that skin/crackling was an absolute flavour bomb, 2. the leftovers were disappointingly scant.

Album of progress.

Because they just love to arrrrrrrgue!

The RuneQuest Starter Set contains everything you need to play RuneQuest, the world’s best roleplaying game of gods, cults, magic, family, and fantasy!

The RuneQuest Starter Set contains everything you need to play RuneQuest, the world’s best roleplaying game of gods, cults, magic, family, and fantasy!

Score! Found some guancale so naturally I made carbonara. Hands down one of my favourite pasta dishes.

The recipe is pretty simple (for which, read there’s nowhere to hide).

Serves 4 people.

Cooking time: about half an hour.

Ingredients:

• some guancale. I like it sliced thin so you get slivers of flavour, but some like it cubed. How much? I used about 100g.

• 500g of pasta. Spaghetti works well here, but bucatini is better.

• Egg. I like to do 1 egg yolk per person plus one whole egg per two people. So, for four, four yolks and two whole eggs.

• Black pepper. Freshly ground. More than you think.

Now some people will tell you that’s all you need (and all you’re allowed for an ‘authentic’ carbonara) but I also salt the pasta water and use some of it in the final saucing.

1. Boil a lot of salted water. Add the pasta. Cook it.

2. Meanwhile, in a heavy based pan, fry the sliced guancale (or pancetta, or if all else fails some unsmoked streaky bacon). You need something like a cast iron or enamelled Le Creuset because we need heat retention later.

3. Also meanwhile separate the eggs, loosely whisk and then start grinding black pepper and grating cheese. Grind slightly more black pepper than seems sensible and add it to the eggs. For the cheese I like to use a 50/50 mix of parmesan and pecorino. I don’t know amounts but if your pasta takes about 8 minutes then grate, stir pasta, grate, stir guancale, grate, repeat, until there’s about one minute left on your timer.

4. With one minute to go scoop up a cup of the pasta water. Then make sure your eggy cheesy peppery mixture is nicely combined.

5. When the pasta is done, turn of the heat on the guancale. Drain the pasta and then add to the guancale, tossing it until all the pasta is coated in the oil.

6. Add half the reserved pasta water to your cheeggy mixture and stir well to temper the it. Then pour into the pan with the guancale and pasta. Stir it! You want the egg to gently cook in the heat of the pan, but not scramble! So stir it, keep it moving until it’s barely saucy. Then add the rest of the reserved pasta water again and stir again until it hits a creamy but not wet consistency.

7. Serve with some more freshly ground black pepper.

No photos because you want to eat this while it’s still hot! Maybe next time.

... I mean, the boat's at the bottom of the sea, bit late to be worrying about health and safety now!

Chicken thighs marinaded overnight in:

• ¼ cup lemon juice
• ¼ cup white wine vinegar
• ¼ cup olive oil
• 1 cup plain yogurt
• 8 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon ginger powder
• ½ teaspoon allspice
• ¼ teaspoon ground coriander
• ¼ teaspoon nutmeg powder
• Salt and pepper to taste

Cooked on a joetisserie on a Kamado Big Joe 3, then taken off the skewer, given a minute or so over direct flame to give a little colour all over and chopped.

!

Served with:

Spicy pickled red cabbage Tabbouleh Zhoug Labneh

And a sort of Greekish salad.

Bonus picture, some bay leaves harvested from my bay tree, washed and drying for later.

I dry brined the wings overnight with a simple barbecue rub (salt, pepper, paprika, ground cumin, ground coriander seed, onion powder, garlic powder, mustard powder).

I brought the Kamado up to 180'C/350'F.

I put the wings on over a deflector for about half an hour then moved them over direct heat, turning frequently, for another ten to fifteen minutes.

Then I served them for saucing to individual taste (I like Buffalo, wife likes BBQ, daughter likes plain).

!

I have a bunch of go-to online sources for recipes that I use, from NYT cooking (subscription required but worth it) to Serious Eats (Kenji FTW!) to BBC Good Food.

But my all time favourite online writer is Felicity Cloake who does an utterly brilliant series in The Guardian.

The premise is simple: for any given dish, she takes a bunch of recipes from various chefs and food writers, tries them all, and discusses what works and what doesn't, then publishes her best version of all of the above.

Whether it's pierogi, nettle soup, cheese empanadas, or pasta ai funghi her articles are great because you can see why she's made the decisions she has for her final recipe. You can pick and chose from the various recipes she tried.

Strongly, strongly recommended.