The Month of Greening Birches, and other old slav lyricism

Thanks to Transparent Language’s Russian Blog, I’ve been reminded of the wonderfully lyrical old slavic names for the months. Check out the postings covering the first half of the year here, and the second half here, but just to pick on a few personal favorites:

• January used to be called, among other things, prosinets, ‘shining month,’ as the days were getting longer;
• February was sechen‘, ‘chopping,’ because it was a time for cutting down trees for firewood, as well as v’yugovei, ‘blizzard-blower;’
• April was the month of greening birches, beryozozol, and snegogon, ‘who drives away the snow;’
• August was zarev, ‘blazing month,’ both for its sunsets and its forest fires;
• October was listopad, ‘leaf fall’ and svadebnik, ‘wedding month,’ given that now the hard work in the fields was over it was time for family unions;
• December, unsurprisingly, was studyonyi, ‘the month of bitter chill,’ or vetrozim, ‘the month of winter wind.’

(By the way, although these are just historical artifacts in Russia, the Czech language still uses such colorful descriptions — and interestingly enough, Listopad is the Czech November compared with the Russian October: autumn comes rather sooner to the Rus’)

 

25% off all Mythic Russia books — until 31 January

As the snow swirls down into NYC, here’s a heartwarming new year opportunity: 25% off any Mythic Russia books bought direct from the Firebird’s Lulu storefront, just use the coupon code LULUBOOKUK305 (applies to orders placed in US$, UK£ or euros). Expires 31 January 2012.

Mythic Prague

It’s all been quiet on the Firebird front, but I did just want to share with you a little piece of news. A recent trip back to Prague, a truly beautiful city with a fascinating history, has confirmed in me a determination to turn various notes and thoughts I’ve accumulated into a Birchbark Chronicle supplement for adventuring in Prague at the same time as the main Mythic Russia timeline, the late 14th century, just after the death of the mighty and visionary Charles IV and during the years of his successor, Vaclav (Wenceslas IV). A wastrel and a drunkard, Wenceslas IV would face numerous challenges to his authority — what better a turmoil-wracked time for adventure?

These are times in which ‘Golden Prague’ is near its height, but as usual I will likely allow myself a few liberties with the chronology in the name of maximum game fun. For example, the Hussite sect only really emerged in the 15th century, but they are too interesting a faction not to include, so one-eyed Jan Zizka, defenestrations (that’s throwing people out of windows — ideally onto waiting pikes) and Hussite war wagons will be in the mix. And for the first time a treatment of Judaism in MR as well as the (*ahem*, 16th century) Golem of Prague. More information to follow, but my hope is to see this book out in 2012.

Expect a detailed guide to the city full of adventure hooks, information on the Hussites and the Jewish faith, keywords for the people of Prague, movers and shakers of the time and also an adventure, tentatively title ‘A Prague Spring.’ And gargoyles, stained glass windows, ghosts, and dumplings.

Eski-Kermen: a cave city of the Tatars

Another place I’m adding to my ‘someday I’ll get to see it’ list is Eski-Kermen, a now-ruined cave city in the Crimea. The name simply means ‘Old Fortress’ in the Tatar tongue, and it was carved into a mesa in the 6th century, and survived the inevitable periodic changes in management, through to the end of the fourteenth century. There were at least 400 caves connected in this settlement, from cattle-sheds to temples, tombs to guard posts. There’s an array of photos here, here and here. It was at once a home, a fortress and watch station and an important trading center. (Incidentally, it was also used as a film set to shoot some of the scenes from the violent but very authentic movie 9th Company, set in the Sovet-Afghan War.)

These cave towns were quite a feature of Tatar-occupied Crimea, because of reasons both historical and geological, and I think they’d make wonderfully atmospheric settings for games.

To the northwest of Eski-Kermen was Kyz-Kule or Kyz-Kermen (‘Tower of the Virgins’ – the mind boggles, unless it is in the same spirit as Baku’s Virgin Tower, supposedly named that way because it was, ahem, never penetrated). The legend is that a massive stone bridge linked Kyz-Kermen with nearby Tepe-Kermen, two towns perennially in conflict. One day, though, it was decided to end this feud by marrying the beautiful daughter of the prince of Kyz-Kermen with the heir to Tepe-Kermen. However, when the girl came to the middle of the bridge on which she was symbolically to meet her fiancé, she remembered the old offences, drew her sword, and cut him down. She was duly killed by his guards and the war resumed, but the bridge collapsed, separating the warring towns.

What if the players were seeking to end the conflict? If their gambit of uniting them by marriage failed, maybe their only option would be to find some way of bringing down the bridge? Or maybe one side or the other, convinced that it has the strength to defeat its foe, is eager either to see the bridge rebuilt or else, through bold adventurers’ questing into the Otherworlds, the shadow of the bridge empowered such that the mossy, vine-twisted rubble that files the ravine suddenly leaps back into place and the old bridge is as new…?

The Firebird on Moscow State University

The 864th anniversary of the official founding of Moscow was the reason for a spectacular laser show projected against the truly massive, Stalin-gothic tower of Moscow State University. What Russian laser show would be complete, though, without this dramatic firebird? Watch this youtube video for a full sense of this pretty extraordinary display.

Kherson: a Mythic Russian city near death

The ancient Greek, then Roman, then Byzantine, then slav town of Kherson in the Crimea has been in decline so long that it is almost defined by this feature. Once ruled by Kiev, it came under the direct rule of the Golden Horde when they invaded and it has been sacked and fought over repeatedly. It is now notionally within the Genoese sphere of influence, but it is perhaps the least of their possessions and it is no secret that they would not fight were the Tatars again to choose to plunder it. Officially, it is part of the Principality of Theodoro, a pocket semi-state ruled from the fortress of Mangup. The Gavras family who rule in Mangup, though, offer little real support or protection. Thus, Kherson is prey to frequent bandit raids, and only ad hoc bands of locals and the hired guards of remaining grandees and merchants make any attempt to resist them.

As this map of the city shows, much of it within the walls is no longer urbanized at all, almost like a Byzantium in miniature, only far less grand and far more ramshackle. As such, it would offer a very ‘wild west’ feel for a game, with nothing like the relatively visible authority of a Rus’ city under princely laws.

The Firebird at Continuum 2012

I’m delighted to find myself in much more exalted company than I deserve, as a Guest of Honour at next year’s Continuum gaming convention in the UK (20-23 July 2012) alongside giants of the industry Robin Laws and Sandy Petersen as well as, if past events are anything to go by, a host of other great writers, artists and designers as well as some of the most inspired, inspiring, insane and convivial gamers around. I’ll be running a big freeform game, some Mythic Russia and maybe also will have some news about another project I’m working on, 1510…

‘Yaroslav. A thousand years ago’ – a gory epic of a pre-Mythic Russia

One of the virtues of spending 9 hours on an Aeroflot airbus (twice) is not the food, but getting to choose from a rather different menu of film and video choices. The Russian adaptation of Boris Akunin’s The State Counsellor was very well done (Oleg Menshikov’s representation of Erast Fandorin is a nicely judged exercise in detachment), but a film that was new to me was Yaroslav. A thousand years ago. It turned out to be a perfectly serviceable blood and guts tale of the heroic eleventh-century Christian prince Yaroslav and his struggle against both marauding bandit-slavers and treachery within his own circle, having to win over the pagan Bear tribe to triumph.

It’s not great art, often quite formulaic and at times gratuitously gory. But there’s some nice representations of medieval Russian wooden towns little different from those of the mainline Mythic Russia era, you see the role of ‘Varangians’ – Vikings’ – as mercenary stormtroopers of the time, and it’s an undemanding and fun way to while away a couple of hours.

(One parenthetic point, if you do watch it. The bandit chief and his male and female sidekicks looked just like either a player-character party or their nemeses…)

The Firebird is in Moscow…

…and who knows what surreal sights he might see, from horses swimming through concrete to paying his respects to Dmitri Donskoi, blessed by Sergius of Radonezh before he set out to challenge the Mongols at Kulikovo…?

The official fairytale map of Russia

When does the ownership of fairytale characters become an international incident? When Russia and Ukraine squabble over who owns what in, let’s face it, a pretty much shared slavic folklore canon. Anyway, thanks to Moscow News for both picking up on the diplomatic spat and also providing a sight of this lovely and useful map (this is just a screenshot – click on the map to go to the original, interactive version):