Other Lands

[Elkhound]

ETA:  look at the fall of the Roman empire and the tremendous loss of knowledge there.  That was a big empire, yet the lights went out remarkably quickly: look at England after the departure of the Roman legions and their communities.  In the West, it took more than a thousand years to replicate some technological aspects of Roman society, not to mention Western society's practices in fields such as medicine.

"A thousand years without a bath."  Religious houses were able to preserve and copy many of the texts and thus save the knowledge, but they were able to do very little to either apply or expand it.  Europe was mired in ignorance and superstition for generations until the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment.

[Alkari]

Exactly Elkhound.  

And while the refugees may have managed to take a few Deryni texts with them, books themselves were things of value at that time, and only the farily wealthy or the Church / large institutions would have had any at all.  Deryni books were burnt by Church authorities along with the Deryni themselves, so what are the odds of a group of secret Deryni refugees being able to collect enough books to preserve their existing magical knowledge?  Not to mention any queries about basic literacy levels in the community: how many ordinary people in Camber's time could read or write?   We also don't know how many ordinary Deryni were fully trained in the use of their powers anyway, though it does seem that the levels of skill, knowledge and power varied widely.  The lower the average level of knowledge and literacy in the group, the more likely you are to reduce the average knowledge passed on, especially if chance robs the community of one or two of its key practitioners.

I like the idea of a refugee Deryni community, but I don't think in any way that they could just arrive in the west, set up a nice happy little village surrounded by farming land, establish contact with friendly natives, and then simply move off to establish trade and commerce via a Transfer Portal network.   You can't rely on disease wiping out all opposition - it didn't work in North America, and it didn't work out here.   With only one ship and limited resources, I think that the practical aspects of survival in the first place would occupy almost 100% of their time.   IF the community survived at all (see Roanoke!), then it would be a long time before members would be out there establishing a commercial network.   What adaptations would they be forced to make in their survival stage?  What if they didn't find coal or iron ore?  What would they have had to do to make sure their precious stock of metal items survived?  Something simple like a horse throwing a shoe and losing it may mean not only a sore horse, but the loss of valuable metal (and of course horse shoes wear down anyway).  Never mind a TP network - I think the colonists may have been flat out simply surviving and getting enough food.

So - HOW did magic help them survive all these very practical matters?  And with RL history and examples in mind, what knowledge and skills (Deryni and other) did they lose as well as gain?

[MerchantDeryni]

Well I wrote an intor to a Camberland story, and I have been thinking about what they gained and lost.

Location: I am cheating and using the maps of the British Virgin Islands. I am also plundering the wikipedia articles on the islands.

I was thinking of stealing the history of Columbus and making the island Haiti, and I have been to the Domincian Republic. I picked the BVI because it is at teh edge of a long sequence of islands. An island hopping Portal network would allow for fast travel. If it was needed.

Now I was envisioning 4 ships making a getaway, but that's a little overkill on my part. So let us assume 1 ship. So a couple of hundred people, human and Deryni survive to make landfall. They meet Natives and settle on a different island. 1 small village of Deryni free to make their way in the world.

So what can they keep of their culture? I will allow some books and oral traditions, and a few scholarly types (It IS called Camberland ) The rest will be taught to the children as they grow up, stories of a Kingdom far away.

Fishing in the area would provide food, and they can grow crops. Maize, manioc would be staples. There is copper on the island they may have to trade for iron. This would be a problem, but a village lacks the manpower to mine for iron. On the plus side, a blacksmith could recreate what he needed of 10th Century tech. Advanced metallurgy would probably be lost, but village level smithing was pretty good.

So I picture a village growing up and using what crops they had, raising goats (and my island larder example would allow for a lot of goats to be grown if everyone stuck to fishing for as long as possible.)

Once the population starts to expand they can use Native ships to island hop and then set up Portal trade. Income could be from movement of goods and people.

Overall I would think the Camberlanders would have to work hard at not being assimilated with just a single village, but if they took a page from Quebec history and made themselves indigestible I think Deryni could grow and prosper.

Iron would be the biggest hurdle. Iron tools would let them hack at the jungle and carve out a space for themselves. All my thoughts about early days would be diplomacy nd trying to find anyone who would be willing to dig ore out of the ground. Then trading axes for the ore.

[MerchantDeryni]

And to use the google maps distance feature. BVI west end of island to Puerto Rico is 120 miles, and 220 to the Dominican Republic (Punta Cana, so let the partying Deryni start!)

An exmple of a 300 mile Portal jump has been given, so Portals would be useful in moving goods from island to island.

Big risk would be having to sail to the destination carrying Matrix cubes. I am not sure about how difficult it is to MAKE new sets of cubes. That would be a vital skill to pass down in a Deryni village.

So it could end up being a village of Deryni carrying goods and passengers and raising families and gathering knowledge together to forge a strong Deryni history. The rapport skills and telepathic functions from Deryni Magic would help in this.

[Evie]

Overall I would think the Camberlanders would have to work hard at not being assimilated with just a single village, but if they took a page from Quebec history and made themselves indigestible I think Deryni could grow and prosper.

Um...indispensable, perhaps?  Or are they surrounded by cannibalistic natives?  

[Evie]

Big risk would be having to sail to the destination carrying Matrix cubes. I am not sure about how difficult it is to MAKE new sets of cubes. That would be a vital skill to pass down in a Deryni village.

So it could end up being a village of Deryni carrying goods and passengers and raising families and gathering knowledge together to forge a strong Deryni history. The rapport skills and telepathic functions from Deryni Magic would help in this.

As long as your ship is carrying several fully trained Deryni, I don't think it would be too difficult for them to pass on skills such as activating and attuning ward cubes.  After all, without the persecution they'd have to deal with in Gwynedd, or even the necessity for keeping a low profile re: their powers, which they might face in even the more Deryni-friendly kingdoms, they'd be freer to teach such skills openly to any new generations of Deryni without fear of reprisal.  But of course the ship would need to have at least one (and optimally several) formally trained Deryni on it; simply being born with the trait and basic abilities wouldn't help when it comes to knowing and being able to pass down Deryni ritual magic and the more esoteric abilities.  I imagine you'd want at least a few of the fleeing Deryni to have come out of Gabrilite and/or Michaeline schools.

[MerchantDeryni]

I seem to recall a saying from a history class that the French Canadians asked a philosopher how to survive in an English Canada, and the reply was "make yourselves indigestible."  My Google-fu is weak tonight and I cannot find the quote. The sentiment was that once the French forces lost and Canada became English, Quebec stayed a French culture and kept their language and identity, no assimilating. It was that concept I figured would be important for a couple of hundred Dryni and humans from Gwynned to survive in a foreign land.

My original concept was that 4 ships set out, kept in touch with each other via Deryni powers, and had Deryni weather magic to reduce risk of storms. Alkari and Elkhound's discussion of a single ship made me think about whether or not a single ship could retain identity. Probably not, unless they settled their own island. Four ships could mean a large enough population to have Deryni specialists and a wider skill set. It really depends on who came with the group.

A few high end Deryni families, with a good tradition of training would be invaluable. Or Camberian monks, focused on the Patron saint of Magic aspect. A Healer with a gift for training.  Even just a few people, and the time and ability to train the next generation could (in my opinion) create a stable core of Deryni knowledge. Writing tools and paper would be important, and the rapport training would be invaluable in this aspect.

Take Portal construction. In High Deryni, one full trained Deryni , a few half Deryni and a few humans built a Portal in less than an hour. The rapport From Arilan trained Kelson, Morgan and Duncan in moments, then the portal was finished a minute after, Granted everyone was tired, and would sleep until midniight, but when you think about how powerful a Portal can be that is a small price to pay.

[tenworld]

Iron would be the biggest hurdle. Iron tools would let them hack at the jungle and carve out a space for themselves. All my thoughts about early days would be diplomacy nd trying to find anyone who would be willing to dig ore out of the ground. Then trading axes for the ore.

They could borrow an idea from Terra Nova and use scrying to find meteroic iron meterorites.  Since the Gulf is thought to be where the great meteor that wiped out donosaurs landed, there should be lots of fragments around. 

[MerchantDeryni]

nice idea!

Weather Magic has been used, and scrying done as ritual magic. It may well be possible to hunt for meteoric iron arcanely. Thanks for the idea!.

[Elkhound]

Iron would be the biggest hurdle. Iron tools would let them hack at the jungle and carve out a space for themselves. All my thoughts about early days would be diplomacy nd trying to find anyone who would be willing to dig ore out of the ground. Then trading axes for the ore.

They could borrow an idea from Terra Nova and use scrying to find meteroic iron meterorites.  Since the Gulf is thought to be where the great meteor that wiped out donosaurs landed, there should be lots of fragments around. 

Marion Zimmer Bradley had the Darkovans do this; Deryni magic isn't quite the same thing as laran but it is not totally dissimilar.  (Not only did they do scrying to find the ore, but they used teleknesis to bring it to the surface where ordinary people gould gather it; that, I think, is a bit beyond Deryni abilities.)

[MerchantDeryni]

I am noodling along on several different stories set in Camberland. Most of them goat and Portal related, I've looking at low tech methods of land clearance and spinning ideas from that.

I like the iron scrying and will use that in a story. There is iron in Puerto Rico, so I think a story will be set there shortly.

I;ve been thinking about the loss of heritage. I always envisioned a small group of Camberites, monks or lay brothers devoted to his patronage of magic. And then it occured to me. The same technique mentioned by KK in passing on knowledge of Portal construction may well be used to preserve the Deryni heritage. The biggest issue is trusting the other Deryni not to corrupt the knowledge being passed along.

Rapport is used over and over to show Deryni magical techniques, Portal construction in high Deryni (mentioned by KK in Deryni Magic) (High Deryni pg 289-295).  Arilan places three people into energy support trance, then teaches Morgan and the others how to make a Portal, and then one is immediately made.

Rhys teaches, or tries to show how to block powers. Not everyone can learn the power, but they can see the area he is working on, they just cannot activate it themselves.

Over and over Deryni mind links share knowledge and planning. While schools are perhaps the best method of passing along knowledge in an orderly and systematic approach. It may well be possible that large chunks of knowledge were shared in order to preserve it. The task after that would be to write it down and codify it.

This could be helped by the mindspeech and any memory enhancing techniques shared. memories of a training manual (if none were saved for the voyage), could be enough to re-write the book, or at least save a fair chunk of it.

All in all, it may be possible to save far more of the Deryni culture than people who were relying solely on books. The caveat would be a poolm of Deryni with enough talent to rapport and share the information.