"In recent years, scholars researching Taal’s origins have studied the Talastein Carvings, a series of 13 stone tablets unearthed in the Kölsa Hills. They attest to the body of evidence that supports the notion that an ancient people known as the Belthani venerated a hermaphrodite god called Ishernos, which united all aspects of nature. When they migrated north, they found stone circles and megaliths scattered across the land, relics they believed were left by Ishernos. They used these places as temples. Over time, seasonal aspects of Ishernos split into three entities -- Taal the Lord of Nature and Spring, Rhya, the goddess of Fertility and summer, and Ulric, the god of wolves, battle and winter.
Marius von Gronighof: This coincides with a tale I was once told whilst planning an expedition to the cairns of the Grey Mountains. A hoary old priest of Taal named Pedragar told me that at first there was the allumina -- an unchanging whiteness without feature or motion. Then came Ishernos, the first one, the primal. From its loins came Rhya the beautiful, rising up with Taal the powerful. Surging with life, they came into the world. Everywhere they gazed, the abundance of nature sprang forth. Where Taal walked, the mountains rose from the earth. Where he breathed, the forests reached for the sun. Such was how the world was made, was what he said."
- —Old Weirde’s Incunabulum[3a]
Tribal Humans worship an ancient place of magical energy, sacred to both Ishernos and the Old Faith.[2e]
Ishernos, known also as Father Earth,[6a] the Earth Mother,[5a] and the Earth Spirit,[4b], were the names of the ancient god of nature among the Humans of the Old World who had both male and female aspects. In the beginning, Taal, the god of nature and beasts, and Rhya, the goddess of nature, agriculture and fertility, were worshipped as a single god named Ishernos, who had a feminine face in spring and autumn and a masculine face in summer and winter.[1a]
Today many Jade Wizards remain devoted to Taal and Rhya in their original, combined aspect of Ishernos to the present day.[1a]
In Stirland Ishernos is still worshipped as Father Earth alongside Taal.[6a]
History[]
Long before the coming of Sigmar, long before even the other gods were worshipped, the Men of the Old World were united in the worship of Ishernos, the god-and-goddess of nature, and a wide but mostly forgotten pantheon of minor gods and spirits.[2a]
They were drawn to the stone circles that they found arrayed across the land, and a class of shaman known as "druids" emerged to teach and record the folklore of these ancients. These traditions are still upheld in rural pockets of the Empire of Man, in half-forgotten hamlets and remote valleys. They seem primitive and are occasionally mistaken for Chaos worship, but present-day followers of the Old Faith feel their ancient connection to the land and an inheritance that goes back to its first people.[2a]
Adherents of the Old Faith are organised around the family, with long lineages closely associated with Ishernos. The most exalted are the Druidic Families, who see themselves as descendants of the original Belthani shamans.[2b]
The holy sites of the Old Faith are the stone circles, dolmens, and cromlechs that stand across the Old World. Followers believe these places of power have belonged to Ishernos since the creation of the mortal world, but they are mistaken. The first Humans to settle the Old World stumbled upon the waystones of the Asur and other older civilisations, sensed their magical energy, and worshipped there. These places remain sacred, even as the Asur have explained to select Old Worlders why the stones were actually erected -- to drain the magical energies of Chaos sweeping across the mortal world during the Great Catastrophe into the Great Vortex at the centre of Ulthuan.[2b]
Many theologians suspect that Ishernos, the dual gendered god of nature worshipoped by the agricultural tribes collectively known as the Belthani, gave rise to Taal and Rhya. The domains of wild nature, domesticity and agriculture are important aspects of Ishernos that have been split up and re-embodied in Taal and Rhya, with the latter bestowing the blessings of spring and summer -- new life and food foraged and hunted from the land.[2c][2d]
Over the centuries, winter came to be seen as the domain of Ulric, god of war and wolves. In the minds of worshippers, the two aspects of Ishernos gradually became distinct deities, yet the Cult of Taal and Rhya remained unified. Some theologians speculate that Ulric was once an aspect of Ishernos as well, forming a divine triad -- a theory supported by the symbol of the triskeles etched into the megaliths found in the oldest stone circles dedicated to Taal and Rhya.[1a]
Some scholars take this theory even further, pointing to the sub-cult of Lupos, the Wolf, Lord of Predators -- one of the most ancient known divine sects, with roots predating the time of Sigmar. They argue that Lupos may represent an early incarnation of Ulric, suggesting that he, too, was once part of the triune godhead embodied by the archaic Ishernos. Little more is known, however, as the worshippers of Lupos are notoriously reclusive and feared, even among followers of Taal and Rhya, for their wild and dangerous ways.[4a]
Vampire Prophecies[]
During the Vampire hysteria of the 16th century IC, druids of the Old Faith were executed for performing blood rituals similar to those of the Qu'rashi nomads. Druids were also linked with the Barrow Kings; Undead champions of the pre-Imperial tribes who rose from their mounds to punish trespassers on their sacred land.[5a]
Also, an obscure field of druidic lore has been linked with the Vampire Prophecies, the most intriguing of which links the old Sun God Oermath -- former husband of the Earth Mother Ishernos -- with the Nehekharan sun god Ptra. Scholars have claimed that Ishernos' sister, an obscure moon goddess, granted Nagash's apotheosis for some hidden purpose in the feud with Oermath. According to these theories, Nagash's fourth return to the mortal world would signal the restoration of the Earth Mother.[5a]
Sources[]
- 1: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition: Core Rulebook (RPG)
- 1a: pg. 179
- 2: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition: Archives of the Empire Vol. III (RPG)
- 3: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition: Deft Steps Light Fingers (RPG)
- 3a: pg. 72
- 4: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition: Sigmar's Heirs (RPG)
- 5: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition: The Thousand Thrones (RPG)
- 5a: pg. 158
- 5: Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2nd Edition: Tome of Salvation (RPG)
- 5a: pg. 79