When challenged for sport, it is acceptable to decline. When challenged for honor, it is shameful to decline. Honor challenges come from offense given in speech or action, or may represent customary formal challenges of status or ritual.
Honor challenges come from offense given in speech or action, or may represent customary formal challenges of status or ritual.
Ashlanders may challenge a stranger who enters a yurt without invitation. Customs differ with different tribes, but leave when requested, and you may be forgiven. Be particularly careful about ashkhans -- tribal chiefs -- and wise women -- tribal seers and counselors. Some are welcoming, some are hostile. Be courteous, and leave if requested. If offended, they may attack.
Ashlanders may challenge a stranger who enters a yurt without invitation. Customs differ with different tribes, but leave when requested, and you may be forgiven.
The Velothi are people of Ashlander stock who have abandoned nomadic life and settled among the native Dunmer; the Velothi are despised by their Ashlander cousins as weak and soft, while the Dunmer look down upon the Velothi as an insignificant underclass.
The Ashlander culture is an anachronistic survival of the ancestor-worshipping tribal culture that evolved into the theocratic Great House culture of the native Dunmer. The Ashlanders perversely prefer the impoverished physical culture and subsistence economy of the Ashland nomadic herder-hunter, and their ancestor worship is shamanistic and primitive by Dunmer and Imperial standards.
Take care when visiting an Ashlander camp. Among clan and kin, Ashlander courtesy is very proper and polite, but you are a stranger, so remember that Ashlanders hate foreigners. Ashlander challenges are very solemn and serious things; do not make a challenge lightly. And know the customs of Ashlander gifts; they are not offended by gifts of money, and take them as tokens of deference and respect. And among outcast Ashlanders, beware the mabrigash, renegade witch-warrior women who practice dark magics.
Know the customs of Ashlander gifts; they are not offended by gifts of money, and take them as tokens of deference and respect.
Take care when visiting an Ashlander camp. Among clan and kin, Ashlander courtesy is very proper and polite, but you are a stranger, so remember that Ashlanders hate foreigners.
Ashlander challenges are very solemn and serious things; do not make a challenge lightly.
Among Ashlanders, a gift is a token of courtesy among strangers, and affection among friends. When coming first among strangers, a thoughtful gift is a sign that you are cautious, and considerate, and aware of the other's wants and needs. Such is particularly useful for traders and travelers. Among friends, it is a private thing, and subtle, with great risks, for the test of the gift is how well it is tailored to the receiver.
When coming first among strangers, a thoughtful gift is a sign to Ashlanders that you are cautious, and considerate, and aware of the other's wants and needs.
Among Ashlanders, a gift is a token of courtesy among strangers, and affection among friends.
Ashlander nomadic camps have portable huts of hides stretched on chitin frames. These huts can be quickly dismantled and packed atop a guar when moving to new grazing and hunting grounds. The khan's hut is simply a larger, more elaborate version of a family hut.
All Ashlanders in a tribe, young and small, are born into the Ancestor cult of their clan. The Nerevarine cult is different, though; it is a very small cult, with only a few wise women with the gift of prophecy, and a few holy warrior-heroes who guard and protect the seers. Sul-Matuul, Ashkhan of the Urshilaku, is the Warrior-Protector of the cult, and Nibani Maesa, also of the Urshilaku, is the Oracle-Seer of the cult.
Ashlanders are the nomadic Dunmer barbarians of the Morrowind wastelands. They live in camps of small, mobile huts, herding guar and hunting wildlife for meat and hides. By tradition, the Ashlanders claim the right to raid settlements and other tribes for booty and slaves. The Ashlanders worship their ancestors, and are led by their ashkhan war chiefs, counseled by the arcane wisdom and prophecies of their wise women. If you plan to visit them, you should know something of Ashlander customs.
By tradition, Ashlanders claim the right to raid other Ashlander tribes -- and non-Ashlander settlements -- for booty and slaves.
The Ashlanders worship their ancestors. Ashlander tribes are led by their ashkhan war chiefs, and guided by the wisdom and prophecies of their wise women.
The Ashlanders hate the House Dunmer, who have become soft, and who have abandoned traditional ancestor worship for the gods of the Tribunal. And the Ashlanders hate outlanders, who invaded and stole their land, and forced them to live as a subject people. A reborn Nerevar who could drive out the outlander invaders, destroy the false worship of the Tribunal, and restore the pure traditional life and faith of the nomads would be a very popular hero to the Ashlanders.
There is too much to tell. Here. Take these notes. I've written here what you should know about the Ashlanders and the Nerevarine cult. But most of all, if you are visiting a camp, there are things you should know about courtesy and challenges among the Ashlanders. And, since you ask about the Nerevarine cult, perhaps you'll be interested in my views on the Ashlanders and foreigners, because a guiding passion of the Nerevarine cult is their hatred of foreigners.
We are the People of the Wastes. We hunt and herd guar. We live the Law and honor the Ancestors. No houses. Just yurts. I was a herder, but now I want to become rich, like a great trader. I will live in a town, fight, find treasure, get rich, learn to trade. The soul sickness and blight storms are very bad now in the Ashlands, so I came to Pelagiad. Now I live in a big house and work for men who pay gold.
We are the Ahemmusa tribe of the Vvardenfell Ashlanders. This is Ahemmusa camp, the last place of the Ahemmusa. All the other places are gone. The Urshilaku have the good lands to the west. The Zainab have the good lands to the south. And the blight has taken our lands, has driven us to this last camp. And even here we have no safety, for the red taint takes our herds and kills the game. The blight-sick animals and blight monsters kill our people. Soon we will all die, and the Ahemmusa be forgotten.
I don't know much about the Ashlanders. Most people say they are murderous savages. But most people are idiots. I know they hate their settled Dunmer cousins almost as much as they hate Westerners. They must be tough to live in the Ashlands. I don't think outlanders can become members of the tribes. I don't know why anyone would want to.
Most Ashlanders wish all foreigners and their false gods could be driven from Morrowind. At very least, Ashlanders wish the foreign devils would leave them in peace. Ashlanders think it shameful to attack unarmed persons, but they will kill without hesitation an armed person who offends them or their clan laws. No Ashlander is fool enough to make war against the Empire. However, if such a war might be won, many Ashlanders might cheerfully give their lives to win such a war.
Ashlanders think it shameful to attack unarmed persons, but they will kill without hesitation an armed person who offends them or their clan laws.
Ashlanders seldom make war like the city people do. We raid other tribes, to prove we are strong, and to make us rich and respected. Our champions challenge one another for duels of sport and honor; it is fitting that warriors should decide these things, not hunters or herders. But when we make war as a tribe, hunters and herders fight beside champions and ashkhans with spear and bow. Such wars are cruel, for we are few, and the lives of our people are too dear to waste.
