Religion & Spirituality

In Tulgar, Svarog is revered as a god of knowledge, and the Black Serpent is seen as member of the same pantheon as a god of death. They worship many other angels, demons, spirits and elementals. There is some variety between the clans.

Darkan & Gardarkan (Priest & War-priest)

The Tulgar priest (darkan in Tulgarian) is the mediator between the divine and mortal world, they work mostly in trance and dreamscapes. They wield powerful magic and is usually decked out in various magical items, spirit fetches and charms.

Darkans have to keep a certain level of spiritual purity and as such they don’t participate in battle and abstain from sex. Much more powerful is the Gardarkan (poorly translated to "war priest") who stands with one leg in each world and can have as much murder and sex as they want.

Totems

Often misattributed to the sacred poles clans erect in the centre of their camp, these are merely the physical manifestation of the totem, which is a sort of clan spirit gestalt of the collective honour, magic, prestige and ancestors.

The Holy Mountain Gar and the great moot

Considered to be the totem of the entire Tulgar people the mountain known as Gar has seen thousands of Great Moots in its shadow and is the only place where every Tulgar is safe from each other, even outlaws. It is off limits to foreigners though who are killed on sight if they try to get near.

Legend has it that the Children of Gar, whom all of the Tulgarians descend from, lived on the Mountain Gar before coming down to the steppe.

Every 3rd year the Kangar clans will gather in the shadow of the holy mountain Gar to discuss matters relating to the entirety of the Tulgar people. Only Sha-Khans can speak at the Moot itself, so if anyone has a matter they want to raise they must get a Sha-khan to speak for them.

It is said that the mountain peak has a spring from which a Darkan must drink to become a Gardarkan.

Amidardag - the conscious interaction with myth

The most important duty of the Darkan is to facilitate the Amidardag, a sort of ritual reenactment of Tulgar myths which they believe will reorder the universe to the myth. This is extremely important to get right as failure means putting the entire universe in unbalance.

The rewards are great though, power, glory, magic and survival...

Example: After a long drought the Gardarkarn of Clan Kingil facilitates the reenactment of when the sun people built a great prison to trap the blue serpents of the mountains and how the War deity Liru tore down the walls letting the water free again. Just as the actor stand-in for Liru kicks down the wall-prop, rain begins to fall...

Coincidence or magic?