The Elder Scrolls VI is set to be one of the biggest RPGs of the next generation. There are still millions of people playing The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim as it is, so it’s unlikely that the next game in the fantasy-RPG series won’t be as popular, if not more so.
Of course, Skyrim is helped along by it being released on practically every electronic device ever made, not to mention the many mods that either improve it or make it much sillier than the team at Bethesda intended it to be. Who can forget the mod that turns all the dragons into Thomas the Tank Engine?
If you’re not an Elder Scrolls fan you can always try one of the other best RPGs on PC.
But wouldn’t it be great if we don’t need to install mods to sharpen it up when The Elder Scrolls VI release date arrives? Bethesda has a reputation for releasing buggy games and ones that also rely too much on repetition. With that in mind, we decided to give Bethesda a helping hand, looking to the other massive RPG series and seeing what The Elder Scrolls VI could learn from it. Yes, we’re talking about The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
Proper relationships
One of the highlights of The Witcher 3 is the intimate relationships you form with its cast. The combination of terrific dialogue and expressive gestures, discussion of complicated emotions, and the drastic consequences of your decisions make the characters feel alive. It helps that you carry a history with Yennefer, Dandelion, and Triss over all three Witcher games, their personalities fully developed into independent people recognisable by their passions, talents, and the mistakes they make.
Characters in Skyrim, however, are often voiced by the same few actors, and those you get closest to are your followers. This includes the likes of Lydia, Uthgerd, and Farkas, who mostly serve as an extra blade or bow at your side, and repeat the same voice lines as if they’re on a timer.
What we’d love to see The Elder Scrolls VI do is give us proper interactions with characters, let us get close and form a bond with them, not just have them carry our items or give us quests.
Rich landscapes
With the exception of Morrowind, the Elder Scrolls series has struggled to supply variation across its locations. Think of Oblivion and you’ll probably imagine stone cities and hilly grasslands. Skyrim is much the same except it’s covered in snow. Even the dungeons repeat the same textures and traps, and you’ll struggle to find a story within them to mix it up, unless that dungeon is tied to a larger quest.
The Witcher 3 showed us how an open world can be realised with not only a range of different environments, but unique cultures and stories to find within them. The vast city of Novigrad contrasts with the snowy mountains of Skellige, and little else in the game matches the eerie power of the smoking wastelands of Velen.
Beyond the broad strokes, The Witcher impresses on the micro level too, with each texture and natural formation in the environment made distinctive, from the authentic fields of flowers and rocky outcrops to populated huts and castles. Given that The Elder Scrolls VI will be launching on next-gen consoles that should mean Bethesda has more freedom to provide a world as rich as The Witcher 3’s.
Quickbooks pro download crack. On a survey, approximately billions of users were using this software in 2016 and it continues to enlarge in each hour.
Every quest matters
Something as small as a missing frying pan is turned into an entertaining story in The Witcher 3. The reason being that the writers at CD Projekt Red understand that what’s important in an RPG quest isn’t the experience points it gives you but how it enriches the world and even the most minor characters within it. Most important is that you can tell as much thought has been put into the secondary quests in The Witcher 3 as has been put into the main ones.
But, in the Elder Scrolls, the glut of quests means that many of them fall into a dull template. You are often hunting down an item, clearing an area of monsters, or assassinating a character. It doesn’t help that many of the quest locations feel like (or actually are) copy-pasted from elsewhere in the game. The secondary quests in The Elder Scrolls are ‘painting by numbers’ whereas The Witcher 3’s feel literary and gives you new insight into its world.
Refined combat
Not everyone likes the combat in The Witcher 3 but there’s no denying the work that has been put into it by CD Projekt Red. Fighting as Geralt or Ciri is refined, with each swing of the sword slicing with finesse, the animations of Geralt dodging his enemies gives a sense of weight and peril to each encounter.
Combat in the Elder Scrolls series has a tendency to feel clumsy. Blades and blunt weapons pass through enemies with little friction and casting magic is displayed as nothing more than a fist opening. Part of this is due to Bethesda having to design everything for first-person and third-person perspectives, which puts limits on the animations.
What also doesn’t help is Bethesda’s focus on supplying lots of weapons whereas The Witcher 3 has only a handful of blades for you to worry about. Where you can better customise your loadout is with the magical signs witchers use to create space on the battlefield or ignite enemies. Even the pre-fight preparation helps to vary it up, as you must gather oils for your blades to fight certain beasts, and brew enough potions to help you take on tougher enemies.
The addition of blood splatters, dragon shouts, and slow-mo death scenes in Skyrim were significant improvements to an area the series has struggled with. So, hopefully, The Elder Scrolls VI will have its own share of upgrades. Bethesda should focus on refining the systems and animations, keeping the number of them small in the interest of quality, rather than trying to give as many combat options as possible.
Minigames
Some of the most popular Skyrim mods add tavern games. Then there are the forums in which people give each other challenges to complete within Skyrim’s world. This makes it pretty obvious that The Elder Scrolls is missing something: minigames.
The Witcher 3’s own minigame, Gwent, has proven popular enough to see it turned into a standalone game. It even has proper tournaments with players competing for thousands of dollars in prizes.
Bethesda has already created its own card game in The Elder Scrolls: Legends, so it would make sense to include it in some form in The Elder Scrolls VI – we all need some downtime. It worked for The Witcher 3 so there’s no reason why a card game with in-game tournaments couldn’t be part of The Elder Scrolls VI. Anything beyond a card game would also be appreciated as an additional pastime – The Witcher 3 had a brawling competition and horse races, for instance.
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- Not to be confused with Ritual of the Innocent Quarry.
The Wild Hunt is a ritual performed by the Bosmer of Valenwood, part of the oath known as the Green Pact, and thus associated to Y'ffre, the main god of the Bosmeri pantheon.[1][2] A historical example of the Hunt was the one that killed High KingBorgas of Winterhold in 1E 369 (thus setting the events of the War of Succession in motion)[3] for the 'iniquities' of his Alessian faith[4] whilst he traveled to Cyrodiil to urge a joint war against the Bosmer.[5] This event was also the last confirmed wearing of the Jagged Crown until the Fourth Era.[6]
Bosmeri lore holds that after the creation of the mortal plane, everything was in chaos, with the first mortals 'turning into plants and animals and back again'. Then Y'ffre established the laws of nature, becoming the first of the Earth Bones and giving mortals a semblance of safety in the new world, as they could now understand it. For this event Y'ffre is sometimes referred to as 'the Storyteller', and it is believed that the Wild Hunt can be performed due to some of the Bosmer still holding knowledge of the 'chaos times'.[2][7] Although the Bosmer are said to be able to resort to animal shapes if needed, their 'most dreaded transformation' is the Wild Hunt.[4] Described as 'a flood of horrific beasts, tentacled toads, insects of armor and spine, gelatinous serpents, vaporous beings with the face of gods, blind in fury,'[8] or 'a pack of shifting forest-demons and animal-gods, thousands strong, which sweeps through the countryside killing everything in its path.'[4]
Breton writer Waughin Jarth describes the Hunt in great detail in his novel A Dance in Fire, through the eyes of his fictitious (although allegedly based on a real person) character Decumus Scotti. In the novel, it is stated that, pouring forth from a great hollow tree, the Hunt 'tore the Khajiiti in front of the temple to pieces', consuming the village of Vindisi within seconds. When sealed within the location by fleeing Khajiiti, the apparitions of the Great Hunt then turned on one another as there was no enemy to be reached anymore, ensuing in what Jarth describes as a 'cannibalistic orgy'.[8] It is said that the Bosmer do not like to talk about the Hunt nor feel any pride in having such a power, and that although the ritual is used for achieving justice, the Bosmer Gomini says that 'every monster in the world that has ever been comes from a previous Hunt. Those Bosmer that go Wild, they do not return'.[4] The voracity of the Hunt in such that the beasts are said to devour other creatures to the bone in the span of a few moments.[8] It is said that when the Wood Elves invoke the Wild Hunt, creatures forget their Y'ffre-taught shapes and shift into unnatural forms, such as those that occupy a space between flora and fauna.[7]
See alsoEdit
References
- ↑Valenwood: A Study
- ↑ 2.02.1Varieties of Faith in the Empire
- ↑A History of Daggerfall
- ↑ 4.04.14.24.3Pocket Guide to the Empire, First Edition: Aldmeri Dominion
- ↑Pocket Guide to the Empire, Third Edition: Valenwood
- ↑Dialogue with Galmar Stone-Fist
- ↑ 7.07.1Events of The Elder Scrolls Online
- ↑ 8.08.18.2A Dance in Fire, Chapter 4
Discussions about Wild Hunt
Spriggans and the Bosmer
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The wild hunt: Asgårdsreien (1872) by Peter Nicolai Arbo
The Wild Hunt is a folklore motif (ATU E501) that historically occurs in European folklore. Wild Hunts typically involve a ghostly or supernatural group of hunters passing in wild pursuit. It is also about pagan youths engaging in hunting to have ecstatic practices to connect to Odin and the spirits of the ancestral dead, holding these events as their processions of certain times of the year.[1] In the Norse lands the ancestral dead are usually said to be the souls of dead warriors, Odin or Odin and a consort leading the hunt and sometimes the hunt may tear men to shreds, bring dead loved ones or severed limbs to the hunter instead of achievements. Carrying out these practices is blessing the land, such as for a harvest, Germany popularised the Wild Hunt.[2] Whether leading the dead or blessing the land, the attitude and the Wild Hunt's connotations is life, danger or limb, many men flee indoors when there is a Wild Hunt. In England it is Herne the Hunter that leads, rattling the chains of the dead, vegetation and vine god, keeper of the forest, though Norse legend suggests it is Odin in disguise. Exploring for the right rewards in amidst turmoil. The hunters may be either elves or fairies or the dead,[3] and the leader of the hunt is often a named figure associated with Odin[4] (or other reflections of the same god, such as AlemannicWuodan in Wuotis Heer ('Wuodan's Army') of Central Switzerland, Swabia etc.), but may variously be a historical or legendary figure like Theodoric the Great, the Danish king Valdemar Atterdag, the WelshpsychopompGwyn ap Nudd, biblical figures such as Herod, Cain, Gabriel or the Devil, or an unidentified lost soul or spirit either male or female.
Seeing the Wild Hunt was thought to presage some catastrophe such as war or plague, or at best the death of the one who witnessed it.[5] People encountering the Hunt might also be abducted to the underworld or the fairy kingdom.[6] In some instances, it was also believed that people's spirits could be pulled away during their sleep to join the cavalcade.[7]
The concept was developed based on comparative mythology by Jacob Grimm in Deutsche Mythologie (1835) as a folkloristic survival of Germanic pagan tradition, but comparable folk myths are found throughout Northern, Western and Central Europe.[4] Grimm popularised the term Wilde Jagd ('Wild Hunt') for the phenomenon.
- 3Regional variations
- 8References
Comparative evidence and terminology[edit]
Based on the comparative approach based on German folklore, the phenomenon is often referred to as Wilde Jagd (German: 'wild hunt/chase') or Wildes Heer (German: 'wild host'). In Germany, where it was also known as the 'Wild Army', or 'Furious Army', its leader was given various identities, including Wodan (or 'Woden'), Knecht Ruprecht (cf. Krampus), Berchtold (or Berchta), and Holda (or 'Holle'). The Wild Hunt is also known from post-medieval folklore.
The Wild Hunt Elder Scrolls 3
In England, it was known as Herlaþing (Old English: 'Herla's assembly'), Woden's Hunt, Herod's Hunt, Cain's Hunt,[8] the Devil's Dandy Dogs (in Cornwall),[9]Gabriel's Hounds (in northern England),[10] and Ghost Riders (in North America).[11] In Wales, a comparable folk myth is known as Cŵn Annwn (Welsh: 'hounds of Annwn').
In Scandinavia, the Wild Hunt is known as Oskoreia or Asgårdsreia (originally oskurreia) (Norwegian: 'noisy riders', 'The Ride of Asgard'),[12] and Odens jakt or Vilda jakten (Swedish: 'the hunt of Odin' or 'wild hunt').
In Northern France, it was known in Old French as Mesnée d'Hellequin (Old French : 'household of Hellequin') and with a large range of variant forms (in Normandy alone as Chasse Saint-Hubert, Chasse Saint-Eustache, Chasse de Caïn, Cache de Caïn, Chasse Artus, Chasse Hennequin, Chasse Annequin, Chasse Proserpine, Chasse céserquine or chéserquine, Chasse Mère Harpine, Chasse du Diable); in Canada it is Chasse-galerie like in Poitou - Saintonge. In West Slavic Central Europe it is known as divoký hon or štvaní (Czech: 'wild hunt', 'baiting'), Dziki Gon or Dziki Łów (Polish), and Divja Jaga (Slovene: 'the wild hunting party' or 'wild hunt'). Other variations of the same folk myth are Caccia Morta (Dead hunt), Caccia infernale (infernal hunt), or Caccia selvaggia (wild hunt) in Italy; Estantiga (from Hoste Antiga, Galician: 'the old army'), Hostia, Compaña and Santa Compaña ('troop, company') in Galicia; Güestia in Asturias; Hueste de Ánimas ('troop of ghosts') in León; and Hueste de Guerra ('war company') or Cortejo de Gente de Muerte ('deadly retinue') in Extremadura.
'Wodan's Wild Hunt' (1882) by Friedrich Wilhelm Heine
History[edit]
'Another class of spectres will prove more fruitful for our investigation: they, like the ignes fatui, include unchristened babes, but instead of straggling singly on the earth as fires, they sweep through forest and air in whole companies with a horrible din. This is the widely spread legend of the furious host, the furious hunt, which is of high antiquity, and interweaves itself, now with gods, and now with heroes. Look where you will, it betrays its connexion [sic] with heathenism.'
— Folklorist Jacob Grimm.[13]
The concept of the Wild Hunt was first documented by the German folklorist Jacob Grimm, who first published it in his 1835 book Deutsche Mythologie.[14] It was in this work that he popularised the term Wilde Jagd ('Wild Hunt') for the phenomenon.[14] Grimm's methodological approach was rooted in the idea – common in nineteenth-century Europe – that modern folklore represented a fossilized survival of the beliefs of the distant past. In developing his idea of the Wild Hunt, he mixed together recent folkloric sources with textual evidence dating to the Medieval and Early Modern periods.[15] This approach came to be criticized within the field of folkloristics during the 20th century, as more emphasis was placed on the 'dynamic and evolving nature of folklore'.[15]
Grimm interpreted the Wild Hunt phenomenon as having pre-Christian origins, arguing that the male figure who appeared in it was a survival of folk beliefs about the god Wodan, who had 'lost his sociable character, his near familiar features, and assumed the aspect of a dark and dreadful power.. a spectre and a devil.'[13] Grimm believed that this male figure was sometimes replaced by a female counterpart, whom he referred to as Holda and Berchta.[16] In his words, 'not only Wuotan and other gods, but heathen goddesses too, may head the furious host: the wild hunter passes into the wood-wife, Wôden into frau Gaude.'[17] He added his opinion that this female figure was Woden's wife.[18]
Discussing martial elements of the Wild Hunt, Grimm commented that 'it marches as an army, it portends the outbreak of war.'[19] He added that a number of figures that had been recorded as leading the hunt, such as 'Wuotan, Huckelbernd, Berholt, bestriding their white war-horse, armed and spurred, appear still as supreme directors of the war for which they, so to speak, give licence to mankind.'[19]
Grimm believed that in pre-Christian Europe, the hunt, led by a god and a goddess, either visited 'the land at some holy tide, bringing welfare and blessing, accepting gifts and offerings of the people' or they alternately float 'unseen through the air, perceptible in cloudy shapes, in the roar and howl of the winds, carrying on war, hunting or the game of ninepins, the chief employments of ancient heroes: an array which, less tied down to a definite time, explains more the natural phenomenon.'[20] He believed that under the influence of Christianisation, the story was converted from being that of a 'solemn march of gods' to being 'a pack of horrid spectres, dashed with dark and devilish ingredients'.[20]
Hans Peter Duerr (1985) noted that for modern readers, it 'is generally difficult to decide, on the basis of the sources, whether what is involved in the reports about the appearance of the Wild Hunt is merely a demonic interpretation of natural phenomenon, or whether we are dealing with a description of ritual processions of humans changed into demons.'[21] Historian Ronald Hutton noted that there was 'a powerful and well-established international scholarly tradition' which argued that the Medieval Wild Hunt legends were an influence on the development of the Early Modern ideas of the Witches' Sabbath.[14] Hutton nevertheless believed that this approach could be 'fundamentally challenged'.[14]
Regional variations[edit]
Britain[edit]
In the Peterborough Chronicle, there is an account of the Wild Hunt's appearance at night, beginning with the appointment of a disastrous abbot for the monastery, Henry d'Angely, in 1127:
Many men both saw and heard a great number of huntsmen hunting. The huntsmen were black, huge, and hideous, and rode on black horses and on black he-goats, and their hounds were jet black, with eyes like saucers, and horrible. This was seen in the very deer park of the town of Peterborough, and in all the woods that stretch from that same town to Stamford, and in the night the monks heard them sounding and winding their horns.[22]
Reliable witnesses were said to have given the number of huntsmen as twenty or thirty, and it is said, in effect, that this went on for nine weeks, ending at Easter.[22]Orderic Vitalis (1075–c. 1142), an English monk cloistered at St Evroul-en-Ouche, in Normandy, reported a similar cavalcade seen in January 1091, which he said were 'Herlechin's troop' (familia Herlechini; cf. Harlequin).[23]
While these earlier reports of Wild Hunts were recorded by clerics and portrayed as diabolic, in late medieval romances, such as Sir Orfeo, the hunters are rather from a faery otherworld, where the Wild Hunt was the hosting of the fairies; its leaders also varied, but they included Gwydion, Gwynn ap Nudd, King Arthur, Nuada, King Herla, Woden, the Devil and Herne the Hunter. Many legends are told of their origins, as in that of 'Dando and his dogs' or 'the dandy dogs': Dando, wanting a drink but having exhausted what his huntsmen carried, declared he would go to hell for it. A stranger came and offered a drink, only to steal Dando's game and then Dando himself, with his dogs giving chase. The sight was long claimed to have been seen in the area.[24] Another legend recounted how King Herla, having visited the Fairy King, was warned not to step down from his horse until the greyhound he carried jumped down; he found that three centuries had passed during his visit, and those of his men who dismounted crumbled to dust; he and his men are still riding, because the greyhound has yet to jump down.[25]
The myth of the Wild Hunt has through the ages been modified to accommodate other gods and folk heroes, among them King Arthur and, more recently, in a Dartmoorfolk legend, Sir Francis Drake. At Cadbury Castle in Somerset an old lane near the castle was called King Arthur's Lane and even in the 19th century the idea survived that on wild winter nights the king and his hounds could be heard rushing along it.[26]
In certain parts of Britain, the hunt is said to be that of hell-hounds chasing sinners or the unbaptised. In Devon these are known as Yeth (Heath) or Wisht Hounds, in Cornwall Dando and his Dogs or the Devil and his Dandy Dogs, in Wales the Cwn Annwn, the Hounds of Hell, and in Somerset as Gabriel Ratchets or Retchets (dogs).[27] In Devon the hunt is particularly associated with Wistman's Wood.[28]
Germany[edit]
An abundance of different tales of the Wild Hunt are recorded in Germany. In most tales, the identity of the hunter is not made clear, in others, it is:
- a mythological figure named Waul, Waur, Waurke, Wod, Wode, Wotk, or Wuid, who is thought to be derived from the ancient Germanic god of the wind and the dead, Wodan;
- a mythological figure named Frie, Fuik, Fu, Holda or Holle, who is thought to be derived from the Germanic goddess Freya or Frigg;
- an undead noble, most often called Count Hackelberg or Count Ebernburg, who is cursed to hunt eternally because of misbehaviour during his lifetime, and in some versions died from injuries of a slain boar's tusk.
Sometimes, the tales associate the hunter with a dragon or the devil. The hunter is most often riding a horse, seldom a horse-drawn carriage, and usually has several hounds in his company. If the prey is mentioned, it is most often a young woman, either guilty or innocent. The majority of the tales deal with some person encountering the Wild Hunt. If this person stands up against the hunters, he will be punished. If he helps the hunt, he will be awarded money, gold or, most often, a leg of a slain animal or human, which is often cursed in a way that makes it impossible to be rid of it. In this case, the person has to find a priest or magician able to ban it, or trick the Wild Hunt into taking the leg back by asking for salt, which the hunt can not deliver. In many versions, a person staying right in the middle of the road during the encounter is safe.[29][30][31]
Scandinavia[edit]
Odin continued to hunt in Norse myths. Illustration by August Malmström.
In Scandinavia, the leader of the hunt was Odin and the event was referred to as Odens jakt (Odin's hunt) and Oskoreien (from Asgårdsreien - the Asgard Ride). Odin's hunt was heard but rarely seen, and a typical trait is that one of Odin's dogs was barking louder and a second one fainter. Beside one or two shots, these barks were the only sounds that were clearly identified. When Odin's hunt was heard, it meant changing weather in many regions, but it could also mean war and unrest. According to some reports, the forest turned silent and only a whining sound and dog barks could be heard.[4]
In western Sweden and sometimes in the east as well, it has been said that Odin was a nobleman or even a king who had hunted on Sundays and therefore was doomed to hunt down and kill supernatural beings until the end of time.[4]According to certain accounts, Odin does not ride, but travels in a wheeled vehicle, specifically a one-wheeled cart.[32]
In parts of Småland, it appears that people believed that Odin hunted with large birds when the dogs got tired. When it was needed, he could transform a bevy of sparrows into an armed host.[4]
If houses were built on former roads, they could be burnt down, because Odin did not change his plans if he had formerly travelled on a road there. Not even charcoal kilns could be built on disused roads, because if Odin was hunting the kiln would be ablaze.[4]
One tradition maintains that Odin did not travel further up than an ox wears his yoke, so if Odin was hunting, it was safest to throw oneself onto the ground in order to avoid being hit, a pourquoi story that evolved as an explanation for the popular belief that persons lying at ground level are safer from lightning strikes than are persons who are standing.[33] In Älghult in Småland, it was safest to carry a piece of bread and a piece of steel when going to church and back during Yule. The reason was that if one met the rider with the broad-rimmed hat, one should throw the piece of steel in front of oneself, but if one met his dogs first, one should throw the pieces of bread instead.[4]
The more work you do with a division, the more favor you'll gain, which increases your reputation and allows you to receive tougher missions. These decisions aren't permanent; you can pick up other contracts as the game progresses.
Kajal Dua or George Lambert. There's a lot of waiting for upgrades to your facilities that you can't just pay microtransactions to sit through.If this was a freemium mobile app, there'd be a lot of microtransactions.The research facility offers various ways to expand your park or improve your dinosaurs.
Leader of the Wild Hunt[edit]
- Brittany: King Arthur.[34]
- Catalonia (Spain): Count Arnau (el comte Arnau), a legendary nobleman from Ripollès, who for his rapacious cruelty and lechery is condemned to ride to hounds for eternity while his flesh is devoured by flames. He is the subject of a classic traditional Catalan ballad.[35]
- England: Woden;[36]Herla; later de-heathenised as a Brythonic King who stayed too long at a fairy wedding feast and returned to find centuries had passed and the lands populated by Englishmen);[37]Wild Edric, a Saxon rebel;[38]Hereward the Wake; King Arthur; Herne the Hunter; St. Guthlac; Old Nick; Jan Tregeagle, a Cornish lawyer who escaped from Hell and is pursued by the devil's hounds. On Dartmoor, Dewer, Old Crockern or Sir Francis Drake.
- France: Artus, King Arthur (Brittany); Lord of Gallery (Poitou).[citation needed]
- Germany: Wodan, Berchtold, Dietrich of Berne, Holda, Perchta, Wildes Gjait. The Squire of Rodenstein and Hans von Hackelberg (both Sabbath-breakers).[39]
- Guernsey: Herodias (Rides with witches at sea)[40]
- Ireland: Fionn mac Cumhaill and the Fianna; Manannán—also known as The Fairy Cavalcade.[citation needed]
- Lombardy (Italy): King Beatrik, la Dona del Zöch (Lombard:the Lady of the Game).[41]
- Netherlands: Wodan, Gait met de hunties/hondjes (Gait with his little dogs), Derk met de hunties/hondjes (Derk with his little dogs), Derk met den beer (Derk with his boar/bear), het Glujende peerd (the glowing horse). Ronnekemère, Henske met de hondjes/Hänske mit de hond (Henske with his little dogs), Berend van Galen (Beerneken van Galen, Bèrndeken van Geulen, Bommen Berend or Beerneken, the bishop of Münster, Germany).
- Scandinavia: Odin; Lussi; King Vold (Denmark); Valdemar Atterdag (Denmark); the witch Guro Rysserova and Sigurdsveinen (Norway).
- Wales: Arawn or Gwyn ap Nudd, the Welsh god of the Underworld.
- Slovenia: Jarnik (Jarilo), also called Volčji pastir (Wolf Herdsman). In some variations mythical wild Baba (similar to Perchta) leads the hunt.
Modern cultural references[edit]
The Wild Hunt is the subject of Transcendental Étude No. 8 in C minor, 'Wilde Jagd' (Wild Hunt) by Franz Liszt,[42] and appears in Karl Maria von Weber's 1821 opera Der Freischütz[43] and in Arnold Schönberg's oratorioGurre-Lieder of 1911.[44]
The Wild Hunt also appears in Marvel Comics, primarily the Thor series, and is led by Malekith the Accursed, the Dark Elf King of Svartalfheim and one Thor's archenemies.
The subject of Stan Jones' American country song 'Ghost Riders in the Sky' of 1948, which tells of cowboys chasing the Devil's cattle through the night sky, resembles the European myth.[45] Swedish folk musician The Tallest Man on Earth released an album in 2010 entitled The Wild Hunt, and in 2013 the black metal band Watain, also Swedish, released an album with the same title.
In Mike Mignola's comic book series Hellboy two versions of the Wild Hunt myth are present. In The Wild Hunt the hero receives an invitation from British noblemen to partake in a giant hunting, 'The Wild Hunt', which they call after the legend of 'Herne, god of the Hunt'.[46] In King Vold, Hellboy encounters 'King Vold, the flying huntsman' whose figure is based on the Norwegian folktale of 'The Flying Huntsman (headless King Volmer and his hounds)' according to Mignola.[47]
In film, The Wild Hunt is a Canadian horror drama of 2009 by director Alexandre Franchi. The MTV series Teen Wolf features the Wild Hunt as the main villains of the first half of season 6. It takes the legend a bit further, claiming that the Wild Hunt erases people from existence, and those taken by the Wild Hunt become members after they are erased and forgotten.[48] Αustralian writer Tim Winton's 'The Riders,' shortlisted for the Booker Prize, mentions a vision of the Wild Hunt that becomes the basis for the main character's own 'wild hunt' of the story.[49]
The Wild Hunt features in The Witcher series of fantasy novels by Andrzej Sapkowski and the CD Projekt Red's 2015 role-playing video gameThe Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, based on the books, after being referenced heavily during the events and flashbacks of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings game.[50]
In The Elder Scrolls series of role-playing video games, the Wild Hunt is a ritual performed by the Bosmer (wood elves) for war, vengeance, or other times of desperation. The elves are transformed into a horde of horrific creatures that kill all in their path. The Daedric Lord Hircine is also inspired by the wild hunt, especially in The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind[51]
The Wild Hunt has appeared in various forms of literature,[52] among them Alan Garner's 1963 novel The Moon of Gomrath,[52]Penelope Lively's 1971 The Wild Hunt of Hagworthy,[53]Susan Cooper's 1973 The Dark is Rising,[53]Diana Wynne Jones' 1975 Dogsbody,[53]Brian Bates' The Way of Wyrd,[54]Guy Gavriel Kay's Fionavar trilogy, three of Jim Butcher's Dresden Files novels (2005 Dead Beat, 2006 Proven Guilty and 2012 Cold Days), the third issue of Seanan McGuire's series October Daye, An Artificial Night, Fred Vargas's 2011 The Ghost Riders of Ordebec, Laurell K. Hamilton’s book Mistral's Kiss and Jane Yolen's 1995 The Wild Hunt.[55] It also features in Cassandra Clare's book series, 'The Mortal instruments' and 'The Dark Artifices', led by Gwyn ap Nudd.[56] The Wicked Lovely series by Melissa Marr contains a modern Wild Hunt. It is also a major plot point in Peter S. Beagle's 'Tamsin.' The Wild Hunt is a primary element of R.S. Belcher's novel 'The Brotherhood of the Wheel'.
The Wild Hunt has been depicted on two different cards in Magic: the Gathering.
The “Åsgårdsreien”, Peter Nicolai Arbo's 1872 oil painting, depicts the Scandinavian version of the Wild Hunt, with Odin leading the hunting party.[57] This painting is featured on the cover of Bathory's 1988 album, Blood Fire Death.
In modern Paganism[edit]
'As far as practitioners of nature spiritualities are concerned, the Wild Hunt offers an initiation into the wild and an opening up of the senses; a sense of dissolution of self in confrontation with fear and death, an exposure to a 'whirlwind pulse that runs through life'. In short, engagement with the Hunt is a bid to restore a reciprocity and harmony between humans and nature.'
— Susan Greenwood.[58]
Various practitioners of the contemporary Pagan religion of Wicca have drawn upon folklore involving the Wild Hunt to inspire their own rites. In their context, the leader of the Wild Hunt is the goddess Hecate. [59] The anthropologist Susan Greenwood provided an account of one such Wild Hunt ritual performed by a modern Pagan group in Norfolk during the late 1990s, stating that they used this mythology 'as a means of confronting the dark of nature as a process of initiation.'[59] Referred to as the 'Wild Hunt Challenge' by those running it, it took place on Halloween and involved participants walking around a local area of woodland in the daytime, and then repeating that task as a timed competition at night, 'to gain mastery over an area of Gwyn ap Nudd's hunting ground'. If completed successfully, it was held that the participant had gained the trust of the wood's spirits, and they would be permitted to cut timber from its trees with which to make a staff.[60] The anthropologist Rachel Morgain reported a 'ritual recreation' of the Wild Hunt among the Reclaiming tradition of Wicca in San Francisco.[61]
See also[edit]
- Mallt-y-Nos, a Welsh version of the legend
- Moss people, wood spirits serving as typical prey of the wild hunt in parts of Germany.
References[edit]
Footnotes[edit]
- ^Daimler, Morgan. 'Odin and the Wild Hunt - Excerpt from 'Pagan Portals Odin''. https://www.lairbhan.blogspot.com. Retrieved 28 June 2019.External link in
|website=
(help) - ^Lecouteux, Claude (16 August 2011). [Phantom Armies of the Night: The Wild Hunt and the Ghostly Processions of the Undead Phantom Armies of the Night: The Wild Hunt and the Ghostly Processions of the Undead] Check
|url=
value (help). Rochester, Vermont: United States.: Inner Traditions. ISBN978-1594774362. Retrieved 28 June 2019. - ^Katharine M.Briggs, An Encyclopedia of Fairies, Hobgoblins, Brownies, Boogies, and Other Supernatural Creatures, s.v. 'Wild Hunt', p 437. ISBN0-394-73467-X. Katherine M. Briggs, The Fairies in English Tradition and Literature, pp 49–50 University of Chicago Press, London, 1967
- ^ abcdefgSchön, Ebbe. (2004). Asa-Tors hammare, Gudar och jättar i tro och tradition (Fält & Hässler, Värnamo). ISBN91-89660-41-2 pp. 201–205.
- ^See, for example, Chambers's Encyclopaedia, 1901, s.v. 'Wild Hunt': '[Gabriel's Hounds]..portend death or calamity to the house over which they hang'; 'the cry of the Seven Whistlers.. a death omen'.
- ^A girl who saw Wild Edric's Ride was warned by her father to put her apron over her head to avoid the sight. Katharine Briggs, An Encyclopedia of Fairies, Hobgoblins, Brownies, Boogies, and Other Supernatural Creatures, 'Infringement of fairy privacy', p 233. ISBN0-394-73467-X
- ^Ronald Hutton, The Pagan Religions of the Ancient British Isles: Their Nature and Legacy, p 307, ISBN0-631-18946-7
- ^'In the Middle Ages the wild hunt was also called Cain's hunt, Cain being another progenitor of the Wandering Jew': Venetia Newall, 'The Jew as a witch figure', in Katharine Mary Briggs, and Newall, eds. The Witch Figure: Folklore Essays by a Group of Scholars in England 2004:103f.
- ^Encyclopaedia of the Celts: Devil's Dandy Dogs – Diuran the RhymerArchived 2006-10-28 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^Called so in the north of England, according to Robert Chambers, The Book of Days: a miscellany of popular antiquities, vol. II, 1883, s.v. 'October 11: Spectre-dogs';
'..He oftentimes will start,
For overhead, are sweeping Gabriel's Hounds,
Doomed, with their impious lord, the flying hart
To chase for ever through aërial grounds,' (William Wordsworth), 'Though narrow be that old man's cares' (1807), quoted in Edwin Sidney Hartland English Fairy and Other Folk Tales, 1890, 'Spectre-Dogs'; 'Gabriel's hounds are wild geese, so called because their sound in flight is like a pack of hounds in full cry', observes Robert Hendrickson, in Salty Words, 1984:78. - ^Houston, Susan Hilary (1964). 'Ghost Riders in the Sky'. Western Folklore. 23 (3): 153–162. doi:10.2307/1498899. JSTOR1498899.
- ^The origin of this name is uncertain, and the reference to Asgard is reckoned to be a corruption by some scholars (a Dano-Norwegian misinterpretation).
- ^ abGrimm 2004b, p. 918.
- ^ abcdHutton 2014, p. 162.
- ^ abHutton 2014, p. 163.
- ^Grimm 2004b, p. 927.
- ^Grimm 2004b, p. 932.
- ^Grimm 2004b, p. 946.
- ^ abGrimm 2004b, p. 937.
- ^ abGrimm 2004b, p. 947.
- ^Duerr 1985, p. 36.
- ^ abGarmonsway, G.N., The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Dent, Dutton, 1972 & 1975, p. 258.
- ^Noted by Harold Peake, '17. Horned Deities', Man 22, February 1922, p. 28.
- ^K. M. Briggs, The Fairies in English Tradition and Literature, p 49. University of Chicago Press, London, 1967.
- ^K. M. Briggs, The Fairies in English Tradition and Literature, p 50–1. University of Chicago Press, London, 1967.
- ^Westwood, Jennifer (1985), Albion. A Guide to Legendary Britain. London: Grafton Books. ISBN0-246-11789-3. p. 8.
- ^Westwood, Jennifer (1985), Albion. A Guide to Legendary Britain. Pub. Grafton Books, London. ISBN0-246-11789-3. pp. 155–156.
- ^Westwood, Jennifer (1985), Albion. A Guide to Legendary Britain. Pub. Grafton Books, London. ISBN0-246-11789-3. p. 32.
- ^Hoffmann-Krayer, Eduard; Baechtold-Staeubli, Hanns, eds. (2002). Handwörterbuch des deutschen Aberglaubens. Waage-Zypresse, Nachträge. Handwörterbuecher zur Deutschen Volkskunde (in German). 1. Walter de Gruyter. pp. 191ff. ISBN978-3-11-006597-8.
- ^Neumann, Siegfried; Tietz, Karl-Ewald; Jahn, Ulrich (1999). Neumann, Siegfried; Tietz, Karl-Ewald (eds.). Volkssagen aus Pommern und Rügen (in German). Bremen-Rostock: Edition Temmen. pp. 407, 29ff. ISBN978-3-86108-733-5.
- ^Simrock, Karl (2002). Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie mit Einschluß der Nordischen. Elibron Classics (in German) (Reprint of 1878 ed.). Adamant. pp. 191, 196ff. ISBN978-1-4212-0428-4.
- ^Schön, p. 204, referring to a report from Voxtorp in Småland.
- ^Adel, Miah M (2012). 'Superiority of Prostration as a Protection from Lightning Strike'. Physics International. 3 (1): 9–21. doi:10.3844/pisp.2012.9.21.
- ^K. M. Briggs, The Fairies in English Tradition and Literature, p 51. University of Chicago Press, London, 1967.
- ^Joaquim Maideu, 'Llibre de cançons: crestomatia de cançons tradicionals catalanes', p. 50. ISBN84-7602-319-7.
- ^Hole, Christina. Haunted England: A Survey of English Ghost Lore. p.5. Kessinger Publishing, 1941.
- ^De Nugis Curialium by Walter Map.
- ^Katharine Briggs, An Encyclopedia of Fairies, Hobgoblins, Brownies, Boogies, and Other Supernatural Creatures, 'Wild Hunt', p 436. ISBN0-394-73467-X.
- ^Ruben A. Koman, Dalfser Muggen Profiel, Bedum 2006. [1]
- ^Hutton, Ronald, 'Paganism in the Lost Centuries', p 169, Witches, Druids, and King Arthur, 3rd ed. 2006 ISBN1-85285-397-2.
- ^Carlo Ginzburg, Storia Notturna – Una decifrazione del sabba, Biblioteca Einaudi
- ^'Transcendental Etude No. 8 'Wilde Jagd' - Giorgi Latso - Piano Music - Free classical music online'. www.classicalconnect.com.
- ^'Der Freischutz'. www.danielmcadam.com.
- ^Cross, Charlotte Marie; Berman, Russell A. (2000). Schoenberg and Words: The Modernist Years. pp. 37–38. ISBN9780815328308.
- ^'Ghost Riders In the Sky: The Wild Hunt and the Eternal Stampede'. 2012-12-09. Retrieved 6 July 2017.
- ^Mignola, Mike (2010). Hellboy. Vol. 9: The Wild Hunt. Dark Horse Comics. ISBN978-1-59582-431-8.
- ^Mignola, Mike (2006). Hellboy. Vol. 4: The Right Hand of Doom. Dark Horse Comics. ISBN978-1-59307-093-9.
- ^''Teen Wolf' season 6: What is the Wild Hunt and who are the Ghost Riders?'. 2016-11-19. Retrieved 6 July 2017.
- ^McCredden, Lyn (2017-02-08). The Fiction of Tim Winton: Earthed and Sacred. p. 42. ISBN9781743325032.
- ^Senior, Tom (2015-05-22). 'How The Witcher 3 puts misery back into mythology'. PC Gamer. Retrieved 2016-04-03.
The skull-faced Wild Hunt are derived from the European folk villains of the same name.
- ^'Lore: Wild Hunt'. The Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages. 2018-10-21. Retrieved 2018-11-06.
- ^ abGreenwood 2008, p. 216; Bramwell 2009, p. 42.
- ^ abcBramwell 2009, p. 42.
- ^Greenwood 2008, p. 216.
- ^Bramwell 2009, p. 50.
- ^Bramwell 2009, p. 51.
- ^'Thor Leads the Wild Hunt for Asgard'. 2015-06-18.
- ^Greenwood 2008, p. 220.
- ^ abGreenwood 2008, p. 198.
- ^Greenwood 2008, p. 201.
- ^Morgain 2012, p. 523.
Sources[edit]
- Banks, M.M. (1944). 'The Wild Hunt?'. Folklore. 55 (1): 42. doi:10.1080/0015587x.1944.9717708. JSTOR1257629.
- Binnall, Peter B. G. (1935). 'On a Possible Version of the Wild Hunt Legend in North Lincolnshire'. Folklore. 46 (1): 80–84. doi:10.1080/0015587x.1935.9718586. JSTOR1257360.
- Bramwell, Peter (2009). Pagan Themes in Modern Children's Fiction: Green Man, Shamanism, Earth Mysteries. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN978-0-230-21839-0.
- Duerr, Hans Peter (1985) [1978]. Dreamtime: Concerning the Boundary between Wilderness and Civilization. Felicitas Goodman (translator). Oxford and New York: Blackwell. ISBN978-0-631-13375-9.
- Ginzburg, Carlo (1990). Ecstasies: Deciphering the Witches' Sabbath. Raymond Rosenthal (translator). London: Hutchinson Radius. ISBN9780091740245.
- Grimm, Jacob (2004a) [1883]. Teutonic Mythology: Volume I. James Steven Stallybrass (translator). Mineola: Dover.
- Grimm, Jacob (2004b) [1883]. Teutonic Mythology: Volume III. James Steven Stallybrass (translator). Mineola: Dover.
- Greenwood, Susan (2008). 'The Wild Hunt: A Mythological Language of Magic'. Handbook of Contemporary Paganism. James R. Lewis and Murphy Pizza, eds. Leiden: Brill. pp. 195–222.
- Houston, Susan Hilary (1964). 'Ghost Riders in the Sky'. Western Folklore. 23 (3): 153–162. doi:10.2307/1498899. JSTOR1498899.
- Hutton, Ronald (2014). 'The Wild Hunt and the Witches' Sabbath'(PDF). Folklore. 125 (2): 161–178. doi:10.1080/0015587x.2014.896968. hdl:1983/f84bddca-c4a6-4091-b9a4-28a1f1bd5361.
- Lecouteux, Claude (2011). Phantom Armies of the Night: The Wild Hunt and the Ghostly Processions of the Undead. Jon E. Graham (translator). Rochester: Inner Traditions. ISBN9781594774362.
- Morgain, Rachel (2012). 'On the Use of the Uncanny in Ritual'. Religion. 42 (2): 521–548. doi:10.1080/0048721x.2012.707802.
- Motz, Lotte (1984). 'The Winter Goddess: Percht, Holda, and Related Figures'. Folklore. 95 (2): 151–166. doi:10.1080/0015587x.1984.9716309. JSTOR1260199.
Bibliography[edit]
- Jean-Claude Schmitt, Ghosts in the Middle Ages: The Living and the Dead in Medieval Society (1998), ISBN0-226-73887-6 and ISBN0-226-73888-4
- Kris Kershaw, 'The One-Eyed God: Odin and the Indo-Germanic Mannerbunde', Journal of Indo-European Studies, (2001).
- Carl Lindahl, John McNamara, John Lindow (eds.) Medieval Folklore: A Guide to Myths, Legends, Tales, Beliefs, and Customs, Oxford University Press (2002), p. 432f. ISBN0-19-514772-3
- Otto Höfler, Kultische Geheimbünde der Germanen, Frankfurt (1934).
- Ruben A. Koman, 'Dalfser Muggen'. – Bedum: Profiel. – With a summary in English, (2006).
- Margherita Lecco, Il Motivo della Mesnie Hellequin nella Letteratura Medievale, Alessandria (Italy), Edizioni dell'Orso, 2001
External links[edit]
- Media related to Wild Hunt at Wikimedia Commons
- 'Wild Hunt' . Encyclopedia Americana. 1920.
- Rogers, Liam. 'The Wild Hunt'. White Dragon (Samhain 1999).
Retrieved from 'https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wild_Hunt&oldid=904030088'
The Wild Hunt is invoked only in time of need. While Bosmer are greatful to Y'ffre for the gift, they prefer not to use it. Once the Change happens they are no longer Bosmer. They have forsaken the greatest gift Y'ffre has given them, their form, and they can never go back.
When invoked, the Wild Hunt is typically a small number of Bosmer, such as a small village. The Changed will destroy the enemy of the Bosmer and anyone else in their way. Once this is done they destroy themselves. They don't last long. It is a truly chaotic form, the form from before. The form of the Dawn. Because of this it is incapable of lasting. It can't destroy the Bosmer because it destroys itself long before that would be possible.
- copy/pasted from hereWhen invoked, the Wild Hunt is typically a small number of Bosmer, such as a small village. The Changed will destroy the enemy of the Bosmer and anyone else in their way. Once this is done they destroy themselves. They don't last long. It is a truly chaotic form, the form from before. The form of the Dawn. Because of this it is incapable of lasting. It can't destroy the Bosmer because it destroys itself long before that would be possible.
From what I recall off hand a wild hunt is triggered by a large group of bosmer all intentionally triggering the change (which is something they all apparently know but don't share with other races) and the hunt continues as the mass of bosmer rampage and ends only when they run out of food. At that time they kill and devour each other until only one is left standing as the champion of the hunt.
http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Wild_Hunt
http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Wild_Hunt
I'm under the impression that the wild hunt spreads like a curse affecting people who are unwilling as well. At the end of the AD storyline we see the silvanar become feral in a scenario so I assumed valenwood was massively outnumbered a a huge number of bosmer created a wild hunt of big size and even affected the silvanar. But if a small number of bosmer do it I assume only a small village is affected?