Woodhelven during the SunBane

[variol son]

How did they survive is my question.

Stonedowns were obviously safe, since stone remains unaffected by rain or drought or pestilence or fertility. A tree however, is subject to all of those things, and a Woodhelven is a tree. So how did they survive the SunBane?

Under the rules of the SunBane as we saw them in The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, a tree would grow an an unnatural rate during a Sun of Fertility, become disease ridden during a Sun of Pestilence and then melt away into nothing during a Desert Sun.

We can guess that Stonemight Woodhelven was protected by it's shard of the Illearth Stone, but other Woodhelven should not have survived. Yet the mention of Far Woodhelven, and of the unnamed Woodhelven where Sunder and Hollian learned of the existence of Landsverge Stonedown in White Gold Wielder shows that they continued.

Any thoughts?

[Warmark]

Oversight?

I really cant remember but, perhaps they were named Woodhelven just because they used to be Woodhelven there, but now they people have addapted.

Guesswork until i reach further in TWL but, they might have changed the way they live, but kept the old names.

[variol son]

I did think that maybe all settlements were primarily made from stone and that the people of the Land simply kept the old names, but surely they would at least rename the village as a stonedown, e.g. Far Stonedown instead of Far Woodhelven.

[I'm Murrin]

I think that they kept the name because the inhabitants were still Woodhelvennin, even if their trees were gone and the lillianrill lore forgotten. Stonemight Woodhelven had wooden houses on stilts as kind of a hark back to the old Woodhelvens, it being the closest they could get to living in trees again. Could be it was common practice to find a shaded spot (like the crevice at the bottom of which Stonemight was built) and build homes like this.

[iQuestor]

Well, we know that soaring woodhelvin was a tree, as well as Revelwood. But when TC was detained in StoneMight, I do not remember any mention of a tree as soaring woodhelvin. My guess is that they did keep their names as Murrin suggests, even though they lost their heritage.

[Avatar]

Sounds reasonable to me.

--A

[tonyz]

One thing should probably be noted: if they are still distinct physical types after all these years it probably means that they have kept very separate over the centuries -- one would expect several millenia of interbreeding to have pretty much erased the differences. So wherever they lived probably wasn't close to the Stonedowners, or else there was little or no intermarriage among them.

(They seem to have been separate types even before Kevin's time; I speculate that the Stonedowners were originally descended from the southerners coming up from Doriendor Corishev, and the Woodhelvinnen from the northerners coming into the Land and cutting down the One Forest from that direction.)

[variol son]

Ooer, good thoughts tonyz.

Oh, and everyone else too.

[iQuestor]

tonyz said:

I speculate that the Stonedowners were originally descended from the southerners coming up from Doriendor Corishev, and the Woodhelvinnen from the northerners coming into the Land and cutting down the One Forest from that direction.)

so the Woodhelvinnen were responsible for the demise of the one forest?dang. thats deep.

I didn't get that they were distinct physical types, I just thought that they were perhaps just people who used different lore and had different customs: Stonedowners for stone lore, woodhelvinnen for wood lore.

the sun bane had been going on for how long? it had been 6000 years since Covenant left, and it had to have taken some time for foul to come back and get going, so perhaps 2000 years the sunbane had been growing.

when the change occurred, you have to wonder why they stayed. probably because they were gradually changing their lifestyle and worldview based on the new environment and the coming of the Clave.

[Marv]

This seems like a good question for the Gradual Interview.

[I'm Murrin]

I'd gotten the impression that the Stonedowns and Woodhelvens had only come about when the Land recovered from the Ritual. The stonedownors, after the Ritual, were the people who survived by moving into the southern mountains, and Wood-lore was forgotten while Stone-lore continued, because one was more useful than the other for surviving. Five hundred years in the wilderness led to the Stonedownors as a distinct race. Supposedly there's a similar explanation for the Woodhelvennin, but if there is we were never told it, so we can only guess what they did during the big exile that followed Kevin's Ritual.

[Warmark]

it had been 6000 years since Covenant left

Mabye my memory serves me wrong but i thought it was 3000 - 4000 at most.

A day to a Land year roughly.

[I'm Murrin]

Approx. 3500, for both Second and Last time scales.

[burgs]

It doesn't seem that the "W" (I'm not going to try and spell it, it's too late), could have survived the Sunbane, given their affinity to the roots of the Land. Their destruction of the forest? I'm not quite sure that I understand how that could have happened, unless they were caught under a mad sun and were driven so.

Yes, good question for the GI, I suppose, but one that SRD would probably tell us to figure out for ourselves, because while it's a great question, the answer should be easily answered. (Not that I have the answer, nor do I think anyone else is wrong...that's just what I think SRD might say, having read his GI faitfully. Is that a bad thing?)

[lucimay]

sorry to be off topic but WHERE THE HECK HAVE YOU BEEN, burgs? dang.

[drew]

Wasn't Stonemight built up on wooden posts?

I suspect that Lumber might last a little better in a dessert sun or pestulent then a living tree. And during the Fertile suns, more wood could have been cut doewn to make posts and lumber, to relace what would have gotten damaged.

[burgs]

Biding my time, Lucimay.....

[High Lord Tolkien]

Wasn't Stonemight built up on wooden posts?

I suspect that Lumber might last a little better in a dessert sun or pestulent then a living tree. And during the Fertile suns, more wood could have been cut doewn to make posts and lumber, to relace what would have gotten damaged.

That makes the most sense.
It's not like everyone's clothes, tables and other textiles melted away during the desert sun.
There must have been some kind of "law" or skill that kept these things intact.

[lucimay]

Biding my time, Lucimay.....

well nice to see you!



(now back to your regularly scheduled discussion)

[burgs]

Forgive my ignorance, but what's the source of your Avatar? I should know this, and it's been bugging me for a long time.