Question: Why does Tyr have Epic Intelligence associated?
Hmm, good question. Back in the dawn of time, in the first few rounds of our pantheon edits, we gutted most of Tyr's associations (which were dumb - seriously, Epic Wits? what?) and replaced them with ones that made at least a little more sense. We actually went through a few rounds of Tyr associations, because he's a very fishy one to try to pin down, even for the Aesir who are always a little bit sketchy.
Tyr's association with Epic Intelligence comes from his reconstructed role as the proto-Germanic father god, a role that many scholars believe he may have occupied before Odin became the preeminent leader of the pantheon. In that role, he was considered a wise and venerable war god, both qualities that he later lost dominion over when Odin took over as the major patron of both. In the purely Norse canon, he is still associated with war and courage, but is no longer the wise father figure, and in fact is subordinate to and considered son of Odin.
We kept the Epic Intelligence association as a nod to Tyr's Tiwaz persona; whether or not Tyr was ever actually in charge of the Aesir at some point depends on your Storyteller's choices about background and mythology, but the concept is certainly out there in Germanic myth. We thought it was worthwhile to represent, and at any rate no thinner than some of the other Norse deities' cobbled-together-from-Edda-asides associations.
But if you're really not into it, it's probably the least strong of his associations, and of course different games may choose to ignore the Germanic connection completely.
I've just been thinking: almost all the 'why does this god have this epic' questions seem to be either Intelligence (Dagda, Lakshmi, and now Tyr), or Wits (Ishtar and Hecate).
ReplyDeleteYeah, or why doesn't God X have Intelligence/Wits is also ever-popular.
DeleteI think it's for two different reasons. Intelligence covers a really broad range of different ideas and concepts (smarts, wisdom, secret knowledge, teacher gods, seers and sages, etc.), which means that lots of different people have different ideas of what it means and who has it, which naturally leads to questioning its inclusion (or lack thereof). Wits, on the other hand, is a stat that is really hard to pin down or demonstrate in a narrative, so it's often questioned because it's elusive and invisible in many stories.
Of course, totally first to admit that some of our associations are stronger than others (occupational hazard, I guess). Most of the ones people question are ones we understand the concerns and opposing viewpoints on; it's rare that someone comes up with a challenge to an association that sounds totally off the wall to us.
I can't count how many times people have tried to argue that Lugh has either wits or intelligence.
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