Rewriting the Gospels for Germanic Barbarians
The Hêliand, composed about 830 A.D., is a tale of the life of Christ in the Old Saxon language. It takes the form of an epic poem, a saga in verse, and was part of a missionary effort to convert the Germanic, early Medieval Saxons from the worship of their ancestral gods to Christianity. It’s […]
Language Windows Into the Vagrant Underworld
Since I was first exposed to D&D, I’ve thought it was neat that one of the languages you could be proficient in was “thieves’ cant,” a language for rogues. Real life and real languages are more complicated, but secret languages do exist, and they have been used in criminal activity. One such is Rotwelsch, a […]
I’ll Sell You Sicily, but You’ll Still Have to Conquer It (Part 1: The Hook)
From 1250 to 1266, four successive popes worked to sell the Kingdom of Sicily to any capable European warrior-aristocrat who could afford the steep asking price. The trouble was, the papacy didn’t own Sicily. In fact, Sicily already had a king who was none too pleased with the whole affair. These popes weren’t selling control […]
Feodor Fedorenko
Once a month here on the Molten Sulfur Blog, I run content taken from our book Archive: Historical People, Places, and Events for RPGs. This post is one of eighty entries in Archive, each more gameable than the last! This post is brought to you by beloved Patreon backer Colin Wixted. Thanks for helping keep […]
The Bishop-Rumors of Notker the Stammerer
Around 884 A.D., an anonymous monk (tentatively identified as Notker the Stammerer) in what is today Switzerland penned a compilation of anecdotes in an attempt to ingratiate himself with King Charles the Fat. The anecdotes were mostly excuses to praise Charles’ great-grandfather, Charlemagne. As Notker was writing 70 years after Charlemagne’s death, these stories – little […]
The Rose-Realm of Laurin, King of Dwarves and Giants
The Laurin poem is a Medieval German saga of adventure and conquest. While the story is pretty boilerplate, it has a truly remarkable setting and antagonist: the sylvan realm of gardens, glades, and underground castles ruled by Laurin, the pagan king of dwarves and giants. Let’s ignore the boring stuff and jump straight to the […]
The Mos Teutonicus and the Excarnates
If a Medieval European aristocrat died far from home, what was to be done with the body? His family usually wanted it returned to be buried with his relatives, but that could entail a weeks-long Faulknerian trip with an ever-riper corpse. Embalming was one solution, but it was frightfully expensive. Enter the mos teutonicus, a […]
The Hoard of Sigurd Fafnir’s-Bane
The Völsunga saga from late 13th-century Iceland is an amazing story of love, heartbreak, adventure, violence, and betrayal. It tells the story of a Germanic warrior named Sigurd, the treasure he wins, the politics he gets caught up in, and the bloody aftermath of it all. It’s incredibly gameable! Let’s look at the relevant parts […]
1936 Olympics in Berlin
Once a month here on the Molten Sulfur Blog, I run content taken from our book Archive: Historical People, Places, and Events for RPGs. This post is one of eighty entries in Archive, each more gameable than the last! This post is brought to you by beloved Patreon backer Justin Moor. Thanks for helping keep […]
Germanic Barbarians As Orcs
There’s been kind of a thing in the RPG blogosphere of recasting standard fantasy monster races. Two that have stuck with me are Hayami Rasenjin’s hobgoblin and Monsters and Manuals’ Lamarckian orc. This is my version. The Roman historian Tacitus gives us another version of the orc in his portrayal of Germanic barbarians: a bunch […]
The Hinterkaifeck Murders
Once a month on the Molten Sulfur Blog, we have a post taken from our book Archive: Historical People, Places, and Events for RPGs. This post, about an unsolved German murder, is one of eighty entries in Archive, each more gameable than the last! The Hinterkaifeck MurdersParanormal Cold Case Located about 70 miles north of Munich, […]