The People (ethnicity)
Here are some more facts about the People, more concerning their culture than their physical makeup.
Naming Traditions
Feminine names
Names like Chalve, Rikkve. Often disyllabic but not always.
Masculine names
Names like Geld, Sarm, Humd, Keruam. Often monosyllabic but not always.
Unisex names
Names are generally considered to be unisex, it's just that some are more common among men than among women, for instance.
Family names
Family names are not used. If needed, the People might say for instance "Ailek, child of Keruam".
Culture
Major language groups and dialects
The People speak two languages: The First Tongue and the Second Tongue.
The First Tongue is a spoken language.
The Second Tongue is a signed language, useful for when out hunting or when you want to be quiet.
The People can and often do hold two conversations at once, one in First and one in Second Tongue.
Shared customary codes and values
One custom that the People all share is the belief in the law of the land: that one must always make good use of what one hunts, lest it angers the spirits of the prey as well as the Sun and Moons. Another one is the belief that one always accepts food if offered, to decline food is a sign of madness.
Children are raised both by their biological parents and communally, by the entire tribe. To put it simply: your parents are your parents, but the tribe is like your aunts and uncles and cousins.
Average technological level
Hunter-gatherer, no agriculture, no cloth making, no written language. The People use stone tools.
Common Etiquette rules
Putting both fists crossed over your chest is a gesture of greeting.
There is a special hand sign made to ward off evil.
Common Dress code
The People dress in clothes made out of animal skins; they don't know how to weave cloth. A typical winter or autumn outfit for one of the People would be a tunic and leggings as underwear, then a hooded jacket made from reindeer fur, trousers made from reindeer fur and boots made from reindeer skin. They use many animals' pelts when they make their clothes and use what's best for the moment, not just reindeer pelts. In the summer they forgo the thick jackets and trousers and just dress in tunics and simple trousers, with shoes made from leather rather than thick fur. They also decorate their garments with things like feathers, seashells and other beautiful things, and also wear jewellery.
Art & Architecture
The People paint on rocks and inside caves, and very rarely make petroglyphs (rock carvings). Their architecture is building various shelters; all tribes are nomadic, although some only move twice a year and some move much more frequently than that.
Common Customs, traditions and rituals
One common custom among the People is to pray every night, and another is to make certain rituals every brightnight.
Birth & Baptismal Rites
Children of the People are not named at birth, but when they've reached the age of three. This is in part due to high infant mortality and an unnamed child being slightly easier to lose than one you've already named.
Coming of Age Rites
At your 15th birthday, you are considered an adult by the People, and must go through the appropriate rites. The night before your birthday, the tribe shaman will approach you and ask you if you want to be a man, woman or kilak. Boys becoming men get spirals tattooed on their shoulders "so that they may carry many burdens", girls becoming women get a symbol of the three moons tattooed on their forehead "to show the moons their willingness to bleed for them (i.e menstruate)", and kilak get a triangle on their forehead, showing that they're neither men, with blank foreheads, or women, with the Blessings of the Moons symbol, but instead kilak, which is something different from men and women.
Funerary and Memorial customs
Each dead of the People must be buried in foetal position in the Marsh of the Dead, so that they may be reborn in the underworld. Failure to bury a member of the People in the Marsh of the Dead results in the dead person coming back as an evil, vengeful ghost to haunt you and your family.
Common Taboos
One taboo is to say that another member of the People is not a hunter; this is almost like saying that they're not a person, that they're worthless at everything they do and will never amount to anything. In this sense of the word, "hunter" also encompasses gathering, fishing, trapping, tracking and other useful survival skills.
A taboo they lack is one about eating dogs, they can and will eat their own dogs if they absolutely must.
Common Myths and Legends
Creation myth: The People were created by father Sun and mother Moon and her two sisters, who gave them good eyes to see prey with, good ears to hear prey with and good hearts to know how to only hunt was what needed. The land was still filled with bad spirits, however, and the Sun and Moons imprisoned them in the Land of the Dead, where dead People must dwell.
The dead: After being buried in foetal position in the Marsh of the Dead, the dead person is then literally reborn in the Land of the Dead, where they are tormented and tempted by evil spirits to commit evil deeds. If they manage to survive one full life without doing evil in the Land of the Dead, they're reborn again among the stars in the night sky.
Ideals
Beauty Ideals
A beautiful person for the People is one with lots of muscles as well as fat, showing that they're both strong and have access to lots of food.
Gender Ideals
Gender roles are fairly similar for men and women.
Encompassed species
Languages spoken
Related Locations
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