[gurps] RE: [Worldbuilding] Intriguing concept

[hal at buffnet.net]

Hello Folks,
  Thank you all for those who have responded thus far - although I've not
responded to much recently, that is more due to the fact I'm averaging
about 4 hours sleep for these last few days plus some personal stuff
going on.

Having said that, I'm pleased to see some of the thoughs being posted thus
far and I'd like to explore these thoughts a little further.  To wit:

Presumption:
Ages 0 through 5 are spent much like toddlers in any culture spend them -
learning control of their bodies and developing their cognative abilities
including speach and so forth.

Ages 5+ through 12 are spent engaging in athletics that build the body and
engage in building the martial spirit in girl children.

Ages 12+  through 16 are spent in building a small unit of like aged girls
into a proto-military unit.  Here, loyalties are built towards each other
such that as a unit, they'd all die rather than permit dishonor or to be
dishonored.

Ages 16+ through 23: child bearing years along with child rearing years. 
Assuming a mandated 9 month pregnancy, 3 months "down time" after
pregnancy, plus an addition 3 months of time trying to "catch with child",
an average of 15 months per child over a period of 75 months for 5
children.  This is a touch over 6 years time. So call it 7 years to
account for variances and so forth.

Ages 23+ onwards - active military lifetime of the woman in question.

During pregnance, early phase up to say, 5 months term, the woman engages
in archery or slinger practice.  After birth, but before next pregnancy,
woman exercises daily to regain "fighting trim".  Studs who favor girl
child production are accorded more honor (and are likely to be loaned out
more" than studs who produce boy child progeny.  Males are relegated
towards those crafts that the women do not engage in.  If most women are
by law required to be kept fit and trim as warriors, this leaves most men
maintaining the cultural needs such as food production, clothing
production, and other forms of craftsmanship.  Not all men are beasts of
burden working the farms and such - some are also helpful towards rearing
children and the like.

Laws of the land: visiting violence upon a woman... if done by a woman, it
is an issue of honor to be determined between the aggressor and the
aggressed.  If a man does it - death by some painful method.  If a man
engages in violence against a man, the matter is taken up by the woman who
owns the man.  If violence is done against a man by a woman, the woman is
fined by some customary price.

Failure to produce children: the woman is stripped of her rights to hold
land, honor etc.  Social status depends on how many daughters the woman
has.  Minimal number of children that must be born unto any Amazon is 3.

Raiding: if a woman can not bring into the world at least 3 children, she
may instead, raid upon a village outside of the Amazonian culture - and
bring 3 or more girl children from outside to be raised as Amazons. 
Adopted children count as 1/2 child for purposes of status.

Unwanted males: aside from those left to die of exposure at birth, some
male children may be deemed unneccessary and sold off as slaves to other
cultures.  Such children may or may not be mutilated (such as the removal
of the tongue to keep the male children from teaching Amazonian tongue
elsewhere?) and remmoved from Amazonian culture.

Interpersonal relationships may or may not include simple marriage as we
know it in most cultures, or it may be between women only - perhaps an
older woman and younger woman for continuity of ownership for land. 
Perhaps it is a group line marriage where each woman has a specific place
in the "line" such as second eldest or fourth eldest within the line. 
Each family is thus a larger non-nuclear style family.

Ah well, that should get my creative juices (and hopefully yours!)
flowing.  The idea here is to flesh out the Amazonian society as a
functional unit rather than leave the whole thing as an unexamined culture
for GM's to use in their game worlds.  Such an Amazonian culture would
truly be alien out of neccessity, and might make for a fun role playing
experience for GM's to hit their unsuspecting players with.  This isn't
about making women "men" and men "women" for the players to play in.  It
is about describing the way of life, the cultural institutions, and so
forth so that players in a game can interact with it and say "This ain't
Kansas Dorathy!".