The Ginger Scrolls – Section 2 – A Gladdening of the Hearts

THE GINGER SCROLLS – PART  2 THE DEPARTURE CONTINUED……

You can read Part 1 here

 

Friend,

I remain nameless but deign not to remain silent. For my people, a gentle friendly Volk with arms outstretched in friendship for all they come across, remain afloat on their small lard hair vessels, tormented by the loss of their lands and kin.

But lo! Just as our tragedy told, seemed to beckon all hope to the shadowy leather bucket of Norsglkiadrtothonotom we received message in form of salvation from great Lord Protector. Galleothon.

Once a mighty warrior who challenged evil to a mime war and boldly saw evil from the door when he did his smiley face, Great Galleothon protector of our beliefs and spirits in times good as well as those tainted by sadness and despair had come to us. The incant of Galleothon was heard across the heavens in the defence and protection of his people;

We fall grim destiny

Locked upon a baleful wind

That draws us toward a future unknown

Oh Land! Oh ice and snow

What befalls us cannot stay

We shall weep but we vow to return one day

A promise made is a lie denied

Krol climbed the mast of his boat and bade us to listen to his warbling message. He took blood from his wrists and scrawled in a proud fist upon the spider’s web sail that sought the winds solace for our benefit. By his luck he wrote in a smallish hand stemming blood loss but those of us with eyesight weak had to squint mightily to read the tiny words.

We are free

Doubt not your heart

We can see

No end but a start

We sail to Deep South

For have no doubt

Galleothon will guide us well

Away from this cruel swell

To calmer water

That is free of slaughter

 

And on we sailed, for once the steel of cold sadness tempered by the thought of new homes and fates with land for us to till in return for our friendship and fealty. Each day we forged further, Mother Sun would appear for longer time, her warmth on our faces and her kindness rekindling our spirits.

The land of the Notalots beckoned……

 

 

To be continued….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Ginger Scrolls – Section 2 – Vos’ Lament

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here, Part 6 Here, Part 7 Here and Part 8 Here.

Following the tremendous reaction garnered around the world and beyond we are pleased and nearly honoured to bring you  Part 2 of The Scrolls.

There remains a debate amongst egg heads about Part 2. This is because it is not universally accepted by the shadowy Supreme Ginger Council that the Scrolls are indeed an accurate portrayal of the history of the ginger people and have in fact been completely made up.

This view has already featured on BBC 2’s excellent documentary series, “Smug bastards with nothing to be smug about being smug about things that nobody really cares about but allows them to travel the world, doinking dusky maidens and prattle on about the future of the Planet”.

Sadly our budget only stretches to sausage and chips in the local café served by Hilary a part-time orthodontic technician with a phobia for railings.

As with Part 1, an editorial decision has been taken to focus on the story and leave out the more technical elements contained in the Scrolls. This is particularly pertinent to one item.

The lard hair boats. 

For those interested in discovering more about lard hair boats we recommend;

“Fat and Follicles – Ghingar boat building techniques and methods” by Douglas Sandwell OUP (635 pages and a pop up keel).

“Sculpting in Lard – fat myth or fat fiction? – Douglas Sandwell – OUP 230 pages (Out of print).

THE GINGER SCROLLS – PART  2 THE DEPARTURE CONTINUED……

The Story So Far; The remnants of the Ghingar have been forced to flee their loved homeland in the north as a result of attacks by the warlike tribes, the Hups, Cups, Jups and Lups who blamed the Gingars for the famine and joylessness visited upon their own lands by the refusal of the Sun to return to them after the long winter months.

Making good their escape in the lard hair boats designed by Rep the Carpenter, the remaining Ginghars are dealt a further blow by the suicide of their beloved Princess Treytel after her betrothed Vos, turned into a dolphin.

Only the brave words and sincere heart of the warrior Krol girded their loins. At the end of Part 1, the Great Lord Protector,  Archangel Galleothon arises from the deep of the deep bits of the ocean to provide the heartbroken folk with hope and succor for their long journey into the southern seas and their untold future.

Their great journey now unfolds like a Cos lettuce leaf in a Waldorf salad. Enjoy.

We begin with Vos’ Lament for the death of his love Treytel……..

When told of her death he could not be solaced by friendly hand or pilchard snack as befitted a part man part Dolphin. Deep, deep into the eyes of Krol did Vos look as he bobbed in the swelling sea. Aghast at the news of the death of his love he forgot to float and sank into the deep. He hoved into view and cried out these words;

Stitch my wounds they have come undone

Rebind the ties that tether me to sanity

My heart bleeds useless sentiment

As I visit your memory

This breaking, raw, flailing pain

Swirls with unctuous ease

Around my mind

As to what if and perhaps

 

Youthful, stubborn pride

Earnest wishes of a mendicant fool

Return to me stolen years

Of the loss of you

 

Cold cold my mind’s eye now lies

No longer towards the sun and future untold

But to hoar frost breath of far behind

The Sun’s rays fall cold upon my soul

Embers of their fires warm no part of me

I am frozen in essence and form

Bereft of all that I know to be true

If I had known what I know now

I would have died for the memory of you

No love will conquer your loss

No hope will instill peace in me

This septic, taunting pain endures

As brute reminder to my folly

Friend, tell me how to forget her

Because I cannot

I will not, shall not

My last breath shall shape your name

My last thought shall capture your smile

My last heartbeat will be broken

And when the worms that will dine on me rest

They shall spell your name

 

Rip and tear my flesh

I have no need of it now

Salt these opened sores

A foolish life I have made

But a life I know must be lived

And true

To all those things

I hold dear 

 

You above all

I wish you well

As I depart dead hopes

Now decaying and pustulant

But like a child’s first unsteady steps

There will be a world of untrampled dreams

To set foot upon once more with undisguised glee

I love you

But I must source peace

To tie me to sanity’s calm purpose

Tears soaked our cheeks as these words, whispered with a sadness as was never heard before or since, fell upon our souls like the dust from a traveller’s sandals.

Vos fell beneath the water as the life of the careworn mariner in the northern seas bade him to come forward. Like Treytel, he too was now lost to us.

To be continued….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 8 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here, Part 6 Here and Part 7 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 8……..a very short one….

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

Then from the sea a beam of light poured out, shooting to the heavens and in the beam a great figure, shadowy at first but gaining depth and texture with each moment, emerged. The figure stepped out of the Ray of Light.

Krol fell to his knees, tears fell down his cheeks and he beat his chest with his mittened hands. “Lord Galleothon! Thou hast come! Thou hast answered our prayers and heard our laments” We are blessed Lord by your presence.”

 

Galleothon rose to his full height of 4 adult sheep. He spoke;

“I am with you people of Ghingar. Your time in the North is now at an end. You are chosen. Your history was written eons ago by myself and my cousin Borofron, keeper of the saints shoes. It is now time for the next part of your history to unfold.”

 

He stood amongst us all, his great size and power over all things giving the broken spirits of the Ghingars new heart and hope. No more tears flowed that day. No more sadness entered hearts. Our Lord Galleothon was with us.

 

We fall grim destiny

Locked upon a baleful wind

That draws us toward a future unknown

Oh Land! Oh ice and snow

What befalls us cannot stay

We shall weep but we vow to return one day

A promise made is a lie denied

 

 

That concludes Part 1 of The Ginger Scrolls……..What will happen in Part 2?…….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 7 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here, Part 5 Here and Part 6 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 7……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

Some swore they saw mother Sun beyond the Horizon, at last revealing herself to us after wait so long and tragic. Hope built once more like the snow mason constructing a new home cube by cube.

But it was not to be.

Princess Treytel loved Vos as deep as the ocean and as high as the sky. For each day of passage the lovers would look across to each other and utter betrothals of love. Each day Vos’ became more and more fevered with loss for his bride and eager for his love’s embrace. Finally, foolishly, and like all young love – stupidly – Vos leapt from his vessel and sought to swim the narrow channel between to reach his love.

 

Treytel saw him fall under the foaming water and never saw him return to the surface as a mortal. A dolphin took his place and wore his little leather cap until it too was lost to the deep. Treytel maintained an eye upon the smiling face of her dolphin lover as he swam nearby, singing to her with a series of clicks and fish impressions which only he understood. But they still made her laugh, the laughter of lovers. Her tears fell at night worried about married life with a dolphin and how she would survive in the water for any prolonged period but love would accommodate her fears and allow her to avoid salt damaged skin. She hoped at least.

Melancholy sat over the vessels like a mighty cheese, dripping salty distemper amongst the flame haired. So much death. So much sadness.

When would the fates allow them to come ashore? What would they find when they reached land? Heroes and hand maidens or goblins and left handed people?

The darkness blackened their souls. Hatred returned when for generations they had existed without it.

Treytel’s tears would not abate, as Vos  skitted one final time, bade his love a clicky farewell and swam with his new family away as their protectors and toward the open sea and a rendezvous with Sea World (note – possible translation error). As she watched him swim away, Treytel cried after her love,

Run to my memory

Along the shore

Swim to my memory

Across the ocean

Climb to my memory

To the highest peak

And when you arrive

Forget not your labour and do not forget me

 

Will I lay with you upon a bed of foaming sea?

The quilted tide warming our bones

Will I hold your heart?

As we float toward Epthereon

Will you my love, love me?

I am distant from your shore

Will you wait for me?

 

 

Such sadness consumed her that she fled her vessel and met the sea water with a diffident splash never to be seen again. The sorrow of the Ghingars at losing their beloved princess was now complete. No words or songs could rest their weary hearts. No tales of the brave or the beautiful would suffice them. Their misery now total.

 

Krol spoke to his people, in quiet hushed tones, mournful in full and suffering from a rooted wind;

 

“When I see your face

I know that I am not past

To the Northern skies I shall turn

And watch the winds dance atop our lands

I will bade them sad departure

As my homeland is now far

 

Oh! Joy of Galleothon bid that I

Even as an old man who asks not for life long

But to sit by your shoulder

And at peace finally I set
My home

My land

Of snow

Of Ice

But the warmth of my kin

Shall stay anymore sadness
Krol finished his sentence and at the moment the wind dropped and the sea was calm, flat like the milkmaid’s embrace. There was silence amongst the Ghingars, for once dropping their daytime incantations. A great hand, cupped into a fist came from the water. It smashed down upon satin sea and threw up a great plume of spray, covering the lard hair vessels.
The fist smote the water once more, again deluging the fearful crews and their broken hearted cargo. And then it was gone. The water’s returned to their calm status, benign and forgiving.

Then from the sea a beam of light poured out, shooting to the heavens and in the beam a great figure, shadowy at first but gaining depth and texture with each moment, emerged. The figure stepped out of the Ray of Light.

Krol fell to his knees, tears fell down his cheeks and he beat his chest with his mittened hands. “Lord Galleothon! Thou hast come! Thou hast answered our prayers and heard our laments” We are blessed Lord by your presence.”

Galleothon rose to his full height of 4 adult sheep. He spoke;

“I am with you people of Ghingar. Your time in the North is now at an end. You are chosen. Your history was written eons ago by myself and my cousin Borofron, keeper of the saints shoes. It is now time for the next part of your history to unfold.”

To be continued……..

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 6 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here and Part 5 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 5……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

One of our number, Strik, bade us farewell and leapt to his death, honoured to be with his kin in after world favouring their affections to those of us still alive. His choice his Way.

Upon the prow of our ships, Narwhals guided us through the disdainful water, their tusks like beacons of light in the grey murk, guiding our navigators to sail with some knowledge of where our desolate future lay.

To each side of our vessels dolphins swam as outriders, to inform and protect the flame haired of any advancing danger or destitute Huplanders who dared to do battle still.

 

Great birds, sent by their brother Exeretheon the Night Flyer squalled above the vessels, eyeing the clouds, wind and future light and the greatest of them the size of a small motorway service station (this may be an error in translation), would defecate on Kerkhof the Pilot of the lead vessel, with messages of the course to be taken.

Man, woman and child, in lard hair boats were carried by desolate winds of despair and the surly tides of bondage. For 173 days we ventured south towards unknown worlds and peoples we had so studiously sought to avoid these previous eons.

We made our peace with the green eyed sea for safe passage. And still mother Sun refused to appear to help or woes lighten and our misery.

Silver gilded Gryphon’s spied upon our desperate journey and their spectral presence haunted even the youngest amongst us. Only Exeretheon’s brothers prevented attacks. For evil’s granite claw has dug its black heart into our people and is determined to make us suffer with every cruel twist of the fates.

 

From each vessel our volk peeled low murmurs to reason with our Gods for safe passage and sanctuary and to cry for the loss of homes, kith, kin and kilns. Oh Tragedy! Oh despair from whence we came, to where we go, we know not save for the lone Pilots of our own destiny, guiding the last of our volk to a future unwritten and unknown.

Sing for the dead

Sing for the living

Sing for the forgotten

Sing for the weary, the tired and the vanquished

Sing of mirth and good nature

Sing to life

Sing my song my love when I am far away

For I shall sing for you

Our incantations, as tradition dictated would continue for the time between day and night, when the winds turned against us. On we would sing, bitter salted tears stinging our eyes and grazing our sallow, dirtied cheeks, but we would not stop as the words gave us comfort and hope as if our past was with us in the present and so we could see a future.

Our flame coloured hair billowed like sparks of fire in the mocking sea breeze, assailing our features and licking our faces like tongues of spitting flame and the people of the lands we traveled past considered our vessels aflame. Even the tawdry gulls afeared, squawking their desultory announcements.

Where we venture from, our land cruelly taken from us by famine and the curse of the fear and famine forged into evil intent by Overath and his minions, was unknown to many who saw us float past them, nor could they fathom or dared ask as we sailed along the coast of Hupland.

Shoreliners, peasants and warriors alike, eager to see us on our way from their barren coastal lands forged a peace with each other in doing so. As we approached night would fall, the Sun abandoning these places also. Even mother Sun was abandoning us to our fate in near Southern lands. The Shoreliners and their protectors invoked the voices of their Gods for wrath to be visited upon our wretched band of kin to move us from their lands and allow precious light to restore its benevolence upon their lands. For famine too had wreaked great suffering along these lands.

As the Hup Chronicles say “There these carriers of doom, these harbingers of evil, and these soulless beasts moved along the coast murmuring and chanting to our gods for evil mercy to fall upon us for the passage of sin conducted by the drowned Overath and his blooduse minions. Had they been abandoned by our deities for foul deeds done foully or had they failed to pay homage to our Gods for protection?

Across the land the people begged for Valhalla’s curse to be lifted and mighty Odin to protect them from the reek of evil these red haired people came imbued with. Curse upon them and their kin we would cry and we would launch stones, rocks and leather leggings out to the cold, green swell in an attempt to ward the flame hairs from landing on our land. But the flame hairs never looked towards land. Instead they maintained a regal pose aboard their proud ships made of lard and hair and steadily floated toward the place the great sea creatures and sea birds were leading them to. For some of us it became a beautiful sight to behold – a broken people together in life and death.” (The Hup chronicles are available in hard back from any good bookshop).

Our tears do fall into the sea

Our hearts are broken wrenched as we are from home

Our hopes are battered upon the brooding swell

But we shall meet again of that I am sure my friend

In a land of peace and Sun

 

We trusted our senses and we paid fealty to our guides and no amount of leather leggings would dispel us from this aim.

On the vessels sailed, beyond the fear and callous overtures of the mortal Shoreliners – our phalanx of sea creature’s guiding us to our unknown destination. Our people’s thoughts finally turning to warmer kinder thoughts, of dance and merriment of love and laughter. Perhaps the great tragedy that lay in the recesses of the far North could be laid to rest.

Some swore they saw mother Sun beyond the horizon, at last revealing her to us after wait so long and tragic. Hope built once more.

But it was not to be.

To be continued………

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 5 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here; Part 2 Here; Part 3 Here and Part 4 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 5……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

“The lard hair boats, be our saviour!” he cried. Many hand mocked his father’s insistence on lashing lard and spare hair together into vessels three sun cycles previously, a mad eyed Karibou they called him, but now his foresight was praised for we, the remnants of the Ghingar Empire could finally set about our future with renewed vim and vigour.

“For when we sail

To far off shores

What shall we see?

What will our children say?

What will be their final word on us?

That we fled our lands, their future home

That we banished them from their destiny?

That we stole their souls?

That we gave them life?

That we gave them destiny?

That we could in our darkest hours afford them hope?

What will they say?

I hope it is kind”

And so friend, we sailed with deep tears in our hearts to witness farewell to our time and our peace. Leaving the lee of the mighty river Sallopian, for so long our source of protection we floated into the gloating Northern seas.

As we set south, the God of Ice, Rijsbergen, sent forth his messengers to guard and guide us through these a dark desolate places populated only by the ghoulish memory of drowned adventurers from time immemorial, their frozen faces etched into the ice that gaoled them.

(Oh Archangel Galleofron where are you to protect your soul keepers? We need you more than ever. Not since the time of the arrival of the Shoelace People have we sought your protective cloak and twig of justice.)(Note; Twig may in fact be sword but the lettering is unclear)

We sail in peace to new found lands

To find our loves who have left before us

We hope that we shall meet again

But even if we do not

Know that you sail with us!

 

Our Ice Guardians, Neeskens and Jongbloed, great slabs of ice, hewn from their Kingdom’s lands at the earliest memory, their faces etched with age and shaped by the sear of the sun and the freeze of the cold, moved south with us and slowly saw our homeland diminished. A deep, still sadness fell upon us as the distance formed between us and our home of memories and kin.

One of our number, Strik, bade us farewell and leapt to his death, honoured to be with his kin in the after world favouring their affections to those of us still alive. His choice his Way.

Upon the prow of our ships, Narwhals guided us through the disdainful water, their tusks like beacons of light in the grey murk, guiding our navigators to sail with some knowledge of where our desolate future lay.

To each side of our vessels dolphins swam as outriders, to inform and protect the flame haired of any advancing danger or destitute Huplanders who dared to do battle still.

Of which there were many.

 

 

To be continued………

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 4 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here and Part 2 Here and Part 3 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 4……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

They sailed for evil intent.

We still huddled in our homes, yearning for lost sun and warmth and food did not see, hear or sense their approach. Three hundred or so ships melting from the east, slicing through our frozen waters in their stone clad vessels like a snore through dreams.

They visited terrible vengeance, slaying our weary Out Guards, pulling down the great beloved Ice Buttock and entering our lands. They slew our King, Michelsrinus, pillaged his family and boiled his potatoes in a cauldron lined with the skins of his children. “Tasty, very tasty.” Overath murmured. “Kill them all!” was his final order to his squadrons.

“Avenge these flame hairs from our lands – sweep them out to the seas beyond our sight and nets. We besiege the Gods. There is nothing we ask of them. Woe, woe, woe upon us that we must sight such evil.”

Fires were kindled and lit along our shores to guide more avengers toward us. Swords sharpened, arrows tipped, axe heads forged and shields buffed to shiny niceness. Men of war and men of peace cojoined to attack the evil they saw in these Northern lands. They coated themselves in grease and roasted chestnuts to pass the time. Some played tag, others knitted and the greatest warrior amongst them known as Bloodlust, the height of two adult sheep, learned the basics of tap dancing.

Why did you come?

Men from the South

Why utter such hatred

From your pustulant mouth 

We sheltered in the lee of the Hidden halls, deep beneath Holy Mountain Westerneye, sheltered from the slaughter but not from the pitying screams of our Volk as they sought false sanctuary, from the bloodied axe and the striking sword, pitiful cries for clemency ignored. We cried, deep sorrowful cries of primal intent for them and yet amongst us few, guilt sodden relief that life still flowed through our piteous bodies.

Three nights of slaughter. No invader did venture towards the Hidden Halls, our brave blood refusing to betray us. Until the men from the South, sated in their need for ignorant vengeance finally set down their swords, axes and clubs and slept among the bodies of our dead.

Trebor the North wind came to our aid, forcing the invaders to leave our desolate lands and pushing the sighs of our dead and grieving South, away from our ears and memory.

 

(Translator’s note – Here the Scrolls fall silent. The in depth description and desecration of the Ghingar’s capital city of Rasmouldjensoningbirdemdeleanto, has never been recorded. If they were recorded in the Scrolls, for whatever reason the author has removed them and there is no trace of them anywhere else. Having said that it must have been pretty bad and so we can only guess at the sadness that these poor people endured. We know that the destruction of Rasmouldjensoningbirdemdeleanto, led to the first ever sponsored walk on behalf of someone or something. This is the stem of the modern day Ginger people’s love of a sponsored walk.)

 

…………One warrior amongst us stood still. Krol, the son of Rep the carpenter, bound us with fortitude. While we weak, afeared to leave the icy shell of the Hidden Halls for fear their protection would be rent from us, Krol parried our weakness and filled us with strength previously unknown in our hearts.

“The lard hair boats, be our saviour!” he cried. Many had mocked his father, Malcolm The Prepared, keeness to lash lard and spare hair together into vessels three sun cycles previously, “A mad eyed Karibou” they had called him, but now his foresight was praised for we, the remnants of the Ghingar Empire could finally set about our future with renewed vim and vigour.

 

For when we sail

To far off shores

What shall we see?

What will our children say?

 

What will be their final word on us?

That we fled our lands, their future home

That we banished them from their destiny?
That we stole their souls?

That we gave them life?

That we gave them destiny?

That we could in our darkest hours afford them hope?

What will they say?

I hope it is kind

 

To be continued………

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 3 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here and Part 2 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 3……..

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

As we say “In the darkest times night follows night”. The wisest knew that such darkness and cold meant that other tribes suffered from similar tribulation. We lived with our way and them with theirs. We hope it would stay that way. It was, alas not to be.

The King of the Hup, a mighty warrior ennobled as Overath, bade blood and fury to reek vengeance upon nature itself and tear the gentle Earth apart to teach her a lesson that never more would she treat the Hup with such disdain. His rage a madness that could only be lessened by death.

He crushed the skulls of thirteen House Carls with his double headed axe and bade for the blood of others. “Tis our tithe to kill, Tis our right to life, Tis our right to blame,” he cried. The people of Hup agreed and foamed with false anger and blazed with sham rage. Strangers. To blame. To find. To punish.

“To the North, to the North. The Ghingars have wrought this upon us with their devilry and odourless magic. It is they who must be stopped. For they are seeking to capture our souls for their own evil intent. They seek to starve us and steal the sun from us – we must destroy them. Summon the other Kings from Lup, Jup, Cup and Wup – I declare Council must be opened!”

It was as if they had become a single terrible beast spoken of in our own fables but never seen, whiffed or heard. A beast of ignorant rage and no more. “To the toll booth then –who has change?” cried mighty warrior Overath. With the Lups, Cups, Jups and Wups now in unison with the Hups, they sailed in mighty force in stone clad ships, captained by the black hearted sailor birds of the Vogts tribe, half man half puffin who sought no more reward than fish for their black hearted deeds.

 

They sailed for evil intent.

We still huddled in our homes, yearning for lost sun and warmth and food did not see, hear or sense their approach. Three hundred or so ships melting from the east, slicing through our frozen waters in their stone clad vessels like a snore through dreams.

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 2 (Of Many)

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

You can read Part 1 Here

Now ’tis time for Part 2

THE GINGER SCROLLS – THE DEPARTURE continued……

 

Ours was a simple world, made good by kindness, potatoes and a lack of foot disorders.

Kindness would be shown to strangers who ventured to our Homestead. The stranger would find life so satisfying that he would stay in perpetuity. On these rare times we would learn of the times in other worlds, the rise and fall of empires far to the South, East and West –  of men of different creeds and living their lives with many more laws, too many I would wager for peace to be allowed to roam over their lands and their people.

For the outsiders, where contentment was a threat rather than a treat, the non-return of strangers, or Nonomers as they were titled, from our lands only saw a further sense of mystery wrap itself around our people.

Tales of devilry and witchery amongst we Ginghars came common to these ignorant tongues. Tales were told by their story men and women of how we would eat our own, raw flesh torn limb from limb. How we savage hearts would allow our women to lay with wolves to produce offspring half man half wolf and how these desperate creatures were used by us to mortify the souls of neighbouring peoples.
Such tales are nonsensical in construct and meaning. Our great thinkers communed closely with the Wolf King, Haan for we bordered each other’s land and it was in each other’s interest to understand each other’s lives. But as we learned, efforts to understand anothers nature were oft seen by other men as an opportunity to curse our namewith their peoples in the name of greed and ignorance.

We lived on vegetables with animal flesh barely passing our lips – only then when the wolves left us offerings at the beginning and end of the dark season to mark their return to the forests that neighboured our lands. Again this was taken as signs of sorcery and witchcraft from our eventual foes.

For we ever understood their ways. We had no good or evil only what we termed Way (author’s note – the Ghingar term used here is actually Veluxmindacimentorroulatersnttfghping – literally translated as “direction of life within our snowy lands – we consider Way to be an appropriate translation).

 

Way of life, Way of death, Way of things, Way of meaning, Way of loving – we had many Ways.

(Note; there is now a lengthy passage in the Scrolls on agricultural techniques employed by the Ghingar. The main topic is how they managed to grow so many root vegetable in such Northern climes and only having snow and ice to grow them in. Whilst this may be considered an agricultural miracle, it is not considered relevant for gingerfightback’s purposes to include these pages. For an in depth assessment of Ghingar growing techniques the reader may like to obtain a copy of “In Ice and Snow We Made Things Grow – Ghingar farming practices and rituals – by Douglas Sandwell – OUP – 956 Pages and includes pop up lettuce).

 

The Dark Stayed…….

……………………………………………..Why the Sun decreed to stay in that year nobody will ever reason. Why the famine took hold, why the fish left the sea waters and why the reindeer moved deeper into the forest, man will look askance at man and never find an answer.

When Mother Sun departed, we bade her farewell and sought her return with due speed. But she did not return at the known time, leaving us and other men to speak with hoar frost breath.

No plant or animal would grow that season. Haan led his tribe further into the Taiga for sustenance, their howling farewells bidding us safe return to summer warmth. Our left flank was exposed. We huddled in our homes for warmth and boiled snow and ice for miserly sustenance, only our stories and madrigals keeping us from mind loss and starvation.

 

The dark is upon us

But your beauty lights my soul

A bright arc fills mine eyes

You are near to me

That I know

Dance with me

Sing with me

Laugh with me

Lie with me

My love

Be among my dreams

And dart among the stars
As we say “In the darkest times night follows night”, so the wisest of us knew that darkness and the cold in our lands could only mean that other man tribes suffered from similar tribulation.

We lived with our way and they with theirs and this it should stay.

It was, alas not to be.

Part 3 to follow……….

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The Ginger Scrolls – Part 1 (Of Many)

 

Hello!

We posted a week or two ago about the great scrolls found in a Canister in Norway by Robert Hamstrangler, Norway’s greatest anthropologist and hot water blower upper that told the story of Ginger Volk.

Here is Part 1!

THE GINGER SCROLLS PART ONE – THE DEPARTURE

Note; The following translation of the Ginger Scrolls is based upon the original work of Professor Tor Legolam, Professor of Nonsense at Bergen University. The Scrolls were discovered in a canister by a man coated in reindeer spittle in October 1927.

A gerbil was also found in this canister.

In all over 1,000 pages was discovered. The Ghingar language employed 34 vowels, 212 consonants and could locate a cedilla over the letter A after it followed GH, at no less than 37 separate angles of elevation.

Gingerfightback’s editorial board has decided to concentrate on the main narrative contained in the Scrolls.

Part 1 is known as “The Departure” and concerns itself with the departure of the final few hundred Ghingars from their beloved homeland and the journey towards their new lands west and south.

 It is impossible to establish with true veracity where the Ghingars finally alighted, but using DNA tests from ginger people in Southern France and examining the contents of mummified Ghingars discovered in Southern France in the late nineteenth century it would be fair to assume that they landed in Southern France.

This is confirmed in Part 3 of the Scrolls entitled “We Landed in Southern France”. A few landed in bonny Scotland due to the accelerated melting of their lard hair boats.

Professor Legolam’s favoured textual translation method is based upon the Albensian system of translation of the ancient texts, perfected by Cardinal Pietro Albensian in the late13th century.

The basic metronomic approach to translation in this manner can be found in the “Digitales Summa Orbis” written by Albensian and his brother Ted the Knife in 1287.

 Recent studies of the Albensian techniques point to the fact that the Cardinal, or Ted the Knife were probably dyslexic and so given all this carry on what you are about to read is probably not very accurate at all and hardly worth the effort. Still now that you have read this far you may as well carry on for a bit and find out a little of the history of ginger folk.

Enjoy!

** Poetry was an intrinsic element of the Ghingar culture as they found expressing themselves in verse to be a far more effective way of communicating in the perishing cold. The poems recited in the Scrolls are an attempt by the author to reflect the mood, tenor and verve of the times. For further reading we would suggest the following;

Notes on Ginghar Poetry and Polemics – Douglas Sandwell – OUP (445 pages with some nice join the dots pictures for when you get bored and also a cut out and keep Ludo set)

The Ghingars –Battling the Cedilla – Douglas Sandwell – OUP (657 Pages with a cut out and keep ice berg and waterfall)

More Ghingars – Please Somebody Buy It! – Douglas Sandwell – OUP (1,234 Pages with a built in sleeping bag and feathery pillow).

The Ginger Scrolls Part of Part One – The Departure

Of my name there is no cause for you to know. I am nameless but not silent. For these tales must be set down, their words appropriated from the mouths of others and our tragedy told. These words will not be tethered to this script dear friend. No! They are freeborn and will fly around this earth and the great bright skies in the North will act as permanent testimony of our suffering yet passion for life untrammeled by that suffering.

Carried by the beating wings of the great Gull, Exeretheon, the Night Flyer our tales will be told and recalled for all time.

Words of passion, wisdom, hope and of love for our homeland and of our people. Words can be the heartbeat between two lovers, the blood that flows between kin or the bile that proposes enmity between men.

We, the Ghingar always value words as tools of joy and hope. We would use them to sing, tell tales and even dance amongst them on our nights of festivals, before the Sun departed us for the other realms of the great heavens where she bade other people light and sustenance.

Our words to her, warm to the touch and comforting to the feel, bade her speedy return but offered her safe passage to her new home and the peoples who would bathe in her rays and affection.

The Ghingar people. Taken from our homelands by those evil pillars of famine and fear that forced us to roam amongst mortal man and his surly ways to ensure our kin hath future enough. We shall return to our home when the stars in the heavens bid it so.

The stars are not hung in the sky by your Gods or our Gods for amusement. They are there to guide, to inspire and to allow us to dream of other worlds.

But truth, dear friend we know not when that glorious day beckons us North once more and to the comfort of the shores and the ice that we called our Home. We people are from far North, distant from your own tribulations and vapours. A world so barren and untouched by the guilt and pleasures of other men that it will remain lost to all until we return.

Hard as life was and as dark as it was, those lands, icy, cold, fearful of strangers and a little bit weird – (translation note; the original Ghingar word here is Maleanstoricbmisltistr – which literally translates as “those who do not always allow the ice to melt before they drink it” – we think that weird is a close enough approximation of that term.) – But they were our lands. Our home.

Malady for loss is something all Ghingars carry. We grieve.

For so long isolated from other groups we had learned to live in peace with each other.

A land of hope, benign gods, tuneful music and a world of smiles. That is why the outsiders gave them the name Ghingar, from the ancient Arctic Empire tongue of our kings meaning “Those who smile”.

But we are not a people to dwell in the past. Indeed our land was governed by only three laws. Not to kill. To always seek shelter from the sun. Never revisit the past with sad intention.

Only the dead were entitled to declare war upon another nation and only those given sanctuarial position were allowed to venture past the great Buttock of Truth, erected before memory began it is said, to protect our people from those with barbarous intent. No God we worshipped only the Sun, fearing its long absences in the cold winter months would hasten our demise,

“Hasten to me morning Sun

That I may bask in thy balmy rays

Hasten to me morning Sun

That I may enjoy the best of days

 

Do not leave so soon morning Sun

That I will have to endure

Darkness and the stalk of night

And deaths tainted allure”

 

Ours was a simple world, made good by kindness, potatoes and a lack of foot disorders.

Part 2 to follow……….

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