“Vieve Roep”
The breeds of Bos do not know religion –
they believe in stories.
AN INDIVIDUAL’S WORLDVIEW is shaped by the stories they value most. These beliefs are very fluid; one spends his youth listening to the stories of parents, family & neighbors. People mature and go through life, pick up more stories, more explanations, more fantasy, and so the mind evolves.
No matter if it’s about the creation of all, the seasons, the physical world or the workings of the mind; anything can be explained and put into allegory. More importantly: everything can be explained better every time, by listening and learning. One can freely believe in many parallel stories, they may even outright contradict each other: when a touching tale is heard it is worth remembering, and has just as much value (or sometimes even more) as the previous rendition.
IN THE TRADITIONS OF BOS, the storytellers known as Vievanten play an important role. These collectors of fables & tales are the living memory of the land; through mental organization and unique mnemonic devices they can amass a treasure trove of stories both old and new, popular or forgotten.
In a most careful manner they bring structure to this plethora of information and re-weave the sagas whose threads have come apart. They are the ones who who spread around new riveting tales to faraway places, but they also breathe life into sagas of old that may have been forgotten, so that contemporary listeners may find new meaning & value in their message.
VIEVANTEN ARE BRIMMING with wanderlust and continuously on the move, to engage themselves & their community, and will do their best to regularly address crowds during Vieves; popular gatherings where everyone is free to listen or spin a yarn of their own. The Vieves are often thematic in nature. Whether through laughter and smirks, or tears and cries, the audience will always feel a renewed connection to the world around it.
The illustration, made in the city of Arys shows us the Vieve Roep; the call to partake in a Vieve.
Central on the stage is the famed Glolobololg, a Vievant famous for internalizing most of the Neegenbloede and hailed as one of the greatest voices of the past.
As a small crowd starts to form, 2 more Vievanten look on from behind the stage, eager & anxious to fulfill their role in the eternal play of Bos.
Notes
Vievanten — professional collectors of stories, fables, sagas & tales.
In the image we see (from left to right), three Vievanten, namely:
Glolobbololg, Maommoam & Zarottoraz.
Their names are palindromes, symbolizing the eternal cycles that are the object of their craft and the eternity of Bos.
Vieves — public gatherings focussed on storytelling.
Vieve Roep — literally a ‘Vieve-Shout’; an invitation to any passers-by to listen and/or partake in a public storytelling session.
