Savashan Amama

The Savashan Amama are higher mortuary priests and shamans in service of the Reignar within the Court of the Fanged. They are fevered worshippers of Hyana, the Surrogate Huntress. Their worshippers are part of the 'Duat'ahku', and the Amama are believed to be those who have attained the title of Ahku (Shining Ones, or 'Blessed Dead'), ancestors that have reincarnated and are able to bridge the gap between the spirits and the living.  

FUNCTION

  The position of Amama is important in both an advisory role to the Reignar, but also in ritualistic ceremony and sense of ritual purity amongst the Gnolls. They also acted as legal authorities, adjudicators, lore keepers, medical professionals and political advisors. However, they have no central nor bureaucratic function, as they typically had no written accounts. Most believe them to be illiterate, hence why they do not record their doctrine or knowledge in written form. Nor is it possible to, as it is considered a crime to write their teachings, as their practices border between divination and necromantic magic - but also because it's treated as sacrilege amongst the Gnolls.   Within the Court of the Fanged, they played an important role within the 'paganistic' society of the Gnolls. They were a caste of semi-nobles, who were responsible for organising worship of venerated ancestors and sacrifices, divination (through bones and reading entrails), as well as simplistic gatherings of judicial procedure. They were exempt from military service and from the payment of taxes or tithes to the Reignar, and had the power to excommunicate members of their clan from religious festivals, making them social outcasts.   As adjudicators, they preside, judge and arbitrate formal disputes or competitions between their communities members. They preside over these in order to give final say in these matters, and should one challenge the Amama, they also challenge their ancestors - a taboo thing at the very least in Gnoll culture.   As lore-keepers, they preserved the histories of their ancestors, and in tandem, preserve the history of the gnolls through the visual of the victors and the strong. They are capable of reciting stories of past tragedies, stories that warn young Gnolls of right and wrong and their place in society. They affirm their culture, and the purity of their lines from the incursion and the influence of their demonic cousins in service to Yeenoghu.   As medical professionals, or 'shamans', they believed that they can interact with the spirit world through altered states of consciousness (trances), in order to direct the spirits or spiritual energies into the physical world for healing or other purposes. But, in their history as nomads and hunters, they have recited and memorised the nature, shape, colour and procurement of numerous naturally growing herbal remedies to aid against past sicknesses or to strengthen one's inner spirit against malicious illness (magic or curses). They can treat sickness caused by malevolent spirits, or leave their body to enter the supernatural world to seek answers, evoke animals as spirit guides or omens, and perform varied measures of divination to foretell future events or the unknowable.

TRAINING

  The lore of the Amama consisted of a large number of verses learned by heart, as well as stories told through oral literature, and could take up to twenty years to complete the course of their study. All instruction was communicated orally.  

SACRIFICE

  It was frequent that the Amama practised animal and humanoid sacrifice to perform different ceremonies in Gnoll culture. Those who had been found guilty or other criminal offences were considered preferable to use as sacrificial victims, but when criminals were in short supply, innocents would be acceptable (particularly the elderly, disabled, mentally ill, the sick). In order for a sacrifice to be acceptable to their ancestors, it had to be attended by an Amama, as they were intermediaries between the people and the spirits of their ancestors and the lost spirit of their goddess. It has been observed that in important matters, they prepare a victim, plunging a dagger into their chest, and observe the way their limbs convulse as they fall and gush with blood, they are able to read the future.   However, most assume that the Gnolls practice these dark magic as a form of necromancy or calling upon dark powers - this is not necessarily true. The Gnolls believe that through divination and through necromancy, they can contact their ancestors. They hold particular values of their ancestors, believing that people who died respected by most and being successful in life could be called upon after death to influence their lives in positive ways, the only cost being offerings of food or drink. The Gnolls also believe that illnesses are caused through the use of malicious black magic or through curses, an external force inflicted upon a person. The Amama combat this through the use of divination to determine the cause of such illness and what curses have been inflicted upon them - and use medicines, herbs or throwing bones to heal those affected.  

THE BELIEF OF THE FIVEFOLD SOUL

  The Amama, and all other Gnolls, unlike other cultures, believe that the soul is made up of five separate parts that can be both immortal or mortal. These five parts are known as:  

1. The 'BA': The eternal and undying part of the soul, that which travels to the Fugue Plane upon dying within the Prime Material Plane and becomes judged by the Divines.
2. The 'KA': The secondary twin of the Ba, which is linked to the life that one has lived, and is the personification of the individual being that lived their mortal life within the Prime Material. This part of the soul stays behind and becomes part of the ancestral line, or the Ahku (Blessed Dead). These partial souls are still capable of eating and drinking and compose one's personality.
3. Ren: The part of the soul that is our True Name, the name given to us at birth. It carries with them great power and can define an individual. It carries weight after death, for they believe as long as the name lives in memory and is spoken, then they are immortal and can never die.
4. KHAT: Our shadow self. It is the personification of all worldly things, emotions, longing, desires. Much debate has been made whether or not this part of our being is evil or our chaotic side, or even if it can be morally defined, rather it is the part of our soul that drives our actions.
5. IB: The heart of the soul aspects. This is the only physical part of the body that is believed to be taken into the afterlife. The heart is believed to be the seat of all thought, housing both the will and intent of an individual. Although it was a physical thing, it acts as the spiritual nexus that all the other aspects of the soul revolved around. It was the representation of the sum of an individual's deeds, both good and ill, and it was believed to be the instrument of salvation that is weighed after a spirit passes on into the afterlife.