City of Saints and Madmen Part 28

D DAFFED, XAVER. An excellent observer of animal behavior whose reputation in recent years has been sullied by accusations he became too intimately involved with his subject matter. Daffed published numerous books on animals of the southern climes, including Diaryof an Aardvark, My Life Among the Sand Turtles of the Moth River Delta, A History of Animals, Vols. I-X, and The Hoegbotton Guide to Small, Indigenous Mammals. He was found dead, of an apparent heart attack, in the tropical mountains near Nicea, wearing only a wooly monkey suit, several perplexed wooly monkeys watching from the nearby bushes. See also: Cababari; Daffed Zoo; Hoegbotton Guide to Small, Indigenous Mammals, The.

DAFFED ZOO. Founded by Xaver Daffed shortly before his death, his work completed by daughter Sarah Daffed, the Daffed Zoo has, over the years, hosted a wide a.s.sortment of the strangest animals ever seen, including the common banded snakblooter, the pigmy sanfangle, the red-and-white slout, and the metigulamated ratpig. Specializing in exotics, the zoo has at times fallen into disrepair and been closed for the public's safety. The zoo has also suffered from such outlandish claims as those promulgated by Xaver's great-grandson, Thomas Daffed, who, shortly before his death, hosted a rather redundant fungi exhibit that was to include a "fungal creature" he claimed to have caught near the ruined monastery-fortress of Zamilon, but which never made an appearance. More recently, the zoo's Odecca b.i.+.c.horal White Whale exhibit was ruined when, in a daring raid, members of the Church of the Fisherman stole the centerpiece of the exhibit: the world's only captive Odecca b.i.+.c.horal White Whale. See also: Church of the Fisherman; Daffed, Xaver; Odecca b.i.+.c.horal White Whale; Zamilon.

DEFECATION, ORDER OF. The most reviled of the orders, although perhaps not the most disgusting. See also: Living Saints.

DISPOSSESSED. Some of the Ambergrisians "dispossessed" of their families because of The Silence became strange and fey to their friends. They would dig up animal bones, eat strange fungus, and visit graveyards, claiming to hear their brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, fathers, mothers, calling to them from the ground. In later years, these individuals became the official Dispossessed, wandering from place to place and burying the bones of their dead in the walls of buildings that others had boarded up after The Silence. For more than 70 years, these urban nomads roamed like lost souls, living by ever more desperate means, their numbers dwindling until they finally disappeared from the city. See also: Fungus.

DREADFUL TALES. A magazine of horror adventure tales published and edited by exploiter extraordinaire Mathew Palwine. Palwine's stable of authors included such hacks as Rachel Thorland, Gerrold Picklin, and Saltzbert Flounder. Dreadful Tales became popular chiefly due to the proliferation of typographical errors among its pages, which made it the darling of the "found object" adherents of the New Art movement. Nicholas Sporlender, among others, found cruel sport in writing letters to the editor on such subjects as "Why the Untoward Removal (Twice!) of a Very Important Vowel From the Word 'Countless' in Saltzbert Flounder's Story 'Tortured Love in the Middle Distance' Renders the Author's Vision Bleak Rather than Maudlin." See also: Midnight for Munfroe; New Art, The; Sporlender, Nicholas .

E e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.nS, ORDER OF. The most pleasurable yet socially-unacceptable of the Orders. See also: Living Saints.

F FESTIVAL OF THE FRESHWATER SQUID, THE. A celebration specific to Ambergris that has, on occasion, led to untoward incidents.

EXHIBIT 2 : "VIEW OF FESTIVAL FIREWORKS FROM SOPHIA ISLAND" BY LOUIS VERDEN, PUBLISHED IN BURNING LEAVES; ON DISPLAY IN THE MORHAIM MUSEUM'S "FAMOUS VIEWS OF THE CITY OF AMBERGRIS" GALLERY.

FIGHTING PHILOSOPHER, THE. See: Peterson, Richard.

FISH HEAD. Holy. Or rotting. Incidental to the Citizen Fish campaign. See also: Church of the Fisherman.

FLATULENCE, ORDER OF. The most deadly of the Orders. See also: Living Saints.

FRANKWRITHE & LEWDEN. A devious and conniving publis.h.i.+ng company run by L. Gaudy and his family. Known for their insidious marketing strategies and accused by some of collaborating with the gray caps. Frankwrithe & Lewden was founded during the waning days of the Saphant Empire and claims to be the oldest publisher still extant on the Southern Continent. Books published by F&L have been banned by the Truffidian Antechamber of Ambergris 43 times. Most recently, as F&L has expanded into areas other than bookselling, it has been engaged in what amounts to a war with H&S over owners.h.i.+p of SophiaIsland. See also: Alb.u.muth Boulevard; Banker Warriors;Manzikert Memorial Library; Midnight for Munfroe; Saphant Empire, The; SophiaIsland.

FUNGUS. A type of spore-reproducing "plant" that is usually quite harmless. One of Samuel Tonsure's favorite words-the most frequently-appearing word in his journal after the words "the," "a," "and," "that," "blood," and "fear." James Lacond, backed by evidence discovered in Marmey Gort's copious notes, has postulated that the gray caps have grown a giant fungus below the southern half of Ambergris. According to Lacond, this fungus started as a single spore but, using black shoestring filaments to expand, now covers 2,000 acres and has a width of three feet. By mapping fungal concentrations of the golden mushrooms that pop up after rainfall-the physical manifestation of the "Monster" as Lacond calls it-he drew a controversial outline of its expanse that is strikingly similar to a mushroom in shape (now on display at the Morhaim Museum). Many trees in the city may actually be hollow husks, according to Lacond, their insides infiltrated by fungal spies. Lacond has not offered any theories as to the purpose behind this huge fungus, whether evil or benign. See also: Cababari; Dispossessed, The; Gort, Marmey; Lacond, James; Monster, The; MorhaimMuseum.

FUNGUS s.h.i.+P, THE. See: Thrush, The.

G GALLERY OF HIDDEN FASCINATIONS. A gallery often considered the flags.h.i.+p of the ideals of the New Art, founded by Janice Shriek. When it closed, the New Art movement lost its momentum and eventually fragmented into a number of splinter groups, including the Found Art movement, the Body Art movement (enthusiastically endorsed by the Living Saints), and the controversial Shadow Art movement. See also: Living Saints; New Art, The; Shadow Art Movement, The.

GLARING, MAXWELL. The author of Midnight for Munfroe, The Problem With Krotch, Munfroe's Return, Krotch Strikes Back, Munfroe Reborn, Krotch Reborn, Krotch's Triumph,Munfroe's Legacy, Krotch's World, Son of Munfroe, Krotch's Last Stand, A Krotchless World, Krotch's Legacy, Son of Munfroe II, Krotch and Munfroe: The Lost Memoirs, and, posthumously, The End of the Legacy of Krotch and Munfroe. See also: Bender, Voss; Krotch; Munfroe; Midnight for Munfroe.

GORT, MARMEY. Marmey Gort kept minutely detailed records of city inhabitants' sanitary habits, including their storage of refuse. A typical entry reads: "Subject Z-outhouse use increase: av. 7x/day (5 min. av. ea.); note: garbage output up 3x for week: connex?" Gort even managed to track gray cap garbage pickup habits and concluded that if the gray caps were using the vast amounts of garbage as food or as mulch to grow food, the gray cap population under the city could exceed 300,000. No one listened to him. No one likes bad news. But Gort didn't care that no one listened to him-he went right on with his research, leaving behind 6,000 pages of observations when he died at the age of 70. Later, the Kalif would use the journals to successfully invade the city. See also: Banker Warriors; Fungus; Occupation, The.

GRAY TRIBES. Successors to the Aan in the Southern Islands. Implacable, cultured and barbaric at the same time. Thrilled to the opening of a book as much as to the opening of an enemy's throat. Denied a foothold on the continent by the Arch Duke of Malid, who thrilled only to the opening of throats and therefore put more enthusiasm into the endeavor. See also: Aandalay, Isle of; Malid, Arch Duke of; Salt.w.a.ter Buzzard.

GREENS. A political movement and amateur military force intended to defend the interests and person of the composer nee politician Voss Bender. The remnants of the Greens ended their days as part of a music guild that provided piano lessons to youngsters. See also: Bender, Voss; Borges Bookstore; Manzikert Memorial Library; Reds.

GRNNCK, HARAGCK KHAN. Responsible for the failed amphibious attack on Ambergris during The Silence. Grnnck had complicated tastes. Utterly ruthless and without peer in the arts of deception, he was also enamored of frogs and all things connected to frogs. He may have possessed the largest collection of frog art in the world, from paintings to sculptures and wood carvings. Torn from his youth in the Southern swamps to join the Haragck who invaded his remote homeland, Grnnck quickly rose through the ranks until, by a stroke of luck, he managed to best the old Khan in single combat and replace him. No doubt love of frogs, a vestige of his youth he did not wish to relinquish, proved his downfall. Who can doubt this love made the idea of an amphibious invasion of Ambergris so attractive? See also: Blgkkydks, Heckira.

H h.e.l.lATOSE & BAUBLE. Although real enough, this squid-and-man circus act reached its zenith of popularity as a cartoon strip inked and written by the reclusive M. Kodfan. See also: Kodfan, M.; Madnok, Frederick.

EXHIBIT 3: AN ORIGINAL PANEL FROM M. KODFAN'S FAMOUS CARTOON STRIP, RUN IN THE AMBERGRIS DAILY BROADSHEET; ON DISPLAY IN THE MORHAIMMUSEUM'S "ILl.u.s.tRATION" GALLERY.

HOEGBOTTON, HENRY. A good friend and accomplice.

HOEGBOTTON, RICHARD. After several false starts, the Hoegbottons finally established a foothold in Ambergris due to this member of the clan. Over a period of 20 years, Richard Hoegbotton crushed Slattery and Ungdom, his main compet.i.tors, and established the beginnings of a mercantile network that today spans from the Southern Isles to the lands of the Skamoo. See also: Hyggboutten.

HOEGBOTTON GUIDE TO SMALL, INDIGENOUS MAMMALS, THE. The definitive guide to the fascinating variety of small, indigenous mammals found in the southern climes, including the tarsier, the wrinkled-lip bat, and the moonrat. The lengthy and rather dramatic chapter on the mating dance of the wooly monkey has long been considered an eccentric cla.s.sic. See also: Borges Bookstore, The; Cababari; Daffed, Xaver; Moonrat; Trillian the Great Banker.

HOLY LITTLE RED FLOWER, THE. One of two central ideas behind the unnamed faith created by the fighting philosopher Richard Peterson, the other being the destruction of the "Strattonist bicameral brain followers." Peterson told the story of "The Holy Little Red Flower that Grows by the Side of the Road" at most of his gatherings, formal and informal. Taken from the third volume of his Dodecahedron (Book of Petals, Chapters 3411, inclusive), published privately by the Holy Brotherhood of the Red Stamen, the tale is generally incomprehensible without the proper religious training. See also: Peterson, Richard; Strattonism.

HYGGBOUTTEN. A clan of nomadic hors.e.m.e.n originating in the far west, near Nysimia. A ruthless people driven east by the even more ferocious Haragck. The Hyggboutten forced the peaceful Yakuda peoples out of their valley and a.s.similated such Yakuda skills as weaving into their own culture. After driving the Haragck out of the Kalif's empire, the Kalif's armies turned their attentions to Yakuda, destroying the Hyggboutten and their bondsmen as a political and cultural force. The remnants of the Hyggboutten fled to the frozen north and eventually became a.s.similated into eastern cultures in such places as Urlskinder, Morrow, and Nicea. Some clan members changed their name to the more eastern-sounding "Hoegbotton" and, over time, descendents such as Richard Hoegbotton founded the Hoegbotton & Sons trading empire. The Hyggboutten were renowned for their skills with horses and their elaborate burial rites. After death, Hyggboutten leaders were flayed from head to foot, their organs scooped out and mummified. Priests purified the remaining skeleton and flesh by laying it out on a litter to dry. The priests also treated the skin with a preservative and a clan artist tattooed it with scenes from the leader's exploits while alive. The mummified organs were then placed back within the dried skeleton and the skin stretched over the bones and grinning skull. The next phase of burial included the ritualistic slaughter of the leader's horses, his servants, and his wife. The horses were transformed into spirit beasts by attaching antlers to their heads and scrawling sacred symbols across their skin. The Hyggboutten then dug a huge pit, built a small house in the pit, planted shrubs and trees around the house, and placed the leader, horses, servants, and wife inside the various rooms of the house. A period of ten days of mourning followed, after which the pit was filled in, burying the house and the dead alike. The Hyggboutten would wait for two weeks before building an identical house above ground on the same location as the buried house. This house would be filled with small pebbles carried by fast riders from any nearby sea or river and delicately placed within the house by virgins no older than 18. Once the house had been filled with pebbles, a Hyggboutten priest consecrated the ground and a tent st.i.tched together by a dozen Hyggboutten women was placed over the house. The leader's eldest son or daughter would then set fire to the tent cloth, the flames also devouring the wooden beams of the house and leaving a pile of scorched pebbles. Each member of the clan would then take a pebble, while still hot-to remind them of the pain of their loss-to keep with them for the next six weeks, after which they would be required to bury the pebble wherever they had camped for the night. Then each member of the clan would carve a stick with the likeness of the fallen leader's "animal of power" and drive it into the ground to mark the location of the pebble. If the clan returned to that site in a year's time and all the pebbles were found, the leader's soul had pa.s.sed on to the after-world successfully. However, if even one pebble could not be found, the Hyggboutten were duty-bound to return to the place of burial and build another house full of pebbles atop the site, st.i.tch together another tent, and repeat the entire process. Over time, and as they were dispersed by the Kalif, the Hyggboutten abandoned this ritual simply because they did not have time to observe it. See also: Hoegbotton, Richard.

I IBONOF, IBONOF. A heretic once named simply Ibonof. A former member of the TruffidianChurch. Excommunicated after having a vision in which he appeared to himself and proclaimed himself "divine." Spent the rest of his life talking to himself and seeing double.

INSt.i.tUTE OF RELIGIOUSITY. See: Morrow ReligiousInst.i.tute.

J JERSAK, SIMON. An unusually socially-mobile individual who eventually became known for his funny and insightful pamphlets about tax collecting and tax collectors. Although usually attributed to Sirin, the quote "those days when taxation has become a thing of beauty" was first written by Jersak. His advice to ordinary citizens is studded with laconic satire: "When a traveler came to some narrow defile, he would be startled by the sudden appearance of a tax-gatherer, sitting aloft like a thing uncanny." See also: Sirin.

JONES, STRETCHER. A poet and blacksmith born in Thajad, a southern province of the Kalif's Empire, who rose to become a leader of men. Driven to fight by the predations of Truffidian priests and the Kalif's troops upon the poor, Jones raised an army of his impoverished peers and, for a time, captured the southern expanse of the Kalif's Empire. A brilliant tactician and yet a gentle soul, his is a tragic story, too long to summarize here. If Stretcher Jones had been victorious, he would have led us all to a better place. There are still those in this world who hold fast to his ideals. His most famous speech was his shortest, to the satrap of Thajad demanding justice: I feel that a man may be happy in this world. And I know that this world is a world of imagination and vision. I see everything in this world, but I know everyone does not see alike. To the eyes of your tax collectors, a sel is more beautiful than the sun and a bag worn with the use of money has more beautiful proportions than a vine filled with grapes. To the eyes of your soldiers, the shedding of blood brings tears of joy that might in others be brought forth only by the sight of a tree heavy with fruit. Some see in man's nature only ridicule and deformity, and by these I shall not regulate my proportions; and some scarce remark on man's nature at all. But to the eyes of the true, this is not so. As a man is, so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers. You certainly mistake when you say that such visions are fancy and not to be found in this world. To me, this world should be all one continued vision of goodness.

See also: Masouf; Nadal, Thomas; Oliphaunt; Salt.w.a.ter Buzzard.

K KALIF, THE. Any one of 80 anonymous, sequential rulers of the great western empire. Known for taking great risks incognito. Often killed in freak accidents of a macabre but humorous nature. One of the more absurd theories put forth is that Samuel Tonsure was an incognito Kalif. Over time, the Kalif's scientists have invented such modern conveniences as the microscope, the gun, the telephone, and the cheese grater. See also: Ambergris; Banker Warriors; Brueghel, Michael; Busker, Alan; Cooks of Kalay; Royal Genealogist;Salt.w.a.ter Buzzard.

KODFAN, M. The creator of the popular h.e.l.latose & Bauble cartoon strip. Kodfan was never seen by the editors of the broadsheets in which his inked antics were eagerly consumed by children and adults alike. As one editor remembers, "Every third day of the week, a messenger would arrive at my office, usually on a unicycle for some reason. It was always a different messenger, perhaps because the unicycle is hard to master. I never saw Kodfan. One time I asked the messenger what he looked like. He told me Kodfan looked 'hooded.' I asked what on earth that meant. The lad said 'Kodfan had a hood on.' I never found out anything about him except that he was fond of squid. Then, one day, the messenger stopped coming. I never heard from Kodfan again. We had to hire that Verden character to ink the strip. It was never the same-Verden wanted h.e.l.latose to pontificate about Strattonism. Eventually, I had to put a stop to it and we discontinued the cartoon altogether. That was when I began to have the fuzzy ribbon dreams, but that is an unrelated issue." See also: h.e.l.latose & Bauble; Frederick Madnok; Strattonism; Verden, Louis.

KRETCHEN, THE GRAY CAP HUNTER. Around the time of The Silence, rumors began to spread of a man, EXHIBIT 4: THE ORIGINAL PENCIL SKETCH FOR A PANEL OF THE h.e.l.lATOSE & BAUBLE CARTOON STRIP; ON DISPLAY IN THE MORHAIMMUSEUM'S "ILl.u.s.tRATION" GALLERY.

cloaked in shadow, mystery, and something fas.h.i.+onably black with a silver lining, who went underground to kill gray caps. Some said he was the cousin of Red Martigan, seeking revenge. Others, that he was half gray cap himself and sought only to find his mother. Regardless, Kretchen never bothered to leave the shadows long enough to take a bow and so historians have placed him in that purgatory known as "possible but not probable." The cappers, on the other hand, have adopted him as their patron saint, putting out "scarecaps" dressed in long black cloaks. See also: Cappers; Martigan, Red; Disappeared, The.

KRISTINA OF MALFOUR, LEPRESS SAINT. With each little bit of her that fell off, she came a little bit closer to Sainthood. Other than her ability to shed body parts with apparent nonchalance, no historian has ever found any reason why she should have been sainted by the Truffidians. She appears to have sat around a lot and eaten hundreds of servings of rice pudding while watching her family work in the fields of the communal farm outside Ambergris. See also: Living Saints.

KROTCH. The villain of Maxwell Glaring's Krotch and Munfroe action/detective series. Krotch is described in the first book, Midnight for Munfroe, as "a tall man, so slender that sideways he might melt into the shadows that had already taken his soul. His gaze, when he brought it to bear upon a man, would show that man the dissolution of his own morals, so dead were they and carious. His mane of black hair cowled him in his evil." Yet by Krotch's Last Stand, Krotch is described variously as "stout," "portly," "emaciated," both a "black, scuttling beetle, low to the ground " and a "wisp torn from the wind in his ethereal height," with "dirty blonde hair" and later "reddish-tinged locks that hung like snakes to his waist." Perhaps signaling that Glaring had grown tired of the series. See also: Glaring, Maxwell; Krotch; Midnight for Munfroe; Munfroe.

KUBIN, ALFRED. A psychologist who specialized in the study of the underlying causes of squidanthropy. Over time, he came to comprehend these causes all too well, becoming a frequent patron of the most nefarious squid clubs. When a Truffi dian priest refused to marry him to a female squid he met in a club's wading pond, Kubin became violent and set fires all across the city during one delirious night of arson. Several historic inst.i.tutions, including the oldest of the Hoegbotton safehouses, sustained severe fire damage. When finally captured, Kubin was incarcerated in the Voss Bender Memorial Mental Inst.i.tute alongside his former patients, many of whom reportedly laughed uproariously before administering a severe beating. See also: Madnok, Frederick.

L LACOND, JAMES. An eccentric historian whose theories of the gray caps have largely been dismissed (unfairly) by the reading public, other historians, and even by the unemployed carpenter who for years haunted the sidewalk outside Lacond's apartment overlooking Voss Bender Memorial Square. His pamphlets have been exclusively distributed by the Ambergrisians for the Original Inhabitants Society. Among his writings is the essay "An Argument for the Gray Caps and Against the Evidence of Tonsure's Eyes." Known for his frequent visits to Zamilon. See also: Ambergrisians for the Original Inhabitants Society; Rats; Zamilon.

LEOPRAN, GEORGE. A Scathadian writer and diplomat best known for his seven-page account of his journey to and from Ambergris. Also the author of the 3,000-page novel A Sliver of Time, which covers one day in the life of a lonely goat herder. In minute detail. The novel includes a 200-page diatribe castigating Manzikert III as an example of the abuse of power. See also: Scatha.

LIVING SAINTS. The long history of the Living Saints predates the Truffidian religion, which embraced the saints for their own purposes. Based on the premise that bodily functions are the most sacred signs of G.o.d in human beings, Living Saints endure solitary lives of poverty. There are four orders: the Order of Flatulence, the Order of e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.ns, the Order of Defecations, and the Order of Urination. The saints spend years perfecting their particular specialty and thus honoring "the G.o.d that made us mortal" as the scriptures read. Many other religions hire these saints as guards because they are so disgusting they scare away criminals. Manzikert III was once mistaken for a Living Saint in the Order of Flatulence. See also: Kristina of Malfour.

M MADNOK, FREDERICK. A flamboyant amateur squidologist of some renown who belonged to the sp.o.r.n-spurn religion. (The numbers of this particular cult dwindled significantly upon the formal declaration of their views, due to a number of unexplained disappearances.) Suffered a nervous breakdown when, due to a printer's error, octopi images were placed in one of his squid monographs. See also: h.e.l.latose & Bauble; Kodfan, M.

MALID, ARCH DUKE OF. Once upon a time, the Arch Duke of Malid was a little boy who tortured insects and small animals. He kept journals of these activities that have survived down to the present day (and which are of great interest to insect collectors and taxidermists for the intense detail of their descriptions). At first, the Duke's father applauded the Duke's industriousness in keeping a journal. No doubt he felt differently when he discovered himself, a little too late, on page 203: "Note to self: Above a battlement, on a wall, on a spike, the b.l.o.o.d.y head of my father." See also: Gray Tribes, The; Salt.w.a.ter Buzzard.

MANDIBLE, RICHARD. One of Ambergris' foremost early economists and social scientists. Unfortunately, Richard's respectable reputation has been eclipsed by his brother Roger's artwork, which was at the center of the New Art's Great Earwax Scandal, as some wags have called it. Roger, it turned out, procured earwax from the lithesome ears of his sleeping lovers and mixed it into his paint; thus the marvelous amber tint to the sunsets on display at the Gallery of Hidden Fascinations. When the source of the amber tint was discovered, Roger suffered little career damage, but staid Richard, scandalized, never fully recovered from the incident. See also: Gallery of Hidden Fascinations; New Art, The.

MANZIISM. The rat-wors.h.i.+pping heretic religion inadvertently founded by Manzikert I near the end of his life. This cult has had little or no influence on history while inexplicably continuing to thrive, at least in Ambergris. Nothing sticks in the throats of Truffidian priests in the Religious Quarter more than the sight of rat bishops, rat clerics, and just plain old rat-b.a.s.t.a.r.ds paraded down the street during the Festival of the Freshwater Squid, a-glitter in their specially-made robes and silver crowns. See also: Manzikert VI; Manzikert VII; Manzikert VIII; Moonrat; Rats.

MANZIKERT VI. Death by bliss. In all fairness to the sixth Manzikert's moral fiber, he never really wanted to be Cappan of Ambergris. He was only too happy to retire to a monastery, especially a Manziist monastery. In those days, the only difference between a Manziist monastery and a brothel was that the latter attracted more priests. See also: Manziism; Manzikert VII; Manzikert VIII.

MANZIKERT VII. Death by an extreme miscalculation while flossing. Of his actual reign, the less said the better. See also: Manziism; Manzikert VI; Manzikert VIII.

MANZIKERT VIII. Death by tire tread. An expert at staging extravaganzas, Manzikert VIII had no notable political or military victories during his reign. He has the dubious distinction of being the first historical personage to be killed by a very early form of steam-powered motored vehicle (during the Festival). An entire line of motored vehicles was later named The Manzikert. See also: Manziism; Manzikert VI; Manzikert VII.

MANZIKERT MEMORIAL LIBRARY. Oddly enough, the ineffectual Manzikert III established the Manzikert Memorial Library. He established the library to house his ever-expanding collection of recipes and cookbooks. Since that time, the library has grown to include a healthy selection of fiction, secret doc.u.ments, and erotica. The position of chief librarian has often been a political as well as administrative position, as when, during the conflict of the Reds and the Greens, the library became a repository for Voss Bender sheet music. Built in the same location as the gray caps' original "library," the Manzikert Memorial Library has experienced some of the strangest fungal outbreaks in Ambergris' history. See also: Abrasis, Michael; Frankwrithe & Lewden; Fungus; Greens; Reds .

MAP, BRANDON. An unfortunate splotch.

MARTIGAN, RED. Leader of a doomed underground expedition against the gray caps. This victim of his own curiosity would otherwise have pa.s.sed out of history altogether. Instead, due to his overwhelming stupidity, Ambergris remembers him as being somehow larger-than-life. He is frequently an inhabitant of horror and ghost stories-in a sense, more substantial in memory than in the flesh. See also: Ambergrisians for the Original Inhabitants Society; Cappers; Kretchen.

MASOUF. The general who finally defeated Stretcher Jones and personally slew the great rebel leader. He is said to have wept over the body of his adversary. After so many years of battling Stretcher Jones, Masouf was distraught to have finally destroyed the only man who had been his equal in military skill and tactics. In his journal entry that fateful day, Masouf wrote, "As I stared into that pale, bloodied face, as I cupped his head with my hands as he breathed his last, I felt as if I were staring into my own face, into an ill-fated reflection, and as the life flickered out of his eyes, so too the life briefly seemed to have left me as well." Masouf relieved himself of his own command three days later, and after an unsuccessful suicide attempt left his wife and children and spent the next 20 years as a recluse in the self-imposed solitude of Zamilon. He would eventually take up Stretcher Jones' struggle and for a brief time liberated the Kalif's western-most va.s.sals from servitude, before being defeated by a general more brilliant than even he. Masouf died when his horse, spooked by a rabbit, threw him as he fled the battlefield. See also: Jones, Stretcher; Zamilon.

MIDNIGHT FOR MUNFROE. The first volume in Maxwell Glaring's series of novels detailing the adversarial relations.h.i.+p between the anti-hero Munfroe and the criminally-insane Krotch. Voss Bender once considered writing an opera based on this book, but abandoned the idea after reading the complete series. Bender's purported reason? "There is too much Krotch in the world already." The book first appeared as a serial in Dreadful Tales, which may explain the staccato "voice" of the book-its high number of cliff hangers and near-escapes. Glaring found the story's success inexplicable and, vowing never again to write a Munfroe-Krotch story, proceeded to churn out a large number of them. See also: Bender, Voss; Dreadful Tales; Glaring, Maxwell; Krotch; Munfroe.

MIKAL, DRAY. Randomly chosen to be the Petularch by a ceremonial bull, as is still the custom. Let loose by the Priests of the Seven-Edged Star, the ceremonial bull was allowed to roam free until it had chosen a Petularch. The selection process consisted of any "sign" from the bull deemed suffi ciently conclusive by the priests. Although the "sign" from the bull in this case has been lost in the garbage heap of unimportant facts, it is known that Mikal was a fruit-on-a-stick vendor before his Ascension. He had immigrated to Ambergris from a small city north of Morrow called Skaal. Luckily, the position of Petularch has been largely irrelevant ever since the overthrow of the Church of the Seven-Edged Star several centuries ago. See also: Caroline of the Church of the Seven Pointed Star.

MONSTER, THE. Depending on the context, either a huge sewer ball or a huge ball of fungus. See also: Cappers; Fungus.

MOONRAT. A pure white rat, about the size of a terrier, that gathers at midnight to drink from tributaries of the River Moth. It feeds on honeysuckle nectar and fungi (to which latter food is attributed the fact that some moonrats glow an intense green in the dead of night). Sacred to the Nimblytod Tribes, the moonrat is also of some significance to Manziists, who every year make the dangerous pilgrimage to the southern rainforests to observe the moonrat in its natural habitat. The moonrat's mating call is sonorous and deep, akin to the sound that emanates from the long horns used by the monks of Zamilon. The symphony created by the moonrat in concert with the Nimblytod's mouth-music is said to rival even Voss Bender for its odd mixture of vulnerability and strength. See also: Bender, Voss; Manziists; Nimblytod Tribes, The; Zamilon.

MORHAIMMUSEUM. A repository over the years of many strange and eccentric treasures, from first editions of Vivian Price Rogers' Torture Squid books to gray cap knives. Thomas Daffed's priceless five-thousand specimen collection may be the MorhaimMuseum's crowning glory. The Morhaim family has remained sharply a-political throughout the years and thereby gained the confidence of many influential figures in Ambergris. See also: Daffed Zoo; Fungus; Rogers, Vivian Price; s.p.a.cklenest, Edgar.

EXHIBIT 5: A GRAY CAP KNIFE SUPPOSEDLY USED IN "RELIGIOUS" RITUALS; HOUSED IN THE MORHAIMMUSEUM'S "UNLIKELY WEAPONS" GALLERY.

MORROW RELIGIOUS INSt.i.tUTE. Although Ambergris is the city of religions, Morrow is the city of religious studies. As Morrow is in all ways removed from the l.u.s.tful thrust of real life, so too is it removed from its spiritual heart to the extent that it holds its faith at arm's length, the better to examine faith's anatomy. The Morrow Religious Inst.i.tute is the most famously able at this dissection process. However, despite producing some famous religious figures and teachers, a disturbing number of its graduates, once exposed to religion-in-the-raw, have either "gone native" or succ.u.mbed to the pleasures of this too mortal flesh. Formerly the Inst.i.tute of Religiousity. See also: Menites; Signal, Cadimon.

MUNFROE. The ever-weary anti-hero of Maxwell Glaring's Krotch and Munfroe series, Munfroe is a protean sort whose past changes from book to book. First the son of humble farmers who travels to the city to become an accountant, Munfroe later becomes the son of accountants who travels to the country to become a humble farmer. Other incarnations include parents who serve stints in the circus, the army, as doctors, and as carpenters, variously. Only one thing is for sure: Munfroe had parents. See also: Glaring, Maxwell; Krotch.

N NADAL, THOMAS. He who died in infamy, his fate too sad to relate here. Let him rest in peace as he could not in life. Faithful to his lover and faithful to his city. A curse on all of those who would defame him for his sole moment of weakness. See also: Jones, Stretcher.

NEW ART, THE. An oxymoron. See also: Burning Leaves; Gallery of Hidden Fascinations; Mandible, Richard; Shadow Art Movement, The; Sporlender, Nicholas; Verden, Louis.

NIMBLYTOD TRIBES. This tree-dwelling people, wiry but strong, has inhabited the southern rainforests for centuries, weaving their bird-like huts in the crooks of st.u.r.dy branches. Oblivious to the efforts of Truffidian missionaries to convert them, the Nimblytod still wors.h.i.+p the sacred moonrat and the plumed thrush hen. Members of the tribe can make flute-like sounds without instruments and the concerts that often break the silence of the tree cover can seem "like the songs of beautiful angels," as one shaken missionary put it. The Nimblytod confirm their independence by blowdarting anyone who enters their territory. (Most casualties in recent years, however, have been Manziists.) The poison used in their blowdarts results in a prolonged period of fever, followed by malaise and then a sudden and intense pa.s.sion for whatever object the sufferer happens to gaze upon at that moment. Eventually, dementia and death follow, like sullen cousins. See also: Manziists; Moonrat.

NUNK, AUTARCH OF. Although a real historical figure, the Autarch is more commonly known to children and adults as the happy fool of Voss Bender's Nunk poems, which contain such rhymes as "The Autarch of Nunk/ Was a collector of junk/Which he kept in a trunk/Beside his pet skunk" and "The Autarch of Nunk/Loved to get drunk/And, in the grip of a sudden funk,/Pa.s.s out fitfully on his bunk." Several critics have complained that a less famous personage would not have been able to get such doggerel published, but the ill.u.s.trations by Kinsky in the omnibus version amply make up for the simplistic verse. Recently, amongst the few possessions left by Michael Abrasis to the Manzikert Memorial Library, archivists discovered a second set of Nunk poems, decidedly more adult, as this excerpt demonstrates: "The Autarch of Nunk/Liked women with s.p.u.n.k/To wiggle and tickle/His enormous pink pickle." (Although some historians believe this is a gardening reference.) See also: Abrasis, Michael; Bender, Voss.

NYSIMIA. A western city known for death, dust, beer, and, more recently, for ridiculous theories involving pony-riding invaders, old dead men, and the gray caps. See also: Hyggboutten.

NYSMAN, MICHAEL. A native of Nicea, Nysman was a high-ranking Truffi dian priest. Although ostensibly sent to Ambergris to a.s.suage the suffering of those who had survived The Silence, doc.u.ments unearthed since his death clearly indicate that the Truffidian Church had sent him to Ambergris for other reasons entirely. Nysman's mission was two-fold: to research The Silence to determine its cause and also to develop a psychological profile of people in extreme distress and deliver a written report to the Antechamber of Nicea on ways to exploit this distress for converts. Nysman's report on psychological distress is less interesting than his report on the cause of The Silence, which includes the following sentences: "With all due respect, I do not know what good it will do us to find out the cause of this affl iction. Surely the truth will be too horrible for any of us to hold within ourselves, and yet we could not loose such knowledge upon the world. The only words I can use to describe the utter despair that settles over me in this city are 'without G.o.d.' I feel entirely without G.o.d in this city." Later in the report, Nysman writes that around the time of The Silence several sheep herders saw strange lights during the night, emanating from Alfar. Nysman finds this fact to be of supreme importance, but instead of visiting Alfar, he abruptly changed his itinerary to visit Zamilon, for reasons that are lost to us. See also: Alfar; Zamilon.

O OCCUPATION, THE. The term given to the 100 days during which the Kalif's troops occupied Ambergris. With the exception of The Silence, The Occupation was the bleakest period of Ambergrisian history. If not for the ingenuity and pluck of ordinary citizens, The Occupation would have lasted much longer. As this letter from David Ampers, the owner of a local tavern, The Ruby-Throated Cafe, to his cousin in Morrow (the infamous "fighting philosopher" Richard Peterson) demonstrates, the Kalif's troops did not have an easy time of it: Why, I had just said to my old friend Steen Potter (you remember Steen from your last visit-the watch salesman?) as we sat drinking at the Cafe and sharpening our knives to an unparalleled sharpness-I had just said that the city, our beloved Ambergris, had been stuck in a sort of malaise, a doldrums, the whole summer, when what should I and every other citizen of the city find nailed to our doors but a barbaric sheet of paper from the Empire of the Kalif that read thusly: "n.o.blest of the G.o.ds, King and Master of the whole World, Son of the previous Kalif, the new Kalif, to Ambergris, his vile and insensate slave: Refusing to submit to our rule, you call yourselves lord and sovereign. You seize and distribute our treasure, you deceive our servants. You never cease to annoy us with your bands of brigands. Have I not destroyed you? I suppose I must destroy you more utterly than you have ever been destroyed before. Beware Ambergris! Beware!"

Oh, I thought to myself, now this was promising. An ultimatum! This promised to shake us out of our rut-a real threat! And backed up too! So of course Ambergris spread her arms to the aggressor, the better to love him to death. The messenger prior to invasion was a broadsheet boy who ran past screaming, "Armies of the Kalif cross the river, crush the free armies of the Cappan!" In a stroke, Ambergris had fallen, after five years of snapping at our flanks by the Kalif-such a tease. All right, we could live with that, but did the boy have to scream it out to the world? There is such a thing as pride, my cousin, and although perhaps Steen over-reacted a little, no one complained when he took aim, let fly, and dropped the lad with a stone thrown to the head. Pride is very important to us here, although you may not understand that, not having been born in the city . . .

So the Kalif's troops invaded and we all came out to line Alb.u.muth Boulevard for the obligatory Parade of Conquerors. It was a bright, breezy day and the swallows flew through the sky like knives. The Kalif's men formed a supposedly impenetrable wall on either side of the street, armed with spears, swords, and small cannons. It appeared they thought the local population might cause some sort of problem. Steen and I exchanged a meaningful glance. All we wanted to do was welcome the invading army to our city.

The Kalif's general, the Great One as he was called, made for an impressive sight, with his emerald turban, white ostrich plumes, silver spurs, and the eight gray oliphaunts that lurched along behind him. At least, he was impressive until someone in the crowd sent a blade flying through his throat. My, what a lot of blood he had in him-and it certainly seemed as red as anyone else's would have been in a similar situation. Alas, the a.s.sa.s.sin slipped away in the resulting turmoil.

When order had been restored, we crowded up the palace steps and watched as the mayor, the defeated Cappan at his side in chains, relinquished, in a formal ceremony, the keys to the city, and gave the sacramental sword to the new Great One (hastily recruited from among five resplendent if fiercely sweating officers). The Cappan performed these duties with a slight smirk and a conspiratorial wink to the crowd. The Cappan's personal bodyguards, too, were in a particularly mirthful mood, considering the circ.u.mstances. Indeed, one would at times during the ceremony have had difficulty determining who was slave and who was victor . . . The Great One, as he looked out on the crowd, seemed discomfited by the applause, the ready smiles, as we showed our teeth. A flicker of fear flashed across the Great One's face before tranquility once again overtook those fine, western features.

It didn't last long, of course, although I shall, in the interests of saving my hands from gripping this pen for hours and you of reading into boredom, summarize the events of the next 100 days. Inevitably, the second Great One was poisoned and the third found garroted in his palace, so the Kalif had no choice but to order the mayor of our fair metropolis hanged by the neck until dead. I'm sure he did not expect what happened at the hanging: We all cheered as our mayor went to a better (or at least cleaner!) place. We'd never much liked him anyway, and would probably have done the deed ourselves in a few more months. But then, following the execution, we rioted and killed many of the Kalif's soldiers because, after all, he was one of us, even if he had been an incompetent, embezzling b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

From then on, it was just a matter of time. Each dawn saw another set of foreigners' heads on spikes down by various city fountains. Each sunset was occasion for mingled screams and pleas for mercy. Everywhere they turned: the confluence of fate and malice in the ancient stone face of the city. When they came to my establishment, why, I treated them like kings, using a slow-acting poison to kill several of them over a period of days. Some trickster they trusted told them that the red flags strewn across the city were flags of defiance, so the Kalif's men tore them up, angering the gray caps, who stirred and clicked amongst themselves before "disappearing" the Kalif's men in droves. The zoo keeper let the big cats free right into the barracks of the Great One's personal guard. Store owners crept up to the Kalif's cannon after dark and poured sand and glue in the muzzles. Priests in the Religious Quarter stoned patrols to death for violating obscure, out-of-date rules and then pleaded exemption from punishment on grounds of conflicting faiths.

Finally, one day, they simply left, cousin, and never returned. We boxed the bones they had left behind into the walls of abandoned buildings. We burned their carts. We appropriated their horses. We scrubbed the palace clean. We re-instated the Cappan. And, once again, we cheerfully settled down to govern ourselves, ever so refreshed by this little interlude, this experiment in occupation by a foreign empire . . . So you should come visit again soon, cousin. The cafe is doing well and we would be glad to have you. The city is beautiful this time of year.

Fondly,

David Ampers

See also: Banfour, Archduke of; Kalif, The; Oliphaunt; Peterson,Richard.

ODECCA b.i.+.c.hORAL WHITE WHALE. The most intelligent of sea-going mammals, venerated by the Church of the Fisherman, prized by zoologists, and possessed of a brain so large that its skull is lopsided. Odecca Whales must always swim at a diagonal, their heads preferably resting on the surface while their ma.s.sive stern fins churn relentlessly. If they stop swimming for even a minute, the ma.s.sive head will cause them to sink to the bottom and drown. By necessity, the whale is a surface feeder. See also: Church of the Fisherman; Daffed Zoo.

OLIPHAUNT. One of Tonsure's favorite mammals, these great gray creatures almost ended Stretcher Jones' rebellion at the outset. Their sudden introduction into battle, brought from the jungle plains of the far southwest, caused such panic at the Battle of Richter that Jones was lucky to escape with his life. Xaver Daffed found this usually gentle mammal so compelling that he devoted two volumes of his A History of Animals to it. Manzikert III found oliphaunts so succulent that toward the end of his reign he ate their flesh to the exclusion of all else. The Kalif, upon his temporary subjugation of Ambergris, planned to build a palace that would have represented the apogee of the oliphaunt motif in architecture: a vast structure in the shape of an oliphaunt. The plans included hindquarters fas.h.i.+oned to resemble a glen with its own running brook and a theater in the front. See also: Ambergris Gastronomic a.s.sociation; Daffed, Xaver; Jones, Stretcher; Occupation, The.

P PEJORA, MIDAN. The most famous architect in Ambergris' history. He holds primary responsibility for the grandest buildings in the city, including the Cappan's Palace. Pejora could best be cla.s.sified as an "idiot genius." From an early age, he erected incredible models of buildings out of wood, sand, and rock, but he could not even graduate from grade school. His parents eventually taught him as best they could at home, and many were the times neighbors would complain because Pejora had erected some new architectural monstro-city in the family's front yard.

PETERSON, RICHARD. Founder of an unnamed faith that preaches the story of the little red flower that grows by the side of the road. The faith uses a calendar of 12 months comprising 30 days each. Each year ends with the five-day Festival of the Holy Little Red Flower, which includes the Day of Seed, the Day of Root, the Day of Stem, the Day of Leaf, and the Day of Bloom. (A splinter faction called the "Scientific Reformists" inserts the Day of Budding before the Day of Bloom every fourth year, rather than the universally symmetrical five-year cycle recognized by the true followers of the faith. Violent confrontations have been known to occur during this false celebration of the Day of Budding.) The Five Volumes of the Dodecahedron represent the only true written teachings of the Faith. Each volume is divided into twelve books (Petal, Sepal, Stigma, Style, Ovary, Pistil, Stamen, Pollen, Anther, Filament, Nectar, and Calyx). Each book is divided into 240 chapters with 30 verses each. Adherents are generally recognizable by their trademark red sashes and precise pentagonal tonsures. The Brotherhood of the Red Stamen, an order of the Faith, is famous for its scholars.h.i.+p and teaching. Specializing primarily in geometry and horticulture, the gardens which surround each of the five monasteries of the order are justly renowned and lead many thousands each year to join the faith. An unfinished cathedral devoted to expressing the Dodecahedronin physical form may one day supplant the gardens as a mechanism of ma.s.s conversions. See also: Holy Little Red Flower, The; Strattonism; Verden, Louis.

PORFAL. An inventor best known for his Porfal Memory Capsule, a festival necessity. Porfal also developed a coin shaped like a knife, issued by Hoegbotton & Sons as a commemorative item and hastily discontinued after numerous stabbings occurred at the subsequent Festival. His most controversial inventions were erotic in nature, including the honey-powered o.r.g.a.s.m Machine, the Mechanical Toe-Sucker, and the infamous Inverted Maiden, into which hapless men in search of ecstasy descended only to find the demands of pleasure too great for their hearts to withstand. See also: Burning Leaves; Cappers; Monster, The; s.p.a.cklenest, Edgar.

R RATS. In sewers. In religions. In words like pirate, desperate, and narrative. Rats infest this glossary as surely as words and mushrooms. See also: Ambergris; Lacond, James; Manziism; Moonrat.

REAL HISTORY NEWSLETTER, THE. A fringe publication that has allowed many historians in exile to have their say under the safety of pseudonyms. See also: Ambergrisians for the Real Inhabitants Society; Lacond, James.

REDS. Originally founded to oppose the interests of the composer nee politician Voss Bender, the remnants of the Reds ended their days running a small tavern on the southern edge of Ambergris and hosting dart compet.i.tions. See also: Bender, Voss; Borges Bookstore; Greens; Manzikert Memorial Library.

ROGERS, VIVIAN PRICE. Brought up on a farm as the only girl in a family that included eight brothers, Rogers revenged herself on her unruly, brawling brethren by re-imagining them as the Torture Squid. For many years the Torture Squid books outsold even the works of Henry Flack in Ambergris' many bookstalls. In later years, Rogers accepted an honorary position at the Borges Bookstore while her brothers continued their lives of dawn-till-dusk drudgery back on the farm. See also: Borges Bookstore; MorhaimMuseum.

EXHIBIT 6: A RARE FIRST EDITION OF VIVIAN PRICE ROGERS' CLa.s.sIC TORTURE SQUID BOOK; HOUSED IN THE MORHAIMMUSEUM'S "FIRST EDITIONS" LIBRARY.

ROYAL GENEALOGIST. A position in the Kalif's Empire much shrouded in secrecy. Only the Royal Genealogist knows the true ident.i.ty of the Kalif, but can publish only the vaguest facts about the royal personage. Although the theory cannot be proven, many historians, this one excluded, believe that on more than one occasion the Royal Genealogist has actually been the Kalif. See also: Kalif, The.

S SABON, MARY. An aggressive and sometimes brilliant historian who built her reputation on the bones of older, love-struck historians. Five-ten. One-fifteen. Red hair. Green, green eyes. An elegant dresser. Smile like fire. Foe of James Lacond. In conversation can cut with a single word. Author of several books. See also: Lacond, James.

SAFE HOUSE. A place, usually controlled by Hoegbotton & Sons, where travelers could seek shelter during the Festival of the Freshwater Squid. Most safe houses provided little packets of useless products and information to a.s.suage the fears of its temporary tenants. This packet usually included some insipid festival "story." See: Verden, Louis.

SAINT PHILIP THE PHILANDERER. A Living Saint who was kicked out of the Order of e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n because he bathed too regularly. See: Living Saints.

EXHIBIT 7: A REPRODUCTION OF THE CLa.s.sIC SAFE HOUSE LETTER INCLUDED WITH SPORLENDER AND VERDEN'S FESTIVAL STORY, THE EXCHANGE.

SALt.w.a.tER BUZZARD. The main beneficiaries of battles between Stretcher Jones and the Kalif, the Kalif and Michael Brueghel, Michael Brueghel and Manzikert I, Manzikert I and the gray caps, the Brueghelites and the Gray Tribes, the Gray Tribes and the Arch Duke of Malid, the Arch Duke of Malid and the Kalif, the Kalif and Ambergris, Ambergris and the Haragck, the Haragck and Morrow. Scavengers, salt.w.a.ter buzzards mate for life, have an average wing span of 10 feet, an average life span of 20 years, and are distinguished from other buzzards by the flashes of red and green on the tips of their otherwise black wings. See also: Brueghel, Michael; Gray Tribes, The; Jones, Stretcher; Kalif, The; Malid, Arch Duke of.

SAPHANT EMPIRE, THE. As empires go, this one made the Kalif's holdings look pathetic. The Saphant Empire lasted for 1,500 years and encompa.s.sed most of two continents at its zenith. Its rulers, elected by an oligarchy, demonstrated an uncanny ability to mix negotiation and ruthless military force to consolidate their successes. Under the centralized stability of Empire, an unprecedented wealth of advances in technology and the arts threatened to make the Empire a permanent inst.i.tution. However, a series of inbred, weak rulers coupled with crippling attacks on s.h.i.+pping by Aan pirates eventually broke the Empire into five pieces. The last Emperor's chief advisor, Samuel Lewden, did his best to hold the central government together, but the five pieces became 30 autonomous regions and then splintered into even smaller kingdoms. Until finally only ghost-like cultural echoes remained of the once-great empire. For more information, read Mary Sabon's one excellent book, The Saphant Legacy. See also: Bedlam Rovers; Frankwrithe & Lewden; Sabon, Mary.

SHADOW ART MOVEMENT, THE. Movement was actually anathema to the Shadow Artists, who, with their bodies and the late afternoon sun, created works of great beauty and grandeur in Trillian Square, shaming the Living Saints who also gathered there. See also: Gallery of Hidden Fascinations; Living Saints; New Art, The.