Nainen,
The Goddess
with Gleaming Hair
Goddess of the night sky, the Moon & Stars, patron of Aurora.
One of several gods unique to the Aurorean pantheon, Nainen has long been viewed as the most important of these local gods in her role as the patron of the land of Aurora. While predominantly a sky goddess — particularly the night sky — Nainen also has aspects of a goddess of beauty and love.
Invariably depicted as a beautiful woman with long, gorgeous hair, the aurorae in the night sky which given the land its name are said to be caused by the shimmering of Nainen’s hair. Similarly, a common metaphor in Aurorean poetry is to refer to the Moon as “Nainen’s lamp.”
Worship of Nainen predates the arrival of settlers from the Elven Empire and elsewhere in southern Realmgard — most notably the large influx of Middelmerish and Gallicantien soldiers several centuries after the fallen of the Elven Empire. Notably, although Gardian and Gallicantien have become the languages of the majority of Auroreans, the name of Nainen (along with the other traditional Aurorean gods) is derived from the ancient Aurorean language of the original inhabitants of what is now the Kingdom of Aurora — dialects of which are historically the traditional language (and remain spoken by) the Trollic, Wilderling, and Tarandarius populations of Aurora.
Although the arrival of the Elves and other southern peoples in Aurora introduced many Imperial practices and rituals, including introducing the cults of the gods found elsewhere in Realmgard, Nainen was never supplanted as the most important deity in Aurora and has been worshipped as the patron goddess of Aurora for centuries, if not millennia.
Nainen is also a major figure in Aurorean stories and poems, a recurring helper of the Aurorean folk hero Sauvaherra. Many Aurorean verses begin with a poetic invocation of Nainen:
Let us clasp our hands together, let us form a circle,
as recited by the Aurorean sorceress Apolline Castor
Let us dance together, til Nainen’s lamp is lighted,
Til all the stars are shining and the moon is brightly kindled.
Let us sing the songs that have come down from our fathers:
Tell the tales of heroes, the ancient ages of Aurora.
Interestingly, although the Kingdom of Aurora and the Duchy of Tanith are located at almost the furtherest possible points of Realmgard from one another, that Nainen and the Tanithite patron goddess Malketa are both sky goddesses has created a good deal of cultural affinity between Aurora and Tanith. Taken to its logical conclusion, a general consensus has arisen between the two peoples that Nainen and Malketa are, in fact, simply the same single goddess worshipped under different names at opposite ends of the continent.
Although aurorae rarely occur as far south as Tanith, this ongoing association of Nainen to Malketa has lead to the rise of Tanithite depicts of their patron goddess with the shimmering, variegated hair typical of Aurorean depictions of Nainen. Similarly, it is becoming increasingly common in Aurora to depict Nainen with the appearance of a Tanithite woman.
It is also becoming increasingly common for Tanithite travellers to venture across Realmgard to Aurora to view the aurorae in the night sky
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