I’m going to present you Fajra. Fajra is in charge of everything connected to religion. I’m going to use the neutral pronoun “they” because their writings do not clearly indicate their gender. This can be explained by the fact that although they are a central figure in society, they also places themselves outside of it because of their status as an intermediary between the divinities and humans.
Thanks to their writings we know more about the religious life of Atlana.
Firstly this society was polytheistic, which means that the pantheon is composed of several gods.
There are several types of deities.
First of all, those related to nature. Zagren, god of the forests. Eion, god of the winds, the air, the storms. Usris, goddess related to freshwater and her sister Ivesis goddess of the seas and oceans.
Rituals are performed to these deities by the inhabitants themselves when they exploit the resources around them (as if to thank the ddeities for allowing them to live and prosper) but also during natural disasters to bring the situation back to normal.
We found several amulets and statuettes buried near the riverbed. Thanks to Fajra’s diary, we know that this year there were few fish to be caught, so the statuettes must represent Usris and were offerings made to bring back the fish.
These rituals were not necessarily performed in the presence of Fajra. They were individual or family rituals.
These traditions attached to the deities of nature show a real respect of the population towards their environnment. There is a kind of harmony or symbiosis with what surrounds them. This idea is also supported by the fact that each priest or priestess is associated with an element. For exemple Fajra means “Fire”.
I will make another post about the other types of deities.
Thanks for reading.