Post by admiral on Nov 2, 2022 9:04:33 GMT
Sorcerer-Prophet Balhutti-Zhurekar the Decrepit: Art by Hunter
Chaos Dwarf Songs
In their mystic rituals, in monotone labour and in the rearing of their children the Chaos Dwarfs of Zharr Naggrund, and all its domains, sing. Be they doomladen dirges, rattling recitations of religious script or just simple work verses, songs are part of Dawi Zharr culture just as they are for other races.
The nature of Chaos Dwarf songs reflects their cruel nature and experiences in life. These are not songs about innocent joy, and very rarely about romantic love or homesickness. Instead they bear the grim worldview of the songs' composers and everyday singers.
These songs have very often a moral aim which would appear twisted if not sickening to many other peoples in the Warhammer world, as is the case with all lore of Chaos Dwarf folk culture. These are stanzas of death and slavery, of exploitation and heinous ritual. They record in the public memory of Chaos Dwarfs the dramatic high points in their long history filled with strife, suffering and ruthless drive for dominance and power.
Often these songs are partially or wholly undecipherable to outside listeners, even if they were to understand the Dawi Zharr language. So embedded are Chaos Dwarf life and thinking in mysticism that most cultural expressions through song would be difficult to interpret at best should any translator and scholar wish to do so.
Instead it is usually through the formative world of Chaos Dwarf childhood that their culture's values and expectations can be uncoded via stories and songs.
Chaos Dwarf children, just like most other children in the Warhammer world, live like "little adults" to quickly mature and get prepared for their often predestined adult life. Many of the songs and stories which surround the youngest are complicated adult works shared by all in family or clan gatherings. This is fundamentally no different from other races' way of life.
Even so, there exists a flaura of Chaos Dwarf children songs, who are relatively simple and generally taught to the youngest by their mothers. These are rhyme songs which, if translated, can be understood well by outside observers, since they should be intelligible to Dawi Zharr children in relatively early development.
Some parts of Chaos Dwarf children songs may be advanced enough to be lost on Human children's ears. This is because both western Dwarfs and eastern Chaos Dwarfs are intelligent races with lives of longevity and slow maturing periods. As such, many Dwarf beardlings possess more knowledge and skill in the crafts than most Human elders.
Even small Dwarf children are often able to grasp concepts which would be complicated for young Human adults. Chaos Dwarfs are no different in this regard from their distant kin. The contrast with Dwarf verses lies instead in the songs' content.
One have to understand that Chaos Dwarf songs at an early age helps instill a moral sense where greed, domination, contempt for others and complete submission to hierarchy all vie with each other and combine to create the merciless character of the Chaos Dwarf people and their monstrous empire.
These are songs of bloodshed and hardship, of carnage and conquest, of failure and damnation. They are glimpses into the psyche of these enigmatic slavers and engineers. And they are not for those weak of guts and heart.
These are the songs of the Blacksmiths of Chaos.
- - -
Chaos Dwarf Cult Songs
1. The Cannibal-Core - Audio (MadHatter)
2. What will the tool do without its wise hand? (Admiral)
3. Lament for Mingol Zharr-Naggrund the Great (Admiral)
4. A Hymn to the Great Taurus (Malificant)
5. Break or Be Broken (Admiral)
Chaos Dwarf Military Songs
1. All for Hashut - Audio (Admiral; audio by MadHatter)
2. Kill, maim, burn - Mantra Audio (Admiral; audio by MadHatter)
3. O Hashut in Thy Power (Admiral)
4. Hashut, crush us not (Admiral)
5. By the River of Ruin (Admiral)
Chaos Dwarf Adult Songs
1.The Passionate Axeman (MadHatter)
2. Nest's pest (Admiral)
3. What a Chaos Dwarf mother told her daughter (Admiral)
4. To war (Admiral)
5. Shovel Coal (Admiral)
6. Run! Run! Run! (Admiral)
7. Gate of Contempt (Admiral)
Chaos Dwarf Children Songs
1. Might's right (Admiral)
2. Math's half (Admiral)
3. Mast's ghast - Audio (Admiral; audio by MadHatter)
4. Mind's grind (Admiral)
5. Man's lance (Admiral)
6. Slave's cave (Admiral)
7. Meat's feat (Admiral)
8. Mound's hound (Admiral)
9. Hat's cat (Admiral)
10. Mold's gold (Admiral)
11. Moan's throne (Admiral)
12. Beware the Skaven my Son - Audio (Dînadan; audio by MadHatter)
13. My hat it has a steelspike (MadHatter)
14. Zharn's craving (Admiral)
15. Fourteen Daemons times unholy twelve (Admiral)
16. Twelve Little Hobgoblins (Admiral)
17. The Unruly Idol (Admiral)
18. Zharr-Naggrund is Burning Down (Dînadan)
19. Slaves Are Plenty Useful (Admiral)
Hobgoblin Songs
Greenskin speech and language are crude, as are their legends and music. Their songs are usually as much an affair of screaming, grimaces, spitting, motions, stomping and violence as they are words, rythm and accompanying music. This is especially true for Orcs, whose stanzas around the campfires are not much different from their warcries. The short, thuggish songs of Orcs reflects their brute and thick nature, whilst Goblin songs are full of spite and malice, just as Goblins themselves are.
Both Orc and Goblin songs are simple and boastful, though Goblins and their Gnoblar cousins might boast mostly of cunning and torture whereas Orcs prefer to laud fell deeds of raw strength. Hobgoblin songs are, on the other hand, often longer, more coherent and more advanced than the verses of other Greenskins.
Hobgoblins are arguably the most intelligent of the Greenskin races, as is evident in their clothing, saddles, tools, armour and weaponry, all of which are more carefully crafted than the works of Orcs, Goblins, Gnoblars and Snotlings. In Hobgoblins, relatively high intelligence corresponds directly with an extremely murderous, cunning and treacherous nature. This is to be expected from Greenskins, for whom brutality and selfishness is at the core of their essence.
To some extent, the souls of Hobgoblins may be gleaned from their songs (if they had souls). More sophisticated than their Orc and Goblin counterparts, these songs are part of an oral tradition in which the Dark Lands Hobgoblins' origins on the Eastern Steppes has not been forgotten, akin to the steppe title Khan which is still very much in use.
These songs are also a reflection of the Hobgoblins' precarious middleman position as the elite slave cast of the Chaos Dwarf empire. They are the taskmasters and slave soldiers for whom service to the Dawi Zharr was a better option than wild free-for-all Greenskin freedom in the Dark Lands.
This was a devil's bargain, for once struck it may never be broken if the Hobgoblins are to survive in the Dark Lands. So hated have they become amongst the other Greenskins for their acts of treachery and servitude to Zharr-Naggrund that if the Chaos Dwarfs were to fall, or if the Hobgoblins were to strike out on their own, they would be hunted down and slaughtered en masse by vengeful Orcs and Goblins. Hobgoblins are already killed on sight by their free Greenskin cousins.
Thus it is that the Hobgoblins of the Dark Lands thrive under the Dawi Zharr's dominion, ever fearful of their ruthless masters and the hateful Greenskin hordes that roam these harsh landscapes. They are expendable cannon fodder, subject to the cruel whims of their overlords, and repeatedly suffer cullings of Khans and even tribes who become too powerful for their own good. Their songs are verbal witnesses of this reality in which they live as the detested henchmen of the Chaos Dwarfs.
Yet above all they are stanzas of paranoia and malice, of plotting and cunning, of treachery and assassination, of bloodshed and pillaging. They are just like the Hobgoblins themselves: Cruel, murderous and insidous to the core.
These are the songs of the Slaves to Damnation.
- - -
Hobgoblin Songs
1. Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc (Admiral)
2. Slice an' dice (Admiral)
3. Watch yer back for sneaky gitz (Admiral)
4. Big 'at tells ya (Admiral)
5. Da Luckee Stabba-Git (Admiral)
6. Shush! Sneak! Vicious streak! (Admiral)
7. Blood in da Mud (Admiral)
Foreign Songs About Chaos Dwarfs
When the ravenous armies of the Chaos Dwarfs conquer, devastate, raid and enslave in distant lands, they leave scars upon the minds of their surviving enemies and victims which may not be visible, yet still lingers long after the Dawi Zharr have departed with their armoured cohorts, mutant beasts and winged monsters, and with their hellish war machines, slave soldiers and shackled fire Daemons. Tales and songs about such encounters are retold and sung from the Old World to Cathay.
War may be strangely exhilarating to experience, but it is also terrible. Glory is only won amongst the moans of dying enemies, lest the most brilliant stratagems and marvellous feats of engineering would be for nothing. Yet to face the fell hosts of the Chaos Dwarf empire is to come face to face with one's own raw, primal fear.
Chaos Dwarfs are the ones who trample and enslave Greenskins on a large scale. It is they who routinely quench menacing Warbosses and thus conquers the most barbaric race in the whole world. The Dawi Zharr shy from nothing to dominate and enslave. Not only mortals are found toiling in backbreaking labour for the sake of Zharr-Naggrund's might and production, but even Daemons have been made into fettered thralls.
Theirs is a dread reputation, and the Chaos Dwarfs do everything in their power to stimulate and uphold it. After all, fear is in itself a potent weapon and deterrent, and the psychological warfare one can find in a Chaos Dwarf army is as sickening as it is deliberately wrought to inspire terror in foe and slave alike.
Their hosts are adorned with trophies from ritually skinned, mutilated and burnt victims, and the very shapes of the Chaos Dwarfs' helmets and bound Daemons are intended to cow and frighten. Live slaves with cut-off limbs, gouged eyes, opened guts and flayed or scorched skins decorate giblets, war machines and even banners in most Dawi Zharr battle lines. These make a grotesque sight, yet to hear their wails and moans is possibly even worse.
The musical instruments of the Chaos Dwarfs are often possessed with bound Daemons to further increase psychological impact. Both Iron Daemons and such monsters as Lammasus and Bull Centaurs increase the terrifying impression of Zharr-Naggrund's armies. Dark sorcery, crushing artillery bombardments and cruel deeds all add up to strike fear into the hearts of the Chaos Dwarfs' foes.
Many of the verses sung about Chaos Dwarfs amongst other races stands as scattered testimonies to the dark dread experienced by enemy warriors and civilians alike. Behind these songs often lurk a grim trauma inflicted upon the minds of those enemies who composed the lines in the first place. These were men and women whose dreams were cast into nightmares by what they saw during war with the Dawi Zharr.
Although Ogres, uncorrupted Dwarfs and many Greenskins are resistant to such scars of the mind, the same cannot be said for the Skaven or the human multitude who time and time again find themselves confronting the Chaos Dwarfs' armies. Even hardened northmen have been left shaken by the sights, sounds and smells emanating from a Dawi Zharr battleline.
This is the stark reality behind most of the sagas and verses sung about the mysterious Chaos Dwarfs in foreign lands. Bear in mind the trauma and horror visited upon those who survived to tell the tale.
These are stanzas of war and slavery, of blood and arsonry, of darkness and madness, and of monstrous cruelty. Above all they are testimonies of a grim dread born out of hell itself, for to face the Blacksmiths of Chaos is to gaze into an abysmal hunger to dominate all and everything, and to break the will of every single living creature.
These are the songs of the Survivors.
- - -
Foreign Songs About Chaos Dwarfs
1. An Ode to the Asscannon - Audio (MadHatter)
2. Stunty tusks (Admiral)
3. Deeds of Ragnar (Admiral)
4. Hell on Earth (Admiral)
Chaos Dwarf Melodies & Sound Impressions
1. Zharr-Naggrund (MadHatter)
Chaos Dwarf Songs Youtube Channel (MadHatter)
- - -
Written by: KNC
Illustrated by: Forgefire
Slice An' Dice
Slice an' dice,
an' burn da rice,
nick a knife,
an' take a life.
We go south ta humie scum,
sound da bloody drum!
Stick an' stab,
an' gut da crab,
pick a scab,
an' bounty nab.
We'll get past da big-big wall,
burn every damn hall!
Shoot an' hoot,
an' get da loot,
kick a boot,
an' bettah scoot.
We outrun da armies' smell,
gettout fast as hell!
- Hobgoblin marching song, originally from the Eastern Steppes
- - -
Blood in da Mud
Hah!
Blood in da mud,
an' gutz in da hutz!
Won't work an' go nutz,
zo bunk while ya kan!
Skull on da hull,
an' gland in da hand!
Won't spare da hot brand,
zo burn while ya kan!
Fart on da heart,
an' stung in da lung!
Won't tell mah knife flung,
zo stab while ya kan!
Kill on da hill,
an' gore on da shore!
Won't miss any store,
zo loot while ya kan!
Leg in da keg,
an' arm from da farm!
Won't hear any harm,
zo maim while ya kan!
Ahahahahaha!
- Hobgoblin loot song
- - -
Written by: KNC
Illustrated by: denelian05
Dere Iz Eight Wayz Ta Stick An Orc
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah one.
Nick a spade an' dig a pit,
give dat pit a pointy stick,
shove an orc into da pit,
an' then dere's seven more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah two.
Nick a bow an' sneaky spot,
bait wiv korpsez dat'z still hot,
wait fer orc an' get 'im shot,
an' then dere is six more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah three.
Nick a chucka wiv a spear,
stick da orcses dat appear,
at barbeque you eat da ear,
an' then dere is five more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah four.
Nick a pole an' dig a hole,
bait wiv ratses and ol' sole,
zee boar throw orc on da pole,
an' then dere is four more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah five.
Nick a blade an' hide in loo,
when da orc make numbah two,
get dat blade an' drive 'im through,
an' then dere is three more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah six.
Nick his choppa in da night,
orc get smashy, start a fight,
stick 'im in 'is back alright,
an' then dere's two more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah seven.
Nick a spear an' wolfy dog,
'unt orc right down inna bog,
stick 'im kornered like a hog,
an' then dere's one more.
Dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
stick an orc,
stick an orc,
dere iz eight wayz ta stick an orc,
and 'ere iz numbah eight.
Nick a knife an' hide in hay,
when boy look da uvver way,
stick 'im hard an' startta flay,
an' then dere iz eight more!
- Hobgoblin camp song
- - -
Deeds of Ragnar
Thirst. Darkness. Hunger. Pain.
A mind so numb and dull,
of toil and drudge,
of bleakest grudge,
in pit of sludge.
Woe. Shackles. Terror. Scars.
A wrath so long oppressed,
of bitter fate,
of vilest hate,
it will not wait.
Whips. Fury. Struggle. Slay.
A deed so raw and great,
of strongest will,
of love to kill,
in blackest mill.
Break. Speech. Muster. Lead.
A chief so filthy low,
of host of scum,
of wretched slum,
now beat the drum!
Rise. Carnage. Murder. Glee.
Thrice Ragnar chose to stand not flee,
led unknown thralls in lands afar,
for warrior would nought die but free,
now raise the mighty Chaos star!
War. Bloodshed. Omens. Flame.
Lift your axe and brandish spear,
forget your maiden's home,
see Hobgoblins run down in fear,
their master but a gnome!
Pride. Valour. Hubris. False.
Praise Dark Gods and hail,
build shields of scrap,
and lethal flail,
fall into trap!
March. Cruel. Power. Hell.
Hear the thralls be torn apart,
know fell ranks arrayed,
see bale Daemon iron cart,
feel your hide be flayed!
Steel. Horns. Ashen. Might.
Burn living flesh to cinders,
and crush man's bravery,
no god their triumph hinders,
the lords of slavery.
Maim. Panic. Torture. Geld.
A wretch so broken down,
of eyes cut blind,
of ravished mind,
his fate to find.
Chant. Occult. Secret. Rite.
A bull so fierce and hard,
of bronze and smoke,
of flames and coke,
to victim stoke.
Knife. Heinous. Idol. Death.
A glow so hot and strong,
of its molten gold,
of flesh thrown cold,
into altar old.
Name. Fame. Saga. Told.
A man so rash and strong,
of gods' caprice,
of whip to cease,
for only thralls wish peace,
war for Ragnar,
listen well,
and sacrifice these geese.
- Norscan war poem