Vozonid symbols

This is a list of symbols in Vozonid culture:

## Auspicious

* **Gryphon** - Represents strength, wisdom, honour, civilisation, and the west. May also represent the protective celestials sent by the dreaming god Zomjonor.
* **Khopesh sword and axe** - The sword is for action, and the axe is for defense. The khopesh alone symbolises victory; together with the axe, they symbolise personal honour and discipline. It is very important never to cross those weapons in an "X" shape, because that was how they were arranged when the wearer is dead, so the "X"-arangement instead represents death.
* **Crest** - A golden wedge that is present in front of the Emperors' crowns, and on the tips of rooftops. It symbolises honour and prestige.
* **Bolt of Tarhunz** - A stylised lightning bolt that Tarhunz uses to strike his enemies down. It represents courage, determination, and ambition.
* **Full moon** - Peace, freedom, prosperity, blessing, sanctity, innocence, hope.
* **Four-pointed star**, **temple with four gates** - The protection of the four-headed god Pjosaroz, or the four directions.
* **Eight-pointed star** - Represents the blessings of the omnipotent Creator and increased knowledge. Also represents the celestials of the sky, Heaven, the blessings of the directions' gods, bringing order to Chaos, or divine power in general.
* **Night** - Peace, rest, endlessness.
* **Stars** - Blessings, wisdom, curiosity, happiness.
* **Constellations** - Wisdom, inspiration, creativity, hope.
* The numbers **4**, **8**, and (especially) **16** - The directions, knowledge, understanding, perfection, completion, beauty, power. 16 is the holiest of all those numbers, as it symbolises the Sixteen Dancers and completion.
* **Ship sailing across the night sky** - The protection of the gods, a safe journey through life.
* **Obsidian** - Courage.
* **Gold** - Honour.
* **Emerald** - Inspiration. Emerald gems were adorned on weapons, banners, and crowns for divine blessings, as its greater divine power makes it the holiest of the three great substances. It is also the sacred gem of Zomjonor, the god of dreams.
* **Ruby** - Ferocity. As ruby gems are more common than emeralds, they were adorned on the weapons of high-ranking officials to symbolise the favour of the war god Tuoroz.
* **Spinel** - Wealth, affluence. As this reddish mineral is very common in Vozolaz, it was used as currency in ancient times. Regarded as the sweat of the earth goddess Hannahanna and the currency of her earth-wights.
	+ As a gem sacred to the Earth Goddess, the spinel is also used to repel evil spirits and invoke the powers of the Vozonid Gods.
* **White horse** - Good luck, happiness, freedom, success, and the north. Miniature white horse figures are used as gifts to wish a friend success.
* **Sunhorse** - Activeness and loyalty, and the east.
* **Sunbird** - Creativity and happiness, and the east.
* **Raptor** - Vigilance and ferocity, and the south.
* **Kalak-bird** - Healing, recovery, and the west.
* **Flower moth** - A pink and yellow-furred moth that pollinates fruit. It represents a peaceful afterlife.
* **Fire** - Power, might, cleansing, purification, renewal, life, the soul, and holiness.
* **Purple** (if used by Gauvajuts) - Honour, wisdom, and holiness.
* **Red** - The Vozonid people, the skin and body, courage, and life.
* **Green** - Blessing, bliss, tradition, the ancestors, and life. Also the traditional colour of the Emperor and most wights.
* **Hedgehog** - Happiness, fertility, vigilance.
* **Blue lantern** (and the colour of light blue, by extension) - Guidance, peace, the protection of the gryphon god Zomjonor, or hope and the stars of the night sky. Set up on Zomjonor's Day at mid-November.
* **Large drum on a platform** - As drums were used in ancient times to convey messages across distances, large drums are also used by Vozonids to this day to worship their gods. The surfaces of the drums are decorated with animals, plants, fire, natural phenomena, or abstract symbols.
* **Cat** - Cats were hunters of rats and pests, considered evil bringers of famine and plague, so they are seen as symbols of divine justice and blessing. One Vozonid legend claimed that every cat in existence is under the Gods' protection, bearing their presence wherever they go after they had pity on one who accidentally prayed to them.
	+ Killing a cat willingly angers the Vozonid gods for hurting a beloved animal, while saving or healing one makes them happy and brings great blessings.
	+ The colour of a cat's coat or fur determines which god it belongs to. Black cats, the luckiest of all cats, belong to Zomjonor; white cats are for Pjosaroz or Tarhunzas; orange or red cats are for Hannahanna (the earth goddess); blue cats are for Sammakari, the sea god; while cats with black torsoes, the unluckiest cats for bring no luck (unless one saves them from harm or becomes its trusted friend), belong to Zoval, the god of death.
	+ When a kitten opens its eyes for the first time, the Gods will bless the home where it lives. If a black kitten opens its eyes, Heaven will provide an even bigger blessing. Vozonids believe that cats usually bring a home closer to the Gods and their blessings, so even a small kitten living inside a home is more auspicious than a hundred lavish offerings.
* **Scorching Heart** - a red star from the north who represents the start of summer.

## Inauspicious

* **Rat** - Disease, death, decay.
* **Barbarians** - Evil, destruction, backwardsness, ruin.
* **Dragon** - Wickedness, chaos, corruption, unholiness.
* **Roosters** - Stupidity, failure, folly.
* **Pink** - Chaos, savagery, wildness, destruction, demons, the Ontemazei, cannibalism.
	+ Vozonid depictions of Hell involve a pink void with floating islands of writhing flesh and mouths. In other words, "Vozonid Hell is pink" or "pink as Hell, taken literally".
	+ The Ontemazei, being a race of aliens with mostly pink hair, love to reclaim the colour as a sign of the Gods' love and beauty.
* **Purple** (if not a Gauvajut colour) - Death, the goddess Mithura.
* **Cherry flowers** - The Ontemazei, barbarians, cannibals, monsters.
* **Cuckoos** - Usurpation, enemies, ruin.
	+ Under the laws of a certain Sarmelonid emperor, all cuckoos in the entire realm of the Vozonid Empire were killed. For millennia, cuckoos were a foreign sight, with native cuckoo birds being utterly exterminated from the land.
	+ The cuckoo was a foreign bird from the west, introduced to Vozolaz in the Third Age.
* **Skulls** - Misery, failure, oblivion, death.
	+ However, Vozonids raise piles of skulls from putting hated animals to extinction, such as cuckoos and rats. Thousands of years ago, the last Ontemazei slave in Vozolaz had his skull placed on a pile of other Ontemazei skulls, long before more slaves were brought in from criminal gangs and during Thralondian rule.
* **Rainbows** - Deviance, chaos, corruption.
	+ On June and July, any pictures of rainbows are covered to avoid attracting ghost armies, as many of the undead armies waved "sparkling flags". This caused problems with the neighbouring Heronoi and Sakautari peoples, who loved rainbows.
	+ Because of the superstition that a rainbow must not be used on a flag, the ritual flags used to divert ghosts away from peoples' homes into temples looked more like multicoloured layers divided into white stripes.
* **Meteors** - Curses, divine anger, punishment, national disaster. Commonly shown in threes.
* **Spirals**, **tambourines**, the numbers **5** and **6** - The Ontemazei, wickedness, savagery.
* **Nudity, any depiction of sex** - Barbarians, wildness, lack of intelligence, lack of knowledge, weakness.
* **Black and red** - Death, funerals, sorrow, destruction, annihilation, the end.
	+ Vozonid people wear black and red robes and fly such flags during funerals. They dislike anyone who wears black and red.
* **Khopesh and axe arranged in an X** (extended to a simple white x in a black background), **crossed weapons** - Death, funerals, oblivion, the end.
* **Hyena** - Disease, death, exile, outcasts, cruelty, oblivion.
	+ In Azgo, hyenas are killed and their skulls are placed on curse-poles. Other Vozonids just avoid hyenas and pray that the death god will not kill them on sight.
	+ In northern Azgo, hyenas are just avoided. They are considered the hounds of Zoval who catch the dead and bring them to be judged in the underworld.
* **The number 100 -** ghosts, the undead, chaos, death, the end.

## See also

* Vozonid mythology
* Sarmelonid pantheon
* Heronoi symbols
* Malendor symbols