The many wives of the Warchief

Letter sent to Galan Thornwood by Thylaea, Winter 162 of the 4th age

Greetings Galan Thornwood,

Your research into the practice of polygamy among the younger races is legendary.

It pleases me your academic pursuits has lead you to consider my personal favourite subject the orcs. However the nature of the question you're posing reveals there is much you don't understand about their culture yet.

Warchief Verthag has no wife and neither does any other orc of the tribes I've visited. For an orc the tribe is family and for a great chief the same goes for all his tribes. I could ask the warchief who then among his many subjects does he favour with a sexual relationship and he would think me a fool. For this question to the orcs is like asking us "Who in your family are you related to".

Sex defines the structure of orc society and the subjects of a chief are exactly those he had sex with directly or by association (in the orcish tongue this always how the word for "sex" is used which may lead to some confusion). It is therefore always so that any powerful orc in the tribe is a bedfellow of the chief with some frequency. But to call these orcs the wives or concubines of the chief would be preposterous if nothing else for the fact that many of them are male orcs.

There are those that are more commonly sharing a bed with the warchief than others. In particular Verthag seems to favour the orc ladies of a lime like complexion and with considerable posteriors. These orcs are however not solely his and are commonly seeking out the warchief rather than in some way being claimed by him. An orc with a close relationship with the warchief tend to be very popular and in turn can enjoy their pick of who they share a bed with next.

The warchief does keep slaves and it is known all are used for his sexual gratification. In their language this would not be understood as "sex" but instead something closer to "amusement" which also happens to include various other acts we would associate with a court jester. This amusement even when sexual in nature does not, as far as I can tell, carry any of the heavy political weight of orc sex.

I sincerely hope this helps further your study.

Respectfully, Thylaea Spiritsong