Kossuth

Kossuth, or the Lord of Flames was the god of elemental fire. Kossuth was symbolized by the holy symbol of a twining red flame and his portfolio covered elemental fire and purification through fire. In the late 15 century DR, he was considered not to be a true god but actually an elemental primordial, a being whose power rivaled that of a true deity.

Worshipers
The church of Kossuth was rather hierarchical and mostly impersonal. The Church's aims tended to revolve around the acquisition of land, power and wealth. The followers and clerics were often of the lawful neutral alignment. Compared to the many other gods of Faerûn, Kossuth and the three other Elemental Primordials were well known for their relative silence when it came to communication with their worshipers. However, of the four, Kossuth was the most active and vocal.

Many Red wizards of Thay worshiped Kossuth and the Flaming Brazier of Eltabbar was supposedly the largest temple of Kossuth in all the realms.

After death, bodies of worshipers were cremated.

Clerical Orders within the Church of Kossuth in Thay

 * Burning Braziers
 * Black Flame Zealots
 * Brothers and Sisters of the Pure Flame
 * Order of the Salamander

Monastic Orders within the Church of Kossuth
Kossuth's church had three different traditions of monk. Normally, monks lost the possibility to obtain further mastery over their monastic arts when they learned the arts of something else. Kossuth's monks though enjoyed more freedom. They could learn to become clerics of the Firelord without sacrificing their potential as monks. The three orders were:

was the good branch of the three. They rigidly ordered their members' studies and behaviors and put their focus on the purifying aspect of their deity. was the evil branch of the three. They were seen necessary for the renewal aspect of their deity and some members' view on destruction bordered Talos'. was the neutral branch of the three. Their goal was to strike a balance between purification and destruction and were acted as the go-in-betweens of the other two monasteries.
 * Disciples of the Phoenix
 * Disciples of the Salamander
 * Brothers and Sisters of the Purifying Flame

Worship in Zakhara
On the continent of Zakhara, Kossuth was called one of the cold gods of the elements. "Cold" because those are seen as uncaring for human affairs, they were considered opposed to the Land of Fate's pervasive culture of Enlightenment. Only a few Zakharans were willing to worship a cold god in order to gain power.

Relationships
The supremely powerful elemental being known as Kossuth had lorded over fire since the earliest moments of the multiverse, though whether or not the contemporary Kossuth was the same primordial being or one in a long line of similarly named successors is a matter of much conjecture. The Lord of Flames rarely intervened in affairs in the mortal world, spending most of his time embroiled in the intrigues of the Inner Planes.

Kossuth's doctrine of elemental supremacy virtually assured conflict with the other elemental lords. Kossuth was vehemently opposed to Istishia and his clergy. He was watchful of the upstart archomental Imix, who was always trying to undermine his better but while Kossuth remained clearly the true master of the element of fire, the Grand Sultan of the Efreet is the only being on the plane who held even a slightly comparable level of power. The Firelord interacted very little with the other deities of Faerûn. Moradin and Flandal Steelskin honored him for the heat of the forge, but he barely responded. The Return of Bane pleased Kossuth, however; the two deities seemed to agree on the importance of a strong religious hierarchy and had a common intolerance for the ephemeral and unpredictable nature of chaos.

Domain
Kossuth dwelled in the Crimson Pillar, a 10 mile wide globe made of the primordial power of fire that floats over the Sea of Fire on the Plane of Fire. It was said that the blue-white flames of the Pillar give off a heat that makes the rest of the plane seem chilly in comparison.

Noted Historical Interventions
- Powerful Raumatharan wizards managed to summon Kossuth from his elemental home and instructed him to destroy a besieging army of hated Narfell. This he did, but he soon turned against the wizards, incinerating their city for their arrogance. The resulting conflagration consumed much of the northern coast of the Alamber Sea, and the fires of Kossuth's anger burned strong for more than a decade after his withdrawal from Toril.

Perceived Historical interventions
1357 DR: The Salamander War- Kossuth is credited with limiting this disastrous event in Thay's history, by his faithful. Without his influence, they say, the War would have turned into an even greater debacle.

Time of Troubles: Kossuth is not one of the deities spotted on Faerûn during their exile of the gods by Ao.

Publication history
Ed Greenwood initially used Kakatal, one of Moorcock's Elemental gods as found in the original Deities & Demigods, as the elemental lord of fire for his home Dungeons & Dragons campaign set in the Forgotten Realms. As Greenwood indicated in his article "Down-to-earth Divinity" in Dragon #54 (October 1981), Moorcock's elemental gods "may later be replaced in [his] universe by 'official' AD&D beings as these are published". Kossuth first appeared in the original Manual of the Planes (1987), and was featured as one of the elemental lords for the Forgotten Realms in the Forgotten Realms Campaign Set's "Cyclopedia of the Realms" booklet (1987).
 * Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition (1977–1988)

Kossuth was described in the hardback Forgotten Realms Adventures (1990), the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting (1993) in the "Running the Realms" booklet, and Faiths & Avatars (1996).
 * Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition (1989–1999)

Kossuth appears as one of the major deities of the Forgotten Realms setting again, in Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting (2001), and is further detailed in Faiths and Pantheons (2002).
 * Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition (2000–2007)

Kossuth appears in the fourth edition as a primordial.
 * Dungeons & Dragons 4th edition (2008–2015)