Lolth

Lolth (pronounced LOALTH ), or Lloth in Menzoberranzan, was the major goddess the Queen of Spiders or Queen of the Demonweb Pits  was the major goddess of the drow and the leader of the Dark Seldarine.

She drove the drow under the pretense of culling the weak into heavy infighting. All for the sake of having fun, while at the same time limiting the growth of drow power and influence to ensure that she remained the only accessible power source to them.

Her sacred animals were arachnids. She considered them valuable enough to kill those who mistreated them.

Worshipers
Lolth’s follower base was very varied. Primarily it consisted of drow but also of aranea, chitins draegloths and deep dragons. She also attracted some surface elves. She tried to get more of them by assuming the aspect of Moander, a deity of rot, who was more attractive to elves than herself.

Clerics
Lolth’s clerics normally wore spider motifs. Her rituals required them to wear darker clothes or no clothing at all. Her clergy sacrificed the living and treasure to her glory.

Orders

 * Militant Myrlochar, Order of Soul Spiders
 * The Militant Myrlochar, sometimes known as the Order of Soul Spiders, was an elite fighting organization comprised exclusively of crusader males and found in the dark elven cities where Lolth was worshiped and males were allowed entrance into her priesthood. They directly served the reigning Matron Mothers of the city and were employed to kill their targets. They were usually used so long without pause until they got killed.


 * Handmaidens of the Spider Queen
 * The Handmaidens of the Spider Queen were an order of female crusaders. Also called the "Daughters of the Yochlol", they had no ties to specific cities and were used when Lolth wanted an entire city to brought back into line. At least three times in recorded history, did the Handmaidens of the Spider Queen destroy entire drow cities to prevent them from straying too far from Lolth. Their usual job, though was it to terrorize merchants who took Vhaeraun as their patron as well as cities run by the followers of Vhaeraun or Ghaunadaur’s.

Dark Seldarine
Lolth was the leader of the Dark Seldarine, but was opposed to varying degrees by all other members of it.

Vhaeraun
On one hand, she encouraged her son’s rivalry with her, for it appealed to her love of chaos. On the other hand, her son having actual success at swaying the drow to his cause of destroying her, her supporters and beneficiaries, and her version of society was a real source of fear for her. He amassed the second largest following among drow overall and largest on the surface, and was an ever expanding force, to the point that Lolth considered Vhaeraun her real enemy and rival.

The two had no common ground.

Lolth promoted favoritism towards females, Vhaeraun promoted gender equality, the Spider Queen wanted surface elves as sacrifice from her worshippers, the Masked Lord urged his followers to cooperate with surface elves, Lolth ordered her followers to keep drow society stagnant in every regard, Vhaeraun attracted those who wanted change in the societal progress, economic growth, territorial expansion, etc. Lolth wanted to extinguish the drow race’s desire to return to the surface, Vhaeraun called for settling the surface, and so on.

Lolth couldn’t compete with her son on the field of trickery. His masked traitors, clerical spies of his, whom Lolth mistakingly believed to be her clerics, weren’t only the stuff of horror stories in her church. They cost her the courage to trust those of male gender in general - the majority of the spies were female - and she considered finding and warning her clergy about their existence a matter important enough for her personal attention.

All in all, it led Lolth, who normally gave worshippers of other drow gods a second chance on being found out, to make an exception with Vhaeraun’s followers, they were killed right away.

Other Enemies in the Dark Seldarine
The other members of the Dark Seldarine were generally of minor importance and Lolth’s behavior towards them could most easily be described as derisive.

She thought of Eilistraee, her daughter, as an inconsequential fool whose actions were first and foremost of aimless nature, but which also could be easily manipulated into serving her ends. Eilistraee’s followers’ insult to describe Lolth was "the Tyrant Poisoner".

Ghaunadaur was a different matter. She did fear the possibility of him swaying drow towards his cause, but he didn’t care enough for drow matters to attract many of them.

Allies - Dark Seldarine
Kiaransalee and Selvetarm were her allies and the only ones in the drow pantheon, who acted as her servants. The former did so out of the big power gap between her and Lolth, but she got a level of freedom after she killed Orcus and took Thanatos, the demon lord’s realm. The latter was Lolth’s grandchild and her champion. The latter position was self-appointed. Selvetarm was practically enslaved to her, but was quite comfortable under her rule. Enough to botch his chance for freedom when his father, Vhaeraun, was about to kill Lolth.

Seldarine
Lolth was an enemy of the Seldarine, especially of Corellon Larethian, her former husband, Sehanine Moonbow, for the part she played in foiling her scheme to overthrow Corellon and Fenmarel Mestarine, who was her partner in adultery but ultimately didn’t join her betrayal. This enmity wasn’t very important to her. Having fun at urging and seeing the killing themselves was a higher priority to her than putting coherent effort into making real on her enmity.

Other enemies
She once helped Gruumsh to kill Corellon Larethian but later became an enemy. She also was the enemy of a long list of Underdark deities.

Other allies
Lolth had occasional alliances with Loviatar and Malar.

Dawn Age
Lolth was formerly Araushnee, the lesser elven goddess of destiny and artisans. She was Corellon Larethian’s consort, who handed her the dark elves over. The two had twins together, the elder Vhaeraun, the younger Eilistraee.

War of the Seldarine
At some point, Araushnee grew ambitious and started to plot against Corellon. She aided Gruumsh in killing her husband by sabotaging his sword. She gave Corellon a scabbard of her making. It caused the destruction of his sword. It was foiled by Sehanine Moonbow. She knew about Araushnee’s tempering with the scabbard because the Weaver conducted this very first step of her betrayal in plain sight of Sehanine Moonbow.

Later, Araushnee agitated Malar into attacking the wounded Corellon,, after she witnessed the Beastlord killing the orc god Herne on Faerûn, he managed to chase the Beastlord away.

Araushnee’s next plan was gather a host of gods on hostile footing with the Seldarine, forming them into an army. The army itself was so badly organized, that she was confident, that they would fail. Her true plan was to give Corellon another cursed scabbard, that drew arrows shot by Eilistraee to him, thus killing Corellon while turning Eilistraee into her scapegoat.

Before the attack by the anti-Seldarine faction was ready, Sehanine confronted Araushnee about her betrayal, as mentioned above, she knew Araushnee to be a traitor. Araushnee detained Sehanine and her confident Vhaeraun, imprisoned Sehanine and organized things so Eilistraee was in the vicinity of her father while at the same time guaranteeing the sheath to be in possession of his father.

The battle started, while a surprise entry by Ghaunadaur happened to help the Weaver, things went according to plan and Eilistraee shot Corellon, while the anti-Seldarine army lost and retreated. Corellon was almost killed and Araushnee tried to poison him with a dose of Eilistraee’s poison, pretending it to be water from Elysium with healing qualities. Sehanine, who managed to break out from Vhaeraun’s prison, albeit at immense cost to herself, managed to stop her. Angharradh was created and Corellon’s life was saved.

A trial was called in, Vhaeraun and Eilistraee became members in exile of the Seldarine, in the case of Eilistraee willingly, while Araushnee was declared a tanar’ri and was also sentenced to banishment. She turned into a spider monster and attacked Corellon. The Protector was too weak of heart to kill her and she managed to escape.

Aftermath
Araushnee took the name "Lolth“. She conquered the 66th layer of the Abyss, the Demonweb Pits for herself. She had competition in the form of Kiaransalee, an elven goddess whom she swiftly subjugated, and Ghaunadaur with whom she had a longer confrontation. That which Lurks tried to subsume her but failed and in his rage robbed his followers their intelligence. It also downsized his follower base and with it his power thus allowing Lolth to win.

After securing control over her layer, she got bored and came up with the idea to be worshipped as a goddess and bring misery to elves because she had no confidence at hurting Corellon Larethian directly. When the moon elf Kethryllia Amarillis came to retrieve her lover, she got interested in the world the elf came from. She sensed the presence of Vhaeraun in Ilythiir, at that time the major deity there, and took a look at that country. She saw the Ilythiiri under Ka'Narlist preparing for war because Kethryllia unknowingly revealed their position to them. Lolth admired the old mage’s craftiness and he became her first worshipper and consort.

Ilythiir, the southern empire, was much to her liking, not only because it was richer, more cosmopolitan and lively, but because its people had the capability to be ambitious and to act on their ambitions.

First Flowering
Originally, Ilythiir and the other elven nations were on good footing, Lolth poisoned this relationship to the point of the elves coming up with the idea to create a dark elf-free piece of land. They caused the First Sundering and destroyed the continent with corresponding casualties. Among the casualties was a large part of the church of Vhaeraun. Vhaeraun’s efforts to make remedying to this were thwarted were undermined by the ongoing conflict between him and Eilistraee, granting Lolth and Ghaunadaur the opportunity to fill the void. She started her machinations that lead to the Crown Wars.

Crown Wars
For Lolth, the Crown Wars were an opportunity to have a lot of fun, it destroyed the majority of the elven nations.

Lolth’s church grew in prominence during the Second Crown War. At that time, Aryvandaar, the sun elf nation, started what was believed to be a genocidal campaign against the dark elves of Ilythiir. Its coronal summoned Wendonai, a balor in service of Lolth, and bought power from it. He got special treatment because, Lolth took it as a golden opportunity to get an entire of subrace of elves under her.

Other noble families of Ilythiir followed their royalty’s example and Vhaeraun, Kiaransalee and Ghaunadaur also had their followings by the Fourth Crown War, but they all couldn’t compete with Lolth. The Ilythiiri were clear on Lolth being a spider deity and that the other five gods and goddesses, who later comprised the Dark Seldarine, Selvetarm wasn’t born yet, were in some kind of relationship. What wasn’t clear to them was, in what kind of relationship they were. The Ilythiiri thus experimented with the iconography of these gods and showed them as spider gods, too. These efforts to put the drow deities in this relation in each other was considered so offensive by the depicted, that Lolth, Vhaeraun, Ghaundaur and Kiaransalee killed their followers for it.

During the Fourth Crown War, the elves' wish for divine salvation was granted and the dark elves were turned into drow and then driven underground.

Era of Upheaval
Once in the Underdark, the drow lived in a borderline animal state. Lolth gathered them together and urged them into the foundation of their first city, Telantiwar. It later destroyed itself through infighting, causing the drow to spread throughout the Underdark.

A thorn in her side was a demon lord called Zanassu. That one called itself the demon lord of spiders. She got rid of him by sending Selvetarm, her grandchild who was born between Vhaeraun and Zandilar, when her followers attacked the Yuirwood. (see here) Lolth convinced Selvetarm that killing the demon would have made Eilistraee proud, so he fought and defeated Zanassu, but ended up absorbing his power and being bound to Lolth’s will. Lolth thus solved two problems of hers. Her rival over spiders was gone and she prevented her daughter from getting an ally.

Time of Troubles
During the Time of Troubles, apart from appearing in Menzoberranzan and assuming the aspect of Moander to attract more surface elves, Lolth was spreading information on Zinzerena, a goddess from another world. That one appeared later on Toril and was killed by Lolth. Apart from gaining the portfolios of chaos and assassination, she also learned how the distribution and absorption of divine energy worked under Ao’s new rules.

War of the Spider Queen
The War of the Spider Queen, a period during which Lolth transformed herself into a greater deity and turn the Demonweb Pits into an independent plane and then systematically got rid of her rivals was divided in two periods.

Silence of Lolth
In 1372 DR, Lolth fell comatose. During this period, called the Silence of Lolth, clerics of hers didn’t receive spells from her.

Vhaeraun took advantage of this and tried to assassinate Lolth. She was seriously injured but saved by Selvetarm.

When she finally awoke in 1373 DR, she called for three candidates to become her Chosen to finalize her transformation, Danifae Yauntyrr, Quenthel Baenre and Halisstra Melarn. The first two came on their own to the Demonweb Pits, the last one was sent by Eilistraee to kill Lolth. In the Demonweb Pits, Halisstra converted back to Lolth.

Out of the three, Danifae was chosen to become a part of the Spider Queen, Quenthel was sent back home and Halisstra was made Lolth’s Lady Penitent, her Chosen.

The Reckoning
In 1375 DR, Lolth and Eilistraee elected to play a game of sava with the future of the drow at stake. Lolth’s core win strategy involved the employment of only two powerful servants of hers Halisstra Melarn and Wendonai.

Vhaeraun, her son, came up with a new plan to kill her. He wanted to kill his sister and unite their churches to increase his power and then go out to kill his mother. Halisstra Melarn managed to get her hands on Malvag, the organizer of Vhaeraun’s plot. Lolth ordered her Chosen to ensure his survival, thus she went as far as reviving him after he was killed by Cavatina Xarann. Lolth’s children clashed and Eilistraee survived and Vhaeraun supposedly died.

Lolth’s plan to get rid of Selvetarm was planned more throughly. Her Chosen, Halisstra was sent to the church of Eilistraee and told them about the whereabouts of the Crescent Blade (which Wendonai had made into a vessel for himself) and led Cavatina Xarann, a priestess of Eilistraee, to the Demonweb Pits. There the priestess killed Selvetarm with the Crescent Blade, as planned by Loth. It allowed her to absorb Selvetarm’s church almost in its entirety. Eilistraee came behind being used by her mother only in 1378 DR. Meanwhile Qilué Veladorn took the the Crescent Blade for herself. The sword was possessed by Wendonai. The demon successfully convinced Qilué to not banish him, for it would have destroyed the blade. He remained at Qilué's side for the next years, although the High Priestess of Eilistraee also started to hatch a plan to actually kill the balor by taking him into herself and using her Silver Fire to destroy him. .

Kiaransalee joined the game in 1377 DR. The ensuring battle was between Eilistraee and the Revenancer. Lolth's servant Wendonai let himself seemingly killed by Cavatina. Naturally, it put the balor above suspicion to be active at all. His influence as a mutterer could be felt when Qilué ordered the death of the defenseless clerics of the Revenancer in the Acropolis after that goddess' death.

Ghaunadaur joined in 1378 DR. Qilué agreed to a risky plan to protect the Promenade of the Dark Maiden from the followers of Ghaunadaur: it failed (intentinally botched by former Vhaeraunites) and the temple was lost. Through its portal network the slime god’s followers managed to kill many members of the church of Eilistraee. Lolth also unleashed Halisstra on her daughter’s worshippers, inflicting great losses that culminated in the following year.

In fact, in 1379 DR, Eilistraee--while inhabiting the body of Qilué Veladorn--tried to free Halisstra from Lolth's clutches and convince her to kill the Spider Queen. However, Wendonai successfully nudged Halisstra into slaying Qilué alongside the Masked Lady. Lolth then abandoned Halisstra after she fulfilled her purpose for which she was turned into a Chosen.

During the Reckoning, Lolth miscalculated twice. The first time was Q'arlynd Melarn’s success at casting elven high magic. The intent was to turn all drow of the church of Eilistraee into dark elves, only few hundreds were changed. Eilistraee’s worshippers’ souls thus stayed in Arvandor but under Corellon Larethian.

The second miscalculation was Ghaunadaur. After getting rid of Eilistraee, Lolth tried to kill the ooze god but failed because that one proved to be stronger than expected, which didn’t mean that he wasn’t strong enough to repel her, but strong enough to run away from her.

Post-Spellplague
Lolth enjoyed a position of supremacy among the drow. She did suffer opposition from the Jaezred Chaulssin, the skulkers of Vhaeraun, at that time the term to describe the church of Vhaeraun who retained divine magic despite their god’s death, and the followers of Ghaunadaur. The last group was a dying force, at least among drow, for Lolth successfully extinguished the knowledge about that god.

At some point in the years leading up to 1479 DR, Lolth ordered her servants to begin collecting blue fire items and relics important to Mystra. Her ultimate goal was to become the new goddess of magic, but she ended up failing with the return of Mystra.

Post-Sundering
After the event known as the Second Sundering, Lolth was no longer unrivaled as the goddess of the drow (even if she still retained her position of dominance), for the dead members of the Dark Seldarine were revived. A further disadvantage for the Spider Queen, after their return, Eilistraee and Vhaeraun reached a truce and even reciprocal friendship (although their followers still skirmished often).

Rites
Like all religions, the worship of Lolth involved a number of rituals and rites. Many of them included sacrifice. The following was a secret sacrificial prayer in Abyssal known only to high priestesses: "Great Goddess, Mother of the Dark, grant me the blood of my enemies for drink and their living hearts for meat. Grant me the screams of their young for song, grant me the helplessness of their males for my satisfaction, grant me the wealth of their houses for my bed. By this unworthy sacrifice I honor you, Queen of Spiders, and beseech of you the strength to destroy my foes."

Appearances

 * Novels:
 * Evermeet: Island of Elves
 * Starlight & Shadows trilogy
 * War of the Spider Queen series
 * Condemnation
 * The Lady Penitent trilogy

Connections
Lolth