View source for Blood Plagues

{{Event
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| name        = Blood Plagues
| partof      = 
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| type        = Divine intervention<br>Weather event
| deity       = [[Yurtrus]]
| location    = [[Sword Mountains]], [[northwest Faerûn]]
| date        = [[Uktar 30]], [[927 DR]]
| duration    = 3 days
| schedule    = 
| frequency   = 
| basicrefs   = <ref name="CoS.W-p8" />
| observedby  = 
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}}
The '''Blood Plagues''' were a supernatural weather event caused by the wrath of the [[Orc pantheon|orcish god]] [[Yurtrus]] that led to widespread [[disease]] and death in the [[Sword Mountains]] during the {{YearlinkName|927}}.<ref name="CoS.W-p8">{{Cite book/City of Splendors: Waterdeep|8}}</ref><ref name="tGHotR-p111">{{Cite book/The Grand History of the Realms|111}}</ref>

==Description==
Beginning on [[Uktar 30]], red thunderclouds amassed above the Sword Mountains. For three days&mdash;Uktar 30, the [[Feast of the Moon]], and [[Nightal 1]]&mdash;blood rained down on the mountains, leaving the slopes red and reeking of decay and rot. Once the rains ceased, [[:Category:Diseases|diseases and plagues]] swept through the bloody mountains.<ref name="CoS.W-p8" />

While many died in the following days, the hardest hit were the [[orcs]]. The survivors believed that they had proven their strength and worthiness merely by surviving the ordeal imposed upon them by their god Yurtrus.<ref name="CoS.W-p8" /><ref name="tGHotR-p111" />

==History==
Before the blood rains began, an orc [[shaman]] called [[Wund]] rose to prominence and prophesied the exact time and nature of the coming storms. When the Blood Plagues struck, every orcish chieftain in the Sword Mountains died, and Wund took advantage of this power vacuum to found the [[Brotherhood of the Scarlet Scourge]] and to unite the orcs of the Sword Mountains into a single kingdom called [[Uruth Ukrypt]].<ref name="CoS.W-p8" /><ref name="tGHotR-p111" /> Yurtrus's holy symbol&mdash;two white hands<ref name="F&P-p151">{{Cite book/Faiths and Pantheons|151}}</ref>&mdash;was adopted as a symbol of this new kingdom.<ref name="tGHotR-p111" />

==Appendix==
===References===
{{Refs}}
[[Category:Climate and weather events]]
[[Category:Plagues]]
[[Category:Yurtrus events]]
[[Category:Events in Icewind Dale]]
[[Category:Events in the Frozenfar]]
[[Category:Events in Northwest Faerûn]]
[[Category:Events in Faerûn]]
[[Category:Events on Toril]]
[[Category:Year of Miracles]]