Movies - Gelfling

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	Movies - Gelfling

Gelflings are elf-like beings populating the fictional world of Thra in Jim Henson's 1982 movie The Dark Crystal
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Jen and Kira are the only two known survivors of a massacre perpetrated by the diabolical vulture-like Skeksis upon their race. Gelflings can speak in the languages of animals and upon physical contact with one another can share thoughts, memories, and feelings in a process called dreamfasting.

Before the Dark Millennium (the 1000-year period from when the Crystal cracked to when it was restored), female Gelfling could fly great distances by use of retractable butterfly-like wings which unfolded from their backs. However, during the Dark Millennium, their ability to fly was compromised to gliding and/or slowing a fall (something that Jen found out only by accident, when he and Kira had to jump from a cliff to escape a swarm of Garthim). Jen and Kira were instrumental in fulfilling the prophecy that restored the Dark Crystal to its natural state.

Art and Music

Two of the major delights of Gelfling are their art and their music. Both have been developed to a very high degree, musical artifacts dating back nearly to the very beginning of Gelfling history having been found. Much of the stonework done in the Great Castle was done by Gelfling during the reign of the Skeksis until the Purge of 529 revealed the true intentions of the reptilian monsters.

Although both art and music are highly developed there has never been a sense of competition amongst the Gelfling as there is with humans. Gelfling artists and musicians took great delight in teaching their crafts and even greater delight when one of their pupils turned out to be a master at the craft.

The vast majority of the music was limited to oral tradition; therefore, in the great purses carried out against the Gelfling much of this was lost forever. Only a few songs were ever recorded in written form; a few of these managed to survive the burning of the Music Academy.

Gelfling Birth Rate

The Gelfling possess a relatively low birth rate. They are not capable of bearing children until they reach their forties. Generally after bonding there would be a period of ten to twenty years before any children would be born. After that several children would be born within the next couple of decades; after that the rate of births tends to fall off. Typically a Gelfling female would bear ten to fifteen children during her life span.

Overpopulation, however, has never become a severe problem. It seems that the Gelfling lived extremely close to the planet itself. A sort of feedback mechanism developed between the environment and the female Gelfling. If, for example, the number of Gelfling should fall off through some sort of accident or disease, then there would be an immediate increase in the birth rate. Should the environment be in danger from impending overpopulation, the birth rate declines markedly.

Bonding

There are several levels of bonding, varying in intensity and length of effects. One level is through the process of dreamfasting. This can be done between two Gelfling or between Gelfling and Podling. This level tends to temporarily increase the psychic awareness of the bonders, establishing a mental link between the two that would gradually decrease over time unless a deeper level of bonding is obtained.

The strongest level of bonding results in a male/female bonding that lasts throughout an entire lifetime (Although this is what happens the vast majority of the time, female/female and male/male bondings also occur and are equal in intensity and effects to male/female bonds.) This can, on rare instances, happen during the first dreamfasting episode, as it did with Jen and Kira. The psychic bonds formed can be intense and permanent and present on many levels of activity. A strong degree of telepathy is usually established and, during the most intense sexual sessions a virtual unification of the minds of the Gelfling takes place.

An extended familiar bonding also takes place, increasing the strength of the family relationship in Gelfling society. This bonding also tends to last the entire lifetime of the individual. Should one of the two members of the strong pair-bonding die, some elements of the bonding still remain, but a new bonding can still take place so that even the eldest of the Gelfling can be found in the highest level of pair-bond relationships.

Bone Structure

The Gelfling possess a light bone structure, the female moreso than the male. The ability to fly, of course, would be impossible if the Gelfling possessed a heavy bone structure so it is believed that the light bone structure is a product of Gelfling evolution and, in their earliest times, was in some way tied to the survival of the species.

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