Turtle Recall Part 16

Geas. A bird, with a head like a flamingo, a body like a turkey and legs like a Sumo wrestler. It walks in a jerky, bobbing fashion, as though its head were attached to its feet by elastic bands. Its prime means of defence is to cause a predator to laugh so much that it can run away before the predator recovers. Geas is also a word meaning curse or obligation. [S]

Genetics. The study of genetics on the Disc has never been very organised. The wizard Catbury (some 300 years before the present) is on record as having noticed, while strolling in his garden, that some plants were taller than other plants and, interestingly enough, that some plants were shorter than other plants. The response to his monograph on the subject can be summed up as 'Yes? Well? So what?', because Ankh-Morporkians have that logical and common-sense approach to life which means that Science is beaten before it starts.

Nevertheless, Catbury's writings remain in the LIBRARY and there were, later, some experiments based on his simple observations. These failed at an early stage, however, when wizards tried the experimental crossing of such well-known subjects as fruit flies and sweet peas. Unfortunately, they didn't quite grasp the fundamentals, and the resultant offspring a sort of green thing that buzzed led a short, sad life before being eaten by a pa.s.sing vegetarian spider.

In any case a more dispa.s.sionate study of the evidence suggests that on the Discworld heredity is more mental than genetic, and certainly owes more to Lamarck than Mendel. The observation of the current ARCHCHANCELLOR, Mustrum RIDCULLY, that heredity means 'that if your father has a good brocade waistcoat you'll probably end up getting it' contains a certain amount of truth. In Soul Music, DEATH becomes enc.u.mbered with a granddaughter, Susan STO HELIT (daughter of his adopted daughter YSABELL and MORT), who has certainly acquired his powers of invisibility and memory. On Discworld, cutting off the tails of mice might well lead to them having tail-less offspring. And probably vengeful ones, too.

Something that appears more like a high-speed conventional evolution, or at least like conventional evolution as commonly understood, has been engineered by the G.o.d OF EVOLUTION on an island near Fourecks. Plants there try to make themselves as useful as possible as quickly as possible in the hope of being taken off the island, and on at least one occasion a dinosaur evolved into a bird in a fraction of a second.

Genua. The Magical Kingdom, the Diamond City, the Fortunate Country. Genua was originally a pleasant and relaxed place in which to live but, under the iron rule of Lily WEATHERWAX, it became a fairytale city; this meant that people had to smile and be joyful the livelong day at spearpoint, if necessary.

Genua nestles on the delta of the Vieux river, surrounded by swamp. It is a wealthy kingdom, having once controlled the river mouth and taxed its traffic. It has always been rich, lazy and unthreatened. From a distance, it looks like a complicated white crystal growing out of the greens and browns of the swamp.

Close to, there is an outer ring of small buildings, an inner ring of large, impressive white houses and, at the centre, a palace tall, pretty and multi-turreted, like a toy castle. Under Lily, everything was very clean. Even the cobblestones had a polished look. The city was guarded by tall soldiers in red and blue uniforms. The place looked, in fact, like a fairytale city . . . With all the horrors that implies.

Both before, during and since the Weatherwax period Genua has also been a city of cooks. They don't have much to cook there, so they have learned to cook everything. A good Genuan cook can more or less take the squeezings of a handful of mud, a few dead leaves and a pinch or two of some unp.r.o.nounceable herbs and produce a meal to make the gourmet burst into tears of grat.i.tude and swear to be a better person for the rest of their entire life if they could just have one more plateful. [WA]

Geoffrey. One-time Secretary and Chief b.u.t.t of the Guild of Fools and Joculators. A Fool. He had eyes like two runny eggs and a very nervous disposition, as is often the case when you do not know where the next custard pie is coming from. [RM]

Gern. Apprentice embalmer in DJELIBEYBI. A plump young man with a big, red, spotty face. He is fond of all the practical jokes you can play with the sad remnants of mortality, such as the disembodied handshake gag and all the other little delights so familiar to generations of medical students. [P]

Gibbsson. Apprentice guitar-maker in the employ of Blert WHEEDOWN. [SM]

Gilt, Reacher. Chairman and CEO of the Grand Trunk Company ('As Fast As Light'). A lot of rumours had begun concerning Reacher Gilt, just as soon as people had noticed him and started asking 'Who is Reacher Gilt? What kind of a name is Reacher, anyway?' He threw big parties, that was certain. They were the kind of parties that entered urban mythology (was it true about the chopped liver?) Some said he owned a gold mine, others swore that he was a pirate. And he certainly looked like a pirate, with his long curly black hair, pointed beard and eyepatch. He was even said to have a parrot (this is true a c.o.c.katoo called Alphonse, who says '12 per cent'). Certainly the piracy rumour might explain the apparently bottomless fortune and the fact that no one, absolutely no one, knew anything about him prior to his arrival in the city. Perhaps he'd sold his past, people joked, just like he'd bought himself a new one. He was certainly piratical in his business dealing.

With his big head, flowing black hair and beard, he also looks like a better cla.s.s of pirate, a buccaneer maybe, but one who took the time to polish his plank. He is a great bear of a man, in a frock coat and striped waistcoat.

Later, briefly, styles himself 'Randolph Stippler'. [GP]

Gimick. One of the many cousins of Lance-Constable CUDDY. A manufacturer of pins.

Gimlet. A dwarf with a famously penetrating gaze who runs a cafe and delicatessen in Cable Street, Ankh-Morpork, as well as another dwarf deli, and 'Yo Rat!' in Attic Bee Street. It used to be for dwarfs only but under the influence of civic decency, a sense of the brotherhood of all sapient species and a desire to get some of the 'troll dollar', it has subsequently catered for that species as well. Try their rat and cream cheese. For vegetarians, they do a soya rat.

By Ankh-Morpork standards, Gimlet's is a well-run and hygienic eatery, although he has been caught subst.i.tuting 'rats' carved out of pork, beef and mutton when the real thing was in short supply.

Ginger. (See WITHEL, THEDA.) Gladys. A seven foot tall, thousand-year-old golem. Named Gladys by Miss Maccalariat, so that it could clean the ladies' rest room at the Post Office. Miss Maccalariat, who ruled the Post Office counters with a rod of steel and lungs of bra.s.s, had objected to a male golem cleaning the ladies' privies. How Miss Maccalariat had arrived at the conclusion that they were male by nature rather than custom was a fascinating mystery, but there was no profit in arguing with such as her.

And thus, with the addition of one extremely large, blue gingham dress, a golem became female enough for Miss Maccalariat.

The odd thing is that Gladys is female now, somehow. It isn't just the dress. She tends to spend time around the counter girls, who seem to accept her into the sisterhood despite the fact that she weighs half a ton. They even pa.s.s on their fashion magazine to her, although it's hard to imagine what winter skin care tips would mean to someone a thousand years old with eyes that glow like holes into a furnace. [GP, MM]

Glingleglingleglingle Fairy, the. While there are many FAIRIES, this one deserves a special mention as a sort of meta-fairy. It is generally a gnome or small goblin, with a set of handbells, and its sole job is the make the 'glingleglingleglingle' noise which heralds the arrival of any other fairy. It may also toss up the handful of chopped tinsel which makes those little twinkly glints in the air, you know the ones. Sometimes fairies have their work cut out to live up to human expectations.

Glod. A dwarf, the tangential victim of a curse placed on the Seriph of AL-YBI (everything he touched turned into Glod, which shows how important it is, when cursing, to check your spelling). His son, Glod GLODSSON, later found employment as a horn player in Ankh-Morpork. [WA, SM]

Glodsson, Glod. A dwarf. Small, even for a dwarf. He has lodgings behind a tannery in Phedre Road and plays a large bronze horn. A member of the BAND WITH ROCKS IN who considers himself to be an extremely professional musician, in that money is always on his mind. [SM]

Glooper, the. The Glooper, as it is affectionately known, is an 'a.n.a.logy machine'. It solves problems not by considering them as a numerical exercise but by actually duplicating them in a form that can be manipulated in this case, the flow of money and its effects within society becomes water flowing though a gla.s.s matrix the Glooper. The geometrical shape of certain vessels, the operation of valves and ingenious tipping buckets and flow-rate propellers enable the Glooper to simulate quite complex transactions. It is also possible to change the starting conditions, too, to learn the rules inherent in the system. For example, one could find out what would happen if you halved the labour force in the city by the adjustment of a few valves, rather than going out into the streets and killing people! The Glooper had been worked on by gla.s.sblowing geniuses and by their counterparts from the hypothetical Other Side, gla.s.sblowers who had sold their souls to some molten G.o.d for the skill to blow gla.s.s into spirals and intersecting bottles and shapes that seemed to be quite close but some distance away at the same time. Water gurgled, sloshed and, yes, glooped along gla.s.s tubing. There was a smell of salt. [MM]

Glwenda. The daughter of a garlic farmer in DJELIBEYBI. Romantically linked with GERN the apprentice embalmer. [P]

Gnolls. A softer-skinned variety of troll, but without the latter's intelligence and n.o.ble disposition. A few are now moving into Ankh-Morpork. They are scavengers, both as a means of eating and also for more complex, hard-to-understand reasons; they'll make careful collections of old spoons or dead seagulls, which appear to be extremely significant to both themselves and other gnolls. It is believed that the huge foetid heaps carried on the bent backs of gnolls are not, in fact, some kind of carapace but are their worldly goods. [ER, TT]

Gnomes, goblins (and pictsies) A more or less interchangeable term (a gnome is merely a goblin found underground, a goblin is merely a gnome coming up for air, a pictsie is a gnome fighting) for the Discworld's smallest (4" to 2') humanoid species. Seldom encountered, not because of their rarity but because of their speed and natural desire to keep out of the way of creatures to whom they would merely be something sticky on the sole of the boot although a well-trained gnome, with that strength so often found in small creatures, can in fact lift a human being. They are generally hunters and gatherers, usually of property belonging to someone else. [SN]

Goatberger, Mr. Publisher in Ankh-Morpork. Responsible, among other books, for publishing Nanny OGG'S Joye of Snackes. An honest, helpful man, who cares nothing for profit and seeks only to enrich the cultural environment of his fellow men. A typical publisher in every way, in fact. [M!!!!!]

Goatfounder, Hilta. A witch in OHULAN CUTASH, where she sells thunderdrops and penny wishes at a small, covered, market stall. Small and fat, Hilta wears an enormous hat with fruit on it and gives the impression of a ma.s.s of lace and shawls and colours and earrings and ordinary rings and so many bangles that a mere movement of her arms sounds like a percussion section falling off a cliff. She laughs like someone who has thought about life for a long time and has now seen the joke.

Her lodgings are over a herbalist and behind a tannery, offering splendid views over the rooftops of Ohulan. Among her 'back of the stall' preparations are: Tiger Oil, Maiden's Prayer, Husband's Helper, ShoNuff Ointment, Stay Long Ointment and Madame Goatfounder's Pennyroyal Preventatives. She performs an important function in the town, although no one talks very much about what that actually is. The only clue is that, if Hilta wasn't there, the town would be a good deal larger. [ER]

G.o.dmothers, Fairy. A specialised form of witch with particular responsibility for the life of one individual or a number of individuals. They use wands probably a modification of the wizard's staff and tend to have an interest in travel. Fairy G.o.dmothers develop a very deep understanding of human nature, which makes the good ones kind and the bad ones powerful. [WA]

G.o.ds, the. The Discworld has G.o.ds in the same way that other worlds have bacteria. There are billions of them, tiny bundles containing nothing more than a pinch of pure ego and some hunger.

Most of them never get worshipped. They are the small G.o.ds the spirits of lonely trees, places where two ant-trails cross and most of them stay that way. Because what they lack is belief. A handful, though, go on to greater things. Anything may trigger this. A shepherd, seeking a lost lamb, for example, may find it among the briars and take a minute or two to build a small cairn of stones in general thanks to whatever spirit might be around the place.

Despite the splendour of the world below them, the Disc G.o.ds are seldom satisfied. It is embarra.s.sing to know that one is a G.o.d of a world that only exists because every improbability curve must have its far end; especially when one can peer into other dimensions at worlds whose Creators had more mechanical apt.i.tude than imagination. No wonder, then, that the Disc G.o.ds spend more time bickering than in omnicognisance.

They are quarrelsome and somewhat bourgeois G.o.ds, who live in a palace of marble, alabaster and uncut moquette three-piece suites they choose to call DUNMANIFESTIN. It is always a considerable annoyance to any Disc citizen with pretensions to culture that they are ruled by G.o.ds whose idea of an uplifting artistic experience is a musical doorbell.

The G.o.ds don't play chess, they haven't got the imagination. They prefer simple, vicious games, where you 'Do Not Pa.s.s Transcendence but Go Straight to Oblivion'; a key to the understanding of all religion is that a G.o.d's idea of amus.e.m.e.nt is Snakes and Ladders with greased rungs.

They are great believers in justice, at least as far as it extends to humans, and have been known to dispense it so enthusiastically that people miles away are turned into a cruet.

The trouble with G.o.ds is that, if enough people start believing in them, they begin to exist. People think the sequence is: first object, then belief. In fact it works the other way. Belief sloshes around in the firmament like lumps of clay spiralling into a potter's wheel. That's how G.o.ds get created. They clearly must be created by their own believers, because a brief resume of the lives of most G.o.ds suggests that their origins certainly couldn't be divine. They tend to do exactly the things people would do if only they could, especially when it comes to nymphs, golden showers and the smiting of your enemies.

G.o.ds and humans are inseparable. Because what G.o.ds need is belief, and what humans want is G.o.ds. (See also DEITIES.) Gogol, Mrs Erzulie. A voodoo woman in GENUA, who smokes a pipe and is known to have made use of zombies when household ch.o.r.es need doing. She is tall, handsome, middle-aged, and wears heavy gold earrings, a white blouse and a full red skirt with flounces. She has a black c.o.c.kerel, Legba, as her familiar. She used to be romantically linked with Baron SAt.u.r.dAY, who was later a zombie, and is the mother of Ella SAt.u.r.dAY.

For practical purposes she can be considered a witch, although perhaps with a slightly different moral sense from the cla.s.sic RAMTOPS craftswomen.

She foretells the future ostensibly by staring into bowls of jambalaya (but probably by relying on close observation and a deep study of human nature all witches understand the need for a little magic in people's lives).

She lives in a house in the swamps close to Genua. From the river it looks like a simple affair of driftwood, roofed with moss and built over the swamp itself on four stout poles. They end in four large duck feet on which the house can, when necessary, move around the country. [WA]

Golems. One of the rarest of Ankh-Morpork's minority groups, and unique in that it has not yet been found anywhere outside the city. It can hardly be called a 'species', since golems are created by priests or holy men from clay animated by a spell (or holy word). The word or spell is carved on their forehead or inserted in their hollow head and is in effect their life force. Highly moral creatures.

No such creation has been attempted by humans for a thousand years, it being held to be a little tasteless, but the events recounted in Feet of Clay reveal that there is a third group that can create golems and that is golems themselves. All they need is some more clay, an oven and a Word. There are no such things as golem children, merely golems who are younger than other golems.

Traditionally, even trolls have looked down on golems, who tend to be (physically) larger and more shapeless even than computer programmers and (mentally) withdrawn and rather sad yet very alert creatures doomed to do the jobs that men disdain and trolls don't want; not for nothing are they called 'h.o.r.n.y-handed tons of soil'. A golem is not legally a living creature, merely property . . .

But now, the golems are freeing themselves. It's the quietest, most socially responsible revolution in history. Legally they are tools property, and so, often supported by the GOLEM TRUST, they save up and buy themselves.

A Golem must not harm a human being or allow a human being to come to harm unless ordered to do so by a Duly Const.i.tuted Authority.

Golem Trust, the. (Motto: 'By Our Own Hand, Or None'.) A charitable foundation set up by Adora Belle DEARHEART to help to free golems. What happens is that the free golems support the Trust, the Trust buys golems whenever it can, and the new golems then buy themselves from the Trust at cost. The free golems earn 24/8 and there are more and more of them. They don't eat, sleep, wear clothes or understand the concept of leisure. The occasional tube of ceramic cement doesn't cost much. They buy more golems every month now, and pay Adora Belle's wages, and the iniquitous rent the landlord charges her for their offices because he knows he's renting to golems. [GP]

Goodmountain, Gunilla. A dwarf, who opened a 'word smithy' at the sign of the Bucket in Gleam Street, Ankh-Morpork. Co-founder, with William DE WORDE, of The Ankh-Morpork Times. Gunilla was later husband . . . er, wife . . . er, partner to BODDONY. [TT]

Goom, 'Wazzer'. A volunteer, with Polly PERKS, to the Borogravian Army. When first encountered, appears to be a small, nineteen-year-old, stick-thin lad with round eyes and a bad haircut and a reedy little voice. Wazzer is very religious and says grace loudly before meals. Stands just slightly too close to you and stares slightly to the left of your face very disconcerting as is the fact that Wazzer hears voices in particular the d.u.c.h.ess ANNAGOVIA. Some friends call Wazzer 'Alice'. [MR]

Gorphal. A bearded, elderly diplomat in Ankh-Morpork. Famed as a student of Agatean Empire affairs. [COM]

Gorrin the Cat. A thief in Ankh-Morpork. B12 was his code identification from YMOR. Called the Cat because of his tendency to sleep a lot and not do much work. [COM]

Gortlick. A writer of dwarf songs with HAMMERJUG. Songs are important to the dwarf community and new ones are commissioned for birthdays, weddings, and so on. Cynics say that the word 'gold' will inevitably turn up somewhere. It rhymes so easily with others words. Well, in fact it rhymes most easily with 'gold', but that's fine for dwarfs, who know what they like and like lots of it. [SM]

Gorunna Trench. An undersea chasm in the Disc's surface that is so black, so deep and so reputedly evil that even the krakens go there fearfully, and in pairs. In less reputedly evil chasms the fish go about with natural lights on their heads. In Gorunna they leave them unlit and insofar as it is possible for something without legs to creep, they creep. No living thing knows what lies down there; those who have found out have not been in a position to tell. [COM]

Granny's Cottage. Home to Granny Weatherwax. A witch's cottage so typical that, if there were any kind of tourist organisation in the RAMTOPS, it would be given a grant. The description can be taken to apply to a greater or lesser extent to all rural witch cottages, although, as indicated, this one can be considered a witch's cottage par eldritche.

It nestles in the woods. It leans against itself for support. It's of the architectural style known as 'the vernacular', i.e. somebody swearing, and by now it gives the impression of having grown in place rather than having been built. Granny's cottage pulses with the force of Granny's personality.

Access to the cottage is exclusively via the back door, but it is first worth taking some time to look at the garden. In the front of the building is a bit of lawn, with a forlorn windsock on a pole, although the cottage is largely surrounded by unruly beds of herbs which seem to move, even on windless days. There are also some leggy soft fruit bushes and, in front of the Rimward wall, a bleached wooden bench to catch the sun. Such shrubs and flowers as are otherwise found are all cuttings or spare clumps given to Granny Weatherwax by neighbours. A witch would never dream of buying anything for the garden. Around the side is a water b.u.t.t and a walled paddock for her goats when they are not turned loose in the forest (witches prefer goats to cows). In a corner are half a dozen beehives and an old goat shed.

Marking a boundary of the herb garden is a tree stump, beyond which is Granny Weatherwax's privy. Apart from the usual offices, the privy also contains the key to the cottage (on a nail), half a copy of an Almanack and Booke of Dayes (also on a nail), a stump of candle on a shelf and a chrysalis (this shelf tends to be a repository of things Granny Weatherwax has found on her walks and which appear to be interesting: oddly shaped stones, strange roots, fossils, and so on). Next to the privy is a large beech tree.

A key sign that this is the garden of a witch is the lack of a wall. Creatures of the forest could wander across it at any time. They very seldom do.

And now, the cottage . . .

Through the back door is the hall, with Miss Weatherwax's official witching hat hanging on a hook. This leads through into the stone-flagged kitchen, dominated by its wide chimney and inglenook fireplace, with its firedogs and hook over the fire for a big black kettle. Over the mantelpiece hang a small key and a clock, kept mainly for its tick; in front of it are a rag rug and a rocking chair.

The room is otherwise furnished with a kitchen table and chairs, a dresser (which contains Granny's box of memorabilia) and an old chest, with a pair of pewter candlesticks. There is also a small speckled mirror. None of the furniture is new. None of it even looks as though it could ever have been new. In a drawer on the dresser is a clean bandage and on top of the dresser is a box of dried herbs: medicinal herbs, because people will even seek out Granny Weatherwax when whatever ailment they have got gets too bad. The room is grey-walled the colour plaster gets from age, not from dirt. There is not a thing in it that isn't useful except perhaps a green gla.s.s ball, a present from Magrat GARLICK.

Off the kitchen is the dank little scullery, which contains the walk-in pantry, a well (topped with a stone slab and a pump), a copper washpot, washboard, scrubbing brushes, slop bucket and a big copper still. Shelves containing bottles and jars of ingredients suggest quite correctly that this is where some of the more physical, take-one-spoonful-at-night-and-another-if-you-wake-up-in-the-morning aspects of witchcraft are carried out. A door in the scullery leads to the lean-to where the goats are bedded down in bad weather.

Back in the kitchen is a small door opening on to the cramped staircase which leads to the bedroom. The plaster on the bedroom ceiling is cracked, and bulges like a tent. On the wash stand are a jug and a basin with a fetching rosebud pattern which also matches another china item under the bed. On the bed itself is a patchwork quilt which looks like a flat tortoise. It was made by Gordo SMITH and was given to Miss Weatherwax by ESK'S mother one HOGSWATCHNIGHT. On the quilt is Granny Weatherwax, lying very still and holding a card saying 'I ATE'NT DEAD'.

Er . . .

Don't all rush for the stairs . . .

Granny Whitlow. A witch. She used to live in the gingerbread cottage encountered by RINCEWIND and TWOFLOWER. The art of residential confectionary now seems to have died out on Discworld. Healthier modern variants, such as the houses of cheese and crispbread, never really proved popular. [LF]

Grateful, Lady Sara. A pupil at the QUIRM COLLEGE FOR YOUNG LADIES. Another horsey gel and an INTERCHANGEABLE EMMA. [SM]

Great Pyramid of Tsort. A now-derelict ancient wonder of the Discworld. Made of 1,003,010 limestone blocks, ten thousand slaves were worked to death in its construction. It is a maze of secret pa.s.sages, their walls reputedly decorated with the distilled wisdom of ancient TSORT. In the circ.u.mstances the most important of these wise sayings must have been: Don't be a Slave.

It took sixty years to build. Its height plus its length divided by half its width equalled exactly 1.67563, or precisely 1,237.98712567 times the difference between the distance to the sun and the weight of a small orange. [LF]

Greebo. Nanny OGG'S cat. A huge, one-eyed tom who divides his time between sleeping, eating and fathering the most incestuous feline tribe. He is technically a mottled grey but is covered with so much scar tissue that he looks like a fist with fur on it. He can only be said to have ears because there's no other word for the things left on top of his head.

Greebo's good eye, his left one, is yellow. The other one is pearly-white. He radiates genuine intelligence. He also radiates a smell that could knock over a wall and cause sinus trouble in a dead fox. Although he is addressed by virtually everyone as 'Yarrgeroffoutofityahbarstard', to Nanny Ogg he is still a cute little kitten and still sleeps on her bed when not out at night looking for something to fight, rape, eat (or all three). The way he affectionately tries to claw her eyeb.a.l.l.s out in the morning is as good as an alarm clock.

However, a residual effect of a hasty spell on the part of his owner has now left Greebo with the ability, not always controllable, to turn into human form. As a human, he is 6 feet tall, broad shouldered and leather clad, with rippling muscles under his shirt. He has long sideburns, a mane of black hair, a broken nose and a black patch over his bad eye. And, it should be added, a worried expression for much of the time. A lot of the things which, as a cat, he would do quite naturally, present him with all kinds of problems when he attempts them in human form.

Greebo tends to flip into his alternate shape when he finds a situation he can't deal with in the current one. On top of all his other problems, this means that people occasionally find a naked human running around meowing.

Greenyham. Treasurer of the Grand Trunk Company, also of Ankh Sto a.s.sociates. [GP]

Greetling. Master Greetling is the Head of the Teachers' Guild, and allergic to loud noises, chalk, and anyone under the age of 16. [GG]

Greggs, Miss. Teaches History at the Quirm College for the Daughters of Gentlefolk. [SM]

Greicha the First. Lord of the WYRMBERG. He was killed by his daughter LIESSA but, because he was also a powerful wizard, he resolved to remain alive unofficially until only one of his children was left to conduct the funeral. [COM]

Gretelina. (See MELLIUS.) Grim, Agoniza and Eviscera. The Sisters Grim are the authors of real fairy tales you know, the ones with blood and bones and bats and rats in. Their stories include such uplifting tales as How The Wicked Queen Danced in Red Hot Shoes, The Old Lady in the Oven, The Gla.s.s Clock of Bad Schuschein, The Seventh Wife of Greenbeard. [TOT, TAMAHER]

Grim, Malicia. Daughter of the mayor of Bad Blintz (a small, thin, worried-looking man with a bald spot and a comb-over). Her grandmother was Agoniza Grim and her great aunt was Eviscera Grim. As a result, she has inherited a fascination with stories and her life is dominated by fairy tales. She wears a long, black dress with black lace fringing and sometimes she bundles her rather-too-red hair up under a black head scarf. Not unattractive, although she can glare better than a cat and her nose is perhaps a shade too long. She carries a bag which contains absolutely everything anyone might need when on 'an adventure'. [TAMAHER]

Grimnir. Queen Grimnir the Impaler (1514-53, 1553-7, 1557-62, 1562-7, 1568-73). A vampire Queen of Lancre. The phrase 'the Queen is dead, long live the Queen' is particularly apposite in her case. [WS]

Grinjer. Maker of grave models in DJELIBEYBI. He is twenty-six, acne'd and still lives with his mother because he cannot find a girl who shares his interest in glue. [P]

Gristle, Petulia. A young witch, and a friend to Tiffany Aching. Petulia is short, plump and permanently red-faced and worried-looking. She wears lots of jewellery she can't resist occult jewellery such as her necklace of silver bats and her amulet of owls. She is a very honest girl and a good friend. Petulia is afraid of pins and she hates to disagree with anyone about anything she's the sort of person who apologises if you tread on her foot. She used to work for Old Mother (Gwinifer) Blackcap over in Sidling Without; she specialises in animals and wanted to be a midwife for humans as well as pigs when she 'grows up'. She has three brothers.

Petulia is a specialist pig-borer indeed she has been the local champion in the n.o.ble art of boring. She could sit down with a pig and talk to it gently and calmly about extremely boring things until some strange pig mechanism took over, whereupon it would give a happy little yawn and fall over, no longer a living pig, and ready to become a very important contribution to the family's diet for the following year. This might not appear the best of outcomes for the pig, but given the messy and above all noisy way pigs died before the invention of pig boring, it was definitely, in the great scheme of things, a much better deal all round. [HFOS, W, ISWM]

Gritz. A troll hotel in Ankh-Morpork. Considered very high-cla.s.s by trolls, since water is piped to every room and there are carpets, or at least something soft, on the floor. The dining room, with its fine selection of clays, is particularly noted. [SM]

Groat, Junior Postman, Tolliver. A very elderly postman at the Ankh-Morpork Post Office. A bent, elderly man with a wheezy voice and a bad cough like a wall being hit repeatedly with a bag of rocks. His short bristly beard suggests to the casual viewer that its owner has been interrupted halfway through eating a hedgehog.

Groatie wears a toupee not a good one. It's chestnut brown, the wrong size, the wrong shape, the wrong style and all in all wrong.

He has an odd smell vaguely chemical, coupled with the eye-stinging aroma of every type of throat medicine invented, with just a hint of old potatoes. He is a great believer in natural medicine, opting for 'cures' such as his poultice of goose grease, flannelette and hot bread pudding. He also puts sulphur in his socks and takes tincture of rhubarb to keep his tubes open.

He was a strict follower of the old Post Office Regulations. Despite, or because of, that, he ended up being promoted, initially to Probationary Senior Postman and, later, to Postal Inspector. [GP]

Grodley, Sister. A witch from the Skund area. Drops her aitches and sticks her little finger out when she drinks her tea. [WS]

Gryle. A 'colleague' of Reacher GILT. A banshee a humanoid race who evolved the ability to fly in some high jungle somewhere. He is a tall figure, in a black cloak and wide, flat-brimmed hat, with a voice which is more of a breath than a voice. He is very thin there is nothing spare about him no spare flesh, spare words or spare time. He is as light as a child and he is not strong as such, but he has sinews like cables. He has a long, pale face and a thin-lipped mouth with rows of pointy teeth. Mr Gryle's special talents came as a package with some funny little ways. He was trustworthy he'd never blackmail you, because such an attempt would be the first move in a game that would almost certainly end in death for somebody; if Mr Gryle found himself in such a game he'd kill right now, without further thought, in order to save time. Presumably he was insane, by the usual human standards, but it was hard to tell; the phrase 'differently normal' might do instead. After all, Gryle could probably defeat a vampire within ten seconds, and had none of a vampire's vulnerabilities, except perhaps an inordinate fondness for pigeons. [GP]

Guilds. Ankh-Morpork is the home of many of the Disc's oldest and most respected Guilds, the largest and most senior of which are micro-societies in their own right. A Guild may well, in return for a t.i.the, oversee all aspects of a member's life practically from the cradle to the grave (particularly in the case of the a.s.sa.s.sINS' GUILD) and possibly beyond (in the case of the Guild of Priests, Sacerdotes and Occult Intermediaries). The oldest and richest guild is the Beggars'; the most stylish, the a.s.sa.s.sins'; the largest, the Thieves' (although there is popularly supposed to be a Rat Guild).

The smallest Guild is, most people are surprised to learn, the Guild of C.M.O.T. Dibblers, membership one. It nevertheless qualifies, under ancient rules that were changed almost immediately after Mr Dibbler discovered them, for full Guild status.

Almost all the schools and most of the hospices in Ankh-Morpork are Guild-run. The 300-odd Guilds to be found in the city include: Accountants' and Usurers' Guild [J, AGD]

Actors' Guild [TT]

ALCHEMISTS' GUILD.

Architects' Guild [NOCB]

Armourers' Guild [J]

a.s.sa.s.sINS' GUILD.