The Kóryos: The Warbands that Led to the Formation of Ancient and Modern Aryan states
By Arya
In his 1953 book “Men Among the Ruins.” Julius Evola redefined the source of the state from the traditional conservative notion of its origin being in the family to that of the Männerbund, the Germanic equivalent to the indo european Kóryos, but what exactly was a Kóryos Warband? What were its functions, composition, and significance? And What were some of its parallels in the daughter cultures of the Aryans? This short essay shall serve the purpose of answering these questions.
The Proto Indo-European word *kóryos meant an ‘army or a warband’; this will come in handy towards later understanding the purpose and organization of this unit; some of the descendant cognates of the term is the baltic word *kāryas, which is roughly translated to meaning ‘army,’ old Persian kāra also meaning ‘army.’ and Lithuanian kãras again meaning army this concludes the exploration of the etymology of the term kóryos and its derivative cognates.
Concerning the function and composition of the kóryos, it was primarily made up of teenage youths from the ages of 12 to 19 who usually hailed from prominent aristocratic families. One warband usually consisted of 2 to 12 warriors who were led by a boy titled the Koryonos, who was determined by a game of die. Concerning its function and purpose, it served as an initiatory rite of passage for the male youths in which, after their service was completed, they earned the sexual license that would allow them to marry and be fully fledged male members of the Indo European tewtéh2 or tribe. Strategically though, it allowed indo european tribes to encroach upon the territories of Non-Aryans and to alleviate issues concerning overpopulation at home since, many times, these same warriors served as colonists in seized foreign lands. On to the mannerisms and dispositions of these warbands, they were expected to be rapacious and wild, being exempt from Aryan cultural taboos condemning rape, pillage, and murder so as long as these actions were not directed against the host society. Wolf motifs were heavily associated with these warbands, with the members being forced to take up names relating to canines, such as wolf and man dog, and were also forced to wear wolf skins to symbolize their barbarity and voracity. The Koryos as a whole was seen in the context of the Ancient Aryan religion as a supernatural chthonic force of the underworld with its members passing in between the ethereal and material realm; this is where we get modern legends regarding Werewolfs, which is literally Old German for man-wolf. The members of these warbands also seemed to have fought as nude berserkers and conducted their operations at the height of the night, which exemplified their connection to the underworld.
The attestations of the Koryos can be examined in numerous descendant traditions of the ancient Aryans. In the Greek traditions, we have parallels among the Athenian ephebos, who were 17 to 20-year-old youths that lived in packs and fought on the edge of society wearing black tunics and minimum armor in order to attain full Athenian citizenship. In the italic tradition, there was the ver sacrum which was a rite of passage in which a whole entire age cohort, usually made up of youths, was sent to establish a colony; one of the colonies that got established in this way was Rome which was perhaps the main reason that led Evola to determine that the Mannerbund was the true origin of the state since most Italian city-states were founded by Mannerbunds via the ver sacrum. In the Armenian tradition, specifically in the legend of Hayk, a group of young warriors named the Manuks are mentioned who fight outside the boundaries of Armenia with much voracity; it is also interesting to note that the term Manuks is probably a cognate of the Vedic Maruts, who were believed to be a troop of young soldiers accompanying the storm god Indra. Attestations of the Koryos can even be found among the West Semites in the form of the Ahlamu the Ahlamu was a Semitic confederation that raided and pillaged bronze-age Mesopotamia for slaves and livestock; they also had a habit of colonizing and resettling in the cities and villages that they razed. These warbands were primarily composed of young warriors, or at least that was what they were intended to be, as shown by the etymological origin of the word Ahlamu which hails from the Semitic root (ḥ-l-m), which means wild young man; therefore, Ahlamu likely meant bands of rowdy young men.
The Koryos were not mere combat battalions utilized to bring into fruition the territorial ambitions of aryan society but were, beyond that, a way for ancient Aryan male youth to spend their chthonic energies that come with youth on something constructive that would have aided the proto-state that is the tribe such as engaging in razzias and colonizing foreign territory in the name of the clan. Today many Aryan youths waste their vigorous energies on unconstructive activities such as taking narcotics, relishing in bread and circus entertainment, or just engaging in general petty troublemaking that harms themselves and the societies they live in in the long term instead of giving an outlet for these youths to express their creative energies in a constructive way society diagnoses these youths with different mental illnesses such as ADHD and ADD in order to inject them with prescription medication to suppress the vigor and energy that comes naturally with youth. The ideal national socialist state should therefore seek to fix this problem by creating a youth organization modeled on the ancient Aryan Koryos, but of course, with a little bit of modernization, such an organization would allow modern Aryan male youth to spend the energies that come with their age on something that would benefit the society that they live whilst the wolf pack organization style of the Koryos would help sponsor feelings of comradery and would prepare the youth leaders for future independent command in the armed forces.