Lolth - The Spider Queen

Lloth in Menzoberranzan, known as the Queen of Spiders or the Queen of the Demonweb Pits, is the most influential goddess of the Drow(elf) , within the pantheon of the Dark Seldarine.
Lloth drove the Drow into heavy infighting under the pretense of culling the weak, while her real goals were to hold absolute control over the dark elves, prevent the rise of alternative faiths or ideas, and avoid complacency (even though she found amusement in the strife that plagued her followers' communities). However, in the long run her influence proved to be an obstacle to the growth and success of the drow, preventing them from unifying against common enemies or for a common cause.
Her sacred animals are arachnids. She considers them valuable enough to kill those who mistreated them.

Lolth's follower base is varied. It mainly consists of drow, but also includes aranea, chitine, draegloths and deep dragons. She gained a few elven followers, and tried to gain more worshipers by assuming the aspect of Moander, a deity of rot.

Clerics

Lolth's clerics are almost exclusively female (although there are a few males). They represent the rulers of most Lolthite communities, and strictly follow the Spider Queen's will, forcing the drow into extreme subservience to their deity, and into the constant state of conflict that dominated their lives. Each priestess strives for the favor of the Spider Queen and is ready to do anything in order to gain status in her goddess' eyes. Her clergy sacrifice the living and treasure for her glory. Their vestments are normally adorned with spider motifs. Her rituals required them to wear darker clothes- or none at all.

Orders

Militant Myrlochar, Order of Soul Spiders

The Militant Myrlochar, sometimes known as the Order of Soul Spiders, is an elite fighting organization comprised exclusively of male crusaders, and found in the dark elven cities where Lolth is 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 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. One of their usual tasks is to terrorize merchants who took Vhaeraun as their patron, as well as settlements run by the followers of Vhaeraun or Ghaunadaur's (or where those faiths were prominent).

Rites

Like all religions, the worship of Lolth involved a number of rituals and rites. Many of them included sacrifice. As an example, what follows is 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."

Relationships

Dark Seldarine

Lolth is the leader of the Dark Seldarine, but is opposed to varying degrees by all other members of it. She is the mother of both Eilistraee and Vhaeraun, along with Vandria, though the latter never supported the acts of her mother or joined the Dark Seldarine.

Vhaeraun

On one hand, Lolth encouraged her son's rivalry with her, for it appealed to her love of chaos. On the other hand, her son's successes at swaying the drow to his cause of destroying her, her followers, and her version of society, led her to consider him a threat. He amassed the second largest following among drow overall (the largest on the surface), and is an ever expanding force, to the point that Lolth considered Vhaeraun her real enemy and rival.
The two have no common ground: Lolth promotes favoritism towards females, while Vhaeraun promotes gender equality; the Spider Queen wants surface elves to be sacrificed by her worshipers, while the Masked Lord urges his followers to cooperate with surface elves; Lolth orders her followers to keep drow society stagnant in every regard, while Vhaeraun attracts those who want change in their societal progress, economic growth, and territorial expansion; and Lolth wants to extinguish the drow race's desire to return to the surface, while Vhaeraun encourages settling the surface.
Vhaeraun's masked traitors, clerical spies Lolth had mistakenly believed members of her own clergy, were enough of a problem that she considered their discovery, and warning her clergy of their existence, worthy of her personal attention. Indeed, Lolth, who normally gave worshipers of other drow gods a second chance on being found out, made an exception for Vhaeraun's followers, who were were killed right away.

Dawn Age

Lolth was formerly Araushnee, the lesser elven goddess of destiny and artisans. She was Corellon Larethian's consort, and the main goddess of the dark elves. They 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. During her first attempt, she aided Gruumsh in trying to kill her husband by imbuing the scabbard that he had crafted for his sword with magic that would cause the weapon to shatter during the fight. However, this plan failed due to Sehanine Moonbow's interferring with it: she knew that Araushnee had tampered with the scabbard, because the Weaver had conducted this very first step of her betrayal during the night, when Sehanine's sight could reach her.
Later, Araushnee agitated Malar into attacking the wounded Corellon, after she witnessed the Beastlord killing the orc god Herne on Faerûn, but even that failed, as the elven lord managed to chase his aggressor away.
Araushnee's next move was gather a host of gods on hostile footing with the Seldarine,] forming an army to assault Arvandor and overthrow Corellon. The army itself was so badly organized, that she was confident that they would fail.[64] Her true plan was to give the cursed scabbard back to Corellon, as during the battle that would later unfold, the item would cause arrows shot by Eilistraee to hit his chest instead. According to Lolth's plan, that would have killed Corellon while turning her daughter into a scapegoat.[65]
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), but Araushnee struck first and imprisoned her with the help of her son Vaheraun. Together, they also made sure that Eilistraee would find and deliver the scabbard to Corellon, and that she would be in his vicinity during the battle.
After Araushnee's defeat in battle, a trial was called in, Vhaeraun and Eilistraee became members in exile of the Seldarine--in the case of Eilistraee willingly, as she had foreseen that the dark elves would have needed her light and hope in the future--while Araushnee was made into a tanar'ri and sentenced to banishment. Furious for her defeat, she attempted one last time at her lover's life, by turning into a spider monster and attacking him. Despite all, the Protector still loved her and could not bring to finish her off, letting her escape.

Aftermath

Queen of the Demonweb Pits.
After her exile, Araushnee took the name "Lolth“. She conquered the 66th layer of the Abyss, the Demonweb Pits, for herself.
After securing control over her layer, she plotted to exact vengeance against Corellon. Being unable to directly strike at him, she planned to be worshiped as a goddess by the elves, bringing misery to them and therefore to their "father".

Era of Upheaval

The symbol of Lolth, during the Era of Upheaval.
Once in the Underdark, the drow lived in a borderline animal state. With Eilistraee's power nearly collapsed due to the loss of so many of her people, and with Vhaeraun's, Kiaransalee's and Ghaunadaur's power being unable to complete with Lolth's, she became the main drow deity. She 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.

Time of Troubles

During the Time of Troubles, apart from appearing in Menzoberranzan and assuming the aspect of Moander to attract more surface elves, humans, and half-elves, Lolth spread information on Zinzerena, a goddess from another world. When she appeared on Toril, Lolth killed her, gaining the portfolios of chaos and assassination, and learning how the distribution and absorption of divine energy worked under Ao's new rules.

Post-Spellplague

In the following century, Lolth enjoyed a position of supremacy among the drow. She did suffer opposition from the Jaezred Chaulssin, the skulkers of Vhaeraun--the term used to describe those members of the church of Vhaeraun who retained divine magic despite their god's death--and the followers of Ghaunadaur. The latter group was however 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.

Humanoid Form,

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