Small Gods characters

Appears from the start

A large, slow-seeming novice in the great Church of the god Om, in the theocratic nation of Omnia. Illiterate but gifted with a flawless memory that forgets nothing he has seen or heard, he is devout, literal-minded, and unfailingly kind. He tends the Citadel's melon garden, and is startled when a small tortoise begins to speak to him, claiming to be his god.

Appears from the start

The Great God Om, worshipped by millions across Omnia, who discovers to his horror that he has been reduced to a nearly powerless one-eyed tortoise. A god's strength depends on the number of people who truly believe in him rather than merely in his Church, and Om finds he has only one real believer left, the novice Brutha, the only person who can hear him. Blustering and self-centred, he must rely on Brutha simply to survive.

First appears in chapter 2

A deacon of the Church and a leading figure in the Quisition, Omnia's feared apparatus for detecting and punishing heresy. Austere, patient, and utterly certain of his own righteousness, he wields terror as an instrument of faith and pursues power within the Church with cold single-mindedness. He takes an interest in Brutha's perfect memory.

First appears in chapter 3

A blind, cynical philosopher of Ephebe who lives in a barrel and carries a lantern, known for a plain-spoken, questioning outlook. He is the author of a book describing the world as a disc carried on the back of a great turtle, a view that is deep heresy in Omnia, which teaches that the world is a sphere.

First appears in chapter 3

The nephew and assistant of the philosopher Didactylos, a young man fascinated by machines and mechanisms. Practical where his uncle is contemplative, he applies philosophy to engineering and builds devices to solve problems.

First appears in chapter 4

A sergeant in the Omnian army who secretly leads an underground movement against the Church's tyranny. Hardened and angry at the cruelties of the Quisition, he wants to bring the whole oppressive structure down by force.

First appears in chapter 2

An unassuming, elderly sweeper who moves quietly about the Citadel with a broom, easily overlooked and treated as a nobody. He is in fact far more than he appears, a member of an order that watches over the proper unfolding of history, and he keeps a discreet eye on events in Omnia.

Appears from the start

The elderly novice-master of the Citadel, in charge of the young men in Brutha's dormitory. Set in his ways and given to muttering at the temptations he imagines everywhere, he oversees Brutha's early religious instruction.