I have read the fine articles by GVD; that use the Ur-Flan as sophist anti-religious order. However the ur-flan are also mentioned as necromancers of real ability and followers of Nerull. Yet other times mentions powerful warriors and mages...
My take - The true Ur-Flan are the GVD sophists, love the concept, however any truly evil flan group or powerful spellcaster simply became lumped under the term Ur-flan by the general population.The sophists and the other evil aspects of the flan culture didn't mind as the increased fear added to everyones reputation and various groups helped each other accomplish common goals.
Even when the Baklunish, Suel or Oeridians migrated throughout the flanaess and came into contact with an evil or depraved group of flan they also were termed Ur-flan by the migrants.
I doubt the Ur-Flan ever called themselves that. The prefix "Ur-" simply means earliest, or original, so originally Ur-Flan was a term used by the Aerdi to denote the pre-migration civilization that they imagined spawned all other Flan cultures, beginning from the theory that the earliest Flan were the most magically potent. They were likely completely wrong in this, of course.
What the Ur-Flan called themselves is a mystery to all save perhaps the druids of the Old Faith. They likely identified themselves as the priestly or wizardly caste of whatever nation they belonged to. The Necromancers of Trask, for example, were a group that would be considered Ur-Flan today. They might have called themselves the Ur-Priests of Trask or the Necromancers of Trask.
Whether any of the Flan, except perhaps those who lived along the Flanmi River, ever called themselves "Flan" is also an open question. I imagine they'd identify themselves by their nation first, and wouldn't have considered themselves a single people until the Great Migrations inspired solidarity against the invaders.
My take is that, in ages long past, the Flan were corrupted by Nerull as he rose to godhood. Necromancers dominated all aspects of society and led them to war against Celene. The elves defeated the necromancers and took the Flan people under their tutelage. Hence, mainstream Flan society came to follow many elvin traditions and became closer to nature. As time passed, the Flan people forgot of their history prior to Nerull's rule, rather, seeing their subservience to Nerull as the origins of their race. Small handfuls were able to elude elvin rule, retaining the necromantic traditions and open worship of Nerull. These were dubbed the Ur-Flan.
It is aslo mentionned that when Vecna rose to power he became chief of his tribe : the Ur-Flan. Who were reputedly accomplished necromancers. When he started to battle against the elven hordes of Galithonian, he had subverted many Flan tribes, if not all, under his rule.
This would not come in conflict with OleOneEye theory.
However as noted Rasgon, the Flan People was not called like this before there are any invaders ( Suloise and Oeridian ). I think that we can postulate that they saw themselves like many different tribes with some traditions in common but not like an united people. Much like the Gaul before Caesar came. _________________ What does not kill us, makes us stronger. Friedrich Nietzsche
I would not argue against an interpretation of all Flan referring to themselves as such. The word in Flan probably has a meaning similar to American Indian tribal names, a variation on "the people." Ur-Flan is thus just a prefix to identify the people of Ur, whatever Ur means in Flan.
If I'm not talking out my 4th point of contact and contradicting some canon, YMMV.
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