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by Krugmar » Wed Feb 26, 2020 4:26 pm
by Rodez » Wed Feb 26, 2020 7:24 pm
Krugmar wrote:Marzarbul wrote:-snip- Dwarves
Both apps accepted!Benuty wrote:-snip- All of Benuty's Apps
Accepted!Rodez wrote:-snip- Kallias and Fleet
Kallias accepted. Fleet accepted also, though I think the number of men in it will need to come down quite a bit.Liecthenbourg wrote:-snip- some elves
Accepted.
by Sraelyn » Wed Feb 26, 2020 7:41 pm
Sraelyn wrote:
Essential Details
Name of Realm: The Wyrne Dominion | Wyrnetyr
Rulers: High Prince Urien Rhaenuhr – Ruler of the Dominion and head of High Kin Rhaenuhr. The High Prince is technically elected by and from the Princes of the High Kin to rule over the Dominion as a whole until it’s death, however the title has been firmly held by the Princes of the Great Kin Rhaenuhr for over 140 years. The High Prince has the authority to place taxes, declare war, request soldiers and levies from the Kin, and enforce the law to an extent, but the Princes are overall quite autonomous in the way they rule their territories.
Prince Eurig Marthen – Head of High Kin Marthen
Prince Andras Cymaron – Head of High Kin Cymaron
Siors Hier – Grandmaster of The Red Carvers
Cultures and Races:
Wyrne: The Wyrne are the dominant culture in the Dominion. This highly militaristic society displays hostility towards non-human races and weariness towards strangers. So far they have kept themselves as a fairly homogeneous people, most of them having pale skin combined with dark eyes and hair.
Society in the Dominion is separated into three strata, slaves, free men, and members of a Kin. Slaves are generally prisoners of war, taken from the continuous skirmishes and campaigns against the Arall tribes. Free men belong to no Kin, and most of them work the land in service of one, while a minority works in the cities or owns a plot of land of their own. Kin are the basic form of organization in the Dominion, there are 64 Kin plus the 7 High Kin in Wyrnetyr, with every Prince having a few Kin within their domains. A person can belong to a Kin by birth or be brought into one after performing a ritual known as Communion, gaining the rights of any other Kin member.
Wyrne are rather practical in nature, a trait that is seen in their architecture and clothing being mostly functional. The only exception to this would be the renowned pieces of elaborate silverwork, used both for religious purposes and as a way to show belonging to a specific Kin. Other details include, having a diet heavily centered around meat, the great value as a status symbol given to Aderyn birds by the Kin, their nearly fanatical adherence to Bloodpacts and their obsession with ritually executing their enemies by bleeding them out alive and ritually drinking, then boiling, their blood.
Arall: This is the name given to the collection of tribes native to the region where the Dominion stands today. Most Arall within the Dominion are slaves, taken when their respective tribes were conquered, with a smaller amount of them being free men. Most Arall tribes worshiped a pantheon of gods led by Queikar, something still done by the unsubdued tribes, but those within the Dominion have been forcefully converted and made to assimilate into Wyrne culture and speak the language.
Religion: “The holy scriptures of Gwaed and it’s secrets as told by the Ceisiwr of the Cysguduw”, also simply known as “The scriptures of Gwaed”, is the core text of the religion followed in Wyrne, the Cult of Gwaed. The scriptures were written by The True Prince Rhys, in accordance to the wisdom given to him by the Ceisiwr or 'seekers'. According to the texts, Cysguduw the first being, created the universe and the Ceisiwr to keep him company, and gave mankind their blood essence or Gwaed to make them different from the beasts. For eons Cysguduw watched over his creations and saw them grow until one day he mysteriously vanished, the Ceisiwr took it upon themselves to find him, yet the world suffered with no one to look after it. In Rhys’ visions, the Ceisiwr claimed to have founded the creator in a deep slumber, and asked for offering of Gwaed in order to reawaken him.
Some of the most important beliefs of the Cult of Gwaed are the following:
The sins against the blood, such as incest or killing a fellow Kin member are considered specially heinous.
Gwaed can be returned to the Cysguduw by a ritual process of bleeding out a person and burning their blood, so that its essence may return to him.
Communion is a ritual in which blood from the head of a Kin is poured into the open wound of another person. With the Gwaed of the Kin coursing now through them they will be considered as part of the Kin for the remainder of their life.
Bloodpact is a sacred and binding way to perform contracts and oaths. In it, both parties will cut into their hand and mix their blood with the others, then proceed to sign and seal the contract, and lastly drink half of he remaining blood each. This act signifies the commitment to it, as their Gwaed is both in the contract and inside the other person. Breaking a blood pact is one of the worst offences, and most Wyrne will go to great lengths to recover their lost Gwaed from the other person.
History:
All historical records within the Dominion begin with the arrival of the True Prince Rhys to Wyrnetyr, claiming that there is no history of Wyrnetyr before the Wyrne. In the same fashion, all mentions to their origin or the True Prince's past or previous name have been long purged from all records and accounts.
The Conquest
A noble from a realm afar, the True Prince began it’s voyage to Wyrnetyr after hearing voices that commanded him to set sail South if he wished to avoid his demise, and so he did. Gathering all the loyal men he could, he assembled a rudimentary fleet and embarked towards an unknown destiny, sure that he was hearing the voices of he gods. After a long journey through the increasingly cold waters, and nearly out of supplies, they came unto a the shores off a peninsula with a suitable landing place and arable land. There, the Prince announced to his men that they had arrived at the land he heard about where they would grow and prosper.
Soon thereafter they made contact with one of the tribes inhabiting the area, which was promptly subdued. With his small yet superior forces, the Prince occupied the tribe's small settlement, forcing the remaining members to accept his rule in exchange of their lives, erecting fortifications with what they salvaged from the ships, and would later become Kairgwyn.
During the following years, the Prince would contact the rest of the native groups, which would be known to the Wyrne as the Arall tribes, and demand they surrender to him. If they refused, they would be forcefully conquered, their men enslaved, and their women taken. Yet if they accepted, they would be allowed to remain mostly free, be granted riches, and their tribal enemies would be crushed.
The Prince scored victory after victory against those that dared oppose him, his domain growing and his army swelling each year. The remaining multitude of tribes that had yet to be on the warpath of him, decided to put and end to their continuous fighting, and formed an unholy alliance against the invaders from the sea. This new coalition managed to beat him in the field, and started to retake the land they had lost.
Now as the loosing side, and many of the conquered tribes on the brink of rebellion, the realm they had build was suddenly on the verge of total collapse. Yet, as their fall looked ever closer and their enemies marched on to Kairgwyn, the Prince started hearing the voices once again, and was led into a cave complex where he remained on his own for three days. Upon his return he spoke of the visions he received, he imparted to his followers the wisdom he was given by the Ceisiwr, messengers of Cysguduw the slumbering creator. The taught his men about Gwaed, made Communion with his closest followers, and named himself Rhys Mawrdyn, casting aside his old one, as he promised a great victory for them on the following days.
Mustering all their remaining forces, they readied for a last stand at Kairgwyn. After a long, grueling battle where hey were severely outnumbered, they managed to emerge triumphant. Victorious yet greatly weakened, they turned their attention inwards, securing their territory and rule, while developing their settlements. Rhys declared himself Prince, only second to Cysguduw, and that from now on they would be called Wyrne and their new land Wyrnetyr, and compelling his followers to leave behind any memory of their previous lives.
Principality of Wyrnetyr
The descendants of Rhys continue consolidating the realm and expanding across the shores, valleys and rivers, this period was marked by the process of transitioning their subjects from their tribal society. To better do this, the families that originally came with The Prince and performed the Communion were given their own territory to rule and aristocratic privileges in exchange of developing the land that they are given, thus beginning the Kin system. Although skirmishes against the Arall coalition continued, there was no open war, and as such, the alliance slowly broke apart as the tribes began warring amongst eachother once more. Overall, the realm developed rapidly as new settlements were created, the new language grew in popularity, and the Red Carvers were established, first to record Bloodpacts and then knowledge in general.
The Age of Princes
117 years after first landing on what would be Wyrnetyr, the last male descendant of Prince Rhys Mawrdyn, Aeron, dies childless from a seizure. The Kin found themselves unable to agree on a successor, and eventually the Princedom fractured into a myriad of small warring territories, all vying for power and claiming to be the rightful Prince of the Wyrne. The realm entered a long period of infighting, famine, and overall decline as the Arall tribes, although no longer united, pushed the Wyrne back to their core lands. From this period emerged eight Princes, who collectivelly managed to subdue most of the others and carved up the realm amongst them. These six Prices would each become the head of one a High kin, in contrast to the lower kin that were now subjects to them.
The Wyrrne Dominion
After 23 years of infighting, Prince Gawain Marthen managed to gather the Princes of the other seven High Kin. Through alliances, persuasion, and threat of force, he was able to convince them into electing him as High Prince, unifying the realm once again under the Dominion, and stoppping the brunt of the fighting ravaging Wyrnetyr. In exchange for their loyalty and armies to push back the Arall incursions, the Princes were given virtually free reign to rule their lands as they pleased.
Rhaenuhr Consolidation
144 years before the present, Arwel Rhaenuhr the Great is elected as High Prince and throughout his rule and those of his descendants, begins a process of slow centralization of power into the position of the High Prince. Gradually, the autonomy of the Princes is reduced, while greatly pressuring them to stop their occasionally petty fighting, and focusing it on the development of the somewhat backwards realm.
Dominion Ascendant
The consolidation of power being a great success, High Kin Rhaenuhr transformed the position of High Prince into a de facto hereditary title, as the Dominion entered a golden age of rapid growth and renewed prosperity. At the beginning of his reign, High Prince Urien Rhaenuhr launches the Southern Campaign, an intermittent war on the remaining, and much weakened, Arall tribes. The objective of which, was to push them further south every year, out of he forests and into the steppes. All the while settling the land conquered, taking slaves, and erradicating the Arall threat once and for all.
Assets
Notable Cities:
Kairgwyn (capital)
Talgarth
Nargarth
Penrhyn
Lanharbwr
Economy: The Dominion’s economy is mostly a self sufficient one, and trade with other realms is of a limited nature, although this has begun to change in the recent years. On the northern parts of the country, wheat and barley are common produce, along with fish, cattle, and salt. Meanwhile, the southern regions are more oriented towards producing timber, mining iron and silver, and herding sheep and goats. Wyrnetyr's manufacturing revolves around either the capital or one of the three largest cities, although their quality is mostly just functional. What trade they do have often revolves around selling slave and their renowned pieces of elaborate silverwork.
Population: 3.8 million, including 400000 slaves
Military
Command: The armies of the Dominion led by either the High Prince, or one of the Princes from the other High Kin. Each Kin is expected to maintain and train it’s own small standing army in times of peace, and bring their banners and corresponding levies when called for war. Currently, they are generally lead by Prince Eurig Marthen.
Strength: The army of Wyrnetyr is formed by the combined standing armies of the Kin, plus all the levied men across the Dominion. Under normal circumstances, this can amount to 8 men from the various Kins, plus and additional 26000 levied men. In addition, between all the Kin, there are about 1200 Reidiwr, elite soldiers that fight atop their Aderyn mounts both on land sky. They are armed with a spear, a shield, a sword, and a couple of javelins, and are mainly deployed for skirmishes or to deal a finishing blow and create a rout.
Diplomatic Relations
Interests: Pacification of their territories and further expansion.
Rivals: The remaining Arall tribes.
Other Information
Location:(Image)
Essential Details
Name of House: High Kin Rhaenuhr
Leader: High Prince Urien Rhaenuhr
Family Members:
Nerys Marthen (wife)
Leolin Rhaenuhr (son)
Aeron Rhaenuhr (son)
Vaughn Rhaenuhr (son)
Eirian Rhaenuhr (daughter)
Eifion Rhaenuhr (brother)
History: The recorded history of High Kin Rhaenuhr begins with the Prince Rhys's conquest, as some of the original followers that arrived on Wyrnetyr with him. For their service they were granted their own territory to rule in the northwest, and where they’ve built castle Rhayadar during the Princedom.
During the Age of Princes, High Kin Rhaenuhr managed to assert their dominance over the nearby Kin, and remain influential. Although not the most powerful militarily during this era, their fertile lands, shrewd management, and rulership over the growing city of Nargarth, gave them the economic power to keep their enemies at bay.
They were one of the main proponents for the reunification of Wyrnetyr under Gawain Marthen, and held great sway in the election of the High Princes thereafter, remaining mostly as key players and rarely in the spotlight. It was with Prince Arwel the Great that things would become to change, he managed to get himself elected as High Prince at a young age, and began the process of centralization that would bring High Kin Rhaenuhr to he forefront of power. Before him, the High Prince had little power outside of the territory that he directly ruled over, and any sort of central administration has almost non-existent. During his reign he would continuously wrestle power away from the Princes through concessions and political maneuvering, something that his successors would follow upon.
Presently, High Kin Rhaenuhr has secured their position as High Princes due to their good governance and influence. The current head, Urien, is ruling during an unprecedented golden age of progress and expansion, while having three strong sons to carry on his legacy. Hopefully, they will be able to resolve their brotherly rivalry before it escalates any further.
Assets
Home: Kairgwyn (Capital of Wyrnetyr)
Fiefs:
Rhayadar Castle (Ancestral Home)
Nargarth (City)
Retinue: They have a standing army of 1400 plus an additional 300 Reidiwr, and can levy up to an additional 8000 men in their territories.
Essential Details
Name of Organization: The Red Carvers
Leader(s): Siors Heir
Description: The Red Carvers started as an organization meant to spread the knowledge of Gwaed as well as to keep track of Bloodpacts, which would be carved into stone tablets, and to master the crafts of magic. However, with the passing years have also taken scholarly aspects, gathering and preserving knowledge, advising Princes and Kin on Religious and academic subjects, as a place of magic training, and even apprehending and passing judgement to those who attempt against Gwaed. The Red Carvers do not actively participate in most wars in a combat manner, instead fulfilling mostly religious tasks.
All people that display magic potential are heavily pressured to join the Red Carvers, where they focus on Conjuration, Evocation and Haematurgy magic. So far, they have chosen to remain aside from both the Convocation and the Colegiate, but their presence in Wyrnetyr is tolerated.
Assets: Gardgarreg, a large fortified estate known for its large garden of massive stone pillars which serves as a carved library, with history, knowledge, and the most important Bloodpacts to have happened carved on them.
Strength: 800 Red Keepers, a force of warriors/scholars/priests/sorcerers, that operate and guard Gardgarreg as well as smaller estates across the Dominion, and hunt down those who have greatly sinned against the Gwaed.
Relations: Loyal to the Dominion and nominally to the High Prince.
Essential Details
Name of Creature: Aderyn
Appearance: (Image)
Description: Aderyn are large, bird-like creatures native to the area that can reach 2,5 meters in height, 3,5 meters in length and are capable or carrying a person on their back both while flying and on the ground due to their powerful legs and large wingspan. They can live up to 80 years, generally lay three eggs at the start of summer each year, and hunt by swooping down or pouncing on their prey with their deadly talons and strong beaks. Aderyn are known for their terrifying screeches, speed and power, yet are rather susceptible to blunt attacks due to their fragile bones.
Location: Southeastern areas of South Minilar.
Essential Details
Name: Aelor Rhaenuhr
Appearance: (Image)
Age: 22
Gender: Male
Legacy
Allegiance: High Prince Urien Rhaenuhr and his Kin
Profession: Noble, Reidiwr, Military Commander
Background: Aelor Rhaenuhr is the second son of High Prince Urien Rhaenuhr and his second wife Nerys Marthen. He was raised with his siblings at Rhayadar castle, the Ancestral home of Great Kin Rhaenuhr, and is where he would start developing what would be a long lasting rivarly with his older half-brother. Leonis is the heir to the Kin and the position of High Prince, and born to his father’s first wife, Ceinwen Cymaron, and is known to be a charming, kind and brave young man, as well as an accomplished warrior and statesman.
What appeared like a blessing in the form of a perfect son and heir to their father, felt like a curse to Aelor, who grew under the ever-present shadow of Leonis, always being bested by him, even for the their father’s affection. This somewhat soured the relation between Aelor and his father as he felt he simply could not compete, instead taking refuge with his mother with whom he became close and they were rather similar, both in appearance and personality.
During the following years he would start vigorously training in order to become a warrior and reidiwr, whom he greatly idolized, as well as developing great interest in the Cult of Gwaed. Once he turned 16, he started accompanying his uncle, Prince Eurig Marthen, who become a sort of mentor for him, personally taught him how to command units in the field, and how to master riding Aderyn.
Currently he is once again campaigning in the West, next to his Uncle and his close friend Prince Delwin Nyth
Beliefs
Religion: Cult of Gwaed and the True Prince Rhys
Motivation: To see the Dominion prosper and grow, defeating his older brother Lionis, enhancing his Gwaed, and to crush the rebellious Arall tribes.
Inventory
Items: Spear, longsword, shield, chainmail and gambeson
Skills: Great Aderyn rider, good fighter and commander, decent singer.
Magical Ability: No
by Great Confederacy of Commonwealth States » Thu Feb 27, 2020 12:47 am
Elerian wrote:What's the stance on slavery in the world? I think I've only seen one nation with slaves so far.
by Krugmar » Thu Feb 27, 2020 10:41 am
Sraelyn wrote:-snip- apps
Added a character and modified the organisation a bit, although the rest was accepted.
I can change the name of the nation if having two realms calling themselves The Dominion is an issue.
by Sarderia » Thu Feb 27, 2020 1:28 pm
Krugmar wrote:And the Political map has been updated, with the NPCs for Northern Minilar added. I will be adding them to the OP to flesh them out as I update it, but feel free to ask me any questions about them. And of course to anybody thinking of applying, feel free to app for their territories, or multiple territories.
by Krugmar » Thu Feb 27, 2020 4:26 pm
Sarderia wrote:Things are looking rather interesting forrussiathe Kniazite League and the southern states.. I'll drop a post probably on the weekend.
Also by the way because there are no NPCs on the remaining continents, could I make a post about sending a merchant expedition, probably to found a colonial/trading outpost down south?
by Reverend Norv » Sat Feb 29, 2020 6:14 am
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Krugmar » Sat Feb 29, 2020 7:04 am
Reverend Norv wrote:I believe Kerwick and the Mootland are NPCs; could I reserve them for a nation of my own? I am thinking of a classic sort of border-march society, closely culturally tied to the Ajakir on the other side of the border, and centered on the high moorland south of the Balor Mountains. Their land - save for exceptionally high-quality iron - is quite poor, but they have stubbornly defended it against Nekhur since the Eighteenth Dynasty, using the finest cavalry in northern Minilar. They regard themselves, with some justification, as the shield of the other Southron realms. That identity is clearly about to be tested as never before.
by Reverend Norv » Sat Feb 29, 2020 7:10 am
Krugmar wrote:Reverend Norv wrote:I believe Kerwick and the Mootland are NPCs; could I reserve them for a nation of my own? I am thinking of a classic sort of border-march society, closely culturally tied to the Ajakir on the other side of the border, and centered on the high moorland south of the Balor Mountains. Their land - save for exceptionally high-quality iron - is quite poor, but they have stubbornly defended it against Nekhur since the Eighteenth Dynasty, using the finest cavalry in northern Minilar. They regard themselves, with some justification, as the shield of the other Southron realms. That identity is clearly about to be tested as never before.
Certainly, that pretty much aligned with the loose ideas I had for the NPC so it's perfect.
The original idea for the Mootland was a fertile Halfling land which had been carved up between Tervain, Kerwick, Valamir, and Serebyan, with Kerwick taking the largest chunk. You're free to scrap that however, just let me know if you do.
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Reverend Norv » Sat Feb 29, 2020 4:45 pm
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Reverend Norv » Sat Feb 29, 2020 5:03 pm
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Reverend Norv » Sat Feb 29, 2020 7:20 pm
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Reverend Norv » Sun Mar 01, 2020 6:41 am
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Krugmar » Sun Mar 01, 2020 1:24 pm
Caltarania wrote:-snip Sand Elves
Reverend Norv wrote:-snip Ironmark
by The Holy Dominion of Inesea » Sun Mar 01, 2020 3:41 pm
Reverend Norv wrote:Obviously a huge WIP.
Essential Details
Name of Realm: Generally simply called the Ironmark. More formally the March of Ealliren (lit. all-iron). Colloquially, in northern Minilar on both sides of the border, simply called the March or the Mark. Residents are Markers or Marchers.
Rulers: The Warden of the Mark is Aedelfrid Brandling. The Warden is an elected monarch, chosen by the Eórodmot. This is an assembly of all the Eórodain, adult male Markers capable of supplying their own lance, bow, cuirass, and hwiða. It meets every five years, or upon the death of the Warden. The Warden's responsibility is to organize and lead the Ironmark in wartime, to coordinate its foreign relations, to protect domestic minorities like dwarves and halflings, and to oversee the Forge of Colborn. All other responsibilities of government administration are in the hands of the Witangemot, a smaller deliberative body of wise men, priests, old war leaders and other dignitaries who are chosen by the Eórodmot. It does must of the practical lawmaking. The Eórodmot must itself agree to all taxes every five years, and can, when in session, absolutely overrule either the Warden or the Witangamot. In an ultimate sense, therefore, the Mark is a kind of democracy, and this principle - the sovereignty and individual equality of the Eórodain - is known as the Uncéas: the oath-pact that creates the polity.
Cultures and Races:The dominant culture of the Ironmark is the Aðadain, whose name in most of Minilar is simply the Markers. They are close cultural kin to the Ajakir on the other side of the Nekhur border - indeed, their name is almost identical save for differences of pronunciation and a different collective suffix - and share many features with their estranged kin. They are, both men and women, a generally tall and muscular people, strong-boned and imposing. They tend to be pale, with dark hair and blue or green eyes. Like the Ajakir, too, they are traditionally a warrior culture, with traditions of honor and discipline and loyalty that go back millennia.
Centuries of resistance to Nekhur has honed this tradition into something very close to a totalizing identity: the paradigm of Aðad-ness is the eórod, the armored horseman mounted on a hwiða, possessed of enough cunning to outwit a Kisharite general, enough toughness to outfight a Balorene barbarian, and enough self-sacrificial courage to face down a legion of Nasaru alone. For every Aðad boy, training in tactics and horsemanship, the sword and the lance and the bow, begins early in childhood. The result of this cultural militarization is a tremendously rich reservoir of cultural wisdom concerning warfare, but a relatively poorer artistic tradition, and one in which women are distinctly excluded from the central locus of power and respect.
This has given Markers their reputation both as the continent's military elite, and as semi-literate horse people. The latter is only half-true; for generations, ironically, many of the Mark's more prosperous families have sent their children to study in Nekhur as young men and women, and the Aðadain likely have more insight into Nekhur culture than any other Southrons. Aðadain even appreciate art, culture, and sophistication all the more for their sense that they have somehow failed in these areas. Still, they are proud of their warrior tradition, and they are proud of their unique egalitarianism: of the Uncéas, the collective vow of a self-governing people to defend their homeland to the end.
The Ironmark has two important minorities. One is the dwarves of the southern Balor Mountains. This community dates back more than a thousand years, and has formed - among the Folk of Devara - a uniquely close bond with their human neighbors. From the Balorian dwarves, the Aðadain acquired their runic script, their fantastic ability to work steel, and much of their love of sagas and melodrama. From the Aðadain, the dwarves received military protection, a respected access point for the commerce of northern Minilar, and control of the Forge of Colborn - the central arms and armor manufactory of the Mark, fed by volcanic fire and legendary for both the quality and quantity of its output. The dwarven community retains a high level of self-government, and the Warden of the Mark swears an oath to protect its rights. Perhaps the relationship is best illustrated by the honorary title traditionally awarded any dwarf by any Aðad: "elder brother."
Finally, the halflings of the Mootland are a relatively more recent addition to the Ironmark. Over the last two hundred years, as the Wardens have extended their protection - and imperfect control - over the rich farmland of the Mootland, halfling traders have become a more common sight throughout the freeholds and ranches of the March. Industrious both in trade and agriculture, with a long tradition of argument rather than of warfare, possessed of a cultural sprightliness and irony that evades but delights the honor-bound Aðadain, they have benefited from the tradition of tolerance engendered by the Mark's long reliance on its dwarvish population. In fact, as many Aðadain are aware, it is the halflings who account for most of the Ironmark's agricultural output, and the dwarves who account for most of its industrial output. It is the nonhumans' economic excellence that allow the Aðadain to focus so intently on military excellence, and thereby to hold the northern menace at bay.
Religion: Both dwarves and halflings follow their own traditional faiths. The Aðadain religion is known as Ymbren. Transcribed using the dwarven-derived runic script and strongly influenced by dwarven monotheism, Ymbren emphasizes a single unnamed God. It is broadly pantheistic, for God is present in all life, and life is defined as anything that moves: wind, water, animals and plants. The supreme mobility of the hwiðas, their grace in motion, is what makes these horse-kings sacred. But all that lives must die: plants wither, animals perish, water dries out, wind blows no more. And so God is constantly dying, and constantly being reborn. This experience - hope and loss, each inevitable - defines Ymbren spirituality; to be close to God is not to "live forever," but to be ever oscillating between life and death. He who can do this without fear, with honor and clarity and charity, will upon death become one with God, to live and die forever in some exalted state where both are equally welcome, and equally sacred. Ymbren churches are community-run, and their priests frequently lack much formal training; the faith is only a few steps removed from a folk religion. But many an eórod has whispered Ymbren's most ancient prayer moments before a violent end: "God, flow with me into dark. Flow with me into light."
History:The Ironmark's prehistory is longer than its history. Some time in the immediate aftermath of the Dragonwake, Kisharite records first make mention of the Ajakir/Aðadain: a tall, fair people whose warrior tradition, even then, was well-established. In the chaos of that time, they moved into the area around the Balor mountains, probably after having been gradually displaced by the Talassians to the west. After a series of bitter wars against the ancestors of the modern Balorenes, the newcomers succeeded in driving the Balorenes back into the highest mountains, and settled down to a meager existence herding goats and cattle in the high moorland of the foothills.
At this time, the proto-Aðadain made a hugely significant discovery that would set them on a different trajectory from their northern kinfolk: the hwiðas, kings among horses. This subspecies - endemic to the southern Balor highlands - possessed speed, stamina, beauty, strength, and most of all intelligence far in excess of the average horse, so much so that scholars have generally agreed that their very existence is explicable only by reference to some ancient magic. It is as fair to say that the hwiðas created Aðad society as it is to say that the Aðadain remade themselves by discovering the hwiðas. From the hwiðas, the Aðadain learned new ways to herd and to wage war - for a horse that can intellectually understand its rider's intent, and act accordingly, is among the most powerful battlefield weapons imaginable. From their new companions' grace, the Aðadain even deduced the experiential basis of the Ymbren faith.
The arrival of Dwarven refugees from Dirovar added the last main element to the Aðadain's cultural evolution. Marveling at the craft and skill of these newcomers, the Aðadain permitted them to settle in the southern Balor foothills, and to build a city there under the mountains. They even committed to protecting this city from the Balorenes, and from their own northern Ajakir kin. There, in the new city of Colborn, the dwarves too made two crucial discoveries. First, they found vast iron deposits. Iron is among the most common of metals, to be sure, but this was special: natively intermingled with other minerals, like chromium and vanadium, that made the iron uniquely suitable for smelting into exceedingly hard, high-quality steel. And the dwarves also found a volcanic hotspot, where extreme heat from the core of the Earth made possible industrial-scale metal manufacturing without the need for an industrial-scale supply of charcoal. Thus was born the famous Forge of Colborn.
The next century, while nobody really noticed it at the time, marked the birth of the Ironmark as it exists today. From the dwarves, the Aðadain learned writing, and refined their religion, and gained tremendous facility with metalworking - though in this, they never quite matched the elder brethren. Numerous and confident, they spread out across the moorland, using their peerless steel and horses to raid steadily in every direction, and expanding their cattle herds. Aðadain society turned increasingly hierarchical, with traditional clan arrangements hardening into annual tithes of livestock and steel to quasi-feudal lords. They were well on their way to becoming yet another Southron principality.
The Mark was saved from this, ironically enough, by the arrival of its great historical enemy: the modern empire of Nekhur. The renaissance of Kishar under the Eighteenth Dynasty put an end to centuries of chaos in the north, and for the first time subdued the Ajakir beneath the banner of the bull: imposing a border where previously Aðadain and Ajakir had been divided by culture and religion, but still spoken mutually intelligible languages and thought of each other as brothers gone astray. Seeing no reason to stop halfway, Emperor Tar-Ninurta pressed on south of the Balor Mountains with an army of seventy thousand men. After two crushing defeats, Aðadain society collapsed almost overnight.
At this moment, a young commander - known to Ironmark oral history as Brand Brandling [lit. Sword Sword-son] rose to prominence as the leader of a company of horsemen who had achieved some of the Aðadain's few victories. He had trained his riders and their hwiðas to a unique level: they were equally effective with recurve bows from a distance, with the couched lance at a charge, and with the sword in a swirling melee. This versatility allowed them to outmaneuver, split up, and destroy much larger Nekhur forces. Brand commended this way of war to the council of the clan elders, but he did not stop there. He also asserted that only as free men, equal before God in life and death and life returned, could the Aðadain hope to triumph over such long odds.
According to legend, the council was so moved by Brand's words that each man swore that henceforth, he would exercise no power save by the consent of those men whose blood was shed for the defense of their common homeland. Upon hearing this, the warriors outside the command tent made their own oath in return: that so long as their rights were held equal, and their leaders served at their will, they would die to a man before they fled the field. This mutual oath-giving was the Uncéas: the fundamental constitutional compact that created the Ironmark as a polity, the foundation of its stratocratic/democratic system.
Over the next five years, Brand Brandling revolutionized the training and equipment of the Mark's riders, combining three crucial advantages: arms and armor from the Forge of Colborn, the extraordinary abilities of the hwiða, and the training of the eórod - the armored medium cavalry equally adept with bow, lance, and sword. At the Battle of Beckesford, eleven thousand eórodain defeated sixty-eight thousand Nekhur troops, including twenty thousand Nasaru. It was the worst defeat the Eighteenth Dynasty ever suffered, and contributed directly to its fall. Tar-Ninurta, as he watched his troops flee, remarked: "This nation is made of iron." The new polity created by the Uncéas had its new name: the Ironmark. And it had its new purpose: the vastly outnumbered guardian, standing in the breach, of the Southron lands against the superpower to the north.
The subsequent eight hundred years have not changed that fundamental identity. The Ironmark has fought seventeen wars, large and small, with Nekhur - along with essentially constant raiding in between. The Mark claims, reasonably, to have won all of them, on the grounds that it still exists. Nekhur, equally reasonably, characterizes all of the conflicts as draws. The eórodain's battlefield record, in either case, is unimpeachable. In the last two hundred years, the Mark has also fought three wars with Serebyan and two with Valamir. These, almost everyone admits that the Ironmark won, and their prize for military success (albeit only on land) has been control of the Mootland: the long-disputed, highly fertile halfling lands that are now functionally a protectorate of the Wardens. At home, the ritual oaths of the Uncéas have stabilized - at the cost of two major civil wars, but only two - into hallowed institutions: the elected Wardens, the Witangemot of the elders, and the final voice of the Eórodmot.
In the tense way of borders everywhere, the Markers have continued to raid their neighbors even as they learn from them. Dwarvish craft, Aðadain traditions, and the divine gift of the hwiða have all contributed to almost a millennium of military tradition, which no Southron lord or Nekhur tyrant challenges lightly. But Marker students, clad in the leather and steel of their people, are a common sight at great Nekhur universities, and as far afield as the cities of the Kniazite League. Like most borderlands, the March is both a backwater and a ferment of cultural contact and accommodation, somehow at the same time.
Over the last ten years, Warden Aedelfrid - widely considered a weak man, a compromise political choice made by a divided Eórodmot - has temporized over renewed aggression from the north. He made no move to challenge Nekhur's war on Seher, or its suzerainty over the tribes of the Balor - though local leaders in the northern Mark have cheerfully continued raiding the mountain barbarians anyway. Aedelfrid did send eórod advisers and a limited quantity of Colborn steel arms to support the Imbro-Tervine war effort, and these may have made the difference at the Battle of Varla and, more recently, the Battle of Torrel. But it has escaped no one's notice that the fall of Tervain leaves the Mark's eastern flank exposed as never before, and an increasing number of influential voices warn that the Markers cannot afford to wait: that the eórodain must ride again, once more - while they still can...
Assets
Notable Cities: The Markers, in general, are not a city-dwelling people. Traditionally pastoral, the Aðadain continue to live overwhelmingly on small homesteads and ranches, in extended clan systems, deriving their wealth from cattle, sheep, and goats. The halflings, too, prefer small agricultural communities. And so the Ironmark has only two major cities:
- Ethandune is the capital city of the Ironmark, and the seat of the Wardens. It is located toward the center of the Mark, north of the headwaters of the rivers of Severa. It is, by most standards, a fairly poor and mean place: about fifteen thousand people in a sprawling complex of wooden buildings, livestock sheds, and stables, protected by a few ramshackle palisades. Ethandune lies on a gently sloping moorland hill, and at the top is a large wooden mead-hall with an impressive stone tower attached, from which one can see for many miles. This is the Warden's headquarters, where he can entertain his eorls and shore up support among the eórodain - though even the Warden is expected to spend most of the year in the saddle. Ethandune's main virtues are a large market, which is lively and bustling, and the omnipresence of music: the city is as close as the Mark comes to an artistic center.
- Colborn is the one truly great city of the Ironmark. Built by the dwarves a thousand years ago in the foothills of the Balor Mountains, it now lies just twenty-eight leagues from the border with Nekhur. It is a spectacular underground city housing more than a hundred thousand of the Folk of Devara in neighborhoods carved into the living rock, with their own shops, schools, and granaries. Beneath it lie the richest iron mines in northern Minilar, perfect for the production of world-class steel. And deep in the city's heart is the Forge of Colborn: fed by the heat of a volcanic hotspot, capable of producing a million pieces of arms and armor a year through manufacturing practices honed for the last millennium. The acquisition of Colborn-forged arms, whether by wealth or by valor, is part of what qualifies a man to be an eórod. The forge is central to the Ironmark's identity and political order, and its defense is the one non-negotiable strategic imperative of the realm.
Economy: The Ironmark is not an economic powerhouse. Its military prowess has been achieved largely by outsourcing economic activity to the dwarven and halfling communities. The latter feeds the country; the former keeps it supplied with manufactured goods. This leaves the Aðadain free to train their children for war, and to keep themselves in fighting shape by maintaining large herds of cattle, sheep, and goats. The result is an economy in which most families can eat meat several times a week, and the people grow large and strong - but imported goods are a rarity, luxuries are practically unheard-of, and barter remains common in areas where there are too few precious silver coins to go around. On the other hand, the Mark is remarkably economically equal for a country of its era - the average Aðad is a freeholding rancher-soldier, not a serf - and it boasts one of the continent's only true military-industrial complexes in the famous Forge of Colborn.
Population: About 5.5 million, of whom 700,000 are dwarves and 1.1 million are halflings of the Mootland.
Military
Command: In principle, the Warden of the Mark is the supreme commander of the Eórodain, and this has usually been true in practice as well. But in moments of comfort or overconfidence, the Eórodmot is prone to elect Wardens unable to bear this responsibility. At such time, or when the Warden is in control of a different army, battlefield command usually falls to the eorls: clan leaders who are heir to millennia of Aðadain military wisdom. The decision to put a specific eorl in command of an army can be taken by the Warden, but a general can also be removed by the Witangemot. At present, Warden Aedelfrid's chief general is his cousin Hereward, also of the Brandling line. He was an instrumental adviser at the Battle of Varla, and at the age of thirty-six is already one of the most influential men in the Mark.
Strength: The Ironmark's entire culture, economy, and polity are geared toward military preparedness. Because halfling agriculture keeps the country fed and dwarven industry keeps it armed, every human boy begins learning horsemanship and tactics in early childhood. The Ironmark fields, by general admission, the finest cavalry in northern Minilar: the eórodain. Each man is equally adept with the recurve bow, the nine-foot lance, and the sword. Each wears at least a cuirass and helmet of Colborn-forged steel over a thick buff leather coat; many have pauldrons and vambraces and greaves as well, relics inherited from past generations of eórodain. Most importantly, each is mounted on a hwiða. While a few hundred of these men guard the Warden at any given time, this honor is not considered to place such men in a different category of service; they are not regulars as opposed to levies. Rather, every able-bodied eórod is a soldier first. His singular responsibility is to remain trained and equipped and ready for military service; all else, his ranch and cattle and family, are secondary. After generations of war, the Ironmark's mobilization procedures are finely honed: the realm can muster six thousand eórodain within a week, and the maximum force of about 120,000 within six weeks. At full strength, over more than twenty wars and eight hundred years, the full Host of the Eórodain has never been defeated in pitched battle.
Diplomatic Relations
Interests: The Ironmark's foreign policy, in principle, is very simple: the Markers want to remain independent of Nekhur, and are happy to work with anyone inclined to help them achieve that unlikely goal. For this reason, they have longstanding ties with Koinon. On the other hand, the Markers also have close and sincere ties with Nekhur - the paradox of all borderlands - and have real contacts in Eatar characterized by the grudging respect born of centuries of principled and successful defiance. The Mark regards itself as the protector of all the Southron realms, though it regards their general orientation toward commerce and wealth as bewildering, and has repeatedly tried and failed to rally southern coalitions against the enemy to the north, which the Mark has been obliged to face more directly than its southern neighbors. Among Warden Aedelfrid's true talents is diplomacy, and the last few years have seen a frenzy of Marker embassies seeking to consolidate support against any further Nekhur aggression.
Rivals: Nekhur. In some sense, this rivalry is so lopsided as to be absurd. In another sense, the Ironmark has been determinedly, and fairly successfully, sticking its thumb in the Empire's eye for the last eight centuries: the eórodain are clearly the most dangerous foe, man-for-man, that Nekhur has ever faced. Despite its utter inability to compete economically, culturally, or politically - and despite the fact that it has never seriously threatened any Nekhur city - the Ironmark remains embarrassingly indigestible for its much larger neighbor, and that wary, respectful rivalry defines the two nations' relationship.
Other Information
Location: Currently marked as "Kerwick" on the map, including the whole of the Mootland.
Essential Details
Name of Creature: The Hwiða, known to non-Ironmarkers as Horse-Kings or Horse-Lords.
Appearance: The hwiða are horses, usually about eighteen hands in height and 1,500 pounds in weight. Their coats are typically white, roan, or pale gold, with white markings on the face or chest or fetlocks. Almost everyone finds them remarkably beautiful, though no one can completely explain why, and their movement is graceful enough to inspire poets.
Description: The hwiðas' name - the Horse-Kings - is well-deserved. Fed only on the grass and heather of the Ironmark, they can cover fifty and sometimes eighty miles in a day, and arrive with enough stamina to fight a battle at the end of it. They are freakishly strong; Nekhur battlefield accounts corroborate their ability to knock several men flying with a single kick, or to shatter siege equipment with a steel-shod hoof. They have been known to reach top speeds of over sixty miles per hour for up to a mile at a time. They live for close to forty years. And most importantly, the hwiðas are remarkably intelligent: closer to a hound than to a horse. They have an intuitive ability, like many dogs, to understand their riders' mind and emotional state, his intent and his plans. Ironmarkers, for whom the hwiða is a religious symbol as well as a constant companion in war and peace, talk about this bond in spiritual terms: horse and rider are emotional, psychic partners, sharing hopes and dreams. But even outsiders cannot deny that hwiðas seem to have some rudimentary sense of tactics and forethought, an ability to predict and respond to dangers, a sense of the objectives that they are asked to perform. This makes them vastly more useful - and more dangerous - than any ordinary horse, and the extraordinary abilities of these animals have been essential to the Ironmark's long, stubborn resistance.
Location: For reasons that no one really understands, but that many scholars suspect is related to the effect of some ancient spell or curse, the hwiðas are found only in the southern foothills of the Balor Mountains - the area that is now the Ironmark. If removed for this area for more than a few years, they tend to go terrifyingly insane, or simply to die. This is yet another mystery of these already mysterious creatures.
Essential Details
Name of House: The House of Brand, also known as the Line of Brand or the Brandlings. It should be noted that this is a clan rather than a dynasty per se, one of twelve to which almost all Markers of the eórod class belong. It has over a hundred thousand members, concentrated in the north-central Ironmark. Its members are disproportionately likely to be elected as Wardens, but no one branch of the clan is singularly powerful.
Leader: Aedelfrid Brandling, Warden of the Mark.
Family Members:
- Aedelfrid Brandling, age 47. Warden of the Mark. Educated in Salatiwara, elected as Warden in 1425 as a compromise candidate. A friendly, diplomatic, timorous man, well-liked and little-respected.
- Wulfrun Ethundling, age 41. His wife; despite their exclusion from most social power, Marker women keep their name and property after marriage. A cultural traditionalist and patron of music.
- Osred Brandling, age 20. His son, of late returned from school in Salatiwara, early and against his father's wishes. A brave youth, reckless even by the standards of the death-loving Ironmarkers.
- Cynfflaed Brandling, age 18. His daughter. A quietly beautiful young woman, unmarried, much in the mold of her mother, but with a strong streak of Ymbren piety.
- Hereward Brandling, age 36. "Cousin" of the Warden, meaning in Marker terms that they share a common ancestor somewhere in the last six generations. Educated in Myrrha, distinguished himself in 1422 campaign against Balorenes and in 1428 conflict with Valamir over the eastern Mootland. Named to the Witangemot in 1430 and led eórodain advisers at the Battle of Varla. Known to have visited Monroyal within the last six months, and thought to have been present at the Battle of Torrel. The country's greatest living commander: intelligent, honorable, pious, an aficionado of Nekhur culture and a sworn foe of the Tyrant. A man respected even by his enemies.
- Leofflaed Sumorling, age 34. His lover; a beauty of middling renown, and - unusually - an unmarried woman of trade, who makes her living as an importer of foreign goods to the few in the Ironmark who have the coin to buy them. Their relationship is trusting, but not close, and neither believes that it amounts to a lifelong commitment.
- Breguwise Brandling, age 62. One of the very few female members of the Witangemot; daughter of one Warden and widow of another. Thought to have the Second Sight, a pre-Ymbren superstition still alive and well in the modern Mark. A wisdom-figure for her clan, and for the whole country, whose voice carries a great deal of weight.
History: The Brandlings are, in theory, the lineal descendants of Brand Brandling: a figure quasi-mythical to the Markers (though quite well-attested in Nekhur histories) who invented the eórodain and brokered the Uncéas. They boast more than sixty Wardens - far more than any other clan - and were instrumental in both of the Ironmark's civil wars: advocates of quasi-royal power defeated in the first conflict, they became staunch constitutionalists and succeeded in the second, ushering in centuries of political stability. They tend to educate their children in Myrrha or Salatiwara, and most are fluent in Kisharite, but they also have trading contacts in the Southron realms of the coast, which has brought them slightly more wealth than the average clan. A strong tradition of Ymbren piety coexists with a high frequency of the Second Sight, especially (though not exclusively) among Brandling women. The clan straddles the center of Ironmark politics in a variety of ways, and this has been crucial to its prominence.
Assets
Home: At present, the Warden's Meadhall in Ethandune. When the clan does not hold the wardenship, its stronghold is Brandceaster: a hill-fort three leagues from Colborn and seven from the Nekhur border.
Fiefs: None per se; the Uncéas means that the Ironmark is not a feudal system, and its society is based on freeholding eórod-ranchers. But about a hundred thousand souls, spread across the north of the Marches, carry the Brandling name, and all of these do something - more out of kin solidarity than legal duty - to support the clan's leadership.
Retinue: About twelve thousand eórodain are Brandlings: roughly one-tenth of the country's total strength. How many of these would side with their clan no matter what is an open question. The clan leadership has no salaried - mercenary, in dismissive Marker parlance - retinue.
Essential Details
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by Reverend Norv » Sun Mar 01, 2020 5:39 pm
The Holy Dominion of Inesea wrote:Reverend Norv wrote:Obviously a huge WIP.
Essential Details
Name of Realm: Generally simply called the Ironmark. More formally the March of Ealliren (lit. all-iron). Colloquially, in northern Minilar on both sides of the border, simply called the March or the Mark. Residents are Markers or Marchers.
Rulers: The Warden of the Mark is Aedelfrid Brandling. The Warden is an elected monarch, chosen by the Eórodmot. This is an assembly of all the Eórodain, adult male Markers capable of supplying their own lance, bow, cuirass, and hwiða. It meets every five years, or upon the death of the Warden. The Warden's responsibility is to organize and lead the Ironmark in wartime, to coordinate its foreign relations, to protect domestic minorities like dwarves and halflings, and to oversee the Forge of Colborn. All other responsibilities of government administration are in the hands of the Witangemot, a smaller deliberative body of wise men, priests, old war leaders and other dignitaries who are chosen by the Eórodmot. It does must of the practical lawmaking. The Eórodmot must itself agree to all taxes every five years, and can, when in session, absolutely overrule either the Warden or the Witangamot. In an ultimate sense, therefore, the Mark is a kind of democracy, and this principle - the sovereignty and individual equality of the Eórodain - is known as the Uncéas: the oath-pact that creates the polity.
Cultures and Races:The dominant culture of the Ironmark is the Aðadain, whose name in most of Minilar is simply the Markers. They are close cultural kin to the Ajakir on the other side of the Nekhur border - indeed, their name is almost identical save for differences of pronunciation and a different collective suffix - and share many features with their estranged kin. They are, both men and women, a generally tall and muscular people, strong-boned and imposing. They tend to be pale, with dark hair and blue or green eyes. Like the Ajakir, too, they are traditionally a warrior culture, with traditions of honor and discipline and loyalty that go back millennia.
Centuries of resistance to Nekhur has honed this tradition into something very close to a totalizing identity: the paradigm of Aðad-ness is the eórod, the armored horseman mounted on a hwiða, possessed of enough cunning to outwit a Kisharite general, enough toughness to outfight a Balorene barbarian, and enough self-sacrificial courage to face down a legion of Nasaru alone. For every Aðad boy, training in tactics and horsemanship, the sword and the lance and the bow, begins early in childhood. The result of this cultural militarization is a tremendously rich reservoir of cultural wisdom concerning warfare, but a relatively poorer artistic tradition, and one in which women are distinctly excluded from the central locus of power and respect.
This has given Markers their reputation both as the continent's military elite, and as semi-literate horse people. The latter is only half-true; for generations, ironically, many of the Mark's more prosperous families have sent their children to study in Nekhur as young men and women, and the Aðadain likely have more insight into Nekhur culture than any other Southrons. Aðadain even appreciate art, culture, and sophistication all the more for their sense that they have somehow failed in these areas. Still, they are proud of their warrior tradition, and they are proud of their unique egalitarianism: of the Uncéas, the collective vow of a self-governing people to defend their homeland to the end.
The Ironmark has two important minorities. One is the dwarves of the southern Balor Mountains. This community dates back more than a thousand years, and has formed - among the Folk of Devara - a uniquely close bond with their human neighbors. From the Balorian dwarves, the Aðadain acquired their runic script, their fantastic ability to work steel, and much of their love of sagas and melodrama. From the Aðadain, the dwarves received military protection, a respected access point for the commerce of northern Minilar, and control of the Forge of Colborn - the central arms and armor manufactory of the Mark, fed by volcanic fire and legendary for both the quality and quantity of its output. The dwarven community retains a high level of self-government, and the Warden of the Mark swears an oath to protect its rights. Perhaps the relationship is best illustrated by the honorary title traditionally awarded any dwarf by any Aðad: "elder brother."
Finally, the halflings of the Mootland are a relatively more recent addition to the Ironmark. Over the last two hundred years, as the Wardens have extended their protection - and imperfect control - over the rich farmland of the Mootland, halfling traders have become a more common sight throughout the freeholds and ranches of the March. Industrious both in trade and agriculture, with a long tradition of argument rather than of warfare, possessed of a cultural sprightliness and irony that evades but delights the honor-bound Aðadain, they have benefited from the tradition of tolerance engendered by the Mark's long reliance on its dwarvish population. In fact, as many Aðadain are aware, it is the halflings who account for most of the Ironmark's agricultural output, and the dwarves who account for most of its industrial output. It is the nonhumans' economic excellence that allow the Aðadain to focus so intently on military excellence, and thereby to hold the northern menace at bay.
Religion: Both dwarves and halflings follow their own traditional faiths. The Aðadain religion is known as Ymbren. Transcribed using the dwarven-derived runic script and strongly influenced by dwarven monotheism, Ymbren emphasizes a single unnamed God. It is broadly pantheistic, for God is present in all life, and life is defined as anything that moves: wind, water, animals and plants. The supreme mobility of the hwiðas, their grace in motion, is what makes these horse-kings sacred. But all that lives must die: plants wither, animals perish, water dries out, wind blows no more. And so God is constantly dying, and constantly being reborn. This experience - hope and loss, each inevitable - defines Ymbren spirituality; to be close to God is not to "live forever," but to be ever oscillating between life and death. He who can do this without fear, with honor and clarity and charity, will upon death become one with God, to live and die forever in some exalted state where both are equally welcome, and equally sacred. Ymbren churches are community-run, and their priests frequently lack much formal training; the faith is only a few steps removed from a folk religion. But many an eórod has whispered Ymbren's most ancient prayer moments before a violent end: "God, flow with me into dark. Flow with me into light."
History:The Ironmark's prehistory is longer than its history. Some time in the immediate aftermath of the Dragonwake, Kisharite records first make mention of the Ajakir/Aðadain: a tall, fair people whose warrior tradition, even then, was well-established. In the chaos of that time, they moved into the area around the Balor mountains, probably after having been gradually displaced by the Talassians to the west. After a series of bitter wars against the ancestors of the modern Balorenes, the newcomers succeeded in driving the Balorenes back into the highest mountains, and settled down to a meager existence herding goats and cattle in the high moorland of the foothills.
At this time, the proto-Aðadain made a hugely significant discovery that would set them on a different trajectory from their northern kinfolk: the hwiðas, kings among horses. This subspecies - endemic to the southern Balor highlands - possessed speed, stamina, beauty, strength, and most of all intelligence far in excess of the average horse, so much so that scholars have generally agreed that their very existence is explicable only by reference to some ancient magic. It is as fair to say that the hwiðas created Aðad society as it is to say that the Aðadain remade themselves by discovering the hwiðas. From the hwiðas, the Aðadain learned new ways to herd and to wage war - for a horse that can intellectually understand its rider's intent, and act accordingly, is among the most powerful battlefield weapons imaginable. From their new companions' grace, the Aðadain even deduced the experiential basis of the Ymbren faith.
The arrival of Dwarven refugees from Dirovar added the last main element to the Aðadain's cultural evolution. Marveling at the craft and skill of these newcomers, the Aðadain permitted them to settle in the southern Balor foothills, and to build a city there under the mountains. They even committed to protecting this city from the Balorenes, and from their own northern Ajakir kin. There, in the new city of Colborn, the dwarves too made two crucial discoveries. First, they found vast iron deposits. Iron is among the most common of metals, to be sure, but this was special: natively intermingled with other minerals, like chromium and vanadium, that made the iron uniquely suitable for smelting into exceedingly hard, high-quality steel. And the dwarves also found a volcanic hotspot, where extreme heat from the core of the Earth made possible industrial-scale metal manufacturing without the need for an industrial-scale supply of charcoal. Thus was born the famous Forge of Colborn.
The next century, while nobody really noticed it at the time, marked the birth of the Ironmark as it exists today. From the dwarves, the Aðadain learned writing, and refined their religion, and gained tremendous facility with metalworking - though in this, they never quite matched the elder brethren. Numerous and confident, they spread out across the moorland, using their peerless steel and horses to raid steadily in every direction, and expanding their cattle herds. Aðadain society turned increasingly hierarchical, with traditional clan arrangements hardening into annual tithes of livestock and steel to quasi-feudal lords. They were well on their way to becoming yet another Southron principality.
The Mark was saved from this, ironically enough, by the arrival of its great historical enemy: the modern empire of Nekhur. The renaissance of Kishar under the Eighteenth Dynasty put an end to centuries of chaos in the north, and for the first time subdued the Ajakir beneath the banner of the bull: imposing a border where previously Aðadain and Ajakir had been divided by culture and religion, but still spoken mutually intelligible languages and thought of each other as brothers gone astray. Seeing no reason to stop halfway, Emperor Tar-Ninurta pressed on south of the Balor Mountains with an army of seventy thousand men. After two crushing defeats, Aðadain society collapsed almost overnight.
At this moment, a young commander - known to Ironmark oral history as Brand Brandling [lit. Sword Sword-son] rose to prominence as the leader of a company of horsemen who had achieved some of the Aðadain's few victories. He had trained his riders and their hwiðas to a unique level: they were equally effective with recurve bows from a distance, with the couched lance at a charge, and with the sword in a swirling melee. This versatility allowed them to outmaneuver, split up, and destroy much larger Nekhur forces. Brand commended this way of war to the council of the clan elders, but he did not stop there. He also asserted that only as free men, equal before God in life and death and life returned, could the Aðadain hope to triumph over such long odds.
According to legend, the council was so moved by Brand's words that each man swore that henceforth, he would exercise no power save by the consent of those men whose blood was shed for the defense of their common homeland. Upon hearing this, the warriors outside the command tent made their own oath in return: that so long as their rights were held equal, and their leaders served at their will, they would die to a man before they fled the field. This mutual oath-giving was the Uncéas: the fundamental constitutional compact that created the Ironmark as a polity, the foundation of its stratocratic/democratic system.
Over the next five years, Brand Brandling revolutionized the training and equipment of the Mark's riders, combining three crucial advantages: arms and armor from the Forge of Colborn, the extraordinary abilities of the hwiða, and the training of the eórod - the armored medium cavalry equally adept with bow, lance, and sword. At the Battle of Beckesford, eleven thousand eórodain defeated sixty-eight thousand Nekhur troops, including twenty thousand Nasaru. It was the worst defeat the Eighteenth Dynasty ever suffered, and contributed directly to its fall. Tar-Ninurta, as he watched his troops flee, remarked: "This nation is made of iron." The new polity created by the Uncéas had its new name: the Ironmark. And it had its new purpose: the vastly outnumbered guardian, standing in the breach, of the Southron lands against the superpower to the north.
The subsequent eight hundred years have not changed that fundamental identity. The Ironmark has fought seventeen wars, large and small, with Nekhur - along with essentially constant raiding in between. The Mark claims, reasonably, to have won all of them, on the grounds that it still exists. Nekhur, equally reasonably, characterizes all of the conflicts as draws. The eórodain's battlefield record, in either case, is unimpeachable. In the last two hundred years, the Mark has also fought three wars with Serebyan and two with Valamir. These, almost everyone admits that the Ironmark won, and their prize for military success (albeit only on land) has been control of the Mootland: the long-disputed, highly fertile halfling lands that are now functionally a protectorate of the Wardens. At home, the ritual oaths of the Uncéas have stabilized - at the cost of two major civil wars, but only two - into hallowed institutions: the elected Wardens, the Witangemot of the elders, and the final voice of the Eórodmot.
In the tense way of borders everywhere, the Markers have continued to raid their neighbors even as they learn from them. Dwarvish craft, Aðadain traditions, and the divine gift of the hwiða have all contributed to almost a millennium of military tradition, which no Southron lord or Nekhur tyrant challenges lightly. But Marker students, clad in the leather and steel of their people, are a common sight at great Nekhur universities, and as far afield as the cities of the Kniazite League. Like most borderlands, the March is both a backwater and a ferment of cultural contact and accommodation, somehow at the same time.
Over the last ten years, Warden Aedelfrid - widely considered a weak man, a compromise political choice made by a divided Eórodmot - has temporized over renewed aggression from the north. He made no move to challenge Nekhur's war on Seher, or its suzerainty over the tribes of the Balor - though local leaders in the northern Mark have cheerfully continued raiding the mountain barbarians anyway. Aedelfrid did send eórod advisers and a limited quantity of Colborn steel arms to support the Imbro-Tervine war effort, and these may have made the difference at the Battle of Varla and, more recently, the Battle of Torrel. But it has escaped no one's notice that the fall of Tervain leaves the Mark's eastern flank exposed as never before, and an increasing number of influential voices warn that the Markers cannot afford to wait: that the eórodain must ride again, once more - while they still can...
Assets
Notable Cities: The Markers, in general, are not a city-dwelling people. Traditionally pastoral, the Aðadain continue to live overwhelmingly on small homesteads and ranches, in extended clan systems, deriving their wealth from cattle, sheep, and goats. The halflings, too, prefer small agricultural communities. And so the Ironmark has only two major cities:
- Ethandune is the capital city of the Ironmark, and the seat of the Wardens. It is located toward the center of the Mark, north of the headwaters of the rivers of Severa. It is, by most standards, a fairly poor and mean place: about fifteen thousand people in a sprawling complex of wooden buildings, livestock sheds, and stables, protected by a few ramshackle palisades. Ethandune lies on a gently sloping moorland hill, and at the top is a large wooden mead-hall with an impressive stone tower attached, from which one can see for many miles. This is the Warden's headquarters, where he can entertain his eorls and shore up support among the eórodain - though even the Warden is expected to spend most of the year in the saddle. Ethandune's main virtues are a large market, which is lively and bustling, and the omnipresence of music: the city is as close as the Mark comes to an artistic center.
- Colborn is the one truly great city of the Ironmark. Built by the dwarves a thousand years ago in the foothills of the Balor Mountains, it now lies just twenty-eight leagues from the border with Nekhur. It is a spectacular underground city housing more than a hundred thousand of the Folk of Devara in neighborhoods carved into the living rock, with their own shops, schools, and granaries. Beneath it lie the richest iron mines in northern Minilar, perfect for the production of world-class steel. And deep in the city's heart is the Forge of Colborn: fed by the heat of a volcanic hotspot, capable of producing a million pieces of arms and armor a year through manufacturing practices honed for the last millennium. The acquisition of Colborn-forged arms, whether by wealth or by valor, is part of what qualifies a man to be an eórod. The forge is central to the Ironmark's identity and political order, and its defense is the one non-negotiable strategic imperative of the realm.
Economy: The Ironmark is not an economic powerhouse. Its military prowess has been achieved largely by outsourcing economic activity to the dwarven and halfling communities. The latter feeds the country; the former keeps it supplied with manufactured goods. This leaves the Aðadain free to train their children for war, and to keep themselves in fighting shape by maintaining large herds of cattle, sheep, and goats. The result is an economy in which most families can eat meat several times a week, and the people grow large and strong - but imported goods are a rarity, luxuries are practically unheard-of, and barter remains common in areas where there are too few precious silver coins to go around. On the other hand, the Mark is remarkably economically equal for a country of its era - the average Aðad is a freeholding rancher-soldier, not a serf - and it boasts one of the continent's only true military-industrial complexes in the famous Forge of Colborn.
Population: About 5.5 million, of whom 700,000 are dwarves and 1.1 million are halflings of the Mootland.
Military
Command: In principle, the Warden of the Mark is the supreme commander of the Eórodain, and this has usually been true in practice as well. But in moments of comfort or overconfidence, the Eórodmot is prone to elect Wardens unable to bear this responsibility. At such time, or when the Warden is in control of a different army, battlefield command usually falls to the eorls: clan leaders who are heir to millennia of Aðadain military wisdom. The decision to put a specific eorl in command of an army can be taken by the Warden, but a general can also be removed by the Witangemot. At present, Warden Aedelfrid's chief general is his cousin Hereward, also of the Brandling line. He was an instrumental adviser at the Battle of Varla, and at the age of thirty-six is already one of the most influential men in the Mark.
Strength: The Ironmark's entire culture, economy, and polity are geared toward military preparedness. Because halfling agriculture keeps the country fed and dwarven industry keeps it armed, every human boy begins learning horsemanship and tactics in early childhood. The Ironmark fields, by general admission, the finest cavalry in northern Minilar: the eórodain. Each man is equally adept with the recurve bow, the nine-foot lance, and the sword. Each wears at least a cuirass and helmet of Colborn-forged steel over a thick buff leather coat; many have pauldrons and vambraces and greaves as well, relics inherited from past generations of eórodain. Most importantly, each is mounted on a hwiða. While a few hundred of these men guard the Warden at any given time, this honor is not considered to place such men in a different category of service; they are not regulars as opposed to levies. Rather, every able-bodied eórod is a soldier first. His singular responsibility is to remain trained and equipped and ready for military service; all else, his ranch and cattle and family, are secondary. After generations of war, the Ironmark's mobilization procedures are finely honed: the realm can muster six thousand eórodain within a week, and the maximum force of about 120,000 within six weeks. At full strength, over more than twenty wars and eight hundred years, the full Host of the Eórodain has never been defeated in pitched battle.
Diplomatic Relations
Interests: The Ironmark's foreign policy, in principle, is very simple: the Markers want to remain independent of Nekhur, and are happy to work with anyone inclined to help them achieve that unlikely goal. For this reason, they have longstanding ties with Koinon. On the other hand, the Markers also have close and sincere ties with Nekhur - the paradox of all borderlands - and have real contacts in Eatar characterized by the grudging respect born of centuries of principled and successful defiance. The Mark regards itself as the protector of all the Southron realms, though it regards their general orientation toward commerce and wealth as bewildering, and has repeatedly tried and failed to rally southern coalitions against the enemy to the north, which the Mark has been obliged to face more directly than its southern neighbors. Among Warden Aedelfrid's true talents is diplomacy, and the last few years have seen a frenzy of Marker embassies seeking to consolidate support against any further Nekhur aggression.
Rivals: Nekhur. In some sense, this rivalry is so lopsided as to be absurd. In another sense, the Ironmark has been determinedly, and fairly successfully, sticking its thumb in the Empire's eye for the last eight centuries: the eórodain are clearly the most dangerous foe, man-for-man, that Nekhur has ever faced. Despite its utter inability to compete economically, culturally, or politically - and despite the fact that it has never seriously threatened any Nekhur city - the Ironmark remains embarrassingly indigestible for its much larger neighbor, and that wary, respectful rivalry defines the two nations' relationship.
Other Information
Location: Currently marked as "Kerwick" on the map, including the whole of the Mootland.
Essential Details
Name of Creature: The Hwiða, known to non-Ironmarkers as Horse-Kings or Horse-Lords.
Appearance: The hwiða are horses, usually about eighteen hands in height and 1,500 pounds in weight. Their coats are typically white, roan, or pale gold, with white markings on the face or chest or fetlocks. Almost everyone finds them remarkably beautiful, though no one can completely explain why, and their movement is graceful enough to inspire poets.
Description: The hwiðas' name - the Horse-Kings - is well-deserved. Fed only on the grass and heather of the Ironmark, they can cover fifty and sometimes eighty miles in a day, and arrive with enough stamina to fight a battle at the end of it. They are freakishly strong; Nekhur battlefield accounts corroborate their ability to knock several men flying with a single kick, or to shatter siege equipment with a steel-shod hoof. They have been known to reach top speeds of over sixty miles per hour for up to a mile at a time. They live for close to forty years. And most importantly, the hwiðas are remarkably intelligent: closer to a hound than to a horse. They have an intuitive ability, like many dogs, to understand their riders' mind and emotional state, his intent and his plans. Ironmarkers, for whom the hwiða is a religious symbol as well as a constant companion in war and peace, talk about this bond in spiritual terms: horse and rider are emotional, psychic partners, sharing hopes and dreams. But even outsiders cannot deny that hwiðas seem to have some rudimentary sense of tactics and forethought, an ability to predict and respond to dangers, a sense of the objectives that they are asked to perform. This makes them vastly more useful - and more dangerous - than any ordinary horse, and the extraordinary abilities of these animals have been essential to the Ironmark's long, stubborn resistance.
Location: For reasons that no one really understands, but that many scholars suspect is related to the effect of some ancient spell or curse, the hwiðas are found only in the southern foothills of the Balor Mountains - the area that is now the Ironmark. If removed for this area for more than a few years, they tend to go terrifyingly insane, or simply to die. This is yet another mystery of these already mysterious creatures.
Essential Details
Name of House: The House of Brand, also known as the Line of Brand or the Brandlings. It should be noted that this is a clan rather than a dynasty per se, one of twelve to which almost all Markers of the eórod class belong. It has over a hundred thousand members, concentrated in the north-central Ironmark. Its members are disproportionately likely to be elected as Wardens, but no one branch of the clan is singularly powerful.
Leader: Aedelfrid Brandling, Warden of the Mark.
Family Members:
- Aedelfrid Brandling, age 47. Warden of the Mark. Educated in Salatiwara, elected as Warden in 1425 as a compromise candidate. A friendly, diplomatic, timorous man, well-liked and little-respected.
- Wulfrun Ethundling, age 41. His wife; despite their exclusion from most social power, Marker women keep their name and property after marriage. A cultural traditionalist and patron of music.
- Osred Brandling, age 20. His son, of late returned from school in Salatiwara, early and against his father's wishes. A brave youth, reckless even by the standards of the death-loving Ironmarkers.
- Cynfflaed Brandling, age 18. His daughter. A quietly beautiful young woman, unmarried, much in the mold of her mother, but with a strong streak of Ymbren piety.
- Hereward Brandling, age 36. "Cousin" of the Warden, meaning in Marker terms that they share a common ancestor somewhere in the last six generations. Educated in Myrrha, distinguished himself in 1422 campaign against Balorenes and in 1428 conflict with Valamir over the eastern Mootland. Named to the Witangemot in 1430 and led eórodain advisers at the Battle of Varla. Known to have visited Monroyal within the last six months, and thought to have been present at the Battle of Torrel. The country's greatest living commander: intelligent, honorable, pious, an aficionado of Nekhur culture and a sworn foe of the Tyrant. A man respected even by his enemies.
- Leofflaed Sumorling, age 34. His lover; a beauty of middling renown, and - unusually - an unmarried woman of trade, who makes her living as an importer of foreign goods to the few in the Ironmark who have the coin to buy them. Their relationship is trusting, but not close, and neither believes that it amounts to a lifelong commitment.
- Breguwise Brandling, age 62. One of the very few female members of the Witangemot; daughter of one Warden and widow of another. Thought to have the Second Sight, a pre-Ymbren superstition still alive and well in the modern Mark. A wisdom-figure for her clan, and for the whole country, whose voice carries a great deal of weight.
History: The Brandlings are, in theory, the lineal descendants of Brand Brandling: a figure quasi-mythical to the Markers (though quite well-attested in Nekhur histories) who invented the eórodain and brokered the Uncéas. They boast more than sixty Wardens - far more than any other clan - and were instrumental in both of the Ironmark's civil wars: advocates of quasi-royal power defeated in the first conflict, they became staunch constitutionalists and succeeded in the second, ushering in centuries of political stability. They tend to educate their children in Myrrha or Salatiwara, and most are fluent in Kisharite, but they also have trading contacts in the Southron realms of the coast, which has brought them slightly more wealth than the average clan. A strong tradition of Ymbren piety coexists with a high frequency of the Second Sight, especially (though not exclusively) among Brandling women. The clan straddles the center of Ironmark politics in a variety of ways, and this has been crucial to its prominence.
Assets
Home: At present, the Warden's Meadhall in Ethandune. When the clan does not hold the wardenship, its stronghold is Brandceaster: a hill-fort three leagues from Colborn and seven from the Nekhur border.
Fiefs: None per se; the Uncéas means that the Ironmark is not a feudal system, and its society is based on freeholding eórod-ranchers. But about a hundred thousand souls, spread across the north of the Marches, carry the Brandling name, and all of these do something - more out of kin solidarity than legal duty - to support the clan's leadership.
Retinue: About twelve thousand eórodain are Brandlings: roughly one-tenth of the country's total strength. How many of these would side with their clan no matter what is an open question. The clan leadership has no salaried - mercenary, in dismissive Marker parlance - retinue.
Essential Details
Name:
Appearance:
Age:
Gender:
Legacy
Allegiance:
Profession:
Background:
Beliefs
Religion:
Motivation:
Inventory
Items:
Skills:
Magical Ability: (Yes/No, if yes then what specialisations, grade, Convocation, Collegiate, or something else?)
I'd like to rework that Serebyan-Ironmark history with you. The Mootland wasn't really a desired expansion of the dominion beyond what we hold . I don't think we'd be the ones to fight three wars with
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by Reverend Norv » Sun Mar 01, 2020 6:59 pm
For really, I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live as the greatest he. And therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear that every man that is to live under a Government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that Government. And I do think that the poorest man in England is not at all bound in a strict sense to that Government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under.
Col. Thomas Rainsborough, Putney Debates, 1647
A God who let us prove His existence would be an idol.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
by The Holy Dominion of Inesea » Sun Mar 01, 2020 9:33 pm
Reverend Norv wrote:The Holy Dominion of Inesea wrote:
I'd like to rework that Serebyan-Ironmark history with you. The Mootland wasn't really a desired expansion of the dominion beyond what we hold . I don't think we'd be the ones to fight three wars with
Fair enough. I had assumed from Krugmar's description that most of the Southron powers held various longstanding historical claims to the Mootland, which would make conflict over it a matter of honor for everyone involved, regardless of their assessment of its actual value - and I read Serebyan as particularly likely to be stubborn on a matter of honor such as that one, hence the three wars. But if those assumptions were mistaken, I can sure change the history.
by Roman Imperator » Mon Mar 02, 2020 1:22 am
by Great Confederacy of Commonwealth States » Mon Mar 02, 2020 1:43 am
Krugmar wrote:And the Political map has been updated, with the NPCs for Northern Minilar added. I will be adding them to the OP to flesh them out as I update it, but feel free to ask me any questions about them. And of course to anybody thinking of applying, feel free to app for their territories, or multiple territories.
by Elysian Kentarchy » Mon Mar 02, 2020 2:15 am
Celivaia wrote:"Today is a great day. Recently, we completed a project that will greatly help the Salarian Union in it's fight, and while I cannot divulge information about this project, I am pleased to announce that this project was no small feat, and for his dedication, work, and pure, brilliant genius, we have a special award for this Salarian. We cannot divulge the name of this operative, but we have given him a special award, the "Star of the Union," and as an added bonus, we have decided to rename this, our home planet, after him. As of this moment, you are now standing on Solus'Kesh."
by Krugmar » Mon Mar 02, 2020 4:27 am
Roman Imperator wrote:-snip- Middle Kingdom
Elysian Kentarchy wrote:Is the reservation map up to date? Don't want to write something for a location and find out it is reserved.
Great Confederacy of Commonwealth States wrote:I’m looking into making a second app for a country more involved in the politics in the North. Is this okay, and if it is, could give a rough description of what you had in mind for Valamir, Imlihir, Serebyani, Torvost, and Avencor?
by Roman Imperator » Mon Mar 02, 2020 4:36 am
Krugmar wrote:Roman Imperator wrote:-snip- Middle Kingdom
I have some reservations about this app, namely about its location and its base in Chinese culture.
For the former it presents quite a culture shock, a sudden switch from nations based on Western Europe to one based on China. It’d be better if it were moved to the southern parts of Minilar, which brings me to my point on the latter. Certain aspects seem heavily based on a China while lacking the conditions that made them possible.
Now I don’t want to make it seem like you can’t do something inspired by a Chinese history, it’d just be best if you moved the location and changed certain aspects to make it clear that these people are likely somewhat distant from their cultural centre. I’d recommend looking at the Western Liao for an example of a Culturally Sinic elite in a less China-dominated sphere, for inspiration.
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