The Free City of Greyhawk

Overview

The city of Greyhawk controls a sizable estate ranging from the northern coast of the Woolly Bay to the southern shores of Midbay in the Nyr Dyv. The Cairn Hills and the Abbor-Alz mark the eastern limits of this domain, while its western boundary is generally considered to lie within the Gnarley Forest and along the edge of the Welkwood. The other towns in the Greyhawk territory each have their own history of independence. Were the entire region not threatened by upheaval in the adjacent lands, none of them would willingly submit to Greyhawk. The “empires” of the Pomarj and the Bright Desert are seen as unstable, but quite dangerous. In addition, neither Dyvers nor Celene, Greyhawk’s western neighbours, hold any affection for the Free City; the Duchy of Urnst, to the east, is a lukewarm ally.
The Selintan River and the River Road that runs alongside it are the main avenues of travel in the Domain of Greyhawk, connecting Woolly bay to the Nyr Dyv. The Western Road carries traffic to Dyvers and beyond, while the Urnst Trail crosses through the Cairn Hills to the east. Trade from all across the Flanaess passes through the Free City, and people of all nations can be found there. In addition to being a centre of commerce, Greyhawk is a city of learning. The University of Magical Arts and the Grey College, among others, attract numerous students here. Finally, it is also a city of diplomacy; statesmen and politicians from nations throughout the central Flanaess serve as ambassadors to this domain, forging alliances and treaties.
The city of Greyhawk is ruled by its Lord Mayor, who is selected by the Directing Oligarchy comprised of twelve to eighteen of the city’s major guild and military leaders, in addition to important clerics and wizards. The current Lord Mayor, Nerof Gasgal, is rumoured to be a former member of the city’s powerful Guild of Thieves. The populace of the expanded Domain of Greyhawk, beyond the city proper, has only limited influence in government. The Greyhawk Council of Mayors and Manorial Lords ostensibly gives the leaders of the various lesser communities in the city’s larger domain a voice in the government, but it is recognised that this annual gathering has no real authority.

History

The city that would command so much attention from the world at large began centuries ago as a modest village on the Selintan River. Built around a trading outpost, the original settlement came to be dominated by a warlord named Maret Nial, an opportunistic infantry captain who led a large band of soldiers across the Cairn Hills in 4 CY and proclaimed the village conquered without bothering to have a battle. He declared his domain to be part of the Great Kingdom and built a motte-and-bailey keep on a hill above the village. After several years of garnering wealth through taxation, and a bit more by overt banditry, the influence of Lord Nial was great enough to warrant a new title: Landgraf of Selintan. Lord Nial’s son and heir, Ganz, was wed to the daughter of the Gynarch of Hardby, thus cementing a political alliance that brought the whole of the river basin together under the old Landstadt of Selintan. The height of this confluence was reached in the person of the last landgraf, the so-called Mad Archmage, Zagig Yragerne, who ruled as Lord Mayor from 310 CY to 421 CY.
This Wild Coast native was a full though distant heir to the position of landgraf. Zagig’s rulership as lord mayor and landgraf was the most successful in the history of Greyhawk; he refortified the city, reformed many of its more onerous laws, established a university, and brought great prosperity to the region as a whole. His construction of Castle Greyhawk was an unparalleled achievement of engineering. While some of his projects seemed without purpose or even destructive, his rule in total was of great benefit to Greyhawk and its inhabitants.
Ultimately, his eccentricities took him far from his duties as ruler. He was also without heir. After many decades of his absence, Greyhawk was proclaimed a free and independent city by Lord Mayor Paerinn in 498 CY, slicing all political ties (which were nearly nonexistent by now anyway) with the Great Kingdom. The old Landstadt was abolished, and absolute authority was formally invested in the Directing Oligarchy. Though beginning with great promise with the legacy of Zagig, the city quickly fell into decline. Numerous thieves and crooked businessmen formed a broad alliance to enrich themselves. Parodying the many guilds in town, the leader of the thieves, thugs, smugglers, and charlatans of the city’s underworld named his organisation the Guild of Thieves, and the name stuck. The Guild of Thieves soon had several members on the Oligarchy in its pay, and eventually grew to such power that even the Greyhawk Militia obeyed the orders of its guildmaster. The city’s trade volume began to drop as foreign merchants sought new shipping routes to avoid the ever-increasing bribes and tariffs placed on their goods. Greyhawk lost its authority over much of the associated territory after 500 CY, most notably the Wild Coast and Hardby. In Hardby, the female wizards, knights, and nobles restored the sovereignty of the gynarchy, though by tradition the title of Gynarch belonged to House Yragerne. Therefore, the women of Hardby named their new ruler the Despotrix, ruling over a domain extending from the lower Selintan to the Abbor-Alz.
In 533 CY, fighting broke out within Greyhawk’s Guild of Thieves between reformers who realised that the Guild’s excesses were driving away profits, and the Kurell-worshipping oldguard, who had no desire to lose their highway to wealth and wanted to unite all thieves under the direction of the priests of Kurell. Casualties were great, including the Guildmaster and leader of the reformers, Yavos the Elder. When the war ended, the great power of the Guild was broken, and the reformers had won out. Under Yavos the Younger, the Guild of Thieves changed its tactics and began working hand-in-hand with the city’s merchants and businessmen. A rough system of paid protection and guardianship was established. Though the merchants hated it, they recognised the futility of preventing every theft, and they came to appreciate the value in having the city’s criminals not only avoiding their premises, but acting to prevent foreign and nonguild thieves from taking their goods. Yavos was even given a seat on the Directing Oligarchy, and the Guild of Thieves achieved an air of legitimacy that astonished foreigners (and many citizens of Greyhawk, too).
The subsequent rumoured appearance of a Guild of Assassins in the city was even further cause for amazement, and not a little fear. Every death in the city was suspected of being caused by hired killers, when in fact almost none were. The Guild of Assassins was formed by a group of guild thieves who were ordered to hunt down several priests and thieves of Kurell who had escaped the guild war in 533 CY, but were now making trouble for Greyhawk’s merchants in the city of Dyvers. The vengeful thieves accomplished their mission so well that they were made a permanent enforcement arm of the Thieves’ Guild. In a short time, they became a separate entity and began to serve the needs of the Directing Oligarchy as well, successfully assassinating a Hierarch of the Horned Society who tried to stir up a revolt among the masses.
Greyhawk finally recovered from its economic decline several decades ago, benefiting from dungeon-loot taken from several major troves discovered in the region, particularly beneath the ruins of Castle Greyhawk. In 570 CY, the careless intervention of Lord Robilar and other adventurers freed the evil demigod, Iuz, as well as other powerful beings, from imprisonment beneath Castle Greyhawk. Every powerful being freed blamed Zagig personally for his or her imprisonment and vowed revenge as they fled to recover from their ordeal.
A rumoured master thief named Nerof Gasgal became Lord Mayor in 570 CY at the age of 30, to the surprise of many. His close friend, Org Nanshen, became Guildmaster of Thieves and an Oligarch in 572 CY. The two brought great dynamism to the government of the city, and they were able to improve business conditions and bring in foreign merchants and tradesmen to settle as citizens, adding to the pool of local wealth and talent. In 574 CY, the Oligarchy was joined by Turin Deathstalker after the entire upper hierarchy of the Guild of Assassins was slain by a summoned daemon. Turin improved his guild’s intelligence-gathering abilities further than ever, and this was of great help to Greyhawk in learning of troop movements across the Nyr Dyv when war between the Horned Society and the Shield Lands began in 579 CY. Turin later left for his native Shield Lands during the Greyhawk Wars where he became a war-hero. Upon his return, he took command of the Safeton Border Guards and did little to hide his hatred of orcs and other humanoids.
By the time of the Greyhawk Wars (582-584 CY), the city was again being called the “Gem of the Flanaess” (a term coined by Zagig) and received increasing numbers of visitors. Although Greyhawk was mostly spared the ravages of war, the domain itself was filled with refugees from the Shield Lands, the Wild Coast, the Bandit Kingdoms, and other realms. Iuz’s conquest of the Bandit Kingdoms and the Scarlet Brotherhood's blockade of the Tilva Strait diverted even more trade towards Greyhawk. For three years, most of the Flanaess flew banners of war. Finally, the battle-weary combatants gathered in Greyhawk to declare peace. Harvester 584 CY was to see the signing of the Pact of Greyhawk, fixing borders and mandating an end to hostilities. On the Day of the Great Signing, however, Greyhawk suffered a great treachery: Rary, one of the Circle of Eight, destroyed his companions Tenser and Otiluke in a great magical battle, then fled. Many suspected that the former Archmage of Ket had hoped to hold the ambassadors hostage, perhaps capturing Greyhawk itself in the process. Instead, he and his cohort, Lord Robilar, went into the Bright Desert to form their own kingdom. Fearing further disruptions, the delegates hurriedly signed the Pact of Greyhawk. Ironically, because of the site of the treaty signing, the great conflicts soon became known as the Greyhawk Wars.
After the wars, refugees from war-torn lands continued to arrive in Greyhawk. Some of the wealthier refugees purchased invented titles, with the prerequisite counterfeit histories and lineages. As a result, the true history of the city and surrounding region is slowly being overwritten. Many see this as the price of growth and success. Greyhawk is, for all its difficulties, more vital and prosperous today than it has been at any time since the departure of Zagig Yragerne.