Note: the history of Empria is extremely long, given that it is so deeply tied up with the history of the
Pratasa religion and Western Samvaran political history.
Divine Era History
Empria was one of the cradles of early mass agriculture. Even before
Lily of Red was born, the earliest proto-
Kima Cities served as a model for city-building in the region, and a handful of cave cities were established there by the time of her revelation. The people of the surrounding river basin either imitated these early cities, or organized against them. While early opposition failed, Lily of Red's religious movement helped bring many river tribes together, and the early Emprian Kima were either destroyed or had their political influence reduced. Lily's rise to power changed what it meant to be a city or a kingdom; her followers built entirely new societies in Empria that sought to escape the restrictive model of the underground city-state. She spent many of her later years in Empria, training druids and overseeing the creation of new cities. While Lily may have been born in the neighboring region of
Pritinam, it was in Empria that she died and that her message was most eagerly embraced.
The period from -1300 to -1000 DE is known as the
Suheskan Period. This period was one of theocratic city-states, micro-kingdoms, and growing druidic elite that rose above it all. Druids were above even the greatest of kings in those days, or so the records say. History from this time is hard to do; individuals and cities from this time period have acquired a mythical element as demigods or magical planes. Certainly the time period was chaotic, as people moved freely between cities and proto-kingdoms, and as druids served as powerful kingmakers second only to
Halcyon. Great ziggurats and palace-temples often housed those druids and their remains, and the size of those monuments grew steadily over the centuries. Two major events mark the end of the Suheskan period: the exile of the
Dawara, the family of Lily of Red (who went East to found the
Halikvar religion) in the -1050s; and the formation of the first
Circle of Archdruids in the -1000s. These archdruids organized Lillian worship into a discrete code, known as
Pratasam, and began drawing a line between good druids of Halcyon and bad druids. No longer was magic enough, now one had to be recognized by other druids as virtuous.
The next period is known as the
Arkoshan Period, the age of scholars. As druidism became more common, better understood, and more organized, the need for education and knowledge curation rose. Cities expanded their sphered of influence over great tracts of land to gather the resources for libraries, academies, swarms of attendants, and even more elaborate monuments. A fascination with the stars began, as the druids looked upwards towards Halcyon to understand their world. Calendars were made, legal codes were refined and standardized, and the last age was memorialized into myth. Every city was still its own realm, with its own culture. This went on from -1000 to -700 DE. Slowly, the
Olukijan Period began. According to mythic histories, it began when the heavenly library in the city of Sokimra was burned by prism invaders, and the druids there were slaughtered - but that follows more of a grand narrative of Pratasa legend than anything else. The rising conflict between the Pratasa and the Kima Cities that raged across the -800s, -700s, and -600s certainly played a significant role in the cultural change, though. The Olukijan period is essentially a militarized period, where druids had to play a role in government and warfare to maintain their state support. The narrative is that kings rose over druids and warriors rose over scribes, and that isn't entirely wrong. There was also a cultural shift, as new model armies eroded the lines between tribes and encouraged new cultural identities along regional lines. This lasted until the -300s, when a series of horrific droughts and major migrations led to a chain of political collapses across Empria. A new series of regimes rose over the course of the next few centuries, wielding iron and organizing around hereditary monarchies.
Early Experiments (0 - 410)
After the Gods entered their slumber in 0 ME, things changed quickly.
The Divine Contact, recently adopted by the priesthood, allowed for direct contact with Lily of Red and the
Lunar Pantheon. Pratasa religion, which had been slowly decentralizing and bleeding power to "secular" leaders since the -700s, re-organized under Lily's guidance and drew sharper boundaries between themselves and the Kima Cities. Cultural practices deemed unethical by Lunar Gods were banned, and minority religious traditions were driven from the realm. When the dust settled, fifteen major kingdoms dominated the riverlands of Empria (with many small polities orbiting around them).
The sharpened definitions of Pratasa religion immediately drew the new circle of archdruids into conflict with their distant druidic cousins across the continent. An
Eastern Circle of Archdruids was formed by the rising
Empire of Shenerem (far to the Northeast) in 30 ME in response. The race was on for Emprian leaders to project power and bring other Pratasa regions into line with the correct authority of Lily of Red. But Empria's expanding influence troubled the Kima cities to the South. They had their own unifying movement going on that sought to bring every Kima City under one great empire -
Grand Ekedum - and Empria's growing influence in their neighboring surface societies worried many in the earliest iteration of the Ekedum. In 210 ME, the Ekedum invaded Empria to end their influence in Pritinam, and a horrible war raged across the region. The three greatest kingdoms in Empria united under one banner and married their dynasties into one; when the Ekedum was driven from Empria in 216, this mega-dynasty quickly assimilated or conquered their neighbors. The result was the
Kingdom of Ejilarna, the first state to occupy most of the territory that is now Empria. Ejilarna was an excellent tool (perhaps partner) or the Pratasa Archdruids, who used its strength and wealth to bring those loyal to Western Pratasa into a grand political alliance against Shenerem. A series of Wars, known as the
War of the Five Deserts, ensued as Ejilarna's alliance and Shenerem fought. These lasted from 240 to 300 ME, and were a complicated and messy series of conflicts that saw many kingdoms and armies switch sides periodically. Ejilarna saw this war as a war to control Western Samvara - and it ultimately lost.
The winner was a most unexpected outsider:
The selkie Khilaia. A selkie warrior and strategist named Kova Kawamahu had become the leader of the Western armies in 290 ME after the
Kingdom of Safimir (who controlled the selkies at that time) took over the war effort for the alliance. Using Empria's vast resources and manpower, Kova remodeled the army around herself and smashed the enemy forces in a blitz of surprising victories. She used these victories and this army to seize total control for herself, and she made the first Selkie Empire using her new military machine. Empria was conquered before it even understood what was happening.
The minutiae of the War of the Five Deserts is no longer important, but the results did spell the end of the Ejilarna dynasty. Kova had no children old enough to succeed her when she died in 302 ME, and her generals took over the empire when she died. Empria was taken by
Ruanaki Salanahi, an esteemed selkie moon druid who served as Kova's liaison to the Pratasa archdruids. Ruanaki was an ambitious man who was loyal to Kova but not to the selkie elders or to Kova's family. He made his own kingdom in Empria, known as Salanari, and he crowned himself as the heir to Lily of Red. He dominated the circle of archdruids, he broke from selkie culture, and he even turned a blind eye to the murder of Kova's husband and son in Emprian waters. He waged many wars from 302 until his death in 339, where he expanded Salanari's territories and created new systems of government. After his death, his systems did not hold and his empire shattered into 13 kingdoms. He has been villainized by virtually every faction for his perversion of Pratasam and his betrayal of the selkies, but he did innovate in his legal codes and approach to government in ways that were remarkably forward-thinking (if ultimately doomed). He is also the vector for moon druidism spreading across Samvara, as he taught the Emprians arts that were previously for selkies alone.
The Lunar Crisis (410 - 800)
After the collapse of Ruanaki's empire, Empria continued to fragment and feudalize for another century. But there was one kingdom,
The Kingdom of Swemet, which succeeded in keeping power centralized around the monarch and city. Swemet kept their druidic school well-funded, and the magic helped keep their fields verdant and their monarch legitimized. Swemet's success in this time of chaos was noticeable enough to catch the eye of a Goddess - Lily of Red began investing more and more into the kingdom. In 410, a druidic prodigy in Swemet named Bashaba Rashajala was approached by agents of the Goddess with a deal: Lily would teach Bashaba how to be the greatest of Empria's druids and would support her in politics, if Bashaba would place Lily in total control of the Pratasa religion in Empria. Bashaba accepted, and by her talent and luck Swemet was greatly expanded. Lunar Cults across Empria began to rise, taking advantage of the decentralization. Other Lunar Gods noticed Swemet's dedication to Lily above even the archdruids, and they positioned their own cults to take over other Emprian kingdoms. The Gods fought a vicious proxy war across Empria, starting in the late 400s and raging across the next few centuries. The proxy wars began in Empria, but quickly spread across all of Samvara. Swemet was always the symbolic heart of the conflict though; every time the kingdom made gains, the other Lunar Gods would throw great resources at pushing them back.
Despite the overwhelming opposition, Lily's supporters steadily made gains. Swemet conquered the Southern heartlands and marched into Pritinam, the birthplace of Lily.
Orchid of Blue cults helped Lily's cults flip political opposition within the circle of Archdruids in the 550s ME, and soon most of Empria was some kind of Lily-aligned. Opposition, led by
Emesh and
Ishkibal, gathered in the North-Western parts of Empria and forged their own state. This state relied on support from within the neighboring
Kingdom of Marsham to function, but collapsed when Lily and Orchid were able to flip Marsham to their side more permanently in 622. Wimbo cults prevailed in the Southwest, but were rolled into Orchid-Lily cults in the mid-late 600s.
You can generally divide the Lunar Crisis in Empria into 2 parts: the interior war period from 480 to 622, and the exterior war period of 622 to 726. The interior war period was feudal lord versus feudal lord, clan versus clan, cult versus cult; all across Samvara, it was unclear which state was aligned with which Lunar God, and the war was as much intrigue as it was conquest. Lunar alliances were unstable, and most of the violence was reactive. After the early 600s, sides were more or less established, and cults had become entrenched in various governments. The exterior war period was a time where Emprian coalitions warred with other major alliances, such as the Kima City alliance, the alliance of Ishkibal-Theia to the Northeast, or fighting the Emesh-infused Empire of Shenerem. Lunar alliances had fallen along species lines, and political factions were biologized; a victory for Swemet was a victory for the Lily-Orchid-Wimbo alliance, which was a victory for dryads. Pratasa archdruids felt their control slipping away to paladins, and the mixed-species doctrine of Pratasa was being ignored in favor of a dryad v human mindset. While the archdruids of the era seemed to embrace Lily and this change in doctrine, enthusiasm for this nosedived in the mid 700s.
The end of the Lunar crisis was more of a whimper than a bang. Populations simply couldn't sustain endless war, and people lost interest in obeying Gods that were increasingly obviously fallible. Paladins of great esteem were dying too quickly to be replaced and the new paladins were being recruited too quickly to check for quality, leading to incompetent or immoral paladins disgracing their Gods to the general populace. The Gods were also getting distracted by changing theaters of war; they were fighting other proxy wars in less-exhausted continents (such as
Nafena ) to prosecute. The process of religious peace began in 700, when the cleric
Ponder began hosting peace conferences between Lunar factions. Wars began to slow after that. The total defeat of the Kingdom of Swemet by the Kima Grand Ekedum in 726 killed the last real enthusiasm of the Lily faction; the defeat of the over-extended Ekedum in 728 was the nail in the coffin for everyone. In 730 ME, a Declaration of Religious Peace was made. Empria was left in pieces once again. The wars left local religious leaders in flux; no one quite knew what to do about theology after all of that. While Lily's fallibility was accepted by most druids, many still believed that she should be championed over other Gods; many also still held pro-dryad beliefs, and clung to the species-rivalries that started in the 600s. Prejudice, violence, and infighting reigned among princes and priests for a century.
Emiet and the Three Circles (800 - 980)
From 728 to 800 ME, Empria had no major ruling powers but was instead a land of six decentralized kingdoms; in 800, one of those kingdoms,
The Kingdom of Emiet, absorbed another (that of Vedunas). This, combined with the legal reforms of the new king of Emiet (Tuminaji I), jumpstarted Emiet's slow rise to power over the ensuing century. This began as a slow process of economic growth, trade domination, and taking small tracts of land in skirmishes, but in the 1860s Emiet's pace of expansion rapidly increased. In 904, Emiet finished conquering the Kingdom of Prahamat, a major milestone in uniting the region; in a shocking move the next year, the Queen (
Askala I) crowned herself Empress of all of Empria, and laid claim to all of the riverlands. She was the first to truly focus in on that regional title, but the idea of a large, united kingdom of Empria has stuck around since. After claiming the remaining kingdoms, the Queen also moved to bring the Pratasa circle of Archdruids into her government, essentially making her kingdom the de-facto vessel of Pratasa religious authority. The remaining kingdoms (and several archdruids) were outraged at Queen Asakala's claims, and so another round of war began - this time for the fate of the entire region. Many surrounding kingdoms also sent material aid to Asakala's enemies, as they were worried that this could mean another Lunar Crisis (or even just a powerful, bullying united Empria). These kingdoms encouraged a rising power,
Milen, to intervene. Milen had just finished bringing Marsham, Gilmasa, and Maruva under selkie rule, but he was still believed to be a temporary threat with little ability to project power away from the coasts. Milen needed little invitation to enter, but this provided him with the political ammunition necessary to divide the local kingdoms and conquer them. From 905 to 910, Empria was Milen's primary focus (outside of crushing periodic rebellions in his other conquered territories) - and in 910, he killed Queen Asakala and captured the royal family. All of Empria was now part of the new selkie empire, and Emiet's conquering bureaucracy was quickly repurposed to selkie ends.
Like Kova before him, Milen left a powerful druid to placate the people of Empria - this time, a powerful local druid with ties to the old royal family named
Elder Kanita. Kanita helped stomp local feudal rebellions, and essentially continued the destruction of feudal privileges that Emiet had begun (now with selkie authority). In 920, after several local dynasties Milen had given control to rebelled, Kanita was simply crowned Exarch-Queen of Empria. When Milen died in 931, Kanita was left with an independent and united Empria - similar to what Queen Askala would have acheived, only now more explicitly druidic and bureaucratic. Kanita died not long after this, and her son left no direct heirs; local feudal lords (still locally powerful despite all of their lost privileges), marched on the capital and demanded the right to select the next dynasty. They were handed over control with only two deaths, and Empria briefly became an elected monarchy. But there were some druids who had grown used to government authority, and who blamed the instability and economic decay of the 970s on the new elected monarchy. These druids were overwhelmingly
Etezan - a faction that wanted all power centralized in the hands of a clerical bureaucracy led by an empowered circle of archdruid, as well as standardized religion that did not allow for local interpretations. The Etezans had always been popular in Empria, but the great success that the Kingdom of Emiet had in mending the divide between dryads and humans (left by the Lunar Crisis) made for a growing culture-image of a clerically-backed monarch with infinite power over their vassals; not just Eteza-Pratasa, but
political Eteza that could be applied outside of strictly clerical circles. And so, the politically-minded druidic students led an angry mob to interrupt the 980 election, arrest the attendant nobles, and place their own candidate on the throne. This candidate was
Kopaji I Swevela - a charismatic man with magical skill and lineage tracing back to Queen Askala. Kopaji appealed to the Circle of Archdruids, who met to weigh in on the action, to support his rule. Nine of the archdruids supported him, and he moved with his supporters to quickly crush the noble rebellion that ensued.
The rebellion was swiftly crushed, and Kopaji's regime elevated the most extreme Etezan Pratasa voices to the top of government. They made the Circle of Archdruids a permanent body, empowered its top-down control over all regional priests, and committed Empria's military to enforcing any Archdruidic decrees. Seven of the ten archdruids voted in agreement, and began rapidly centralizing power; when the other three stormed off, Kopaji offered replacements from among Empria's finest (and most radical) young druids. The rest of the Pratasa world was outraged; two other kingdoms, Marsham and Maruva, called their own Circles of Archdruids in opposition. Marsham's was a mixture of Etezan druids and
Prikian druids (voices for decentralization), though the actual meaning of Eteza and Prikia were significantly different in Marsham's local political context than Empria's - Marsham's primary concerns were an overt favoritism towards Eteza-Pratasam, and the undue influence that Empria had on the circle (six of the seven pro-Emprian archdruids having been born in Empria). Maruva, meanwhile, was aggressively Prikian and simply wanted to split the religion down the middle along sectarian lines. Empria went to war with both, and everyone took sides with one of the three circles in the ensuing war, later known as the
War of the Three Circles. Empria started out almost alone in the conflict, but quickly proved that they were a military powerhouse. Nonetheless, the raw number of kingdoms aligned against them (some of them not even Pratasa) was enough to make their gains temporary. This war was not constant fighting, but it was consistent, large, and bloody. In 1032, a weakened Marsham finally submitted to Empria's circle of archdruids, and brought their allies with them. In 1038, Empria conquered the neighboring region of Terminar - granting them land access to Maruva. And, in 1040, Emprian soldiers burned the Prikian archdruidic palace and scattered the survivors to the winds. The great war was over, but conflict persisted - many heretics, sectarians, and dissenters plagued Pratasa, even in Empria's own lans, for the next century. Finally, in 1150, a peace between the two sects was negotiated and the now-permanent Archdruidic circle was moved to neutral ground - the isle of
Kojara, which would be given its own kingdom under them.
Full Circle (980 - 1300)
Outside powers had been trying to conquer pieces of Empria for centuries; during the Lunar Crisis, during the Six Kingdoms period, and during the War of the Three Circles. One of these neighboring interlopers was Terminar, the land to the Northeast along the coast; a land famed for its adventurers, opportunism, warriors, and spiteful independent attitude. Empria was extremely satisfied to have conquered Terminar in 1038, and kept the region annexed afterwards. Terminar never settled into being ruled, but remained a constant source of rebellions and costly interventions. At the same time, Empria was suffering wave after wave of plague, and their trade was deteriorating - the same magical terrorism that had helped kneecap Marsham during the War of the Three Circles was also hurting Empria's ability to make money. Maruva, meanwhile, was regularly skirmishing with Empria and was hungry for vengeance after the 1040 campaign - and occupying Terminar meant that they were right on the kingdom's borders. They were even appealing to allies in the East - the resurgent forces of the
Aretan Temple, fellow heretics of Pratasa happy to see the archdruids curtailed in power. Pritinam, in the South, was also sustaining pressure on Empria and wanted to take back scraps of territory they'd lost in the war. In short, Empria won the war but inherited diplomatic isolation, debt, and a long list of enemies that regularly tested their boundaries.
The Kojara Compromise say a sudden pivot from near-theocratic absolute monarchism to "secularism" of a sort. At first, the idea was that the crown should train their own literate class for the bureaucracy, but they simply lacked the resources to meaningfully make that work. Feudal lords and autonomous druids moved in to fill the gap, and state power began to collapse into decentralized pockets of authority (all still wearing the skin of a centralized monarchy). Selkie adventurers were preying on Emprian vessels with impunity and poaching islands from the kingdom. And, in 1250, everything converged into a terrible collapse:
The Great Terminari Rebellion. Terminari lords elected a prince, who was then backed by Maruvan and Aretan soldiers in a big for greater autonomy (and maybe independence). When the prince died, a selkie adventurer and pirate named
Kilai Pohil entered the fray with a band of mercenaries and was able to have himself elected prince. Sensing blood in the water, the Kima Prisms of Pritinam marched a great host North, to take back their territory and loot as much as they could. As Kilai's pirates pressed into Empria's islands, Empria left them undefended to simply burn - and so the islands turned to the Archdruids of Kojara for protection. The defender of Kojara, an ambitious paladin named Adareet Kohabha, led his fellow paladins and warriors to protect them, and ended up seizing them from Empria in the process. Empria survived all of this, but lost its island territories, Terminar, and lands near Pritinam. And it even had to curate good relations with Kojara and Maruva afterwards - further humiliations, in the eyes of many. Humiliated and exhausted, Empria was left with dissatisfied elites and a shattered self image. And, slowly, the emergent narrative was that secularism was the problem; the Kojara Compromise was the problem; there was work that was left unfinished by the hyper-Etezans of 980.
The Druidic Revolution (1300 - 1320)
Discontent with the current order was not just present in Empria; there was a broad sense that the faith was under attack, both by armed religious enemies (
Ayshans in the North, heretics in the East, converts in
Larazel) and by a world that was becoming more interconnected and chaotic with every passing decade. The continued Pratasa infighting also left many with a desire to reinvent the religion, "returning Pratasa to its roots", even if that reinvention was really just part of the infighting. Unhappy young druids from across the Pratasa world came to Empria to study and serve the empowered Circle of Archdruids, and a new group of truly international bureaucrats and druids was forming in Empria's Northern cities. In 1300, after the unpopular and newly-crowned King Akaji II announced a new series of reforms that would confiscate libraries and labor from druidic academies and that would heavily tax and regulate Pratasa druids to better fund a new class of royal lawyers, young druids took the the streets in rage. Angry mobs of urban residents flocked to their banner - they also had a bone to pick with the reforms, which changed how food would be extracted from the countryside in a way that temporarily spiked food prices. The young druids, scribes, and urban commoners marched together on the palace, and ended up overthrowing the King after months of chaotic politics. What marked this event as unusual was not the palace coup, but what came after: the druids did not have any royal candidates that fully fit their vision, so they gave all power to a druidic council instead. A king was still crowned, but he was largely powerless and kept under close supervision - this was a theocracy now, and he was just a formality. And so, the Druidic Revolution began.
Many traditional elites were outraged by the revolution, and moved to overthrow the new government. But the revolutionary spirit was infectious - it spread through the cities and towns, and even into the countryside as a subversive force. However, it is worth noting now that this wasn't a united or consistent ideology. The young druids, merchants, bureaucrats, and some guild artisans were more or less on the same page, while everyone else took the revolution in completely different ways. The young literati saw the revolution as a return to Pratasa fundamentals using new technologies; they wanted a druidic holy state, with more social mobility for those who had access to education (and, to go with that, more access to education). They wanted a standardized, "true" Pratasa to overwrite the old traditions and sects, with an emphasis on the direct word of
Halcyon (instead of the words of old druids). This was, for them, a semi-monotheistic movement that wanted Halcyon raised more clearly above all lesser Gods as the Grand Architect; it was also an ascetic rationalist movement. Old corrupt druids must be taken to task, and lineage (while still relevant) was less important than virtue, intellect, and devotion (which could be demonstrated by celibacy and modest living). Those not fully literate or without access to text in daily life (the arrival of the first printing press was still a century away and even then, efficient mass printing would take another five centuries) interpreted the Druidic Revolution however they wanted to - mostly as a mystical religious revival that gave power to local communities. Ironically, this led to a flourishing of local traditions that are now associated with Prikia Pratasam. At the time, though, the idea was that communities could push back against local landlords by appealing to divine ritual, and that ascetic peasant-oracles could stand against opulent upper-or-middle class sinners. So, the Druidic Revolution was really at least two very different revolts, with immense local variance in desired demands. This chaos wiped out the old order in a spectacle of public violence and social transformation, but ended fairly quickly - the druids managed to reign in local revolutionary leaders by 1302, though the country was still extremely instable for the next decade.
In 1302, the old royal family, and many esteemed nobles, fled to Kojara, the kingdom of the Archdruids. The government demanded that the Circle of Archdruids hand them over; the Archdruids refused. The government then sent demands for total reform of the Pratasa faith, which was again refused. And so, Empria invaded Kojara. The powerful magic of the archdruids was unable to resist the overwhelming power of Empria's armies. Kojara was also betrayed from within; many Pratasa clerks, acolytes, and apprentices there were sympathetic to the revolution, and several archdruids ended up siding with the revolutionaries once the armies began to approach. The archdruids who refused to join the revolution fled Kojara, and began rallying kingdoms against Empria's administration. They found an unlikely ally and home in the
March Kingdom of Arashoka, which had recently been seized by a Pratasa administration. Meanwhile, the kingdoms of South Marsham, Terminar, Gilmasa, and Maruva moved to contain Empria once again. But the revolution was spreading. In 1303, South Marsham almost fell to revolutionaries in Safimir and fell out of the war effort; in 1304, Maruvan dissenters rose up in several urban centers and began a civil war. From 1302 to 1310, rebellions cropped up in major Pratasa cities, as theocratic utopianism spread wherever young literate people clashed against the older, corrupt institution. The conservative archdruids, with an Arashokan navy at their back, returned to Kojara in 1309 and demanded to negotiate - they would end this religious war with compromise, same as the last. While the revolutionaries hated the concept of compromise, they were hungry for legitimacy. In 1310, they agreed to implement new reforms along revolutionary lines: more social mobility for new or prospective druids, more restrictions on the lifestyles of powerful druids, and more structure to the Pratasa priesthood. Eteza-Pratasa kingdoms were willing to bite the bullet and accept these reforms, for the most part; fringe sects were not. Maruva and Northern Larazel immediately rejected this compromise and tried to leave the Pratasa community. Empria responded by invading Maruva, along with several allies. Northern Larazel was already drifting away from mainstream Pratasa, though, and had the distance to escape retribution - they became the
Ruekan Circle.
A decade of wars against the Prikia and intensifying religious extremes ensued. For, while the revolution was being absorbed by moderates in the rest of the Pratasa world, Empria's home revolution was intensifying. Many in Empria felt that the revolution was only in its first phase, and that it was time to construct a utopian society of total druidic control. Rebellions and infighting ensued. Finally, in 1318, a war-druid named
Shirva Drivara, leader of the campaigns in Maruva, seized the throne of Empria and tried to bring both the radicals and the reactionaries to heel. Shirva began reversing some of the revolutionary reforms, while keeping those that helped expand her power. The result was a more bureaucratic, centralized state. Unable to fully bureaucratize Empria, Shirva also instated new feudal lords (with limited powers) rather than allow communities to continue self-governing. Rebellions ensued. In 1320, the last revolt against her was crushed, and the revolution was officially over.
New Problems (1320 - 1600)
The Druidic Revolution resolved some of Empria's problems, but it hardly began a golden age of Emprian dominance. Terminar, to the East, continued to cause problems; their staunch loyalty to the conservatives during the revolution greatly expanded their power, and they attempted to create a naval-colonial empire across Western Samvara from 1320 to 1400, which ultimately failed and collapsed Terminar's influence. Maruva continued to periodically rebel against the Archdruids, causing periodic crises that Empria was always dragged into. Instability at home continued over the century. And, in 1390, a palace coup led to the fall of the Drivara dynasty and a brief civil war. During this civil war, the Northern coast seceded to Kojara (a mixture of local politics and the last dregs of theocratic sentiment). Instead of a second revolution, sentiment turned towards stability in the 1400s: bringing the Kima in line, subjugating the desert nomads. The economy finally recovered, the population boomed. Kojara, having taken some of Empria's trading ports, was rising as a regional trade power, but outside of a few skirmishes there was little political will to retake the coast.
Again, Empria's feudal lords gained more local power. This time, though, people were not bound to the land in any way; Empria's interior was beginning to commercialize, and the druidic revolution had created a new class of small-scale landowners that were much more mercantile and mobile than the old order. Empria remained strong, even if it lacked the overwhelming power it once had.
Earthquakes and volcanic activity brought famine, plague, and disorder in the late 1400s and 1500s. These earthquakes caused immense chaos in the Kima heartlands to the East; the
Underway, the intricate underground road system of the Grand Ekedum, saw massive collapses that killed thousands and sudden severed Samvara's trade networks. Thousands of displaced prisms fled the chaos, and many entered Empria. Prisms living alongside humans and dryads is against the social order of Pratasa; there is a divide between the underground world and the surface world, and violation of that peaceful divide is punishable by divine wrath. Naturally, this refugee influx caused something of a social panic, then. During the 1500s, a "Covenant Aid" program was made to resettle all refugees into new Kima Cities that would then be loyal to the Emprian state; this would open up new mineral resources, would simultaneously dealing with this problem. Unfortunately, the implementation of the Covenant Aid policy was corrupt and mired in dangerous politics. Empria had maintained peaceful relations with neighboring Pritinam by not meddling in Kima affairs; now, Empria was starting to form relationships with Kimas in Pritinam, just as Pritinam was forming connections to settlements in Empria. The old issue of Pratasa communities in Pritinam (which had religious and political autonomy, but were not in control of the government) was also returning after centuries of being safely ignored. Wars with Pritinam began to occur in the 1530s, along with rebellions at home. Meanwhile, tensions were growing in the North with Kojara, as many Northern cities and fiefs were starting to move away from Emprian royal authority towards the druidic authority there. In 1570, Kojara and Empria went to war in a major war, and Empria lost in an embarrassing spectacle. Kojara annexed all of the Emprian coast, including some of its richest lands, and placed the Emprian capital into easy attacking range for future wars.
Fall and Rise and Fall (1600 - 1800)
Anxiety about Empria's place in the world was rising again. Another series of earthquakes in the 1590s, the last major spike until the 18th century, sent another wave of Kima refugees into Empria as the kingdom was in the middle of licking its wounds. Anti-Kima sentiment broke out along with religious reactionism - people blamed spiritually corrupt leaders and outsiders for the failures of the kingdom, and war with the Emprian Kimas broke out. Many of the new Kimas were dissolved and destroyed, and their people were told to gather their things and leave the realm. Refugees of Empria and Pritinam gathered under a charismatic leader named
The Vessel, who claimed to be the
Akadist order incarnate. Emprian royalty, which was eager to avoid a massacre of Akadists that might trigger a war with Pritinam, threw money and boats at The Vessel to help them remove the Akadists to a new promised land. This fleet would go on to be extremely controversial to the point where the Emprian Queen who supported The Vessel was put on trial by the Circle of Archdruids and forced to abdicate - essentially, The Vessel turned out to be a heretic who wanted to blend Pratasam and Akadism into a syncretic faith, and invaded a Pratasa kingdom in order to realize that vision, all using Emprian ships and gold.
After the trial and exile of Queen Askala IV in 1603, Empria fought a terrible civil war and was split between noble houses. War, fragmentation, and intrigue reigned for most of the 1600s. In 1691, the Kalila family reunited the kingdom once again, mobilizing both the excellent strategists of their family and the regional fears of Kojara, desert nomads, and Pritinam invading. These fears were almost realized in 1730, when a Kojaran vassal claimed the Emprian throne and invaded. In a shocking reversal of fortunes, Empria won their war, and Kojara was driven back to their islands in 1755. With their coastline returned, Emprian wealth and power surged. A coalition of surrounding powers began to form when Empria made it clear that they fully intended to subjugate Kojara and assert claims on neighboring lands, and Empria's neighbors fought wars of containment from 1760 to 1795. Finally, in 1795, Empria withdrew their territorial claims, ceded some coastline back to Kojara, and agreed to demilitarize.
Return of Empire (1800 - 1911)
By 1795, the last of the earthquakes had ended and Pritinam was bouncing back with a vengeance - the kingdom was only a step away from outright claiming to be the next Grand Ekedum (unifying empire of all Kimas). While Pritinam had no official territorial ambitions on the surface, they had a growing desire to carve out a sphere on influence, and making Empria into a client state was the perfect first step. Empria rebel against this status quo a few times in between 1800 and 1840, but each Pritinami victory only solidified their dominance. Finally, in 1870, Pritinam withdrew its domineering influence from Emprian government, for a multitude of reasons: Pritinam was quickly losing diplomatic support for its power in Empria as it became more direct and exploitative, the balance of power was shifting towards containing the
Empire of Shenerem (which had established some power over Maruva, which was now invading Terminar), and Pritinam was dealing with its own internal problems. Peacefully, quietly, Pritinam slinked out and Empria was once again unshackled.
Empria had been covertly remilitarizing for decades using the wars in Garadel and Larazel as an excuse to expand their army. In the 1880s, the kingdom fully embraced this - looting Garadel was extremely profitable, and holy wars overseas helped train warriors that could be used against Maruva. In 1890, the last war between Kojara and Empria occurred. Empria won, took back its last bit of coast, and the current borders were confirmed and legitimized. Entering into the 1900s, Empria was again a Samvaran superpower, though it was still finding its footing.
Given the fragile politics of Western Samvara, the 1908 Arashokan Revolution was a spark that nearly triggered a major war. What was once a Pratasa power was now officially
Sumoxan and embraced a kind of secular neutrality. Religious rebellions in Northeastern Arashoka were supported by Empria, and instability crossed into the kingdom. Selkie pressure to withdraw was swift. After the Emprian monarch withdrew forces and recognized the Sumoxan regime (rather than invade), a palace coup unseated them and placed a new, zealous dynasty on the throne. This dynasty, the
Sharavar, were a military family with few ties to the landowning class and deep ties to the desert tribes (as well as the Pratasa nomads of Northeast Arashoka). A brief civil war broke out in 1909, and the Sharavar were unseated from power. In a move of naked greed and opportunism, the Kingdom of Marsham swept in during the war and annexed the territory bordering Arashoka - territory that granted Empria critical trade access outside of the interior sea. Wars broke out between Empria and Marsham as soon as the civil war ended, and only intervention by the archdruids prevented it from escalating.
Modern History
The
Samanasi dynasty, which took power during the 1909 civil war, has reigned to this day without interruption. The first monarch in this line was King Tuminaji V (r. 1909 - 1923), a warrior with deep ties to the nobility and some experience fighting in Garadel. Tuminaji was a military reformer, who wanted Empria to have a flexible, powerful, and modernized military to compete with its neighbors. He was also commercially competent, and expanded Empria's role in the global textile market. His daughter, Queen Kanita IX (r. 1923 - 1955), was less innovative than her father but worked hard to de-escalate international conflicts and stabilize the kingdom. Her daughter, Kanitaja II (r. 1955 - 1988), has generally been agreed to have been an "alright" monarch, though at the time she was often portrayed as weak. The 1980s were a generally strange time in Empria: growing commercial cliques were becoming increasingly entangled in other countries, particularly in Pritinam. Many worried about Pritinam's growing influence in Empria, and Kanitaja only encouraged further intermarriage between elites of the two kingdoms. For a few years (1985 - 1988), Pritinam did seem to have growing economic and political power within Empria's government, and new joint estate projects were moving populations over the borders of the two kingdoms regularly.
Kanitaja's daughter, Queen Askala X (r. 1988 - 2008), learned quickly to be aggressive with Pritinam and other countries. She was not a warhawk necessarily, but she was a ruthless and cynical politician who saw diplomacy as a zero-sum game. When the government of Pritinam began its prolonged crisis in the 1990s, Askala X moved quickly to accumulate power in Pritinam. Askala was a woman of great ambition and grand designs, who did her best to position Empria to eventually invade Pritinam - which would, to Askala, serve as a stepping stone to invading Maruva and beginning Empria's new empire. The Pritinami political crisis was not quite volatile enough for Askala's schemes, though, and she died without ever launching her grand plan.
The new queen, Rashaja II, has been groomed for war and empire from a young age. She was always her mother's attack dog, and remains so even after her mother's passing. Rashaja has not been much of a politician - diplomacy has fallen by the wayside since she took the throne, and she has started to accumulate enemies. Nonetheless, she has been a very competent administrator and a very effective military leader. In 2012, Pritinam's political gridlock finally turned to violence, and Rashaja moved ferociously into Pritinam and almost took the kingdom for herself. She was denied her victory by unexpected political developments in Pritinam (which stabilized the country), and threats of invasion from Maruva. The ease of her victory sent a clear message, though, and she has used her military success to astroturf political support for her in Pritinam. As of 2017, another war between Empria and Pritinam is breaking out - and, unless a miracle occurs, Rashaja will certainly prevail this time.
The Western riverlands are more contained; the Kelmali and Shanashi riverlands are more or less pockets of variant culture, that have only recently been fully absorbed into the Emprian mainstream. Most of the land not immediately surrounding rivers is desert in the West: rocky, dry, shrubby, ideal for horses but a nightmare to farm. These deserts are mostly lived in by Anoja, ranchers and nomads that live outside of the Emprian norm, though small oasis towns do exist and serve as municipal anchors for royal authority. The counties of Sarkun, Danapal, and Rinsien (2, 7, and 8) are mostly occupied by Anoja. The "black space" on the map beyond Empria's borders also contain many Anoja, who trade and feud with the Emprian Anoja communities periodically.
The Eastern half of Empria is verdant and green forests and swamps (with the exception of the county of Arumet, which is arid hills). This half of the realm holds much of the population, and is the nexus of wealth and power in Empria.
It is worth noting that a number of Kima Cities exist across Empria. Many of these are smaller, though several large compounds exist in the counties of Hebkima, Danapal, and Yokima (3, 7, and 13). Also of note is that the Northeastern-most county, Datimar, is culturally tied to the region of Terminar to the Northeast - an occupied land currently undergoing a civil war.
Comments