Fortunado
Ruled by a Grand Duke and his feudal lords, this Dukedom has two provinces located on the eastern shores of the Arresadi River in Renscroprec and is a center for trade and commerce. With all major water and land routes passing along its borders, it is historically one of the wealthiest nations in the region. Though a recent generations long famine plunged them into a stark reality they are recovering both economically and militaristically.
Structure
| Societal Rank | Military Role | Etiquette | Church Equivalent | Etiquette |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Grand Duke | Cavalier | Gracious Sir | ||
| Duke | Commander | Most Noble Sir | Mother/ High Priest | High Eminence |
| Baron | Banneret | Right Noble Sir | Matron/ Priest | Eminence |
| Lord | Companion | Noble Sir | Maiden/ Under Priest | Most Learned Sir |
| Gentleman | Bachelor | Gentle Sir | Senior Sister/ Brother | Right Learned Sir |
| Unlanded | Squire | Sir | Sister/ Brother | Learned Sir |
| Freeman | Sergeant | Right Master | Initiate | |
| Yeoman | Man-at-arms | Master | ||
| Serf | Footman | |||
| Villein | ||||
| Bandsman |
Culture
Men and women both wear their hair short and close cropped. With men donning short beards and mustaches. Though the more hair on the head the less is generally on the face. Most common jewelry are necklaces for women and bracelets for men, with anklets for servants. Most wear woolen clothing with linen undergarments. Brighter colors, better materials, and longer jackets are a sign of greater wealth. Aristocracy and the wealthy tend to have elaborate patterns worked into their outfits as well. Diets consist mostly of porridge, breads, and pies made from various grains. Fruit and vegetables of all types are readily available, mostly sun dried. Meat is rare but goat, pig, chicken, and lamb are most common for the middle class. Venison and cow are for the wealthy. All classes consume fish in numerous varieties. It's usually salted or smoked to preserve for long term use. Marking the skin permanently is common amongst the lower classes and military. The wealthy are unlikely to have any such decoration. Tattoos are normally in non-visible areas. They can represent guild membership, professions, family loyalties, and military groups among many other things. Magistrates will routinely mark criminals to easily identify repeat offenders.
Popular art comes in many forms. Whether ceiling murals, stained glass, wall and door carvings, statues and monuments, hanging tapestries, or illuminated manuscripts they are all vibrant and full of life. Topics range from religious, political, military, to a rising romantic trend. Most literature are songs, poems, histories, legal or medical texts. Old legends still persist and take many forms, singers and musicians abound. Bass, alto, and piano are performed by stringed, percussion, brass, woodwind instruments, and singers alike. From the traveling troubadour and jongleur to large choirs and orchestras, entertainment is highly sought after. Smaller scale entertainment includes board games like chess and checkers, dice games like knuckle bones and hazard, and card games like tables and kings. On the larger end there's archery, horseshoes, wrestling, hammer throw, and game ball. While the wealthy entertain themselves with feasts and banquets, jousting and dueling, and horse racing.
Public Agenda
To protect and maintain its citizens and holdings. Pave, repair, and secure roads from threats both human and monstrous. Dig wells and drainage ditches. Build, maintain, and secure bridges and ports. Provide courts for high and low justice. Maintain birth and death records as well as citizen rolls. Enforce construction standards on homes. Mint coins and catch counterfeiters. Ensure doctors and priests make their rounds. Ensure skilled labor jobs are filled (carpenter, smith, weaver, glazer, etc.) Guard against disasters such as famine, fire, flood, and disease. Provide water mills and fairgrounds.
Assets
Wealthy in terms of tin, silver, copper, and other precious metals. Large topaz and beryl deposits and number one source of red stone. Large professional military with well-equipped soldiers. Provinces have hired Sartrix for military use. Large exporter of textiles, southern and western hardwood, and dyes.
Demography and Population
The vast majority of the population are Arres peasants producing food. Be it herds of sheep or goats in the hills and mountains, pigs in the towns, fishermen along the rivers and lakes, hunters in the forests, or farmers on scattered cottages. There are a few Einjar artisans and herdsmen among the predominantly Arres population, and a large amount of Mauri serving as Bandsmen along the southern borders working the many farms around.
Territories
Western bank of the Arresadi River from mountains to the end of the rolling hills.
Military
This Dukedom fields an Army of mostly axemen and bowmen in light to medium armor from the peasant ranks, led by knights in heavy armor. Their nobles and merchant classes provide the cavalry. Though horses are hard to come by on these hills. Each Duke is expected to raise a full battalion in times of war.
Technological Level
Recently developed circular towers provide for great defensive bonuses. While this technology is being adopted slowly across the region, they have the most towers of this type.
Religion
The majority of the residents within this dukedom follow the Church of the Great Mother, though the Einjar who reside within still keep to the Druid Circle. The Mauri practice ancestor worship and do not have an organized religion, but they meet in communal sanctums for religious observances.
Foreign Relations
At peace with established trade rights to the neighboring kingdom and dukedoms, and far off Marches. The Mauri are a vassal state of Adinerado and all trade with them must first go through that kingdom.
Agriculture & Industry
Along the low hills barley is planted in spring, beans planted after the yield, and winter wheat planted last. With cabbage, broccoli, and canola rotated in to boost the yield. Whole grain stalks can be used as livestock feed, but the husk must be removed for human consumption. Entire community takes part in husking festivals. In the higher altitudes they plant carrots, radishes, and beets in the spring and fall.
Cloth and banking are where the real profits are. Wool is most common, collected from sheep and goats, then treated at the merchant's home, taken to a weaver, and then a fuller. It can be dyed at any point in the process. Linen from flax, cotton imported from the south and east, and silk from the mystical flujsa lands are rare but popular. Merchants use profits to buy other products at the fair and immediately resell to pledged customers, break into smaller lots, warehouse until markets rise, and send out for finishing. They then invest profits in real estate to gain rent, likely to their own employees, in forests for timber rights, fishing rights in a stream or pond, and eventually become a money lender when they can pay for the table license. Once a table is acquired from the baron, he can start lending money as a pawnbroker. Interest rates vary from 6% to 20%. Lend someone money to build a house and their family will be paying rent for generations. Buy goods at discount with promise to pay remainder, with interest, at next fair. Nobles borrow to wage war and equip armies, and merchants have been known to be knighted for services rendered.
Trade & Transport
Trade routes follow the river south east and go by land north west. River ships capable of carrying several tons make their way down river, while wagon trains make the return trip as merchants take their goods to market. Once at the mouth of the river at the Sostaut Sea a merchant can continue on ship along the coast in either direction. To go out to the many islands of the sea a different ship is required.
Education
The Grand Duchy has formal schools in towns for children's education. From the age of 7 they are allowed to enroll, for a price. They learn the basics of language, counting, and etiquette. The church offers comparable classes for free in the frontier. At age 14 they choose a career path and switch to a more practical education.
The practical arts are only taught by masters in guilds. Every major city has guilds regulating certain industries. The most common and most powerful are masonry and carpentry related, followed by smithing of all kinds. Law, medicine, and war are taught at city Universities. Those same universities are where students would learn the trivium and quadrivium.
The creative arts are taught by masters on a one-on-one basis, these studies are reserved for those with a wealthy parent or patron. The poor can be taken in by a master if they have great talent. The leading fields are brightly painted wall carvings and statues, stained glass, epic poems, and painted pots. The younger one starts, the better.
The performing arts are taught by masters in a classroom setting, these studies are most commonly left to the freemen and yeomen. Anyone who can afford the fees is welcome. Acting, singing, and playing instruments are the highest forms of the art. Juggling, acrobatics, and the like are viewed as lesser and require less of a financial commitment to learn, many of these come from the Travelers. The younger one starts, the better.
Infrastructure
The Grand Duchy has roads paved in red stone crossing its entirety, following the river, to facilitate the movement of both goods and its armies. Walled cities and towns dot the riverbank with protected docks and harbors and remote castle towns protecting the frontier. There are several major bridges operated by the Duchy to protect river crossings, water mills along the river, aqueducts to bring water to the major cities too far from the banks and sewers to dispose of the water after. With wells and drainage ditches for those with no river access. The courts exist for both high and low justice, to maintain birth and death records, mint coinage and catch counterfeiters, and provide grounds for fairs.
Founding Date
Year 1145 of the 7th Age
Type
Geopolitical, Archduchy
Capital
Alternative Names
Grand Duchy
Demonym
Fortunate
Government System
Monarchy, Elective
Power Structure
Feudal state
Economic System
Market economy
Currency
The Sodi is the official coin of Fortunado and used in all the lands west of the Adi River. There are four denominations regardless of material: usually bronze, copper, silver, and electrum. The sodi(1), dos (2), thrudos (3), and idos (4). The metals raw values are .25 for bronze, 1 for copper, 20 for siler, and 170 for electrum.
Legislative Body
The Grand Duke writes all the laws of the land and the Dukes must follow.
Judicial Body
- Magistrates are appointed to noble courts to adjudicate the laws of their rulers.
- Noble courts adjudicate High crimes punishable by fines, serfdom, mutilation, or confinement.
- Lower courts adjudicate Low crimes punishable by fines, serfdom, or mutilation.
- If a noble is brought to court they face the Grand Duke or his appointed magistrate.
Executive Body
The local nobles enforce the law within their own domains and Grand Duke sends his Sheriffs to ensure that they do so.
Official State Religion
Location
Official Languages
Related Traditions
Controlled Territories
Neighboring Nations
Related Species
Comments