The Toreador (tor-ey-ah-DOHR)

Structure

The Toreador have no formal overarching hierarchy. Ad-hoc gatherings called "affairs of the clan" are called, with no mandatory attendance though most turn out for them. These can range from parties, dinners, art showing, or actual meetings. The Toreador of a city organise themselves into Guilds. While this has something of an artistic ring to it, most Toreador in the city are members, whether they are Poseurs or Artistes (see below). The head of the Guild is typically the oldest and most influential Toreador within the city, with the other members forming a complicated stratified social system, the rules of which boggle many an outsider.
The clan itself has two divisions. The Artistes consist of the sculptors, the painters, the musicians, and the writers. They consider themselves to be the "real" Toreador as inheritors of the Clan's original values and goals. The Poseurs make up the other faction – they can include the failed artists (or those that happened to be Embraced while their sire was riding a particular fad), as well as the professional critics and those who consider their bodies to be their life's masterpiece. It should be noticed that neither group has a nickname for themselves – they tend to be only flung at the opposing faction as a derisive epithet.

Culture

The word "Toreador", meaning "bullfighter", was invented by Georges Bizet for his opera Carmen when he decided that the Spanish "Torero" had too few syllables to fit the song in which it is sung. The eponymous Carmen is best known for her desire to be admired and for her ability to manipulate the other characters in the opera. This is reflected in the lore of the Toreador which paints them as master manipulators, and the association with Bizets' opera is hinted at in both their love of art and the symbol of the rose.
Clan Toreador has ever preached selectiveness in its rituals of the Embrace. The clan elders stress time and again that the clan requires pioneers among the arts and every kind of avant-garde. The clan is at its strongest when compromised of the freshest thinkers and those who desire experimentation and aesthetic discovery. For this reason, many Toreador emerge from the ranks of accomplished artists, both new and faded. But not all artists need wield a brush: To the Toreador, art encompasses all forms of entertainment and stimulation. The clan courts the greatest actors, singers, writers, dancers, and even sex workers, if the degenerates believe such mortals will offer something new to their clan.
Despite the custom of Embracing only the best, the Toreador fixation on beauty and innocence has caused many a diva to make a fledgling in haste. Many a moonlit night, new clan members have emerged as shallow hedonists, one-hit wonders, or just a stunning body with nothing else to offer. The greatest mistakes are erased and forgotten. Still, the clan is diverse, its members considering the ensemble as a kaleidoscope of talent and beauty.
It is said that while the Ventrue are the mind of the Camarilla, the Toreador are its soul. It was one of their number, Rafael de Corazón, who was instrumental in its formation. The Toreador are the greatest supporters of many of the Camarilla's traditions, most notably that of Elysium. This is where the Toreador are in their element, showcasing their latest pieces and practicing their highly effective (and sometimes deadly) form of social maneuvering. From the outside, most other Clans think of one face of the Toreador, but see another. When speaking of them to another, most envision Toreador as the Artistes – billowy shirted, frock-coated fops who crow about the beauty of the ages and lamenting their lost humanity. In reality, outsiders are less likely to meet such characters, given as they are to sequestering themselves away to work on their latest masterpiece. Far more often encountered are those Toreador whose unlives have become dedicated to the Kindred social scene – Toreador are often a large contingent of the city's Harpies, and having spent years with their bitchy and conniving clanmates they are more than capable of ruining someone's reputation with a pithy comeback or a damning piece of gossip whispered in just the right ear.
The Toreador portray themselves as the vampires closest to the living, breathing pulse of the humans around them (though this honor might be shared with the Brujah). They claim that this is what keeps them so vital and modern. Indeed, Clan members are often the first ones to be aware of what mortals are wearing, eating, buying and sleeping with. While a Malkavian elder might be found in his 1800s finery, the Toreador is much more likely to be wearing something from this year's Paris catwalks. Many Toreador are fond of having mortal "families" or assuming mortal identities, in order to capture the breath of life that is denied to them. The constant pressure that the proximity to mortals can elicit, however, can cause a Toreador to break down, losing all of their creativity and motivation in the process, resulting in a debauched individual that desperately searches for the next kick to experience the feeling of being mortal again, eventually turning to mortal vices like drugs in order to feel just this one aspect. The older a Toreador gets and the more mortal associates he has watched die, the more likely a "burnout" is to occur. Other vampires have to deal with it, too, but no Clan suffers so uniformly under this aspect of their existence than the Toreador.
As stated before, there are two rough moulds that clan members fall into. Artists make up a large proportion of the clan, which in the modern nights can include computer graphics artists, avant-garde performance artists, and sportsmen alongside the singers, dancers, and writers. The other portion consists of businessmen, critics, and those who are simply beautiful. While the main detractors of the clan, often the Nosferatu and the Brujah complain that Toreador coddle their childer, the truth is a much more brutal one. Toreador sires are notoriously capricious, and while the subject of their Embrace can be the most cutting edge, the most innovative, the most beautiful, the most now, they can easily be terribly passe and embarrassing the following week. The sire then inevitably dumps the new childe as soon as is feasible, leaving the young vampire confused and struggling to make their own way. Such is the nature of the Toreador.

Public Agenda

Cursed by their unbridled sensuality, the divas are obsessed by aesthetic perfection. A fashion model overdosing on a bad batch of heroin, a YouTube clip of a perfectly executed beheading, the dazed eyes of a child who has seen too much, or the reflection of the moon in a pool of blood – these are the kinds of things that make a Toreador lose themselves. They say the first diva finally died in front of their looking glass, unable to tear their gaze away from the image of their face touched by the reflected dawn. But, to dismiss the Toreador as wanton perverts or shallow artists is the last mistake a Kindred will ever make. Beauty is power, and love can make anyone do just about anything. And that is the promise of the Toreador. They can make even the dead feel something raw, something real.

History

Early History

It is said that the Clan's founder, Arikel was a mortal painter and/or sculptress in the First City. Famed throughout the lands for her work, after her Embrace she painted a mural on which the past, present and future of Kindred society was depicted. When Caine saw a terrible future for his race, he cursed her with the affliction that affects Toreador today – the art that she loved most dearly would now be her obsession and distraction above all things. The Toreador had a strong presence in the early minoic cultures of Greece. The Toreador attribute many of the classic tales as distorted versions of actual interference of mortals and Cainites (such as the tale of the Minotaur or the tale of Tantalus and Pelops). Their squabbling, however, weakened the first civilization of Mycenae, as childer drew their sustenance from the population, who in turn became too weak to defend themselves from foreign invaders. After the fall of Mycenae to the Dorians, the Toreador wandered across the Mediterranean, often seeking shelter by the Roman Ventrue or the Carthaginian Brujah.
At first, the Toreador supported both sides in their struggle, but when it became clear that Carthage would lose, many Toreador abandoned the city and joined the Roman forces, bringing with them tales of debauchery and infernalism that propelled the Ventrue to completely raze the city to the ground. The Toreador began to insinuate themselves into the city, often competing with the Ventrue and Malkavians. When Rome's glory began to fade, one of them, the Toreador Mi-ka-il, deserted Rome to follow Constantine into Nova Roma, to construct the Dream that had failed in Rome, much to the shock of many Toreador Elders. Constantinople remained a beacon of Cainite power and glory, until the city was sacked by the Fourth Crusade in 1204 and original Cainite population either had fled or was destroyed.

Dark Ages

In the Middle Ages, the Toreador were a member of the High Clans, and their numbers were made up of the same types that are common in the modern nights – minstrels, painters, poets and actors. Many Toreador insinuate themselves into the structures of the Catholic Church, primarily because the Church was the only supporter of art in these dark times. The Courts of Love, which encompassed much of France, were firmly under their control and the Toreador. Following the formation of the Camarilla thanks to the efforts of the Toreador Rafael de Corazón, some of the members left the Clan proper upon the formation of the Sabbat, most famously Arianne of Esztergom. Toreador antitribu are the dark reflection of their Camarilla cousins – while they are beautiful social butterflies, their weakness has twisted so that all antitribu derive joy from the emotional, physical and mental suffering of others.
The Renaissance is well remembered as a Golden Age of the Clan among the Elders. As one of the most powerful Clans within Europe, the Toreador prospered in France as Europe's cultural nexus, enjoying the works of various new artists as Michelangelo and DaVinci as well as the works of Shakespeare and the invention of the mirror. Many Toreador began to turn away from spiritually motivated preservationism to a self-serving hedonism that plagues them today.

Victorian Age

The Toreador revelled in the Victorian age. The Industrial Revolution led to a phenomenon that only the rich had been previously afforded – leisure time. A heyday of theatre, music and art began in cultural nexuses like New York, London, and Paris and spread throughout the globe. While the influence of the Church in people's lives (and consequently, the influence Toreador held over the church) waned, those Kindred that latched themselves onto businessmen prospered. Possibly the one thing most Toreador love with the exception of beauty is money, and it was now accessible from places other than the landed gentry of the time. While the Clan has had peaks and troughs, this was a time that cemented them as a true power in the Camarilla.

Modern Nights

The Toreador play their games as they always have, albeit at a slightly more frantic pace due to the upheaval of the various skirmishes the Camarilla have fought. The recent innovations of cinema, television and the internet means that new forms of art and expression are being discovered almost daily, meaning the Toreador have become even more varied.
However, the Toreador are still a noble and aristocratic clan, and many perceive the Embrace of graffiti artists, Wall Street Wizards and CGI technicians as a pollution of the vaunted ideals that the Clan used to stand for. Many nights are filled with one Toreador bickering with another over what can be considered true art, and each Toreador's opinion is as varied as the definition of art itself.

Type

Geopolitical, Clan

Alternative Names

Divas, Clan of The Rose, Degenerates, Artists, Hedonists, Harlots, Perverts

Ruling Organization

The Camarilla