Linen in summer, wool in winter. Gowns very full and not
excessively ornamented. Drasnian women wear their hair long and
straight down the back.
COMMERCE
Highly developed. Lots of local shops in each neighborhood. Major
commercial centers along the docks in Boktor and Kotu. Huge
amounts of money change hands daily. Keep track on slates and
settle at the end of the day. Each major merchant has his own strong
room – heavily guarded. (Drasnian blacksmiths have devised
elaborate locks.)
RANK
THE KING
Hereditary
THE PRINCES
These are Clan-chiefs. All are related – distantly – to the King. 20-30
in the country.
LORDS
Hereditary nobility associated with land. Similar to Cherek.
CHIEFS
These are the owners of the reindeer herds and the clan-leaders of
the tribes which tend them. They are very primitive groups, and the
chiefs are to varying degrees powerful particularly in the north.
Each tribe has its own huge pasturelands. The authority of the King
is far from absolute in the north.
*This was not retained.
COMMONERS
All others. All Drasnian men are bearers of arms.
MILITARY
Units organized on the family-tribe basis.
MODES OF ADDRESS
Addressed by Rank, thus ‘King John’, ‘Prince Fred’. Commoners
called ‘Worthy John’ or ‘Friend John’.
Drasnians are polite and have a great sense of humor. The transition
from calling someone ‘Worthy John’ to calling him ‘Friend John’ is
extremely elaborate, and Drasnians are amused when outsiders
attempt to go through the stages of the process.
Note – Drasnians have developed an elaborate ‘finger language’
consisting of barely perceptible gestures. Can hold entire
conversations with each other even while talking to some foreign merchant.
Highly useful in trade negotiations and in their espionage work…
*The ‘secret language’ proved to be very useful, although it was just an aside in the
Preliminaries.
HOLIDAYS
Erastide
Festival of Belar
Dras’s Birthday
Day of Sorrow (when Angaraks invaded) early June (Lent here)
Day of Victory (Battle of Vo Mimbre) late June
POPULATION
Population approximately l ” million
Algaria
GEOGRAPHY
With the exception of the Aldurfens to the north and the area south
of the low range of hills that mark the upper reaches of the Aldur
River, Algaria is a vast, rolling grassland lying between the two arms
of the mountain range that forms the spine of the continent. The
land is fertile and well-watered by the Aldur and could be profitably
farmed, but the Algars prefer instead to remain semi-primitive
herdsmen. Virgin gold occasionally appears in transactions with
the Algars, but no hint of its source can be found.
The Algarian herds are the finest in the known world and provide
meat for most of the kingdoms of the west. The yearly cattle-drive
to Muros in Sendaria along the Great North Road is one of the
genuinely magnificent spectacles one may behold. Centuries of
carefully controlled breeding have made Algar horses un-surpassed.
THE PEOPLE
The Algars, of course, are merely another branch of the numerous
Alorn people and are similar to their northern cousins. They are tall,
fair and generally an open people, honest in their dealings and ‘ firm
in their friendships and alliances. They dwell for the most part in
large wagons in which they follow the wanderings of their herds.
An Algarian city can rise in the space of an hour – a well-ordered
city of tents and pavilions, neatly laid out on streets, and the whole
surrounded by a wall of poles which are carried under their wagons.
Each of these moveable cities represents an entire Algarian clan
usually numbering up to a thousand armed and mounted men and
their families. The herds of each clan are vast and are owned in
common. As with most Alorns, feuds among them are not
uncommon, but the last clan-war took place at about the end of the third
millennium. Since that time disputes have been settled by ritualized
single combat.
There are two major peculiarities about Algarian society’ The first
is the presence in the hill country at the south of the grassland of a
vast stone fortress known simply as ‘The Stronghold’ which is
garrisoned but not actually occupied. The second is the continuous
mounted patrols maintained around the perimeters of the Vale of
Aldur, a beautiful but uninhabited area in the extreme south of the
kingdom. Both the garrison at the Stronghold and the patrols in the
Vale are comprised of contingents from all of the clans.
THE HISTORY OF THE ALGARS
Once again we see an Alorn people who were separated from their
fellows at the time of the disintegration of the empire of Cherek
Bear-shoulders. The legendary founder of the nation was Algar
Fleet-foot, second son of old King Cherek. Like Drasnia and Riva,
Algaria was populated at the end of the second millennium. There
appear to have been large herds of wild horses and cattle on the
Algarian plains, and the people were soon mounted upon the horses
and their own herds had mingled with the wild cattle, creating a
new breed much sturdier than the somewhat scrubby Alorn cattle
they had brought with them, while not so totally unmanageable as
the wild cattle indigenous to the plains.
There is evidence that a prolonged series of skirmishes with
Angarak raiding parties took place along the eastern escarpment
of Algaria with always the same predictable results. The Angarak
columns were, naturally, on foot and were quite simply cut to pieces
by the mounted Algars. The ability of the Algars to move rapidly
and to call upon other clans for reinforcements as required made the
Angarak penetration suicidal. No hint of motive can be discovered
to explain why the Angaraks continued these hopeless expeditions
for a thousand years.
During the fourth millennium Tolnedran emissaries attempted to
conclude treaties with the Algars as they had with the other
kingdoms of the west, but suffered a full five hundred years of
frustration, since they were unable even to identify the Algarian King
often negotiating for years with a man who turned out to be a mere
clan-chief. When they finally did manage to single out the true king
of the Algars, the venerable Cho-Dom the old, the wily old bandit
came to the negotiation pavilion armed with copies of every treaty
the emissaries had hammered out over half a millennium of
negotiation and insisted that every concession granted in every treaty be
honored, slyly reminding the emissaries that he was the king and
asking them how they could presume to offer him less than they had
offered a mere Clan-chief.
The result was one of the more humiliating treaties ever concluded
by the Empire. No Tolnedran garrisons were permitted within the
borders of Algaria. No commerce was allowed within the country
except for certain limited trade at Aldurford in certain precisely
specified items – mostly tools and necessities rather than the high-profit
luxury items. There was not even the most-favored status
customarily
accorded Tolnedran merchants. This made it necessary for
Tolnedran cattle-buyers to appear at Muros in Sendaria and to
actually vie with others in the purchase of Algarian cattle rather than to
select, at their own price, the cream of the herd as was their practice
elsewhere. They were also forced to bid their lowest prices on items
the Algarian clans purchased in quantity (Algars seldom purchase
items individually) invariably in competition with other merchants
from other nations. All of this has made the great fair at Muros in
Sendaria one of the major commercial events of the year. Tolnedran
merchants have complained bitterly about the treaty with the Algars,
but Emperor Ran Horb ii had, at the time of its signing eyes only for
the vision of the Great North Road, and each of the concessions
granted the Algars forged more miles of that splendid dream.
When word reached Algaria in 4002 that the Rivan King had been
assassinated, an event took place which had never before been
witnessed. The Tolnedran ambassador, Dravor, reported in secret
dispatches to Tol Honeth that the entire population gathered at the
Stronghold leaving the herds only sparsely attended. There was a
great conference of the Clan-chiefs with King Cho-Ram IV, and an
army of the finest warriors was conscripted from the assembled
clans. Ambassador Dravor reported further that other elements of
Algar cavalry were set to patrolling the borders. Then, at the end of
sixty days, the multitudes of Drasnian infantry appeared and joined
with the Algar cavalry in their trek across the mountains to attack
the eastern borders of Nyissa. While this horde was technically in
violation of Tolnedran territory, the Emperor, Ran Vordue I,
prudently chose not to intercept them.
Algar cavalry struck terror into the hearts of the Nyissans, and
King Cho-Ram IV and King Radek XVii of Drasnia developed a
series of tactical alternatives involving the cooperation between
infantry and cavalry units which remain classics to this day.
Following the destruction of Nyissa, Algaria prospered, although
there appears to have been a significant tightening of security along
the eastern border.
With the invasion of Drasnia by the Angaraks, the Algars