History of Glantri, player's perspective
by Michael SimmsI noticed that, in GAZ3, there is only a DM's perspective of the history of Glantri. So, I've put together a player's perspective. This has some deliberate errors, as it is from the perspective and propoganda needs of the ruling princes. 1000AC timeline. Hopefully some will find this useful. Thanks to Bruce, most of the ideas were his, and some of his words were used verbatim, but I tried to do this as little as possible.
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Many thousands of years ago, mere centuries after the great rain of fire, the area now known as Glantri was settled by elven migrants, refugees from the ancient elven homelands which had been rendered uninhabitable by that unimaginable disaster.
The exact nature and names of these elves are unknown, lost in time even to the long-lived Elven scholars. However, what we do know, is that only a few hundred years after settling here, their civilisation was destroyed. We don't know how, but it is believed that the destruction is what caused the Broken Lands, that cursed and desolate area to the south of Glantri where beastmen and humanoid monsters abound.
What became of these elves is also unknown. Maybe they all perished, maybe they moved away. There is no record of them in the histories of Alfheim, Wendar or any other known Elven nation. We only know of them from artefacts discovered, and imperfect scrying of events from so long ago.
In the year 395AC, The copper-skinned Flaemish peoples arrived in the region. Some claim they came from another world, a world destroyed by the Alphatians, but all evidence of the truth of this has long since been lost, and only tales and legends remain, with Alphatians making the same claims against the Flaems.
Within a hundred years, these settlers had built the city of Braejr, a grand city with brass towers and thousands of prosperous citizens following what they called "The Great Flame" - a philosophy of the ascendancy of fire magic. Because of this culture, the Flaems were strong in the ways of fire magic, and isolationist to such a degree that outsiders were more likely to be sacrificed by burning, than greeted as friends.
Over the next two hundred years, the Flaemish nation expanded, but was hemmed in by huge mountain ranges to the north, a vast desert plateau to the west, and the broken lands to the south. Only to the east was there plentiful and accessible land.
This was the land of the Ethengarian tribes. Breeders of horses and fierce warriors to ride them. After initial hostile contact, the Ethengarians began an unprovoked and systematic attempt to wipe out the Flaems. Several decades of attacks followed, with many towns and villages destroyed, until the Flaemish people struck back, taking an army into the Ethengarian grasslands to wipe out the primitive tribes that had been so much trouble for so long.
A few remnants of the invasion force struggled back home with tales of horsemen that struck in the night and vanished without a trace, and lands where the plants and trees themselves attacked them. Most of the Flaemish army was never seen again. This was the last time the Flaems would invade Ethengar, settling instead for fortifying their eastern border against further incursions from these barbarous and uncivilised people.
Around 730AC, settlers from the far south arrived in the region. They came in numbers that were too great to ignore, and well enough defended that they were not easy to destroy and sacrifice. These settlers were from the Empire of Thyatis.
The Thyatians set up communities in the southern regions of the Flaemish territory, close to the borders of the broken lands. They were soon joined by Traladarans from what is now known as Karameikos, and elves from Alfheim, all brave explorers looking to colonise new frontiers, and expand their new territories. Except the Flaems didn't consider this a frontier for the taking, they considered it their nation. Their home.
The northward expansion of the settlers continued for some years, as more and more migrants came to the Flaemish lands. Tensions finally exploded when a Thyatian farmer killed a Flaemish lord. The Flaems formed an army and drove the colonists south, using powerful fire magic that the settlers had no answer for. Within a season, none remained in the north of the country, and the remnants were being systematically pushed southwards, or annihilated.
The Flaems may well have driven the remnants of the settlers from the whole nation then and there, except for the arrival of a new faction of settlers, which changed everything. Led by the wizard Halzunthram, these new settlers had blue-tinted skin, and were well versed in air and lightning magic. Halzunthram sided with the routed colonists and joined their fight against the Flaems. The tide was turned, and the Flaems were driven north of the Vesubian river.
The Treaty of 788 partitioned the once united Flaemish lands. The south was given to the elves, the north to the Flaems, and the west to the human settlers. A council was formed to oversee the three regions, with representatives from the factions agreeing to use this council to mediate their disputes.
And then, within a year, Halzunthram executed a coup and took over the council he had helped to create, declaring the whole land a province of the Empire of Alphatia. Evidently this had been his entire goal from the beginning.
Infuriated by this, the elves proclaimed their independence and the Flaems once again formed new armies - this time with the support of those same Thyarian and Traladarian settlers who had been their bitter enemies only a few years earlier. This uprising became the start of the Forty Years War.
Even war doesn't stop greed, and during the latter years of the war, word spread that gold was to be found in the mountains. Dwarves from the eastern mountain ranges, ever known to be hoarders of anything that glitters, arrived to form lawless, armed bands, bringing chaos and disease with them. A dwarven plague struck the warring nation, killing a tenth of the population, and leaving more than half affected with blindness, deafness, or terrible scarring.
To protect the country, Halzunthram reluctantly declared a bounty on all dwarves and hin, in an attempt to prevent further outbreaks and disasters caused by these unclean and uncivilised races. The bounty of 10gp each, which still stands today, added extra incentive to an already angry population who fell on the dwarves, relentlessly hunting them down until most fled the land.
It was during a dwarf-hunt that Lord Alexander Glantri, a war hero of Thyatian descent, ambushed and defeated the hunting party of Halzunthram. Their leader captured, the Alphatian faction surrendered their control of the council and disbanded their army. Halzunthram was exiled back to Alphatia in disgrace.
Having imposed a period of peace. Lord Glantri successfully founded a government recognising the rights of all communities. The city of Braejr was renamed Gianti City in Lord Alexander's honour, and the nation itself would later become known for its capital city.
With a population made up of a mixture of Flaems, Alphatians, and elves, the nation became a centre for magical knowledge. The arrival of the Averoignians a few decades later through magical portals only increased the nation's magical heritage. Construction of the Great School of Magic began in 845AC, and in 858, the Light of Rad was introduced into the Glantrian parliament.
This proclamation rightly asserted that nobility was reserved for the practitioners of the arcane arts, and that others - mundaners - were to be ruled by arcaners. Most of the population welcomed this new law, as it brought stability, prosperity, justice, and powerful rulers free from the petty squabbles that could be seen happening in other lands. A small uprising of mundaner lords who had lost their lands and privileges was swiftly overwhelmed, and the new leadership, in their mercy, exiled the rebels instead of having them executed. Once and for all the compassion and justice of the magocracy was demonstrated.