M-Taíno and M-Caribs in Karameikos
by Travis HenryWhen you think of Karameikan cultural analogues, what comes to mind?
M-South Slavic/Balkan Traladarans?
M-Byzantine Greek/Latin Thyatian settlers?
...Well, how about M-Taíno and M-Caribs?...that is, indigenous M-Caribbean Amerindians? Yep, they're official!
SPOILER ALERT!
Yes, in 1984's AC2: COMBAT SHIELD AND MINI-ADVENTURE, in its mini-adventure "Treasure of the Hideous One", there are in fact, four indigenous villages in (presumably)* the Blight Swamp on the western border of Karameikos. And a close analysis reveals they of M-Indigenous Caribbean culture.
Placing the Swamp of the Hideous One:
*Note: I say "presumably", because the overland map, and the travel times described in "The Veteran's Tale", are very problematic. AC2 offers a pretty lame disclaimer: "This map does not exactly match any map in the Expert rules. Because of this, you may place this map where you wish." Lame, because the text and map do reference that the swamp is due west of Luln! I basically picture it was rush-job, like: "Editor to Cartographer: "This hex map you put together does not match the map of Karameikos. But, we got a deadline, so let's just slap a disclaimer on it."
AC2's swamp map is quite a lot bigger than the Blight Swamp, and the river orientation doesn't match. And if you compared daily travel times from the BECMI rules vs. The Veteran's Tale, I think it would be way off. A 7-day march west, no less! A long way!
One fix would be to ignore the scale of the map, chalk up the long travel time in "The Veteran's Tale" to various untold travel/terrain snags, and make the depicted river a tributary of the Riverfork River, and just plop the key sites in the Blight Swamp, as it is.
-Irving Galvez provides a fixed map here.
-Agathokles places some (but not all) of the features here.
-Cthulhudrew chimes in here.
It'll be interesting to see how Thorf amends this one for the Atlas of Mystara!
Yet another fix—which I might like even better—would be to make the "Swamp of the Hideous One" a Domain in the BECMI Multiverse's equivalent of Ravenloft, whatever that might be ("Nightmare Dimension?" "Limbo"? a so-called "Dimension of Dread"?). Given the vampiric status of Rosentos, this could be pretty fitting. (He'd be neighbors with Lady D'hmis's sadomasochistic Gulluvia domain, which also floated off into the mists!) No wonder "This map does not exactly match any map in the Expert rules." Because it wafted off to Ravenloft! 100 years ago, the terrain of western Karameikos was a gigantic swamp, and the river was shaped as seen on the AC2 map, but this landscape and river were pulled into the Mists, and the present landscape (of Achelos Woods etc) appeared in its stead, thanks to the Immortals. Rostenos claims: "He is unable to leave because of the hazards the swamp holds for a single man." The first part is true: he's unable to leave the Swamp of the Hideous One…because it's a dreadful prison domain!
The four villages:
Anyway, back to the cultures. There are four villages, one of which was destroyed before the adventure takes place:
#1) "the first village", "the burned village," "evil natives." Yet was "raided and then abandoned many years ago." At that time, the chief of the second village viewed this first village to be "demons and enemies of his village" who had "craft and evil art of the demons." We'll call this First Village.
#2) "the second village". Was "friendly" to the Karameikan expedition. Presently ruled by Chief Korat. Note: "This village is the second village mentioned in The Veteran’s Tale. The natives here are not descendents of the same friendly villagers, however. The village was overrun many years ago by evil natives from the first village mentioned in The Veteran’s Tale." We'll call this Second Village.
#3) "the slave farm", also referred to as a "village." The text states that these folks are all charmed captives from the Second Village. Not a proper village…just a Slave Farm.
#4) "the village of the cay-men"
In regard to the conflict between First Village and Second Village:
When I was growing up in American elementary schools in the 1970s we the learned the standard story that the Caribs were a warrior culture who conquered the peaceable Taino/Arawaks not long before European Contact. And pushed them from isle to isle, starting with the Carib base in South America, and overrunning the Caribbean Islands, from southeast to northwest. The story goes that the mean Carib warriors did away with the Arawak men, and took the Arawak women and children as their own, resulting in a hybrid bilingual culture, which was encountered by the first Europeans. I mention this because I see an echo of this in David Cook's depiction of how the "evil" "first village" overran the "second village." I wouldn't be surprised if Cook had this standard schoolbook story in mind. (Sorry to equate "evil" with the Caribs; we're playing with fantastic quasi-cultural analogues here. But, we'll see the Cay-men are M-Caribs too, and are good folks.)
Ethnocultural indicators:
-Bow and arrow
-Stilt houses made from reeds
-Pet dog (probably the native Taíno breed, now extinct: https://medium.com/@viewpr/taínos-a-cul ... 09a460880b)
-Canoes
-Feathers as a gift
-Bone and feather headress (cay-men)
-javelins and bone daggers (cay-men)
The Language of First Village — 100 Years Ago:
Based on the (perhaps oversimplified) parallel of Carib aggressors vs. unwarlike Arawaks/Tainos, the First Village is equated with M-Caribs. So, 100 years ago, the "First Village" spoke M-Galibi (Mainland South American Carib). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carib_language
The Language of Second Village — 100 Years Ago:
The Karameikan explorers refer to "long slender boats" and "their slim boats called ca-noos." Which shows that the word "canoe" is new to Thyatian Common at that time. In the RW, the word "canoe" (via Spanish canoa) is borrowed from via the Taíno word kanowa. Which affirms that, 100 years ago, the Second Village spoke M-Taíno (a.ka. Island Arawak / Greater Antillean Arawak).
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/canoe
Of this language (M-Taíno, from 100 years prior), the Veteran's Tale states: "His [the chief's] tongue was strange."
The Language of Second Village — circa 1000 AC:
But at the time of the adventure (circa 1000AC), only the Second Village remains. It is an M-Island Carib culture—a fusion of Carib and Arawak. In the RW, the surviving representative of Island Carib is the Garifuna language. The language is Arawak-based (45% of the vocabulary), but contains a large number of Island Carib loanwords (25% of vocabulary). The Second Village, as of 1000AC, speaks M-Garifuna.
Of this language, AC2 says:
The Second Village (in the present day) speaks "a language that the characters do not know." And: "The characters do not recognize the language."
We have two names from that language:
"Thut" (the tracker)
"Korat" (the chief)
But these are almost certainly random fantasy names.
Here are some words in the M-Garifuna language
Aüdü Biama (Village Two)
ábuti (chief)
guriyara (canoe)
ounli (dog)
gimara (arrow)
agimarahati (archer/bowman)
ubouhuraü (isle)
wuribati (hideous)
mutu (person/one)
Wuribati Mutu (Hideous One)
Source: http://garifunainstitute.com/index.php? ... nary_front
The Cay-men and their Language:
"Cay-men" are named after the RW caiman, a kind of alligator-like animal of South America. The English and Spanish word "caiman" is from the Galibi (Mainland Carib) word acayouman. Which means that the Cay-men speak M-Galibi (which was also the language of the First Village humans).
Of the cay-man language, in their monster write-up in the back of AC2, it's said they speak "their own tongue."
This is true in the BECMI Reality (which I call "Multiverse-B"), where most monsters have their own distinct language. But in the 3E, 4E, and 5E Realities of Mystara (Multiverse-3, Multiverse-4, and Multiverse-5), Cay-men (Cayfolk?) would speak Draconic, with M-Galibi localisms.
Coincidentally, the English word "cay, key", in the sense of "island" (e.g. Key West) is also from Taíno.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cay
The Caymen of the Savage Coast have a separate origin story. But AC2 invented Cay-men. So they must be legit. Just like how Chameleon Men exist in the Journey to the Rock adventure (where they first appeared), but were then were picked up by Bruce Heard as an M-Australian Aborigine analogue for the Savage Coast. A fantasy world is big enough for multiple origins and multiple populations. Think Rockhome Dwarf vs. Modrigswerg vs. Kogolor Dwarf.
The bone map and its language and implications:
There's a map carved on bone, which has writing on it.
"Characters having an Intelligence score of 13 or higher have a 40% chance to recognize the writing as being similar to some language the character already knows. The writing reads, “Truly the days of Kelshet and his evil hordes are numbered! ” However, there is no indication of which village was led by Kelshet. "
This could be interpreted to mean an intelligent character might be able to piece together the M-Taíno or M-Carib language by intuiting their etymology…which is some major "fantasy linguistics"! Even if a character knew the language(s) of the Atruaghin Clans, this would impossible in the RW. The linguistic difference between North American and Caribbean indigenous languages is too great.
So here's a meta-game interpetation: the players of high INT characters have a 40% chance that the writing of the bone happens to be in some language (any language) that a character knows. It could be Dwarven, Elven, Alphatian, anything! A 40% chance. The language of the inscription is different depending on what languages a particular adventuring party happens to know. In this case, the native scribe used an outside literary language to write the vow on the bone. It's said that the tracker of the village has been outside the swamp, and some of the natives do know pidgin Thyatian Common, so it's conceivable that a village sage from 100 years ago knew an outside literary language.
But if I were revising or converting the module, I'd say the bone inscription is definitely written in Thyatian Common (from 100 years ago)—since that's the only outside language which the natives appear to know. In the RW, it's common that a culture whose language is traditionally unwritten will use an outside literary language for written communication. In that case, a high INT PC simply has a 40% to decipher the obscurely carved archaic, pidgin Common (or an INT skill check in later editions). Or better yet, a hand drawn player-handout, written in pidgin Common, with hard-to-read bone-carved letters, showing the route between the two village locations.
It's hard to say which village wrote the bone oath. And thus which language the name "Kelshet" represents. (But the name is almost certainly just a made-up fantasy name anyway.) Since the bone shows both villages, either could have made the map. And both probably thought the other was "evil." But the module narration affirms that the First Village was truly "evil." Whereas the Second Village was "friendly." I'm not sure I understand how the First Village got "raided and then abandoned many years ago" and yet the Second Village "was overrun many years ago by evil natives from the first village."
I guess these are the turn of events:
1. Second Village raided First Village. I'm guessing that Kelshet was the chief of the "evil hordes" of 1st Village. And that the chief or scribe of 2nd Village wrote the bone oath, showing both villages on a map. The bone was left or dropped in the raid on 1st Village.
2. Then, due to the decimating raid, 1st Village abandoned their own village.
3. But then took the fight to 2nd Village, overran 2nd Village, doing in the men, and taking the women and children, and taking their village entirely.
***
The point? Yes! There are (or were) M-Caribbean Amerindians in western Karameikos
If I wanted to play in the Bulgarian Orthodox Empire, I'd play a D&D Historical Earth campaign. I mean, we have bald, sonic-blasting sci-fi lizard-riding Ur-Traldar and Quasi-Egyptian Jackal-folk in the Lost Valley of northern Karameikos (okay, actually in southern Darokin). Weird drug-addicted Cynidiceans in M-Arab Ylaruam. Then why not M-Garifuna humans and M-Galibi Cayfolk in western Karameikos? …Or at least in a Ravenloft domain drawn therefrom...the Swamp of the Hideous One.
Background for this article:
Good sources for background on Taino and Carib words:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_E ... _languages
https://sta.uwi.edu/stan/article13.asp
https://cuba50.org/2019/02/04/rememberi ... y-in-cuba/
A couple additions:
p.26 of the Atruaghin Clans GAZ refers to "clan languages." Which basically means that each clan has its own language. The Atruaghin Clans were based on the "cultural regions" not on one specific nationality. For example, the Children of the Elk are a fantastic synthesis of all the RW Eastern Woodlands nationalities, not just Iroquois or Anishinaabe or Lenape...they all speak the Elk Clan Language. In the RW, there are many Eastern Woodlands languages, but in Mystara, there's just one language for each clan.
William Connors based the Clans on this 1979 National Geographic map "Indians of North America", or a similar map*. https://www.firstnationsseeker.ca/NAMapB.jpg
Note the Circum-Caribbean Cultural Region was left out of the Atruaghin Clans scheme.
I would apply to this framework to these outliers of the Pre-Atruaghin Oltec peoples. Atruaghin's direct influence didn't extend to this Clan, so it's not "politically" part of the Atruaghin Clans.
So, there'd be one language shared by the two ancient human villages (of which only one still exists in 1000 AC), but they would've had "localisms" as described above.
But first, need to pick out a clan totem animal.
For the M-Circum-Caribbean Culture (Sturm's Oteino), we need an animal whose name comes from a native Caribbean language. Could be Caiman Clan, Iguana Clan, Peccary Clan, or Josibi Clan (the dog breed which was presumably seen in the village in AC2). Let's say (provisionally) the Peccary Clan. Peccaries are a native Caribbean wild pig.
100 years ago:
First Village: Spoke Peccary Clan Language with Galibi Localisms.
Second Village: Spoke Peccary Clan Language with Taino Localisms.
Cay-men: (In BECMI Reality) Spoke Cay-man Language with Galibi Localisms. (In 3E/4E/5E Reality) Spoke Draconic Language with Galibi Localisms.
1000 AC (In Karamekos or Ravenloft):
First Village: destroyed
Second Village: Speaks Peccary Clan Language with Garifuna Localisms. (Garifuna is a mixture of Arawak and Carib.)
Cay-men: Same as 100 years ago. (In BECMI Reality) Speaks Cay-man Language with Galibi Localisms. (In 3E/4E/5E Reality) Speaks Draconic Language with Galibi Localisms.
See my "Analyzing the language of Mystara" for how "localisms" work: http://pandius.com/analang.html
P.S. Rosentos is basically the Mystaran analogue of Hernando de Soto, an explorer well known to U.S. school children (at least in the 1970s textbooks). He died on the banks of the Mississippi River. His actions of destruction, as his expedition plowed through La Florida (the U.S. Southeast), were akin to a real-life vampire.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hernando_de_Soto
*I worded that awkwardly/wrongly as I quickly typed. Yet I hedged it with: "or a similar map." I would rather say:
William Connors based the five Atruaghin clans on five RW Indigenous North American "Culture Regions":
Eastern Woodland = Elk (Some maps divide the Eastern Woodlands into Northeastern and Southeastern)
Southwestern Pueblo = Bear
Great Plains = Horse
Pacific Northwest = Turtle
Mesoamerica = Tiger
These Cultural Region maps are commonly seen in maps of Indigenous North America. Though such maps simplify the vast complexity of ethnonational-linguistic diversity. One of the most salient and popular of the Cultural Region maps is the 1979 National Geographic map "Indians of North America." Though others were circulating in the 1980s when Connors wrote the GAZ. Yeah, I didn't pore through Connor's text: if he mentions specific books, would want to check those to see if/how they map by Culture Region.
These "Culture Regions" maps are distinct from Traditional Territories maps, which show the national extent of each nation or language. Connors melded the many nations of each Culture Region into a single amalgamated Clan. (It'd be like representing England, France, and the Low Countries as one Northwestern European Clan; Spain, Italy, and Greece as a Mediterranean Europe Clan; German, Austria, Switzerland, Poland, Czechia, Hungary, Slovakia, and Croatia as a Central European Clan, etc.)
Note: Some Culture Regions are not present represented:
-Arctic / Inuit
-Subarctic
-California Indians
-Southeastern (if not included within Eastern Woodlands / Elk Clan)
-Circum-Caribbean. It is this "missing" cultural region which is found in the First Village and Second Village of the Swamp of the Hideous One. (And the culturally related Cay-man village. Which I'd call the Children of the Peccary (though Children of the Iguana sounds pretty cool too.)
For completeness sake, I'd suggest there are other M-Amerindian clans elsewhere in Mystara which represent the "lost" Cultural Regions.
P.S. I have a special interest in this because I've done graduate work in American Indian Studies, and served as one of the main contributors to the NativeLand.ca map, which has gone viral.