Talmoa

Tālmoä is a city in central Saiän, and the capital of a realm of the same name. It sits on the centre of the Joel, the 'Heart Isle', an island in the middle of the Reisra river. It was founded in the year 1 ABV by Saeszuëlan, the inventor of the written Syannic language, around the Rintālusza, a stone circle which had been the seat of government for the previous Sorosāszīnat. 
Tālmoä was home to some of the most important figures in historical Saiännic culture. After being founded by Saesz it was also the birthplace of the seeress Szaeda, and became the heart of the pan-Saiännist Reidaun movement. In later centuries it also produced the explorer Amathalas, the Reidaun philosopher Czete and military leaders such as Czeti and Meruszyph.
==History==
===Pre-History ===
Before the Beïveï, the Jorel  was the centre of an antediluvian state called the Sorosāszīnat Saiël. Saiëllic oral histories traced the Sorosāszinat's history back to the very beginnings of Saiän, and according to legend it hosted the gathering of the Sorosāszā that led to the formation of the League of Ashad and the subsequent Saiännese triumph at the Battle of Ka.
Ka, along with the other Sorosāszīnata like Nanan and Ashad, the daemon-masked Warosaszīn of Tuan, and a great deal of pre-Beïveïd Saiëllic history, is perhaps only a legend.
===Foundation===
According to what histories remain, Saesz the Engineer was born in 23 BBV and grew up in the final years of the Sorosāszīnat Saiël. A gifted child, he survived the Beivei as a young man and swiftly assumed a position of leadership amongst the remaining Saiellene. 
According to legend he founded 'Talmoa' as a sheltered camp, built in the reassuring shadow of the old seat of government. From here Saesz, with the assistance of 100 soldiers from Urba, coordinated the rescue effort across the island and gradually reasserted some form of government control. Four new settlements were established at each of the four compass points but Talmoa, by dint of its central and sacred location, beccame the de facto capital.
The island secure, Saesz set out to reassert Saiellene control over their former territories on the banks of the Reisra, although due to the pressures of rebuilding he did not exploit the devastation to claim new territory. This process included displacing the ancestors of the Rumoene.
Under his rule the settlement of Talmoa flourished, bolstered by trade and the new agricultural and construction techniques introduced by Saesz. It soon outstripped any settlement in the old, decentralised Sorosāszīnat and became a true seat of government, establishing a model which would become the standard throughout the Saiannic world.
According to what sources remain in by about 25 ABV - a mere quarter-century since the calamity - Talmoa had blossomed into what architects consider to be the first true city east of Zaia. Contemporary Talmoa takes no little pride in being the eldest of the great Saiene metropolises.
==Politics and Constitution==
===Constitution===
Talmoa, as with most Saiene cities, is a seraiat - an unusual hybrid of a republic and a monarchy. Sovereignty is held by the Covosaidansai, the Council of One Hundred and One, a parliament which convened roughly every decade or so. Originally the franchise was confined to citizens of the city of Talmoa and her immediate surrounds, but the constitutional reforms implemented by Tailasz extended the vote to all eligible citizens in the Talmoene dominion.
The franchise is a modified version of the stakeholder franchise. Citizens can have more than one vote, and accumulate votes both by virtue of their economic role in society and through other contributions to the state, such as academic achievement or military service. This de facto confines the vote almost exclusively to the seraiat's privileged urban population.
Unusually for a legislature, the Covosaidansai passes little primary legislation - "scripts of command" - as every law passed by the Covo is in effect a constitutional amendment. Instead, the Covo spends most of its session taking evidence and hearing arguments regarding so-called scripts of clarification: laws which correct the findings of the courts and annul precedent deemed to be a misinterpretation of the Covo's will. It was not uncommon for several consecutive parliaments to convene without new laws being passed.
Executive responsibility is held by the Serai, literally 'First', who is elected by the Covosaidansai at the end of their session. This individual serves until the next Covo is called. The Serai appoints a cabinet, the Covoat, or Council of Eight, to administer executive functions. The Serai ruled by issuing executive orders, which function much as laws in conventional monarchies. No Serai's orders can bind their successors, but all such orders have to be in line with the constitution - the body of law passed by the Covo.
Citizens who feel that an order breached the law could challenge it in the courts. Talmoa is a highly litigious society: skilful advocates could often become city celebrities, and major trials a form of elite entertainment. Legal challenges were regularly employed by rival political factions to thwart each other, and a skilful advocate was invariably an important member of any Talmoene cabinet.
===Politics===
With a sophisticated and substantially literate urban population, Talmoene politics is a much more developed phenomenon than in the monarchies and theocracies to its south and west. The country's high politics is broadly divided into two informal tendencies:
*Reds: This faction tends towards hard-line pan-Saiannism, staunch support for the military, ardent imperialism, and a strong belief in Talmoa's manifest destiny. A hard-line subset of the Red faction, the Czetevāri, can claim to have been Amauvala's first true fascist movement.
*Blues: Much more commerce-oriented, this faction unites merchants with a strong interest in peace with non-violent pan-Saiannics, and tends to support a much more limited, economic form of Talmoene imperialism as well as less adversarial relations with Talmoa's Saiene neighbours.
These groups were not ideologically rigid, and indeed were often not at cross-purposes: each supported strong trade links wherever they could be found, and both supported the city's drive to seed colonies. The two are only drawn to clash when the prospect of war looms large: the Blues have been defined, historically, as those opposed to the major conflicts of the last two centuries.
Most of the antipathy - and there is antipathy, at least on the part of the Reds, has historical roots. To many Reds, the Blues are the inheritors of the legacy of the "traitors" who undermined the city in both the First and Second Oathbreaker Wars: the merchants who attempted to assassinate Szaeda during the first, and the Blue Lily's who attempted to state a pro-settlement putsch during the second.
==Architecture==
Originally, Talmoä was built in the traditional Saiännic style, with wood and reed buildings elevated on stilts over mud streets. Engineers dug the Talmoan Canal through the centre of the city, and a network of trenches running under the stilted houses provided the world's first sewage system, the flow of the Reisra carrying the waste out to the sea.
History records that in the build-up to the Tricentennial Anniversary, a decades-long effort was undertaken to rebuild the entire city in brick. Whilst scarcely comparing in size or scale to the ancient super-metropolis of Zaiā, it was the largest and most culturally influential city in the Saiännic world, and almost certainly the entire Teraisra flood plain civilisations.
Perhaps the single greatest diffierence between Talmoä and Zaiā noted by travellers of the time was the former's lack of grandeur. Zaiā was an unparalleled monument to central planning and gigantism, with sweeping boulevards, elegant canals, and towering buildings all layed out in a manner pleasing to the eye. Talmoä, by all accounts, was a warren of narrow streets and multi-story buildings with relatively flat roofs. Government buildings, stadia and theatres, and a scattered portion of private residences and businesses were made of stone, but otherwise the city was build from brick and timber. The canal which ran through the city, whilst not lacking in pleasure craft and waterside gardens, had a far more functional feel to those in the west, and thronged with merchant ships.
Parks and road-lining trees were gradually added in the build-up to the Teradan. The outer city, which fell outside the First Walls (constructed circa. 150 ABV) was also less densely packed and contained more gardens and green spaces.
==Culture and Society==
==Philosophy, Ethics, and Politics==
==List of Heads of State==
Note: With the exception of a few figures of particular historical note, like Saesz and Czeti, all reign dates are speculative. According to the chronicles Joszao, who ruled at the turn of the Fourth Century, was the Twentieth Serai, and his closest recorded predecessor is Kalaszunalme, the Eighteenth, who began her reign in the year 276.
All details of the Nineteenth Serai are lost, and if the Talmoän numbers are correct then there were three other seraiä somewhere Tasza, the Second Serai, and Kalaszunalme. Prior to Kalaszunalme the Serai's regnal numbers are lost to history, so these lost seraiä are impossible to place or approximately date.
Name 	Title 	Reign (ABV)	State
Saeszuëlan 	Reisza	1-22 	Beveïd Saiël
Czaïutalan 	Reisza	22-26 	Beveïd Saiël
Szamususaiän 	Reisza	26-44 	Beveïd Saiël
Marusaimoran 	Reisza	44-54 	Beveïd Saiël
Szaduophasaiän 	Reisza	55-68 	Beveïd Saiël
Czadioitigan 	Reisza	68-73 	Beveïd Saiël
Czetiotalman 	Serai 	75-105 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Taszaiutalman 	Serai 	105-113 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Mēryuzesaiän 	Serai 	113-38 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Szamuyaphan 	Serai 	138-165 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Thácatalmoan 	Serai 	165-189 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Maruzesaiän 	Serai 	189-203 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Namóütalman 	Serai 	203-213 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Nehosztoutal 	Serai 	213-232 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Beiszoutalo 	Serai 	232-245 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Caszúmathau 	Serai 	245-252 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Ghylomaszelan 	Serai 	252-268 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Beofaszatalo 	Serai 	268-269 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Naszumontalmo 	Serai 	269-276 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Kalaszunalme 	Serai 	276-? 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Nineteenth Serai	Serai 	?-290 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
Joszao 	Serai 	290-300 	Creäseraiat Talmoä
 	 	 	
Category:Syan
Category:Nations
Category:Cities