The Vortics

The Vortic people were those who hailed from the Vortic Isles, a large set of subtropical and tropical islands to the west of Indratera. They were spurred to explore and colonise the world because their homeland was sinking due to seismic action; 70% of it disappeared within only two thousand years. These people were some of the world's best sailors, and they hunted, fished, and cultivated the flora and fauna of the sea. To the Vortics, the sea represented the ever-changing nature of life and death. In modern times, from the Vortic people rose the Mercatorium, a confederation of merchants that established a worldwide successful trade network and one of the world's most powerful naval forces. They came to rule not only their own homelands, but the gulf of the Burning Hills, the northern islands of Lakay, and at several points had colonies in Felonil, a protectorate in Sanctum, and vassal states in Lyskeiön.
== Different Terms ==
To clarify the confusing similar terms:
* Vortic - The general term for people of this area and their culture and language family. Also used in geography (e.g. Vortic Sea)
* Vortai - The transliteration of the name of their language.
* Vortais - An old antiquated name for the people and their culture and language.
* Evortal - The people of the North Vortic Islands, who evolved on their own for a long time.
== Homeland ==
The modern Vortic Islands were the outcroppings of a rapidly sinking continent known as Vorterra. Vorterra was subducted between the Lakayan plate to its south and the West Danderillic plate to its north, so it was rapidly being forced under the ocean. In the year 0, the Vortic Isles were two or three large landmasses, as can be seen with the outlines on the map across - within under 2 millennia, it had been reduced to a scattering of archiepalgos, atolls, and large islands. Its continental shelves lay hidden under shallow waters, the sea reclaiming ruins, villages, and everything in its path at up to a metre a year in some places! The North Vortic Islands were more low lying, and so disappeared faster, leading to the isolation and lesser numbers of the Evortal people in the north versus the still numerous Vortai people in the south. 
== Brief History & the Mercatorium ==
=== Prehistory ===
Humans first settled the area over 100kya, migrating from the Euluskan cradle of civilisation in the south. The people of these islands developed a unique culture and rich traditions from their isolation from other groups - and from one another, due to the scattered archipelagic nature of their homeland. They warred, allied, traded, and more.
For much of the late iron age (two thousand years before zero to a few centuries after zero), the Vortic people had scattered and isolated contact with the northern Kaneeyi who lived in the Volkotti Straits, and with the Euluskans who sometimes were blown off course during explorations. Proper contact occurred in the early centuries after zero.
=== The Mercatorium ===
Many of the Vortic islands, which were historically the rule of one singular clan known as a anga, finally united at the end of the seventh century to form one central power. They had had contact with, and seen the power of, the Euluskan Empire and the Kaneeyi Confederacy, and realised that a global power would help them. This is because, as aforementioned, their homeland was sinking due to seismic action. By the seventh century, 13% of it had sunk. (By 1500, over 70% of it would be sunk). They formed the Vortic Mercatorium in the 700s, a naval merchant confederacy, and set about unifying their islands first. 
In modern Vortic, it was called the Selakuepinga Pẽkoatengu a Poté-ing Kalohakíangá /sɛlakuɛpiŋa pẽkoatɛŋu a potɛːʔiŋ kalohakiːaŋaː/, meaning "mercantile confederacy of Vortic seamasters". It was ruled by a council of what we would call Admirals (people with a large fleet - the Vortic term was kalohakíanga, meaning "master of the waves"). They elected from amongst them a Grand Admiral (the Vortic term was kalokalohakíanga, meaning "master of the wave masters"). 
Just at the turn of the thirteenth century (in 1199), the Mercatorium invaded and began to colonise the interior Gulf of Dragons of the Burning Hills. Here they set up the Burning Hills Territory (in Vortai, the Sũterisonga). They set up various colonies like Charteyn, Singakhafta, Visdvoryac, Zinlelal and Lahar (in Vortai: Sateínga, Singakáputa, Pikitoria, Sĩelala & Lahara) to mine for sulphur and metals, build ships, and catapult their empire to a powerful trade partner. The Vortics were actually the first inventors of gunpower and of firearms, which the Euluskans traded with them for. By the 1300s, the Vortics were a power to be reckoned with, ruling great swathes of ocean with ships that had the first powder cannons and first firearms. They also began to colonise some of the northern Volkotti Straits in this era using their power, expanding their reach to the north and west straits and even onto Lakay's west northern shore. This colony area was known as Lakeisonga, meaning "the Lakayan territories". Also in the 1300s, the Mercatorium lay claim to the polar volcanic archipelago of Feŋ, with monthly trade ships there.
The Mercatorium's capital, which was once named Kaméiha a Poté-i (Crown of the Vortai), was renamed to Sant-Martus (Vortai: Sangu Mátukó) after the death of Saint Martus of the Vortai in 1366 to honour him. Martus (birth name Mátukóhaso-o) was a Vortic native who was taken as a slave boy to Lyskeiön by Euluskans raiders and forced to fight as a gladiator; after winning great glory and being freed, he became a beloved Euluskan celebrity athlete and public figure, and after his death in 1366, the Euluskans canonised him as one of only two Vortic saints (the other being Emeli the Vort, who brought Euluskan Evasanktaranism to the Vortic Isles in the 800s on a small scale as a missionary). 
=== Sixteenth Century - Great Age ===
When the Lakayan Revolution happened in 1513, the Mercatorium rapidly retreated from its Lakayan colonies amicably, working out a deal with the new Federation. Some years later in 1519, with the Euluskan Empire crumbling, the Mercatorium grand admiral Kalokalohakíanga Riukolaha met with Machavellio Disforza, Lord Governor of The Lakayan Federation and they made an alliance. When the Empire's forces left north to try to retake Felonil in a desperate last bid, the Mercatorium and Federation attacked the Horn. The Vortics sieged, bombarded, fought naval battles, landed, killed, burned, pillaged, and conquered over the several week campaign. They assisted in winning, and thus leading to the Sack of Lyskeiön, where the great capital was razed, the Emperor lynched, the coffers looted. After the flames died down, the Vortic Mercatorium took Lyskeiön, Cessalia, and Sanctum, once three massive rich trade cities, as their vassals and protectorates. (The three cities were only given independence from the Mercatorium about twenty years later due to the relative low amount of wealth they provided for the hassle it was to rule them).
In 1522, the Vortic Mercatorium provided the recently independent, and incredibly powerful, city of Felonil with military aid for the Moor Wars. The Mercatorium was given a large plot of land - called Rettumarka in Euluska (Queen's March) or in Vortai, the Poté-i Rena (Vortic Overlook) . This district of Felonil's northern suburbs was used to place various Mercatorium enterprises, companies, naval bases and military logistics. This led to a sizeable Vortic diaspora in the city thereon.
=== God Wars & Collapse ===
When the God Wars broke out in 1622, the Vortics were going to remain neutral. However, the army of Halcyon stationed troops on the Nethir Upland, the northern entrance to the Burning Hills, to threaten or bully them into remaining neutral. Being an honourable and incensed sort, the contemporary Grand Admiral, Kalokalohakíanga Kaitiaharanga, saw this as an act of war. The Vortic Mercatorium allied with the Lakayan Federation to form the Vortic-Lakayan Union, and took part in the war. You can see more at The God Wars. The Union fought bitterly on several fronts on the West Danderillon, South Burning Hills, and the Fallo coast on numerous great offensives, sacking Euluskan cities, and the like. Near the end of the war, they formed a pact with the Boreal Alliance (Rakkimar, Datria, etc) and managed to sack the great city of Halcyon! After the Everlasting Night broke out and worldwide snow and ice killed millions through hypothermia and famine, the Mercatorium retreated to their ancestral territory. In the Collapse Era, they ruled their islands, and had numerous trade consulates with places like Halcyon, Naysayer, Fort Thunderlord, Heather's Vineyard, Sanctum & Cessalia.
== Population Genetics ==
The native inhabitants of the Vortic Isles were descended from the global southern population (all ethnicities on Indratera could trace their origin either to Rakkimar or the Lusken Peninsula). They were of the Euluskans vortensis species; the Vortais people were of the australis subspecies and the Evortal were of the borealis.
In general, most native Vortic people had several notable traits which evolved from their ancestral practices of distance sailing and shore hunting:
* Tough, reddish/orangeish undertoned skin, with tones ranging from mid tan to deep brown
* Very resistant to sunburn
* Increased lung capacity - large rib cage and increased vital capacity, adapted for swimming and diving
* Fairly resistant to tropical/waterbone diseases and parasites
* Experienced less motion sickness than some other groups of people
* Very efficient kidneys, giving them the ability to sip saltwater without major injury. 
* Vortics did not lose their diving reflex during infanthood - it persisted strongly through life. 
* They did have fairly high rates of lactose intolerance because they natively never domesticated any terrestrial mammals.
== Culture ==
Vortic culture was heavily centred around the sea and sailing. In Vortais, the mantra Í ma-ási meant "The sea gives" and it summed up their lifestyle. The Vortic people got their food and materials from the sea through gathering, hunting, and later mariculture and aquaculture (saltwater and freshwater farming of fish, crabs, and shellfish). They were born of the freshwater and they died of the saltwater.
=== Pan-Vortic Common Practices/Beliefs ===
* Since the Vortics believed people were borne of the freshwater sea, Vortic women practiced water births, usually in rivers. It was safer against complications, less painful, and the people were adapted to it.
* Upon death, the body of a Vortic native would be laid on a raft or canoe, and they would be let to drift out to sea. Funerals were usually scheduled when ocean currents would take bodies west, off the edge of the World Sea into the unknown.
* The westerly direction, of the sunset, was associated with death and unluckiness. 
* The sea, or í in Vortais and ii in Evortal, was the personification of life and freedom. The sea was personified as epã í or "mother sea", a mutable and changeable god - it could be benevolent and warm, bringing fat tasty fish and useful driftwood, or it could be dark and stormy, bringing destruction and terror. 
* Likewise, the sky/wind was the male personification of nature - emã ngawai "father sky" brought rain, storms, sun, the moon, wind. Sailing was possible only with the unification of the waters of mother sea and the winds of father sky.
* In Vortic culture, the "power" and "purpose" of a person, known as iri, was concentrated in the heart and head. It gave them the power over people and their environment.
=== Evortal (North) Unique Cultural Practices ===
The Evortal (endonym: gnevourtési /ɲevoulteːθi/) bore similarities to the Vortais, but had been isolated for about ten thousand years until the Vortais made contact in the first millennium TE. So, they had developed a few unique cultural traditions. They were sometimes a little more warlike than the Vortais, reflected in some of their traditions.
* The Evortal people believed that it was humiliating or powerless to let an enemy see your true face. They developed lots of masks and helmets depicting faces, made of driftwood, ivory and/or whalebone. Warriors wore them in war, but faces were an important part of Evortal culture too - they were used as decoration. Animal and people's faces made of material were used to decorate boats, sails, houses, used as markers, etc. They were stacked like totem poles sometimes, too. 
** When the Lusken Empire met the Evortal warriors who repelled them in the North Vortic Islands, the Euluskans nicknamed them the Votxki Ñavakusi, meaning "Basket Headed", for their large wooden head coverings.
* Those who were warriors and raiders among the Evortal people believed that to remove an enemy's heart was to strip them of their power and memory/legacy. Only the most savage among the generally quite chill Evortal would do this, but it was still striking to invaders who warred with them.
== Language ==
The Vortic diaspora spoke various languages through history, all part of the Lakayan branch of languages. 
=== Modern Language - "Vortic" - poté-i ===
The written language's alphabet was 15 letters: p,t,k,h,a,m,e,s,o,ng,u,-,l,i,w. The spoken language included nine consonants /m p t k w s l ŋ ʔ/ - the glottal stop was written with the hyphen - as well as five vowels /aeiou/. These five vowels could be modified by tildes ã, acutes á, or both ã́ for nasal, long, and nasal-long vowels, or they could be diphthongised with any other one vowel, giving a lot of ways to make a vowel sound. The modern language had a relatively strict syllable structure - V or CV. Every syllable was one consonant then one vowel! There was rarely ending utterances with consonants!
In realised speech, Vortic speakers (especially when speaking another language) often realised their /t/ sound as an alveolar tap /ɾ/ like in the American 'Atom' or 'Adam'.
There was adjective agreement in Vortai. Adjectives came after their noun. Sentences were SVO.
=== Others ===
* Proto-Vortic contrasted voiced and voiceless stops/fricatives - /t d, p b, k g/. Evortal maintained this voiced/voiceless distinction, but when Vortais became Vortic, it stopped caring about the voicing of consonants. Proto-Vortic also contained the sounds /ʒ β ɟ/ which were quite unique and eventually evolved out.
* Evortal was also quite weird, having been an offshoot of Old Vortais. It often inserted vowel sounds at the start and end of words - something that Modern Vortic would only evolve 1200 years later. Evortal also often rounded vowels into diphthongs in certain places /a/ to /au/ for example. Finally, Evortal contained the sounds /ð θ ɣ/, counterparts to /t s k/. Evortal also often rounded vowels into diphthongs, or added /i/ at the end of words. It also sometimes lost the contrast between k and t.
* Old Vortais contained the modern sounds, plus the consonants /ʁ f ʃ n ɲ kʷ/ which were since lost. Its uvular R became /l/, its /f/ became /p/ and its /n/ was turned into a nasaliser of the preceding vowel instead.
* Finally, Old Vortais was transcribed according to Middle Euluska notation, but there was a spelling reform in the 1600s for Vortic.
A comparison of words in the various languages. An asterisk denotes reconstructed words.
Proto-Vortic 	Old Vortais 	Evortal 	Vortais / Vortai 	Vortic 	English
*Euordais /eβoʁdeis/ 	Vortais /voʁteis/ 	Vourtési /voulteːθi/ 	Vortais /foɾteʔi/ 	Poté-i /poteːʔi/ 	"[the language]"
*Magjunais /maɟuneis/ 	Magnais /maɲeis/ 	Maúgnesi /ɱauːɲeθi/ 	Bangais /baŋei/ 	Pangé /paŋeː/ 	"bird"
*Medikis /medikis/ 	Medig /medig/ 	Emedég /eɱeðeɣ/ 	Medeg /metek/ 	Pẽteki /pẽteki/ 	"gold" (n)
*Vairovuzh /veiʁovuʒ/ 	Verovuch /veʁovuʃ/ 	Averovusi /averovuθi/ 	Verovús /weɾovuː/ 	Waelo-ú /wailoʔuː/ 	"ship"
*Zherkjevigje /ʒeʁceviɟe/	Chérqevígne /ʃeːʁkʷeviɲe/	Sergvovigni /θergvoviɲi/	Chéraqeving /ʃeːɾakʷeviŋ/	Selakuepinga /selakuepiŋa/	"commerce"
=== Sounds in the Vortic Language ===
Vortic and Vortais Consonants and Vowels. Bolded consonants are in modern Vortic, unbolded are in other historical forms or Evortal.
Consonants 	Consonants	Consonants	Consonants	Consonants	Consonants
 	Labial 	Alveolar 	Palatal 	Velar 	Glottal
Nasal 	m 	n 	 	ŋ 	
Stop 	p 	t 	 	k 	ʔ
Fricative / Approximant	f 	s 	ʃ 	w 	h
Liquid 	 	l~ɾ 	 	ʁ 	
Vowels 	Vowels 	Vowels 	Vowels 	Vowels 	Vowels
 	Front 	Front 	Central 	Back 	Back
Close 	i 	i 	 	u 	u
Mid 	ɛ 	ɛ 	 	o 	o
Open 	 	 	a~ɑ 	a~ɑ 	a~ɑ
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