Certusa

"Ville Chartreuse," Jean-Louis Lorraine CE 951

## Historic Sigil

"Capriovis," the symbol of Certusa

**Certusa** or **Chardreau** is the second-largest city in the Old World, located in *Corrivalia*. The settlement has existed since the days of the Dinamid Republic, but its rapid growth only began after the Thirty Years' Siege. Falian invasion also made it strategically valuable for the Ascani Empire to gain a foothold outside of *Solernia*, which demanded greater fortifications. Later, Robaerigon would be handed control of the city by Galmes the Bloody, and its rule moving forward was entirely one under the House of Merovia.

Certusa is situated on a group of 288 small islands called the Chartreuse Islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 1,000 bridges. The islands are located in the shallow Chartreuse Lagoon, a slightly enclose body of water fed by the Cabannon River. Like White Harbor, the city offers city citizenship which it uses to conduct a biannual census.

The name of Certusa comes from the Chartreuse Islands on which it is built. The city was historically the capitol of *Corrivalia* and considered an extension of the *Illyria* metropolis. It remains an important center of commerce, delivering silk, grain, and spices to *Corrivalia* and beyond from its many ports in the Broken Gulf. It is also a hib for fine art. The city-state is sometimes considered the first great metropolis. Certusa has been known as "The Domina", "New Serenity", "Queen of the Tomyrian", "City of Water", "City of Bridges", and "The Floating
City." Many great musicians and artists call the city home, and even today, people from all over the Old World visit Certusa to experience its beauty.

## Culture

### Literature

Certusa has long been a source of inspiration for authors, playwrights, and poets, and at the forefront of the technological development of printing and publishing, closely following behind White Harbor. Three such writers of considerable note are Saint Martin, Antarch, and Cassian.

Certusan playwrights follow Dinamid traditions of professional theater, long inherited from elven and even Hellastian plays Preliturgy. Playwrights from abroad, especially Jade-blood artists, draw great inspiration or set their own works in Certusa. The Cyravine playwright Solobene notes that, "the closest city to what the elves aspired to is not in Prace, but in Certusa." Some Certusan theater features the "comedy as an art" practice, a type of theater specifically for the lower class.

Certusa was established during a period known for its epic poetry, and as such inherits a long tradition of poets that write in old Dinamid styles, sometimes even writing poetry in Vernacular Dwarvish in respect of its long heritage.

The poet and activist Joseph spent the latter years of his life in a Certusan villa, where he completed a few of his anthologies before his death in CE 977.

Certusa was the location of one of Arborea's earliest printing presses called the Seawater Press, established about ten years after the first printing press was made in Auberoth. From here, Certusa developed as an important typographic
center. One in twenty books in Arborea are printed in Certusa, and out of one hundred books printed in Arborea, half are printed in Certusa.

### Painting and sculpting

Certusa is a major center of art and developed a unique style known as the Chardreau School. Along with Illyria Proper, Rhodes, and Lenorum, Certusa is one of the cultural epicenters of western Neuphany. Certusa today continues to inspire painters and sculptors. Many wealthy patrons of noble houses find their artists in Certusa, and rather precariously, painters will hang their portfolios from the bridges to allow passing nobility to see their work as they travel.

Oil painting was developed in Certusa, and some of the first panoramas come from neo-Hellastian styles in the city. Sculptors following in Dinamid marble styles also create extraordinary works of realism that are in display in their many plazas.

### Certusan architecture

Certusa is built on unstable mud-banks, and has a very crowded city
centre. Conversely, it is largely safe
from riot, civil feuds, and invasion due to its advantageous position over the water and divisions by its many brudges. These factors, with the canals and the great wealth of the city,
 made for unique building styles.

The unique arches that denote Certusan architecture are inherited from both elven designs and old Dinamid construction. The wealth of the city is able to feed the demand for steady building over the canals and shifting sands underneath the city's roads and bridges. Much like *Tiberia* and *Galatia*, Certusa was forced to develop unique styles of building to adapt to its environment.

### Certusan glass

Unlike glassware and crystal made in Cascadia, Certusan glass is made by glassblowers who use the sands that wash in from the sea to blow the glass. Certusa poached silver-blood artisans from Vostok Manda shortly after the Merovian Schism. This allowed the Auber invention of synthetic crystal to become widely available in Certusa.

Most crystal and glassware in Arborea comes from Certusa. Though not "authentic" glass like from Auberoth, the glassware is still considered high faire among the population drinking from wooden, bone, or metal goblets.

### Festivals

#### Carnivale Certusa

The Carnivale Certusa is one of the most important events in the arts calendar. People don masks, much like Numendorian worship of Mim Kapal or ancient Perthic festivals, though the reason is unique to Certusa. The festival lasts for the entire month of October and celebrates the resurrection of Galmes the Bloody by Saint Martin.

The ritual to ressurect Galmes the Bloody was deliberately forgotten to prevent its abuse under coordination of the Pontifect. However, one of the key elements in its success was that a large number of people, possibly the entirety of the population, were forced to wear blank white masks. It therefore became a tradition to wear handmade masks during the festival.

There was a ban on wearing masks outside of October for various reasons. After the second death of Galmes the Bloody, criminals and dissidents of Merovian rule began wearing the masks as a way to disguise themselves. Gamblers, thieves and others wore the masks in public to commit crimes, leading to the ban outside of the Carnivale Certusa in CE 721. The ban was reduced to only the months of August and September in CE 987 by the Marquis of Merovia, allowing for masks to be worn for a majority of the year.

Later, certain sumptuary laws were put in place for mask-wearers, including the forbidding of buying or carrying eggs while wearing a mask and laws against non-citizens from wearing masks outside of the Carnivale Certusa. Specifically, the "egg edicts" were put in place after political dissenters began to throw scented eggs containing perfumes and resins inside them at nobility. This escalated from eggs containing frankincense to eggs containing ink, and beyond into eggs containing more dangerous substances.

Today, masks are only eligible to be worn if created by a mask-maker associated with a mask-making guild. Wearing masks made by oneself is against local ordinance. Certusan officials developed this as a way to hold the mask-makers responsible for crimes done while in their masks. This has made it so that mask-makers will usually only sell to those with citizenship, and records of all mask purchasers are deliverable to the Marquis. Despite this, masks can be painted in any manner by the owner.

Each guild makes their mask easily identifiable through their unique styles. The mask-making guilds are as follows:

* *Bautte*, who produce gilded masks with a large, bulbous nose and a beak-like protruding chin. These allow the wearer to eat, drink, talk, and breathe easily while wearing the mask. This mask is often worn by men.
* *Lume*-*Binot*, who produce gilded half-masks that only cover the eyes, nose, and upper cheeks. This mask is worn by both men and women.
* *Murette*, who produce a black oval mask with no mouth and only two holes for the wearer to see. This mask is only worn by patrician women.
* *Larvolta*, who produce the most iconic masks in Certusa: solid white porcelain masks that fit tightly around one's face, which often have benign or neutral facial expressions and encourage decoration by the wearer. These masks are impossible to wear while eating and drinking, and are mostly worn by women.
* *Pianta*, who make comedic half-masks that give an appearance like that of a sad elderly man, often to parody the aristocracy. These masks are worn exclusively by men.
* *Arle*, who make comedic half-maks that give an appearance like that of an Auber, with a comically broad nose and sloped forehead. *Arle* masks are often paired with *Pianta* masks and are worn exclusively by men.
* *Chino*, who make ornate gilded full-face masks with protruding horns, made of dyed porcelain to be either blue or black. They feature jutting horns from the horehead and a hooked nose, depicting the appearance of Galmes the Bloody. This mask, despite being modeled after a man, is worn by both men and women.

#### Ides of June Salvation

Another city-specific and secular festival, this two-week occasion in the middle of June marks an annual penance that has lasted for over one thousand years. A mass prayer to Melakesh commenced in June 134 NCE to help ensure victory over the Perthic Caliphate during the Second Perthic War. After the victory at the Battle of the Tigerlands, the celebration was held annually to help *Corrivalia* heal from the terror of Attacus Rex. Later, in June CE 2, during the annual celebration, an engimatic and unmanned trireme *June Beneficia* (*Blessings of June*) sailed into Certusa's only harbor at the time, filled with three dozen domestic sheep at a time when the city was starving due to the discord brought by the Castigation of Espios. This cemented the practice as not just a religious ceremony, but one that had saved the city.

Every year, for two weeks in the middle of June, the city prepares a grand feast every night and nobles invite the poor to dine with them in their homes. Boats are lined up along Certusa's canals, making it easy to walk across the canals and "uniting" the city into one landmass. Every day, a new blessing is cast into the ocean by each of the people, a metaphor that is often portrayed with the etching of the first letter of a virtue (e.g. "C" for charity) onto a silver coin and casting it into the streets. If someone performs a good deed or exemplifies a virtue, they can travel into the streets with the person they helped and are given a coin for their deed.

While criminal duos do crop up from time to time, many citizens of Certusa take this time seriously and self-enforce the tradition by means of social shaming. This is done by throwing coins from the street at the accusers, often in large mobs, a form of assault that serves as a metaphor not lost on the victims.

### Music

Certusa has played an important role in the development of the Arborean style of music. The territory has often been called the "Musical Marquessette." An anonymous merchant in the Tenth Era is said to have remarked that "In every
home, someone is playing a musical instrument or singing. There is music
 everywhere."

Today, Certusa is one of the most notable centers of music in the Old World, marked by a characteristic style of
composition and a fresh "polychoral" style developed by local monasteries. Certusa is also home to a great number of orchestras who feed demand for printed music, as Certusa is one of the only places in the Old World where musical notation is printed at all.

### Cuisine

Certusan cuisine is characterized by seafood, but also includes
garden products from the islands of the lagoon, rice from the mainland, and wild game. Certusa is not known for a peculiar cuisine of its own: it combines
local traditions with influences stemming from age-old contacts with other great cities across Neuphany and Tyrrhos.

Perhaps what Certusa is better known for is its wide variety of sweets. The most famous of these are: fisherman's bread, cookies, wedding biscuits, doughknots, coffee cake, tiramisu, and milk pudding.