Petty Manogre Princedoms

## The Land of the Manogres

The lands east of Elfwood used to be filled with dense forests, covering massive expanses of terrain, practically leaving no area uncovered. However, the masses of vegetation have been steadily been shrinking down, being replaced by prairies and plains, perfect for nomadic husbandry. The once plentiful forests have been reduced to big patches spread out and isolated from each other, filled with predators like tigers and wolves that hunt in the plains during the night and then hide in the woods during the night. The land also has a considerable amount of mineral wealth, with many deposits of tin, copper, iron and brass. Most of the mines are surface mines, since the workers of the mines are ogres, and their size makes them unable to fit in small tunnels, and constructing massive, cavernous shafts would collapse great parts of the mine. The control over these resources has changed hands plenty of times, with many fights throughout history between the faerie lords, the westerling humans and the native manskin ogres.

Inhabiting the land, one can find many species of grazing animals, both native and imported from faraway lands. The plentiful grass and gentile hills and plains allow for great amounts of wild herds, usually being mistaken by those that are domesticated and under the care of herder. There is a wide variety of animals, from sheep to buffaloes to wild horses. Even certain populations of southern elephants from the lands of the Bagdassi have managed to find a home in the meadows, probably as the result of trade with the south. This also means that the predators are plentiful, usually big canine and feline hunters, like the sabertooth tiger or the horned wild wolf. In the past, many of these species were relegated to the furthest corners of the region, but the grew in number the more the plains encroached over the forests. As such, the local populations have been hunting these predators down for a while, and their numbers have gone down once again. Many of these species can only be really found in the dense patch of forests, since they can hide themselves better in the think forests from the hunting parties and the herders defending their charges.

## History of the Manogres

The **Manskin Ogres**, colloquially known as the **manogres**, are the main population of the region. The manogres are particularly noteworthy in all ogredom in that they are the most civilized of their race. They have a long history tied to the faerie lords of the west and the westerling humans, and adopted many of their cultural customs and arts. Whenever someone suggest that ogrekind is related to the fey, they are usually talking to the manogres. The history of the manogres in the area can be followed back to ancient times, where the ogres lived in a nomadic lifestyle, usually as hunter-gatherers in the dense forests. They would be organized in small tribal groups hunting in the forest, opening small clears in the greenery to set up seasonal shelter. Eventually, however, the lands of the manogres would be conquered by the faerie lords, during the times of the expansion of the Western Elven Empire. This brought the manogres into service of the faerie lords, a service they absolutely despised. The faerie lords used the ogres as workhorses, usually as mercenaries or as caretakers for their charges. The faerie lords would teach the ogres things like husbandry, the care for plants, medicine, tool crafting and other such things. They would also stamp out the faith in the Gluttony God, replacing it with fey religions and rituals.

After the azanese victory in the wars against the Western Elven Empire, the human population began increasing in areas where they had been a decisive minority, especially east and south of Elfwood. The growing contact with humans greatly benefited the ogres, since they saw them as a possible alternative against the oppressive faerie lords. While the humans also saw them as mere brutes, they taught them metalcraft, something that would come to mark greatly manogre society. The ogres also took from the humans their different forms of organization, with the tribe warlords happily self-appointing to themselves titles of nobility. The humans also began using the forests of the area for lumber, with the eastern human kingdoms using great amounts of wood to build their growing cities and ships. This began turning the previously lush and dense forests into the prairies they are nowadays, something that would fit the ogres’ way of life much better, since green pastures are better for their herds than dense forest where predators can lurk in the shadows.

The human influence would give birth to the ogres first “cities”, though by the standards of the rest of the world, they would be overgrlorified farming towns, only scaled up to sizes fitting to ogres, and a couple of stone towers and walls to guard their charges at night. These towns would also appear near the mines, serving as great hubs to accumulate raw materials to export to the neighboring countries. However, all of this growth greatly worried the faerie lords to the west, who were still technically the manogres’ masters. With time, however, the growing independence of the human kingdoms began giving the ogres ideas of their own freedom, which culminated in a series of rebellions in 1.800 ABE. While these were quelled, the ogres saw the growing weakness of the faerie lords, and continued pushing back against them, usually by cutting great swathes of the faerie’s beloved forests, turning them into grazing fields. After a couple of centuries and the fall of the Western Elven Empire at the hands of the drow, more than half of the forested area had gone, replaced by grasslands. Humans also partook in this process, usually by bringing new farming animals to the manogres, motivating them further to gain newer fields. The ogres were not the best herders, though, and many of their charges ended up escaping, giving birth to the many wild herds that nowadays roam the lands. This would turn out to be very beneficial for the ogres, since these animals would end up eating away any chances of the forest regrowing.

In the end, the growing weakness and isolationism of the faerie lords forced them to leave the ogres alone, giving them a de facto independence. This allowed the faith in the Gluttony God to resurface, although very differently than what it once was. Without the pressure of the faerie lords, the manogre tribes, now renamed the manogre princedoms, began expanding in influence, which clashed with the growing human kingdoms in the east. The fights between them were short, with the human kingdoms being much better armed and organized than the ogres, but hostilities ceased relatively quickly, preferring to just offer some seasonal tribute to the human kingdoms in exchange of them leaving the ogres alone. The fall of Waldemaria at the hands of the mercenaries has made a lot of manogre princelings worried that the dark wizards will try to expand their influence even further west, leaving with no choice but to ask the fey from Elfwood for help.

## Society and culture

The Manskin Ogres are considered the most civilised and sophisticated of all the ogres, and it is not difficult to see why. The heavy fey and human influence in them has allowed them to reach a culture that would not be out of place in many human kingdoms. This does not mean the ogres do not show many of their wilder tendencies, though. They are still fearsome and brutal in many aspects of their culture, it’s just that they have been refined enough to the point that violence is not a constant between them, unlike in many other ogre populations in the world. The manogres are organized in “**princedoms**”, which used to be just a rename of the old ogre warchiefs, but over time it has slowly evolved into something slightly more complex. Nowadays, an “**Ogre Prince**” are individuals who manage to rule over one or two tribes of ogres, though the level of complexity in their organization rarely goes further than them asking for tribute and obedience. Many ogre tribes are free from princes, and those who have them keep their own customs and rules from each other, since the only thing they may have in common is their obedience to the prince. Outside of that, the social structure of the lands of the Manogres is very spread out, and has no central power structure. The closest thing to that are the ogre cities, which are towns of great stone buildings made out of simplistic masonry, wood and hay. They serve as the residence of the princes, as well as a place to trade and barter.

For the most part, manogres live in isolated groups, tending to their charges. They have great herds, constantly moving around the land in the search for greener pastures. They are not particularly attentive herders, and a lot of animals will escape throughout the year, since they do not have shepherd dogs. To solve this, they just grabbing wild animals from the wild herds and adding them to their own. Most wild herds are somewhat used to this, and do not offer that much resistance to the grabbing, since a frustrated ogre might squash down the entire herd if they are angered enough. This opens the question of why they don’t just add the entire wild herd to their own, but for the most time this is answered by they either not wanting the extra work, or they not being bright enough to come up with the idea. They travel with their families around the land to protect the herds from both predators and other ogres. Once an ogre becomes of age, it is kicked out of the family unit, and he is then forced to create their own herd by hunting wild cattle if he ever wants to come back. Since this is a tedious task, and considerably harder than it looks for a single individual, it is frequent that young ogres will try to kill other ogres to take over their herds, this being one of the main causes of mortality between young ogres. Once they have gained a herd of their own, most of them decide not to come back and live with their own charges, but those who do want to rejoin the family unit can end up accumulating thousands upon thousands of animals.

Family groups can associate themselves to help each other in the care of the herds, especially if they have different animals. A family of ogres with a sheep herd will associate with a family with a herd of cows, trading with each other the produce of their animals. If enough of these families gather, they will need to organize a set of rules, giving origin of a tribe. If this process is repeated between tribes, this will be the origin of a princedom. Once a princedom is born, the prince will start searching for a place to settle, beginning the construction of a princedom. Princedoms are designed to be as simple as possible, since ogres do not have the technical knowledge, the intelligence or patience to build complex cities. A big building made out of rock in the middle of the settlement becomes the prince’s house, and much smaller and poorer buildings around it are designed to gather and protect the charges, as well as for things such as metallurgy. These towns are protected by high walls (though this being relative, since from an ogre’s perspective, they might not be that big), with watchtowers to keep a watch for intruders. Cattle-stealing is frequent, especially from young ogres kicked out from their families. The size of the princedom is the prince’s pride and joy, and they will compete to see which princedom has the biggest domain, though this end up in open warfare and the destruction of both towns, never really allowing them to grow into something like human cities.

The mineral wealth in the region has caused many princes to focus their efforts into exploiting the mineral veins of the lands. These prospections will bring a lot of young ogres who failed to create their own herd, and they now work in the mines instead, or that they work in exchange for a number of herd animals. The minerals are then worked by ogre metallurgists to create many items, from weapons to decorative trinkets. This particular custom has resulted in the nickname “the petty ogres”, since ogre princes greatly value them as a sign of wealth and power, and will be covered from head to toe in jewelry and other ornaments, either made by ogres or imported from the fey or human traders. Control of these mines can led to rather massive wars, creating alliances between multiple princedoms to keep others from accessing the mineral deposits.

## Religion

The manogres have been greatly influenced by their old overlords, the faerie lords. After their conquest of the region, the fey persecuted the worship of the Gluttony God, seeing it as a barbaric god that promotes excess and overindulgence, instead of following a balanced life in tune with nature. The long period of influence of the fey meant that they were able to impose many elements of fey culture and faith in the manogres, though much more simplified due to the duller nature of ogres. As such, manogres do worship many icons representing nature, and have a lot of celebrations for the seasons. However, these celebrations have changed over time, since the manogres’ attack on the forest means that their worship of nature clearly does not extend to all aspects of nature. Ogres are known to build great megalithic statues, with the shape of different animals. These great statues are very crude, but their size can be thrice that of an adult ogre, so they have become important milestones for the wandering herders. They are used to pray to the spirits and the gods, wishing for good health and safe births for their cattle. Ogres give offerings to these statues, and it is common to see wild herds munching on fruits and other offerings left by the ogres. Incidentally, this means the herders can catch some of the animals attracted by the food laid there, and this effect makes the ogres believe they truly have the endorsement of the spirits.

The cult of the Gluttony God has somewhat resurfaced within the ogres, but unlike many other ogres, the manogres do not worship the Maw. Instead, they partake in culinary competitions to show their devotion to their god. The manogre herders will put to the test how many sheep can eat before being unable to continue, due to either fullness or death. In fact, this is the way courtship works within manogres. If a female manogre has multiple suitors, the candidates will first see if they can intimidate the others through force and brute strength. If the manogres are considerable smaller than their competition, they will wisely leave, least the alpha takes action and puts his words into action. However, if the strength and size of the manogres is similar, and starting a brawl might end up with the death of one or both, they will settle the dispute by starting a cook-off. This will put to the test both the manogre’s endurance (how much can he eat in one sitting) and the size of his herd (if the candidate eats all of his herd while the opponent still has cattle to spare, he is considered a less capable herder, and worse at feeding the bride, thus being disgraced in her eyes). These cook-offs attract quite a lot of attention, with many manogres cheering the participants. It is also known that these spectacles have attracted the attention of other races, such as hobbits, well known for their culinary habits. They have been known to participate into these cook-offs, but due to the obvious disadvantage of a hobbit in that their body size allows them to eat much less quantities than an ogre, they are allowed to use turkeys instead of bigger cattle.

## Foreign Relations

The manskin ogres are rather isolationist due to their particular lifestyle. Their constant movement throughout the prairies searching for the best green spots to feed their charges makes them seldom enter in contact with other races. This is especially true after they achieved their independence from the faerie lords to the east, since they had been the ones keeping the manogres in contact with the rest of the Western Elven Empire. Back in the day, the faerie lords would gather the many manogre tribes to use as disposable mercenaries, seeing as they wouldn’t be able to act with the finesse expected from fey forces. They would also double as just workhorses for the logistics of the empire. The manogres would get little to no respect from the faerie lords (and most of the fey in general), which would cause a lot of resentment between the manogres. For one, the manogres did not care about fey politics, they only wanted to tend to their charges, and the insistence of the fey to grow and protect the forests stopped the land from becoming adequate for herding. The growing weakness of the faerie lords allowed the manogres to push back, chopping of great swathes of the forest to block the influence of the most magical of the faerie lords, which also doubled as a great source of wealth, selling great amounts of wood to the human kingdoms to the east. Eventually the manogres managed to free themselves from the fey, but many are of the opinion that the faerie lords simply got tired of dealing with the manogres. Current relations with the fey are generally negative, unless they are visitors from the Hedge, like gnomes or hobbits, always interested in buying and selling cattle. In particular, the manogres absolutely hate the wood elves, and seeing the damage the ogres did to the forest, the feeling is most assuredly mutual.

The relations to the eastern human kingdoms is better, but it is not free of issues. The humans have a decent amount of trade with the ogre princes, bringing weapons, jewelry, medicines and exotic livestock in exchange for either great amounts of cattle or for access to the mineral wealth in the region. Their main ally is the Zapalovah Republic, since the high amount of trade in the region greatly benefits from access to the ogres’ mineral wealth. Zapalovach traders will come from the sea, where traders have established coastal outposts. Since manogres are not interested in the sea or navigation in general, they have been allowed to build towns in the area, serving as the exchange spots between ogres and the zapalovach. Many zapalovach will bring gifts from time to time to the ogre princedoms, to keep them happy and gain some help protecting their towns from young ogres searching for easy pickings. It has become something of a custom between zapalovach traders to bring rare animals to the manogre princes, like albino individuals or species from far away. This is believed to be the reason why there are growing populations of southern dwarf elephants in the region.

The relations with Sniden are more complicated. The manogres fear the figure of Adonis, the strange faerie lord that rules Sniden through his mystical influence. While the manogres are not smart enough to undertand the intricacies of Adonis’ control over his country, they can pick up enough clues to conclude they want nothing to do with it. Manogres have attacked from time to time Sniden, mostly as raiders and as a way to intimidate the snidenese into staying in their side of the border, but Adonis’ forces usually counterattack in force, causing great damages to the scattered manogre populations. Some manogres have fallen to the worship of Adonis, leaving their lands to join their lord in Sniden. These manogres are considered heretical in the eyes of their fellows, and are banned from coming near any princedom under penalty of death.

The relations with Waldemaria used to be peaceful as well, in a similar vein to those with Zapalovah. The monarchs of Waldemaria even used to invite many ogre princes to spectacles and celebrations, so as to keep good and peaceful relations with them. However, the breaking of the Kingdom of Waldemaria at the hands of the mossovyan necromancers has caused a lot of concern between the ogres. The manogres distrust necromancy, seeing most magic as something not to be trusted, and necromancy seem to be the worst of the lot in their eyes. The destruction of their old ally and friend in the waldemarian royal house has caused a lot of manogres to bring human refugees from the lawless lands of Waldemaria into their princedoms. However, while grateful, manogre princedoms are not a safe place for humans at the best of times, and as such most of these have traveled north to join the zapalovah towns. Rumors say that the members of the Laurentian Crusade are in talks with some ogre princes to ask them for help against the necromancers.

Contact with the fake humans are rare. The irregular growth of the Glass Mountains means that sometimes the pass towards the fake humans to the south is blocked by crystal mountains, and the manogres do not like crossing them if not for a good reason. When they do meet, however, relations are usually peaceful, though some young ogres will take the occasion to pillage nearby towns.