Yanaman

**Yanaman** [[[Map of Yanaman|map]]] is the name for the geographical area located to the east of the Dwarven Lands, The South and The Elven Land of Zarnishia, and to the west of the Great Sea. The area is well known for its long and complex history, dating back to the first era. The social and legal history of the are is similarly complex, with many factions competing over power of the area's central feature, Mount Guran. The mountain itself is nothing special, but it has great religious and strategic importance that cannot be overlooked. The area is primarily an enormous desert that stretches from Teran to Grashid. Past here, the area slowly becomes green fields that stretch on seamlessly into the Dwarvern lands, and further north can be found a lightly forested area that acts as the edge for the jungle that later becomes part of the Elven Land of Zarnishia. In the brief periods where the land has been unified under one leader, the capital city has always been Po-Tan, the city that sits at the base of Mount Guran.

## Toponomy

#### Aetril (Common)

The word *Yanaman* can find its source in 2 words - *Yancru,* the gnomish word meaning 'desert' and *Hirocman*, the orcish word meaning 'warriors'. It is believed by scholars that the name was chosen to celebrate the ancient god Oberon, who often mixed up languages when speaking to mortals, and therefore may once have called the desert warriors of Ailys *Yanaman*. Interestingly, there are circles in the Po-Tan Linguistic Society that believe that *Yanaman* in fact comes from a term in the ancient tongue of the Lizardfolk. Whilst there are no native speakers of the language anymore, texts from the time refer to *Yilaman*, a legendary god-king who first unified the land of Yanaman under his rule a thousand years before the coming of Elven Gods and the start of the first era. It is entirely possible that his name served as the basis for their name of the Yanaman area.

#### Gnomish

In Gnomish, the area of Yanaman is known as *Yancral Hyiri irchan*, meaning 'The Land is the Desert', which was coined thousands of years after the first recorded use of the word Yanaman yet through some delightful coincidence has the abbreviation *Yan'an*, very similar to Yanaman. Of course, this only works in orthodox Gnomish abbreviation, and in the more modern, alternate abbreviation format becomes *Yancral Hyirichan*, which is not only functionally useless as it only removes one syllable, but also isn't half as close to the official, universal name for the area.

#### Elvish

Whilst most elves use the word *Yanaman* when describing the country, many elves, especially Eldareth Elves, prefer to use the archaic term *Lis Herranae*. *Lis* is the Elvish word for East and *Herranae* derives from the Elvish words *Herra* and *Grinae*, meaning desert and islands, basically making *Lis Herranae* a reassurance to elvish travelers that there are some nice looking islands just east of the desert.

## History

### Early Settlement

In the year 1E613, elven settlers crossed the threshold into the desert of Yanaman. The area was infested at the time with ancient races that had inhabited the land before the coming of the Elven gods. This was soon fixed in an event known as the Lizard Genocide, in which a single platoon of the highest trained elves in the world swept the desert for 15 long years, systematically raping, experimenting upon and then killing all Lizardfolk and approximately 90% of all orcs. They learned a powerful lesson in that campaign that has followed elven military strategy ever since - magic is far more powerful than a bow and arrow. Not that the less developed race of Lizardfolk had yet discovered the bow and arrow, leaving them with only sharpened teeth to defend themselves. You can all imagine how that turned out for them.

Orcs, at least, put up rather a better defense. In the town of Ailys, the only 500 orcs remaining in all the world stole and learned from a book of dark power, which granted their leader the power of the necromantic arts. Keeping his army alive, the first lord of the Ailys region took back his land from the Elves. and what could the elves do, for all they killed would soon rise and all of theirs that fell would only be risen to fight their former allies. After the reclamation of Ailys in the year 1E638, the orcish forces swept the land, settling as much of Yanaman as they could. Of course, in the absence of anyone claiming the land, masses of humans had moved in from the west of the continent, whilst all manner of creatures had swept in from the Great Sea to settle the vast wastes. Whilst the orc hordes tried as they might to remove the humans from their land, they were fairly unsuccessful. After a few hundred years of trying, the orcs of the north and the east decided that it was not worth trying, and so allowed the humans to keep the land they had taken.

### Clan Warfare

By 1E800, the land of Yanaman was divided between 10 different clans. These clans spread out across Yanaman, with many of them laying claim to the same lands. The most contention was risen about which of the 10 clans had the rightful claim to Mount Guran. As a holy site valued by all faiths, the mountain has seen its fair share of wars over its occupation. Most bloody of these was the battle that came to be known as the 'Battle of the Baractan' in 1E912, in which forces from Baractan had to defend themselves from a co-ordinated attack from three clans at the tame time, with Chakasian soldiers pressing upon them from the north, whilst the riders of Goddenfield and the hardy survivalists of Kakastal-Bah pressed upon them from the south. The death toll from this battle has never been stated outright but is expected to be somewhere in the hundreds of thousands. The battle raged for three months before the siege of Po-Tan began. Whilst invading forces managed to take the outskirts of the city, they were faced with a mysterious sorceress who easily held back their armies with her powerful magics. It is not known to any who this woman was, but it is known that by protecting the final refuge of the Baractan clan, she prevented a war between the three clans of Goddenfield, Kakastal-Bah and Chakasti over who would be able to rightfully claim Mount Guran. without this mysterious mistress of magic, the land of Yanaman may never have been unified, and much of history would have drastically changed.

The 10 clans are here listed in alphabetical order, followed by their corresponding colour on the above map.

* Goddenfield (Brown)
* Kakastal-Bah (White)
* House of Dral (Yellow)
* Chakasti (Green)
* Baractan (Light Blue)
* Grashid (Red)
* Teran (Orange)
* Dastiili (Pink)
* Ashlusarn (Dark Blue)
* Wyz-Garuk (Purple)