House of Darcedon

The cedonis represents the heritage of Darcedon

The **House of Darcedon**, or the **Crown Principality of Darcedon**, is a house of great esteem from the region of *Cedonia*, in eastern Kasmir. It is one of the oldest and most powerful houses in the Old World, claiming its Patriarch as Brutus Mandus Draco. They are known by their coat of colour, blue and white.

The House of Darcedon maintains strict control over the entire regions of *Andalia* and *Cedonia,* as well as the holdings of *Granadia, Lotania*, and parts of Bastria. In terms of sheer land owned and maintained by an individual house, it is twenty percent larger than the second largest in the Old World, the Jade House of Lords, and fifty percent larger than the House of Marques.

Through a series of political marriages, alliances, and maneuvering with the Papetral Pontifect, the House of Darcedon has become the single most valuable seat of power in the Old World next to the Papet itself, as it has stakes in almost all of Neuphany. It is also one of the few houses independent of the Pontifect.

## Name and heraldry

The name of Darcedon is a conjoined house name from the names of the Draco genus and Adonis genus. The name Draco-Adonis was initially used as a way to maintain the genus and reputation of both houses, but as time passed and the value of the Dinamid naming conventions declined, the name of the family was revisited by Prince Francesco I in CE 194. The Draco-Adonis name was condensed to Darcedonis, further reduced to simply Darcedon in later Eras.

At the time of its founding, the sigil of the blue serpent was chosen as an emblem representing the dragon defeated by Brutus Mandus Draco, its visage a common cropping in their architecture. Over time, the Darcedon name became more associated with the blue serpent itself, as it also symbolized the Blue Comet heavily integrated with the Darcedonian identity.

The *cedonis* is the most common sigil used after its creation in CE 716, once the eastern coast of Neuphany was free from Auber rule. The emblem depicts the blue serpent consuming a man that's appearance frequently changes depending on the context. Most often, an Auber male is the victim; however, during conflicts with the Jade House of Lords, the sigil depicts a man of Jade descent; and the House of Marques, a human of *Brumadoria*.

## Principality status

Though the House of Darcedon is one of the oldest, largest, most powerful, and most widely proliferated houses in Neuphany, it is still regarded with only a Crown Prince, with no king and no greater house to which it owes loyalty. This is a vestigial remnant of its status under the Dinamid Republic, in which the House of Darcedon was dictated as being a province owned by Brutus Mandus Draco and his male heirs. As kings and monarchs were forbidden in Dinam, the province was given a hereditary provincial governor called a *principes*, or "ruler" in Dwarvish.

Despite having a different history than the term *prince,* used to designate a male heir to a king, *principes* retained its etymology and has been conflated with the Common term "prince" even today, with the only distinguishing factor being that Darcedon has a "Crown Prince" - a term that arrived in the Mythic Ages once Goodfellow rule had collapsed.