History of the Tapphic Nomads

# Tapphic History

The Tapphic ethnic group has it's origins as far back as the war between the Ancients themselves. The Xa Goddess Ibixuu gave this history to the Ganzseher De'moda, while he was imprisoned under the occupation of Avacyn and DVX Latt, during a meditative trance.

## Proto-History

The early history of the Tapphic people exists in a period where families rarely contacted others for long. Settlement in this territory was a rare sight. These groups had cultures and beliefs of their own, but these are lost to time now; parts or most of certain cultures are extinct. Still, many parts of almost all cultures carried on in some capacity and contribute to modern Tapphic society.

This history is only loosely relayed by the Goddess Ibixuu, and the major highlights are outlined here.

### Early Proto-Tapphic Groups

The earliest point in the Tapphic ethnic story is inhabited by the Proto-Tapphic clans. Clans tended to associate with those in their area, which is generally divided between the east and west portions of their projected range. The eastern portion was far more culturally transmissive, while the western portion was more focused on inter-clan politics. This however was a not a rule: each side had both in common. The distinction though can account for the east’s eventual cultural supremacy, postulates Ibixuu. From what’s been said, these families exhibit highly novel cultural backgrounds, possibly owed to the diverse biome composition of the area.

#### Southeastern Groups

##### T'iq

The T’iq were a small family group consistent of 11 male adults, 7 female adults, and 22 children at the time they first contacted the other clans and groups. Their matriarch was Yi’li T’iq. The family had a strong faith in the original Elder Deity Yad. In this case, their view involved an ocean connotation, viewing Yad as a God of the Seas, and nature as a massive ocean. They also had another deity that they personally prayed to: a manta like entity known as Zibuk. This fish seemed to push them to migrate often by appearing and chasing them away until they collapsed. They would often be seen at large bodies of water in order to both gather and observe prayer to ward of Zibuk.

They wore wool and hide clothing and lived in the high altitudes of the southeast, where they followed alpaca herds. Sometimes they would fish at the rivers they frequented. They lived at altitudes much higher than many can even stand to be at. The T’iq were quite avid partygoers; often after a successful hunt they would consume psychoactive plants and play a very intense version of tag on mountain peaks, often until they collapsed. Given their extensive knowledge of their environment, rarely did anyone get lost permanently.

##### Wu Hizh

The realm of the Hizh, or the Wu Hizh, were a significant player in earliest days of these clans. They consisted of 20 male adults and 38 female adults, with 57 children. Their leaders were the Chief Hizh and the Shaman Jiqso. This Wu created large piles of stones as markers for migration points. These stone piles later became very important to the civilizations that would arise here, as they would serve to operate as a center for many cities. For a few Proto-Tapphic families, if you toss a precious stone on the pile, you will be blessed. As such, these piles were focal points of social and cultural advancement, and often the Hizh could be seen interacting happily and debating fiercely at them.

They wore surprisingly colorful beaded fur clothes and would get the dyes and beads from crushed or carved stones. They killed cow and rabbits. Ibixuu reveals that they are responsible for many primitive ochre paintings in the area. They also discovered an advance style of knapping that produced a fine edge stone blade. It is believed that their faith was underdeveloped, or perhaps subdued. Nonetheless, they espoused charismatic personalities, with many Hizh believing in a personal spirit that inspired action and creativity.

##### Eku

The Eku was a mysterious family, consistent of 2 male adults, 3 female adults, and 5 children. Their patriarch took the title Sigeda and abandoned his previous name. This family had faith in the Elder God named Dath, in the form of a lunar deity called Dakke. They were primarily nocturnal, and wore special headdresses shaped like an bat that amplified local sound. They were an incredibly successful group of hunter-gatherers, as they could catch animals after they fell asleep. Just as well, they raided other clans for their resources.

They wore a coat of owl feathers strung onto simple hide wraps. They seemed to employ large wooden staffs with stylized hooks carved into each end while traversing the forests, though they lived on the plains in leather tents. It is said that in the hours the sun would go down, they practiced a shamanistic dance/combat ritual. In this exercise, they would salute using a fluid dance, and then try to trip the other with their hooks in an elaborate back and forth. It’s said that these staves were unique to each Eku member.

##### Xi'goe

The Xi’goe were a very large, yet relatively passive and secluded, horde of Proto-Tapphics. They consisted of 53 male adults and 65 female adults, as well as 122 children. They had no leader, and worshipped Yad, as a forest entity named Iadu. The trees of their home forest were once larger than any known building today, though they were eventually caught within the Scattering. They lived in the trees themselves, meters up, in portable hammocks connected by large branches. They wore woven plant-based garb, and wooden armor, as well as strange wide brim wooden hats. They were woodworkers primarily, having traded for stone tools with the Wu Hizh to continue this craft. This allowed them to eventually spread to different forests, form safer treetop travel ways, and to be fitted with slots for their hammock dwellings. They tended to wield simple sharpened branches as spears, since they are recoverable and renewable.

In order to defend themselves, both from the elements and frequent Eku raids on their food stores, they employed an ingenious, convoluted ladder system. The Xi’goe would have stone plates from the Hizh, carved with hand holds in the back. They would be attached to a rope rig, which lead to the food store. It would be tied at the top, so that if the rig was pulled, the entire line of stone plates would flip over, and stick to the tree tightly. That way the ladder would no longer be accessible. That they could only be manipulated by someone already in the tree was a major advantage to the Xi’goe.

##### Wu Y'peth

Wu Y’peth was a scattered group of related families that inhabited the northern most reach of Proto-Tapphic migration. They frequented the desert, often traversing at night to reach valuable materials while it was cool. They consisted of 12 male adults, 13 female adults, and 17 children. Their matriarch was known as “Mama Thuun”. They believed that elemental forces controlled everything, similarly to gods, but more explicitly linked to what they called the “First Will”: an extension of the will of every living being. They were strictly shamanistic, choosing to defer to the wisdom of those who could understand the First Will. They wore loose, thin wraps of mutely dyed cloth. They wielded slings, and smooth stones.

The Y’peth were a successful group of early barterers that specialized in textiles. They would maintain contact with the T’iq families and trade for wool and other pelts. Then, they would hand make complex patterns, used to symbolize anything from status in training to availability for marriage. These textiles were also used as flags denoting family origin. They would eventually make it through the Scattering and sell their services when coinage was finally printed, says Ibixuu.

#### Southwestern Groups

##### Fess

The Fess were a tightly knit clan that followed Goppes the Pale, a purported sorcerer/philosopher that first brought the cosmological view of Ganzzweig (Whole Branch, or Tree Shaped) into oral tradition. They consisted of 15 male adults, 10 female adults, and 27 children. Once maintaining a gripping caste system, this group has (within the time of contact with other groups) since progressed into a more council-based clan. They wore very little, choosing to cover themselves with hide when needed and going bare almost all other times. They inhabited shallow caves and would clear small sections of land flat in order to meet for study. They were vegetarians, and gathered locals plants for their meals. They were quite avid cooks as well, with a rich tradition for preparing many kinds of spices to enhance their meals. There has been no instance of inter-clan war involving the Fess, and during times of conflict would disappear underground. They would hold large feasts when they could to encourage social cohesion.

They lived very close to the border between east and west, and often frequented Wu Hizh, and the Hizh stones. It was here where Goppes would eventually spread his philosophical teachings to the wider Tapphic population. His insights derived from the former caste system exploded into a movement that would inspire a contemporary in Tethis, and future philosophers such as Sewhat. The tendency for Fess to study and discuss methods of classifying plants would also attract families that wished to see their culinary craft. Often, you may still find edible crops at the edges of caves due to the Fess, says Ibixuu.

##### Djuu

The Djuu were swamp dwelling groups that operated on rafts within the mire of Southwest Iaddithis. They consisted of 23 male adults, 19 female adults, and 31 children. Their patriarch was named Halg. These families believe in the Elder God Gul, in the form a deity known as Gil’djuu. This entity was a field of glowing lights, or small orbs of fire, that surround practitioners and ward of evil. They lead those who collect the most Juk (animal bones, believed to house portions or all of the soul) to grand treasures. They lead those who are evil into Gil’djuu’s realm of fire and lava. The fireflies of their native swamps frequently operated as agents for these lights. The Djuu wore a dress of chords that draped to their feet, with loose loincloths and other modest garments under. The most decorated wore carved bone.

The Djuu would harvest Pithis trees for their roots. The pithis tree housed much of its stored sugar in its roots, which operated as the staple diet alongside animals such as alligator or crane. They could be recognized primarily by their hooting calls, with which they located and counted the other groups in the area. Certain parts of Djuu territory had different hoots. Some Djuu claimed that these noises also scared off dark spirits, and so they often did so when firing their arrows. Eventually, they engineered arrows that whistled and hooted as they went through the air. It’s believed they are the family that eventually invented proper seafaring boats within the Proto-Tapphic groups.

##### Sauo

The Sauo clans were a set of related families that inhabited different plains areas within Proto-Tapphic range. They consisted of 11 to 12 families at a time, each with 1 to 2 male adults, and 3 female adults. Each family had anywhere from 3 to 7 children. The Sauo had different heads for different families, and their common group was broken apart by intense social politics. It is said that each family maintained an oral tradition of the event, but that each tradition was wildly removed from each other version. They were clad in hides, and could be seen with pouches and trinkets hanging from their side, for contests that may have appeared. They did not believe in deities, and often pleaded to the idea of luck itself for their protection.

The Sauo were hunter-gatherers, living in the shade of lone trees or finding cool spots to rest in. They hunted large game such as horses or cows, as well as finding sweet berries and plucking from Fess cave gardens. The Sauo families never truly actualized conflict between each other, though they sometimes competed for resources in contests of games. They were handy clans and generated any number of both athletic and mental games to play. Where one family would kick a ball into a goal past defenders, another might manipulate small stones on a board in mock warfare. It seems the Sauo found every way possible to fight except war, claims Ibixuu.

### Bark-Eating Wise Men

Contact between these families slowly became more commonplace over the ages. Over time, prominent names began to bubble to the surface, in what Ibixuu herself considers to be a sort of Tapphic age of Bronze: a history of hardy survivors, and ancient bastions of culture and wonder. The backdrop to this age has already been set, and little do these people know their lives would be changed by a psychotropic tree, an albino man, and a trip from the foot of a mountain to a pile of stone.

#### Goppes the Pale

##### Sa Wels

Goppes the Pale was originally to be born into the Old Fess clan as the son of a Kathis’yet, a member of the hunter-warrior caste. At this point in the Fess’ history, the caste system had been divided into 5 parts, where once it may have been 3 or 6 instead. The Kathis’yet comprised the caste just under that of the Gyisji, the highest caste of divinely ordained warrior chiefs, and just above the Sivaku, the caste of the priests and sages. In this period, the upper 2 castes focused on refining their version of the Hizh faith, in which each person had a personal spirit that was both their identity and their protector. The Gyisji had spirits of mythical entities, such as dead legends or demigods. The more skilled Kathis’yet were believed to have had the spirits of animals, many owing their spiritshape to their family patron animal. For all other castes, the Sivaku sages, the Benthsu artisans/merchants, and the Dalcu laborers, personal spirits reflected a virtue or idea they held dear, revealed by the Sivaku and a child’s parents on their coming-of-age birthday.

Unfortunately, none of identity rituals would come to pass for Goppes. When he was born, it was noticed that his skin and hair was a pale white, and his eyes were red. His family’s personal Sivaku remarked that the child’s spiritshape was not that of an animal, but a beast. Some form of fairy creature has stolen their son’s soul, and therefore, his birthright to the Kathis’yet caste. Goppes was, in essence, born a demon: Sa Wels, the Pale. In the far past, such were the lowest, sixth caste, undesirable Xils, but the Old Fess would purge their sixth caste altogether. As such, the Sivaku took Goppes away, proceeding out of the caves, and making his way to surface. Goppes’ family was inconsolable, and hurled accusations of witchery to anyone they could think of. One such woman, a lowborn Dalcu, happened to spot the baby being carried out into the wilderness. When one of her friends had heard her being accused, she warned the Dalcu woman, and elected to distract those who were ready to begin seeking her out.

Thinking as quickly as she could and knowing that her life was soon to be in danger, she approached the Sivaku meekly. She requested to take the child away herself, that the blight may touch holier hands no longer, and that she may receive better blessings and station through her actions. The Sivaku being so flattered readily agreed. As she received the baby, her friend was brushed aside. Calls came out from behind the Sivaku: “Sa Wels!” “Fairy Mother!” “The Baby is hers!” The Dalcu woman took Goppes and fled into the wilderness, now both being wanted by the clan they once called home.

##### Rainbow Exile

The Dalcu woman, named Seda, now had a demon baby, and the rest of the open plains and forests, to herself. The Old Fess thought she was a witch, and some part of her maybe believed that she was. Now, Seda found herself a mother to a strange baby who cried when the light was on him. She was not deterred easily, however. She knew how to build, she knew how to work the land, and she knew how to take care of a little one. So, she walked every night, and slept during the day under the large trees. She did this repeatedly, until she realized she was lost in this forest. Moreover, she looked down and her child was cloaked in burning fire. She reasoned to herself that she felt no pain, but as the forest began to spin, she saw more things appear. Visions of flying spirits, zooming back and forth along lines of crimson. She began to run with the burning child in arm, and the world becoming stranger…

Seda eventually saw a light. She ran towards it so fast her headdress came off and came out the other side to see a large canyon between colossal mountains. Scattered about the plains and craggy plateaus were piles of colorful stones. It is said that time was slowed and that the air tasted like cold honey. Here her visions peaked: and she witnessed the Aurora Undulatus (a glowing remnant of a cosmic event Ibixuu is unable to properly articulate), ripped off her veil and wept at it’s sight, declaring that no more would her and her kin be slave to powerful spirits of man. Instead she would discover the secret wills that delivered her into beautiful nature, and removed her binding veils.

Seda decided that she would live in this territory, under the strange Xi’goe vision trees, now in the land of the Hizh.

##### Goppes' Youth

Mother Seda had separated herself from the Fess culture and beliefs. She and Goppes would learn to properly walk the forest paths in a way that would not trigger whatever caused those strange visions. In a sense, Seda had begun to submit herself to natural forces, and in many ways, she started to become the witch the Fess would accuse her of being. They were often seen clad in nothing but decorative sets of bone jewelry and horns in their hair. In her pursuit of understanding Seda and her son would travel far between the Xi’goe territories and the Wu Hizh, learning what they could about flora and fauna of the area. The Fess would send hunters frequently, but they could never pass through the forest without becoming lost. In their freedom, and for much of Goppes’ childhood, they defied the very foundation of the Fess social structures.

Goppes grew to focus intensely on this part of his identity. As a child he understood he was different, even from his own mother. Due to his albinism, and lack of proper social support, it never escaped him that he was missing something. Even with all the freedom in the world, Goppes did not have the full picture. It felt like he never would at certain points in his life, even as he poured himself into his studies of nature. Seda noticed her son’s wandering turmoil and began to devise a plan. When Goppes was old enough, she would bring him to the beginning of the path that she herself had wandered and protect him while he found himself within the visions like she had. The tradition of the Seydwalk had begun. In the meantime, Goppes would learn more and more of how nature worked.

##### The Final Seydwalk

Goppes stood at the edge of the forest, now a young man. Seda acknowledged him, and advanced into the woods through the trees, signaling the beginning of the Seydwalk. Goppes would breathe deeply before stepping forward. He was gifted a walking stick, some water, and a fruit shell containing some food. He began his slow decent under the blanket of the Xi’goe trees. Moment by moment passed, mundane until he saw the shapes of the trees bend. Suddenly, it was as if spirits played out scenes of grandeur, in perfect cycles of time. Wolves and jackles hunted and killed, and the children of those slain animals grew and chased them off, before they themselves were killed by the very same. They returned to the start, and played it out again and again, right before his eyes. When he looked down, he saw a snake-like stretch of energy reach downward from the trees, into the core of the planet. It was held together by something, but it stretched out to reach everything. So… he decided to follow it. His mother followed with him.

As he walked, animals paid him no mind, nor did they stir when he placed his hand on them. The trees couldn’t have minded, when he did so to them. Goppes tore at the bark, and crumbled it to see the liquid sap, pink in color, run down. In his sight, it was a portal to everything, and so he brought it with him. First, he approached a tree, and within the tree sat three creatures obscured by the darkness. The tree loomed and snarled at him. He moved on, for he could not find a way to lead those creatures. Then Goppes lured a deer, with a beautiful black hide and golden antlers. Its eyes were like an endless cave. After this, he saw an elephant, clad in beautiful white and blue rugs, and ornamented. Soon after, a pair of fighting birds: one owl with piercing yellow eyes, and one raven, with deep purple feathers. He walked forward still, as they and Seda followed. His mother watched him advance alone on a branch; to her the animals were not there.

Unfortunately, there was one that was: a Baboon, covered in muck and algae. Goppes had almost found the edge of the forest, after nearly a day’s trek. Yet still, his visions remained. Seda endeavored to protect him, and so grabbing a branch, beat the green Baboon out of their path until Goppes reached the edge of the forest. The magic liquid had seeped into his skin though, and so he continued into the canyon, driven by the visions. Seda tried desperately to follow. Quickly, she was caught in something. She looked down to see what it was and found a red web. In a flash, Seda became paralyzed, having been bitten by a small white spider. Goppes then advanced through the canyon, alone.

##### The Seyducan

Goppes wasn’t afraid. Another twenty minutes had passed, and the canyon walls scraped the clouds above him. The spirit path burst forward beneath the ground he walked on, and the animal spirits watched him with each step. After the initial haze of the tree sap, Goppes had a hold of his sense of perception again and came to realize that he was alone. Still, he didn’t feel alone. He felt as if there were so many people, walking alongside him. Goppes for the first time felt as if he belonged somewhere, and it was right here in an empty canyon. He couldn’t help but think that he was walking in the same direction as whatever presence he felt that he was progressing towards some final goal. Inside, he felt warmer and warmer, and as the canyon retreated, in front of him was a wide open grassy plain, and a large pile of stones not too far off from his view. Multitude silhouettes faded in and out of his sight, playing and laughing, or slowly marching in the direction he chose to advance. “This spirit path” he wondered, “it connects me to these ghosts? Whatever it is… it connects me to everyone. Everything is a leaf on the branch in my eyes.” Past the stone pile he wandered, absentmindedly smoothing a stone over in his hand before tossing it back on. “The roots of the tree…” he continued to himself, before sitting at the pile, “…where do they start?” As he sat, the silhouettes converged, resting alongside him and around him. “Me. They start with me,” he remarked. To him, the spirit path converged on this one area, branching through the ghosts, through the animals, through him. Knowing not what this meant, he waited at the pile in hopes that he could somehow see the tree grow, sitting and waiting…

Before long, a family of Hizh approached the pile, and saw a naked young man, sitting.

The Hizh were fascinated and wary. The father of the group approached, stoic and ready, before asking the young Goppes why he was sat in front of this pile. Goppes replied that this was where he would grow a tree. The father then asked “Why here? Why grow a tree on this sacred pile?” Goppes then removed the stone he had touched before, holding it out in front of him. “The stone. Is it within your head? Is it within the pile? Or is it in my hand?” The father sat in front of him and motioned his family over. Then he replied to Goppes that it was in the hand. Goppes continued: “And the hole that is left. Is it in your head, or in the pile?” The father, nor anyone in the family could answer. Goppes explained, while placing the rock into the fathers hand: “The stone, nor the pile, nor the hole, nor my hand or you are the source of these confounding mysteries. It is the tree underneath… Where once the rock has been, so too the branches of it’s matter follow. The hole is never a hole, where once the branches of the tree have been. You do not occupy where you once have been, and nor the stone that occupies your mind.” As Goppes talked, the sap from the tree began to work, and soon the Father cried out “I see it! I see the path”, and his family looked on with awe. As the teaching continued, another family arrived, and another. “The stone, the hole, you, we are not what these eyes can understand. The stone was never in my hand. It was never in the pile, and it was never in my mind that this thing existed. The truth it seems… is that it always is. It always must have been. Where it once was to us, it lingers still, connected to that which it has seen. You see it too, and what I have experienced, the stone has as well. Through your faith in that, you have seen too.” More and more Hizh families arrived, over the course of hours. Then, soon it became a full day, then a week, and a crowd had drawn, desperate to ask this strange man for answers to questions only he could perceive.

“All things taught to me on my final walk. Form is an illusion. Only that which belies form is real. You and I, we have no distinction, because what we see and how we name will never be the Tree that is all. Only the sight, and only the name shall it be. But as all things live, interactions, the weaving of branches, one must understand that the paths we take and what we are must be the same. We are our drives, our desires, our actions. One day, we become the desires and drives of the dirt, the worms, and the deathcap. When we cease, we will still be, as we once were and therefore must continue. The unified whole is our only truth, and I will be here forever…” – The Seyducan, the only recorded words of the Prophet Goppes, and some of the first examples of proto-Tapphic literature/philosophy.

It is said that during this period, many Fess tribesmen of all castes came upon the Seyducan gathering. They tried to take the demon child but were unable to stop the crowd. Desperately, they returned to their settlement and attempted to denounce these strange ideas publicly, but it was already too late. It wasn’t before long that the teachings of Goppes reached the rest of the Fess, and though he was not there to experience it, Seda came to not long after. She returned to her life, without her son. Within a week of her waking, she came upon her old Fess settlement, ruined and abandoned, with many unclothed followers in worship wielding branches dripping with pink sap. The sermon had quickly produced a revolution within Fess culture, and the lower castes had violently overthrown the social order that had plagued Seda’s life. The doctrine of sameness, and oneness, had finally broken the back of Fess hierarchy. For the first time in many years, she approached her old village and was welcomed, not as a servant, but as the mother of the man who brought the truth. Her son saved her, and after the Seyducan was over, he returned.

Goppes would then lead the disparate Fess until his death.