Theory on Early Red Population Dispersion

Evidence heavily suggests the first Reds originated in the southern portion of the modern DSRR. After some relatively long span of time, population increase combined with scarcity of resources in that area spurred the northward migration of a majority of these early Reds. Those Reds who did not migrate expanded to fill the whole southern expanse.

The migrating group is speculated to have maintained a nomadic lifestyle across the central plains until they encountered the mountain range. At this point, the group would have split, two thirds going West around the mountains, one third going East.

The eastbound group eventually arrived at the Eastern coast under the central mountains, and thus circumnavigated the mountain range, arriving in a lush, tropical environment where they settled.

The westbound group arrived at the western edge of the mountains, which is marked by increasingly swampy terrain. One half continued deeper into the swamp, ending up in the southwestern marshes, close to the modern Purple border. The other half of this group turned northwards, emerging in a woody region on the other side of the mountains. However, this area wasn’t enough to sustain them all, so the group once again split, with some fraction later continuing on into the northwestern deserts, close to the modern Orange border.

Estimates for the length of time needed to finish this long migration throughout the Red territory range from a century to nearly five hundred years, but all sources agree that it was enough time for a lot of history to be lost, since there were no written records during the migration and oral histories degrade.

After this migration, that happened primarily on foot over decades and perhaps centuries, the separate groups essentially lost contact, with the exception of the woodlands and the desert group, who were close enough to maintain occasional contact. However, oral histories became legends and stories, and by that route each group kept some idea of what lay over the horizon, and that other groups of Reds might exist.

Over the next era, the groups expanded into their section of the Red territory, and learned the skills needed to thrive in these varied environments. Those who remained  in the southern tundras became individualistic hunters, fishers and warriors, and thus took the name Blood. Those who took to the northeastern jungles first lived off the land, then farmed it, living in harmony, and took the name Rose. Those who lived in the deserts and the woods became artisans of every craft, and took the name Flame, after the flames in their forges and their kilns. Those in the swamps created a system of knotted strings to relay information through the complex marshes, and thus took the name of Knot . These four groups remained completely separate for the remainder of the century, roughly.

At this point, we start to see written records, albeit in different forms, in each of these four groups. Knot developed their iconic knotted string system early on in their history. Flame developed a system of tall monoliths in the deserts and “runestones” in the forest region, which resisted the winds and rains of both environments, and were used to guide travelers and gatherers. Blood cut a set of glyphs into small flattened wooden sticks, which could be carried in pouches and did not deteriorate in the cold or the wind. Rose developed a paper-like material from river reeds and wrote on it with pens made from the stems of local ferns. These records are critical in providing documentation of the first contacts between these four groups, generally described as tribes at this point in time.

The first record we have of inter-tribe interaction is a small runestone, found at the junction of two rivers in Knot territory. The stone first notes the way to the wooded region north of there, in runes and in pictograms comprehensible by the Knot tribespeople. It then explains that it is a gift from the Flame tribe, and that the Knot are always welcome to trade for something translated as “floatwood”. Modern historians conjecture that floatwood refers to whole trunks of trees from the north, that could be made into swamp canoes by people of Knot.

There are many examples of later meetings, all marked by peace and trade. This is due to the various Reds knowing of other groups of Reds through old stories, and the fact that they all spoke dialects that were similar and comprehensible by all parties. These meetings helped create connections and routes between the groups. However, the demographics of the tribes remained essentially the same for another roughly fifty years.

After this point, something changed that is not entirely clear to modern scholars. Records start to show the transfer, not only of goods, but of artisans, of people. However, these trades clearly don’t make up any system of bondage. Rather, it seems that this worked as an exchange system for young craftspeople. For example, a young Flame blacksmith might be exchanged for a young Rose agriculturalist because an arable oasis had been found in the desert and a forgeable meteorite had landed in the jungles. Once these people had done their work, though, they wouldn’t always return to their homeland. A significant number stayed in their newfound home, plied their trade, settled down, founded families, and so on. This practice served to diversify the gene pool and the skillset of communities and tribes. Eventually, there was no lineage basis to tribe membership, since there had been so much intermingling. The tribes were the same in all but location and ideology. Over the next centuries, they spread out to cover all of Red, and the tribe distinctions blurred to become the light-hearted personality monikers we know today.