History

The peoples of Karameikos know the history of their
land well. The earliest history, recorded in an ancient
work of poetry entitled
“The Song of Halav”, tells of the
Traldar people. Generations of
Traldar bards and village
priests preserved this epic
through traditional oral storytelling
before historians finally
committed it to writing six centuries
ago.

The region now called the Kingdom
of Karameikos was once
the homeland of the Traldar, an
indigenous human race. Short,
stocky, pale skinned people, the
Traldar descended from the now
lost Nithians, an ancient empire
of which little survives.

Scholars excavating Traldar
villages have discovered that
the early Traldar relied almost
exclusively on fishing and hunting
to survive. They made their
weapons of wood and stone,
constructed rude dugout canoes
for transportation, and lived a
frugal, subsistence-level existence.

In Traldar legends, the Immortals
(godlike beings) bequeathed
to the Traldar the secrets
of working tin and copper
into bronze, weaving with spindle
and loom, creating pottery
with a potter’s wheel, and using
many other miraculous tools
and weapons. Indeed, evidence
indicates that Traldar civilization
took a sudden jump in sophistication.
Almost overnight,
the Traldar were forging bronze
weapons and armor, cutting
roads through the dense forests,
and joining communities into a
trading network of some complexity.
Traldar hero-kings such
as Lavv, Dendros, and Irthu
reigned over large forest communities,
engaged in trade, and
used armor and weapons of glittering
bronze.

The heroes from the legend, Halav, Petra, and Zirchev, were actual
persons. Halav was the chief of Lavv, a fortified village on
the site of modern-day Kelvin; Petra was the queen of Krakatos,
widowed early in the gnoll wars; Zirchev was a man of extraordinary
intelligence who had been educated by the Hutaakans (which
may be why the later legends gave him a bestial aspect).

## The Dark Age

The time of King Halav has since been called the Golden Age of
the Traldar, for the people of this land sank into a dark age following
the death of this great leader and never fully recovered
from the devastation brought by the gnolls. According to legends
which have sprung up since this Golden Age, King Halav must return
to Traldar lands before this can become a mighty nation
again.

During this dark time, many evil things appeared in the Traldar
forests and mountains. Some evil force cursed the land with vampires,
lycanthropes, and other beasts. Today, every village has its
legends of a neighboring ruin once occupied by a vampire lord, or
some local lad turning out to be a werewolf and slayer of villagers.
Often the legends are true, and every youth knows that the
land has its vampires and were-beings.

Because horrid things flourished in the woods, travel between
inland villages became unsafe. While coastline villages prospered
from foreign trade, only the bravest of traders would risk expeditions
into the Traldar interior. As a result, the inland villagers remained
isolated and more ignorant than their seaside cousins.
Clans of goblins, hobgoblins, and orcs also settled in Traldar
lands, away from human communities. They warred upon one another
and upon the humans, in general making the land wild and
dangerous.

Tribes of elves and gnomes also came to Traldar lands, the elves
settling in the central forests of the land, the gnomes in the
mountain foothills to the north. Both races traded peaceably with
the humans and fought beside them against the less friendly humanoid
tribes.

In time, the Traldar recovered from the inhuman onslaughts.
They began to call themselves Traladarans; Hutaakan influence
and the passage of centuries had wreaked a natural evolution
upon the Traldar, their customs, and their language.

Traders from Thyatis and the Minrothad area began making
regular trips to the coastal villages, improving their economy. The
Traladarans remained a non-nation of independent villages that
fought and traded together as the mood struck; they united to repel
a foreign invader but had no central government, no King Halav
to bring them together under a single banner. A number of
petty lords took the title of king, rarely ruling farther away than a
day’s walk, and often at the length of their sword. Ythron, Ivanovich,
and Demara were among these rulers.

Marilenev, a village at the mouth of the Volaga
River (now officially called the Highreach River),
rapidly grew into a town as trade flourished. It was
nicknamed “The Mirror Port” by the traders who
frequented it, due to the calmness and reflective
quality of its sheltered bay.

## The Thyatian Invasion

By a century ago, Marilenev was a flourishing trade
city of 500 residents and the chief port of the
Traladaran region. At the same time, improved communications
and trade raised the standard of living
within the disparate and previously isolated communities
farther inland, recreating a sense of national
identity. Had the Traladarans been left to their own
devices, the various clans most likely would have
united into a single council (similar to Glantri’s
principalities) dominated by a strong leader, possibly
a member of the powerful Marilenev Clan.

However, as a result of this growth, the nearby nations
of Darokin and Thyatis began viewing
Traladara with increasing concern. The forest nation
had never posed any organized threat, so neither nation
had ever erected any significant defenses
against Traladara. But, their leaders supposed, what
if the Traladaran people should be united under a
powerful leader – or, worse yet, conquered by an enemy
foreign power?

Darokin began sending merchants and government
agents to build commercial ties and alliances with a
number of Traladaran clans. The Empire of Thyatis
sent troops to Marilenev, the Traladaran capital, and
conquered it, claiming Traladara for Thyatis. The
Darokinian leaders shrugged at this development but
ensured that its border was secure from further
Thyatian adventurism.

Thyatis took few real steps to secure Traladara for
itself beyond installing a garrison of soldiers in Marilenev.
The military commander at the time renamed
Marilenev Specularum (which means “The Mirror
City”) after the reflective beauty of the bay. Taxes
were collected on all trade revenue changing hands in
the city.

Other than that, the rest of Traladara was left pretty
much to itself. The more isolated communities were
completely unaffected by the “conquest.” Traders suffered
a Thyatian tax, but the increased Thyatian interest
in Traladara merely resulted in booming trade
and increased profits for the Traladarans.

Such was the situation upon the arrival of Duke
Stefan Karameikos to the land that would eventually
bear his name.

## Stefan Karameikos

The modern history of Karameikos began 40 years ago in the empire
of Thyatis. Stefan Karameikos III was born in A.C. 948, the
heir to the small but unusually wealthy duchy of Machetos. His
mother died when he was nine, his father when he was 20, and he
became ruler of the duchy at that time. He’d already served as an
officer in the imperial cavalry for three years and had been participating
in adventures and heroic exploits even longer. He was a
friend of the emperor of Thyatis. His future seemed predictable:
Years of service in the military with adventuring on the side, then
retirement to wisely rule his duchy and advise the emperor on
matters of war and state.

Karameikos was no content with that fate. He wanted to rule
territory shaped by his hands and formed in his own image – and
that description fit neither the duchy of his ancestors nor the empire
of his Thyatian friend. He approached the emperor with an
offer. Stefan would grant most of his ancestral lands and properties
to the emperor in exchange for ownership of the Traladaran
region and a guarantee of autonomy.
The emperor was intrigued with the offer. Traladara had substantial
potential to become a wealthy region, but it would take
more time and effort than the emperor was willing to devote.
Karameikos’s lands were close at hand and already valuable.

The emperor and Karameikos came to terms and emerged from
their conference more than satisfied, each convinced that he had
come out ahead. Stefan Karameikos surrendered his ancestral
lands to the emperor. The few properties he had remaining he
sold for the ships and goods he would need to rule the region
properly. The emperor, in return, recognized Traladara as the
Grand Duchy of Karameikos, a sovereign region under the rule of
Stefan Karameikos III. Both rulers signed decrees of eternal
friendship and the promise of mutual defense in times of invasion,
and the deal was set.

Immediately after his agreement was signed into law, Duke
Stefan sailed for his new duchy, making landfall in Specularum
two weeks later. No fool, he presented his articles and orders to
the city garrison before assembling the city leaders to announce
his agreement with the emperor.

The powerful Traladaran families in Specularum saw the political
change as an opportunity to reestablish Traladaran independence.
If they could kill the duke when he was most vulnerable,
perhaps they could then erect a spirited enough defense to make
it economically unfeasible for the cost-conscious Thyatians to
conquer them again. However, before any organized plans could
be made, the Marilenev Clan led an armed revolt against the
duke. Stefan and the garrison put the rebellion down decisively,
and most of the Marilenev men died in the attack. Naturally, from
that point on the duke watched the other powerful families carefully,
especially the Radu and Torenescu clans.

Hooded assassins made a second attempt to take Duke Stefan’s
life, this time in his very bedchamber, but Stefan awakened in
time to seize his weapons and slay his attackers. He never learned
who had sent the assassins, although the wealthy Traladaran
families were obvious suspects.

The Traladaran clans, offended by the duke’s stubborn resistance
to assassination and overthrow, slowly and resentfully
swore loyalty to him. They turned to other methods of combat
and began to oppose him in the political, economic, and mercantile
arenas.

The duke began luring talented and ambitious young nobles
from Thyatis. He concentrated his attention on the second and
third sons and daughters of Thyatian aristocracy: the young men
and women who would have been properly trained to rule and
hold land but who would never inherit their own ancestral lands
due to their siblings’ continued good health. Many flocked to him, nobles, adventurers, merchants, and common folk alike, ranging
from single men and women to entire clans. Notable among these
new retainers were:

Ludwig von Hendriks , Duke Stefan’s aggressive and theatrical
first cousin, who received a baronial title and lands in the western
part of the duchy;

Philip Vorloi , a successful merchant who provided substantial
economic support to Duke Stefan and received a baronial title and
lands to the east of the Marilenev estate;

Sherlane Halaran, a nobleman and cleric of note who received
baronial rank and lands in the lushly wooded northern region of
the duchy;

Olliver Jowett , a church leader in Thyatis who broke from his
former teachings to help found the Church of Karameikos. While
he excepted no land, Jowett became patriarch of Specularum and
master of the church and

Desmond Kelvin, an officer and gentleman who was of crucial
importance to Karameikos during the Marilenev rebellion and received
baronial rank and lands north of Specularum, where the
Highreach (Volaga) River forks.

Duke Stefan spent some uncomfortable years in Specularum after
his arrival because he expended almost all of his tax revenues
on the maintenance of his army and the building of fine roads to
span the duchy. While he was about these tasks, the new breed of
Thyatian settlers spread out from Specularum, founding homesteads
and flooding into existing villages, often clashing with the
native Traladarans. Duke Stefan, in his youthful exuberance,
wanted to cement his claim to the duchy and push along the process
of settlement and civilization. Unfortunately, he was not as
thorough as he should have been about guarding against Thyatian
abuses, so early resentment against him and his followers was
harsh … and often deserved. After the Marilenev rebellion in
Specularum there was no further armed resistance to the rule of
Karameikos or his subordinate lords, but Traladaran resentment
started off high and was fanned by the callousness of many
Thyatian lords for years to come.

Baron Vorloi stole no lands, but he began undercutting the
prices of the Specularum merchant families, effectively stealing
much of their business. These families, already bitter at
Karameikos and his followers, now took great pains to oppose
them at every turn, publicly or secretly, as revenge for what they
had suffered. Worse still, Ludwig von Hendriks, the duke’s cousin,
caused immediate and unending troubles for the duke as soon as
he settled in his western lands (see sidebar, page 61).

Not all situations where Thyatians moved into Traladaran areas
were violent or even antagonistic. Baron Sherlane established
himself as lord of the village of Threshold and then ruled firmly
but fairly, treating Thyatians and Traladarans with equal justice.
Desmond Kelvin created a new settlement and named it for himself;
since he had seized no land and kept his followers in line in
stern military fashion, he did not earn the immediate enmity of
the surrounding Traladaran residents (his son, however, is another
matter).

## Recent History

In the three decades following Duke Stefan’s arrival in Specularum,
trade continued to flourish. Logging enterprises based out of villages
such as Threshold and Kelvin provided significant revenue
to the duchy. Specularum began housing ambassadors from many
of the civilized nations of the world, particularly those that wished
to engage in ongoing trade with Karameikos. Stefan founded a
magical college on the ruins of the old city of Krakatos, which
quickly became a center of learning.

The duke, no economist or merchant himself, was
generally a good judge of character and relied upon
the advice of intelligent and impartial ministers and
friends when deciding policy, arranging trade and
state relations, and settling disputes. When the
duke’s own common sense was not enough to solve a
problem, he used the brains and experience of those
who could provide a solution. His personal charisma
and reputation for fairness began to endear him to
the populace, Thyatians and Traladarans alike.

The family of Karameikos also has profited. In A.C.
979, Duke Stefan married Lady Olivia Prothemian, a
distant cousin of the Thyatian Imperial House. Stefan
and Olivia had been betrothed when she was just 11,
before Stefan took the Traladaran territory. Olivia
stubbornly waited to see if Stefan could establish
himself as master of his grand duchy, before finally
traveling there at the age of 20 to wed him.
The Karameikos’s first child, a daughter named
Adriana, was born in A.C. 980; their second, a son
Justin, was born in 982; and their third, a son Valen,
in 986.