Cianian History (Patreon)

Ciania was originally settled by human barbarians from the East, likely searching for food during the great famine.  They settled first in the Ester river valley, before learning of a vast inland sea of fresh water.  Explorers discovered the Buen, a massive inland lake the result of a massive glacial melt ten thousand years ago.  Roughly four hundred miles across, and eight hundred miles long, the Buen was a formidible barrier in its own right, and some believed it the edge of the world.  However, a large island bisecting the narrowest section of the Buen, the remains of an ancient, colossal morraine, proved to be far more appealing for agriculture.  It was also home to large desposits of bluestone, which could be pulverized into a deep blue pigment widely valued back east.  The barbarians settling the island quickly prospered and united under the first great King, Cyarr the Conquorer.  He founded the Cianian calender from the time of his coronation, with time being labeled as AC or BC.

During the Rise of Buenlan, many barbarians continued to move further west, displacing various non-humans as they spread.  It wasn't until 12AC that Cyarr died and his eldest son Cyann took the crown.  Cyann had his sights set to the immediate west, where the terrain was idea for both fortification and settlement.  His goal was to capure the territories between the two mighty rivers in the west that fed into the Buensea.  However, there was a problem.  The lands were under the sway of various cults of Darkness, and he feared their reprisal.  In secret, he summoned the witches of Darkness and pledged that he would protect their order if they did not oppose him.  They agreed.  He marshalled an army of 1200 fighters and crossed the narrows to the shore.  In three years time, he was able to pacify most of the scattered tribes.  However, this agression caused many settlements to pull together, and the People of the Hart organized to styme his expansion further west. Rather than force a conflict, Cyann the first started fortifying a large granite outcropping near the straight.  This fort would protect both the island and their gains.  Cyann renamed the country Cyanlan, after himself before his death in 56 AC.

Cyann the second, the First Westward Step, rose to power ready to prove himself.  He was the only one of four sons to survive to adulthood, and many thought him sickly.  He martalled an army of ten thousand and went to war with the Hartlanders.  The fighting was fierce, but Cyann exploited a tribal loop hole.  Instead of slaughtering all resistance, he married women of the prominent tribes, and wed his sisters to men from cooperating tribes.  Most of these marriages were purely ceremonial, but six of the tribes became supporters of Cyan the 2nd.  These tribes absorbed the others and became the 'Heart' of Cyannia.  Cyann the second spent the remainder of his life cementing the cooperation of the tribes until his death in 89AC.

Cyann the third, Child of Light, was a superstitious man who considered many of the tribe's practices dangerous.  A devotee to the cult of Light, he followed his father's practice of wedding into the tribes, but had no interest in growing ties.  Instead, he declared that all forms of the Cult of Darkness had to be purged.  Soothsayers, gravekeepers, witches, and seers were rounded up and executed.  Sites sacred to the darkness were burned or leveled.  The result invited a catostrophic magical backlash against the king.  While fixated on this hunt, and with the various curses and attacks, the Buen was neglected terribly.  Cyann the third's second son, Tyan, deposed his father, sentancing him to prison on a remote keep on the Buen.  He assumed the title Cyann the fourth in 108 AC.

Only 16, Cyann the 4th took the title, The Restless, and struck a truce with the cults of darkness.  He married sixteen women and nine men in a ceremony to cement the union of Cyann, and successfully pacified much unrest.  Cyann the 4th also had a noted sense of humor.  Instead of conquest, he financed exploration of the west, learning the western border of the Heartlands, as well as discovering the great granite plateau of the Stonelands to the north and the Riverlands to the south.  Cyann the 4th was a builder, and saw the value of the stone immediately.  He comissioned the first raised, stone paved road betwen Cyann and the Stonelands in 117 AC, and started the Westward Road across the center of Cyanlan.  The roads, meant for defense, also facilitated trade between settlements and the capitol.  In 131 AC, he undertook the first war for control of the Stonelands from the barbarian tribes that inhabited it.  By carefully isolating each tribe, he was able to force most surrenders without copious bloodshed.  He also discovered Mount Cyarr, which he named after his great, grandfather.  He attempted to climb the mountain nine times, dying on the final attempt in AC155.

His death struck off a severe seccession crisis in the kingdom.  Cyann the 4th had 17 male heirs on his death, and several refused to acknowledge the eldest as king.  The tribe leaders called a meeting called a 'conclave', to work out who would be king.  Ultimately, the tribe leaders settled on his 12th son, an unassuming young man camed Hardon.  He was seen as a compromise between the eastern heartlanders, and the western heartlanders, and the families on the Buen.  Named Cyann the 5th in AC156, he was then married to 27 different women.  He became known as Cyann the Weary.

Inspite of this title, Cyann the 5th continued the systematic annexation of the Stonelands, but now feared potential conflicts from the East.  The Pashta Kingdom was in ascent, and Cyann feared that they'd attempt to spread westward.  He struck up diplomantic discourse between the Pashta and Cyann, and an odd friendship was born.  Both men were of similar ages, and the Pashta kindled in Cyann the 5th a desire to make Cyann not just mighty, but wise.  However, families on the Buen were unhappy.  The Islanders felt that they were being neglected to conquests to the west.  To placate them, he expanded the public works to the island as well, providing paved roads, docks, and helping the families build their palaces.  Quieted, he then addressed grumblings in the Heartlands that they were neglected by moving the capitol from the Buen to the fortess on the western shore. 

The construction of the capitol began in AC177, and was in part inspired by the majestic city of Caliparst in the east.  Building a city from scratch, Cyann called the finest minds to plan a centralized city that would be defendable, an effective capitol, and a center for trade and learning.  Using the stonebuilding skills they'd honed producing roads, the captol of Buencrown was founded.  Many tribes refused to assist in the payment of the capitol, so Cyann the 5th appointed some as High Families to cement their support.  Cyann the Weary died in AC201.

There was no dispute to Cyann the 6th, the Bloody.  While his father had focused on the construction of the new capitol, Cyann the 6th had systematically poisoned, stabbed, and strangled most other contenders for the throne.  Some believe he was responsible for his father's death (In fact, it was the 69 year old's 15 year old wife).  While he followed his father's tradition of taking multiple wives, those from the Heartland quickly died in accidents.  Cyann the Bloody saw the islanders of the Buen as the true people of Cyannlan.  He instituted a series of pogroms and humiliations against the Stonelands and Heartlands.  Heirs were forced to come to the capitol as hostages, where they were frequently brutalized for imagined insults.  Taxes were raised to crippling heights, and squandered on lavish banquets and other excesses on the Buen.  Failure to pay was met with harsh reprisals.

In AC205, the first uprisings began.  The Ston, a noble family in the Stonelands, collaborated and unified a half dozen other families across the Stonelands.  Cyann the 6th sent out the army to butcher and annihilate every Ston in the west.  The Ston's army met at the battle of Rushing, where the army was funneled into a narrow gap in the mountains.  The Stonelanders trapped them, and butchered the army from the cliff's above.   Instead of declaring themselves an independant country, as many expected, the Stons declared themselves as true children of Cyannlan and the 6th as a usurper.  Rebellion took fire in the Heartland as well.  The old families, the Grenbows, the Lonspers, the Stags, the Southwaters, and the Hammers raised their own armies.  Cyann the 6th withdrew to the Buen, but then faced rebellion as Buen nobles allowed the armies to land.  In AC209, Cyann the 6th was captured attempting to flee south.  He was deposed, and burned alive along with most of his children.

The youngest male heir of Cyann the 5th, Ironically the child of his youngest wife, became Cyann the 7th.  Only 8 years old at the time, many assumed he would be a weak king.  However, his mother, Temesse, had secured his safety in Pashta during the 6th's reign, and he returned as the kingdom's first literate ruler.  He wed only into the families that had rebelled against the 6th, taking Marsila Ston as his first wife.  The two were only a year apart in age, and yet complimented each other perfectly.  She was familiar with all the families, and he knew what Cyann needed to grow.  He spent ten years erasing the damage done by his uncle.  Cyann proved patient and fair, taking council from his mother and wives, who became the first Private council.  He became known as Cyann the Kind, then Cyann the Just, and finally Ciann the wise.

In AC220, he completed the annexation of territories and tribes in the Stonelands, and now considered the tribes in the Riverlands, south of the Heartland.  The rivers made military attempts difficult.  He made several diplomatic attempts, but the tribal people in the Riverlands refused to deal with him.  Unexpectly, he let them be, and instead focused on building a road from the east edge of the Buen to Pashta.  He assisted in the establishment of the Kingdom of Estlan, between the two countries, a country seen as a unifying bridge between East and West.  He also assisted Garumi refugees, resettling them to the north of Cyannlan at the headwaters of the Icinrun river.  They formed the Kingdom of Rannya, and named Cyann the 7th as a blessed figure.

In AC241, Ferlanders to the south launched the first raids against the Heartlands.  Paddling up the shore in long canoes, they set up raiding camps, fleeing when the army arrived.  Cyann the Wise sent multiple envoys to the Ferlans to try and determine who was behind the raids.  His patience paid off, and he sent his army into Ferlan with the blessing of their tribes and spirits.  They routed the raiders, and opened up trade with the Ferlans.  Cyann the Wise also started building the first warships seen on the Buensea, to discourage future raids.  He also drafted the first writen laws of the kingdom, and had them placed in every major settlement where anyone who could read, could see them.  Finally, he gave protection to the non-human residents.  The Taurine people could live on property under the protection of noble houses.

In AC262, Cyann the Wise died in his study, surrounded by books and notes for the future of the kingdom.  His third son, Balzar the Bold, had little interest in them.   He named himself Cyann the Mighty, and set out to expand the borders of Cyann along the eastern edge of the Buensea.  Pugnatious, he dared war several times with Estlan, and even Pashta itself.  Finally, in AC283, he suffered a crushing defeat at the hands of the Estlanders and Pashta.  this, in turn, inspired him to modernize and organize the largely warrior based army into a true military.  Units were standardized, and the first officer corps were implimented.  The upkeep of units was entrusted to the noble houses, which were expected to provide assistance to the crown during war.   He then marched against the barbarian highlanders in the mountains to the west of the Heartlands.  Although he secured little territory, he did prove the effectiveness of the new military.  He died in AC 285 from disease.

His first son, Cyrbol, seemed an ideal choice.  Charismatic, open minded, and handsome, many had high expectations from Cyann the 9th, the Beautiful.  However, it was soon clear that he had none of his grandfather's wits.  In AC288, he attempted to secure the Riverlands once and for all.  He organized an army of 50,000 men, the largest ever in the west, and marched south along the Buensea... in spring.  The mud was ungodly, and hundreds drowned in floods and to diseases spread by biting flies.  He blamed the failure on the Cult of Darkness, and persecuted the order, inviting renewed curses from the witches.  At the first battle, three competing generals bungled affairs so badly that the army was defeated by a well organized mob of 3000 warriors.  Cyann the Beautiful then tried to march through the Ferlan to invade the Riverlands from the south.  The Ferlan tribes rose up inmasse and annihilated the invading force before they even reached the Riverlands.  He attempted to use the navy to invade directly, but the deployment was so mismanaged that the soldiers were often left starving or slaughtered in piecemeal.  Finally, he attempted an invasion of Runnya... simply because he'd had no luck with the Riverlands... in winter.  Two thirds of the army froze to death.  This was compounded with Cyrbol's neglect in running the state.  He was more interested in spending time composing music than in royal affairs.  He promoted massive orgies in a crude attempt to placate the masses, and then over indulged in them himself.  Funds for roads were flitted away, and rumbles of rebellion began anew.

Fortunately, it wasn't needed.  In AC 321, he was discovered drowned in his own vomit.  The noble houses selected his 5th son, Arrol, as King in a Conclave.  Arrol was well educated, but the opposite of his father, moody and isolated.  Many feared he was mad.  Worse, his father's bungled wars had left the country dangerously vulnerable.  Hachian raiders from the far north swept through Runnya and were poised to strike Cyannlan itself.  The horsemen were the first pure calvary based armies ever seen.  Cyann the Silent, however, did not throw his men at the invaders as the generals wished.  Instead, he ordered settlements in the invaders path to be stripped of all supply and burned.  The army fought delaying and redirecting tactics, even building a fake town to lure the army back on itself.  The populace roared, but he maintained control.  Within a year, the Hachians were starving, and caught by the fall mud season, surrounded by the army.  The Hachians were all but slaughtered.  Then, instead of seeing to his own, Cyann the tenth marched north.  He liberated Rynnia from the Hachians encamped there for winter is a brutal winter campaign.  Some belive he made deals with the dark pact to keep his army from freezing.  He then set about restoring the country from his father's over indulgences.  Still, he kept the unhealthy practice of orgies commonplace in the captial, more to placate nobles than to partake.  This lead to the 'great muddling'.  Doubt in noble lineages skyrocketed.  Common people were disgusted by the practices.  To handle both, he sought out Pashtan sorcerers to track blood lineages and to cement that a child born to a family was of that family.  This lead to mixed children with dual claims in more than one household.

Cyann the silent had a long but largely uneventful rule.  He perfered the company of men, but managed to sire one son with his wives.  He died in 349 alone in his study.  His son was named Cyann the 11th.  Like his father, he was quiet, and his growth was stunted.  He stuttered, and many expected a conclave to remove him.  Cyann the small, however, proved himself to be a cunning ruler.  He played nobles against generals, and took actions that cemented the throne's power over each.  He only took three wives, and one husband, and yet was most fond of a non-human mistress.  He also achieved what his grandfather had failed to do: annexation of the Riverlands.  He observed the various tribal feuds that gripped the region, and allied himself with certain clans.  With their help, they neutralized the opposition and helped his army take the Riverlands.  Then he winnowed out the most loyal and offered them nobility in return for annexation.  They agreed.  Cyann the silent also sent expeditions to map the mountainous Highlands, and even travelled all the way to the sea.  Cyann had deep attraction to non-humans, having a 'menagerie' that he spent a great deal of time with later in life.

Perhaps that neglect was to explain for Cyann the 12th.  He was Cyann the small's youngest son, yet he was enamoured of the Cult of Light.  More specifically, the religion spreading across the east, the Light of Man.  It claimed humanity was the creative force in the universe, and non-human races were inferior.  One night AC 380, he and a cabal of believers, broke into his father's menagerie and slew him and his non-human wives.  In the skirmish that broke out, his siblings were killed and he anoited himself ruler of Cyann.  Support from the east flowed in to back him as he ruthlessly crushed any opposition.  He targeted non-humnas and the cult of darkness at first, but soon any opposition was crushed.  Foriegn mercenaries from the east waged a bloody war fueled by intolerance and zealotry.  By 380, he had killed thousands of innocents and tens of thousands of Taurines.  The race was almost wiped out, fleeing west into the highlands for sanctuary.  He had a single, Pashtani wife, and mandated that all cults of Light convert to the Light of Man.  Cyann the Terror, with foreign assistance,  instituted a religious conversion of the west.  Runnya converted to avoid an imminent invasion.

However, unbenownst to him, his son in AC396 was making moves for a conclave to be held in secret.  Representatives from the families met, but questioned how they could overthrow him with his substantial foreign assistance.  That was when the witches of darkness met.  They aggreed to assist the coup in exchance for protection under the law.  After much deliberation, they accepted their offer.  The conspirators bid their time until, in AC 398,  when Cyann the Terror's foreign mercenaries turned south.  to convert the Fenlanders to the faith.  With he majority of his allies south, the nobles rose up and overthrew the few defenders remainding.  For the next two years, Cyann the Terror fought against Cyann the Dark.  Witchcraft kept the armies of the pious disorganized, spying and eliminating enemies.  After two years, the armies of the faithful were spent, and the foreign assistance dried up as rebellions in the east diverted resources.  Cyann the Terror went north to Runnya, demanding assistance.  The King of Runnya refused, exiling him.  He would eventually return to the east, certain that he was the true king of Cyannlan.

(more later.  I need to change my introduction)