Hasaapian

Hasaapian are an ethnic group containing multiple species sharing a common language family and religion inhabiting the area to the north of Huiruior and beyond, and is speculated to have originated in the area of the river Hasaap. The group has historically formed multiple tribal federations that have threatened the Silnarian Empire’s west flank. They follow their namesake Hasaapian religion. They reside in large numbers around the Hasaap river basin and in areas far off to the west.

General Information

• Primary Faith: Hasaapian
• Language: Hasaapian
• Locations: Anuishken, Kadrush, Off-Map West
• Minority: Silnaria, Mentia
• Races: Canifor, Ursinoid and some other Beastkins.
• Inheritance Law: Male-Preference Primogeniture.
• Slavery: Hasaapian are fine with the idea of slavery. Slaves are considered the lowest part of their society - though laws prevent them from being abused too heavily, and they can be bought or sold at will. Hasaapian accept the idea of freeing people from society - a freed slave and their descendent is considered to owe allegiance to their former master for at least three generations before becoming fully free. One can become a slave by falling into debt, being captured in war and skirmishes, or being born to slave parents. A children born of mixed slave and free parents are considered slave, but master may choose to take them into their own family if they particularly like them.
• Name Generation: https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/finnish-names.php & https://www.fantasynamegenerators.com/sami-names.php, avoid names of foreign origins, especially German.

Cultural Traits

• Rule of the Elder: Hasaapian tends to respect the older members amongst their tribes and see them as a vital source of wisdom - though not necessarily leadership.
• Respect for Strength: While strength is not the sole criteria for leadership (Contrary to popular belief, allowing the strongest brute to challenge the leader tends to lead to disintegrating society), strength is greatly respected in Hasaapian society. However, “strength” also includes magic, and so one could win great respect despite being an outsider by mastering powerful magic. The strong are showered with gifts, respects, assistance where needed, but also expected to support the weaker one.
• Tribal Honor: An offense against a tribal member is an offense against the entire tribe, and a favor for one tribal member - especially one that has since become deceased, is one that will be repaid by the entire tribe. This is of course, subject to the rule of reciprocal favor.
• Favor Society: Favors and interpersonal relationships are highly valued. If one accepts a gift or help from others in time of need, you - or your closest able kin are expected to return the favor. Hasaapian value the idea of debt and honor.
• Right of Conquest: When formal wars are declared, Hasaapian believes in a winner take all situation. There’s no civilizing mission, and once war is won - the winners are expected to take their wealth, livestocks, people and land.
• Raiding Culture: Hasaapian often participate in frequent, usually low casualties raids aimed at taking livestock but not lives, against each other and their neighbor. Hasaapian rulers have historically tried to channel their aggression outward with varying degrees of success.
• Dueling Culture: Between people of roughly equivalent power with great disputes, a duel to first blood (but not death) is seen as a proper way to resolve dispute, and there is no dishonor in losing, for by accepting a duel one is doing the honorable thing. What is dishonorable however, is to duel people who are clearly much weaker - which is seen as bullying, and to not accept a duel when the matter at hand is at stake. Accusations of murder and other heinous crimes are seen as sufficient ground for duel. The Hasaapian elites have managed to twist this tradition a bit however - if they are sufficiently strong and don’t believe in their chance of winning a duel, outright warfare might result with devastating consequences.
• Free Intimacy: Hasaapian are very accepting of the idea of physical intimacy before and outside of marriage, and consider it to be not a problem so long as it is done in private and discreetly. Indeed, it is implicitly accepted for people of both genders to occasionally partake in such pleasure. Conceiving children outside of wedlock however, are highly discouraged.
• Symbiotic Culture: Hasaapian consists of multiple groups of race - primarily Canifor, Brayer and Centaur. Canifor dominates the agriculture based society, with brayer taking in a secondary role, often as warrior and laborer. Centaurs tends to dominate the job of herding, trading animal products for grown food though impoverished centaurs will often contribute to farm labor.

Subculture

Jorti

The Jorti are variously classified as a subculture or an independent culture. Although they share the same language and religion as the Hasaapian, the Jorti consists entirely of Qua which have co-existed and migrated alongside Hasaapian for centuries, but have developed some drastically different customs of their own:

• Cognatic Primacy: In contrast to the Hasaapian’s male preference, inheritance runs along the female line and is primogeniture in nature, with females gaining much more power in their society.
• Quasi Democratic: Queens are elected amongst respectable and senior members of their society for life, who then elect a queen amongst themselves.
• Maternal Justice: Duels, feuds and war against each other of the same culture are highly frowned upon in Jorti society and disputes are solved by taking issue up to the most common matriarch or elected queen.
• Merciful Warfare: Jorti don’t believe in winners, take all raiding warfares and avoid it against members of their own society if they can help it.
• Polyandry Acceptance: Jorti accept polyandry and prohibit polygamy, which is the reverse of regular Hasaapian culture.

Cuisine

Hasaapian cuisine is not considered to be highly sophisticated. The primary types of grain eaten are wheat, millet, oats and rye - in the inland part of Hasaapia, the weather can get cold enough for wheat to be not growable. Potatoes are not eaten by Hasaapian, with most Hasaapian believing it is poisonous and unhealthy for non-Silnarian. Whereas oats are often seen as animal feed elsewhere, oats are eaten in massive amounts eagerly by Hasaapian centaurs. The primary types of fat are butter and lard, with plant based oil seeing nearly no occurrence.

Cattle, pigs and sheeps are herded en masse - and brayer see no issue with consuming beef - nor does centaur with consuming horses. Pigs are commonly raised by the Jorti. Meat is commonly prepared in a large, whole roast with salt, onion, thyme and rosemary and other kinds of local herbs. Hasaapian however, are extremely skilled at salting and curing meat - and is known to have developed a very intricate system of cutting, dividing and grading meat, salting them which is then often exported to the Silnarian and eaten widely amongst themselves.

Fruits are commonly grown and cultivated, and added as simple flavoring or dessert for higher class meals.

The primary drinks are beer, made with different kinds of grains and flavored with fruit. There is no natively grown wine, and it is an expensive import. Mead is a common prestige drink, and honey is used frequently as a sweetener.

Hasaapian cuisine are based on Polish cuisine with Eastern European influence.

Warfare & Tactics

Hasaapian warfare has developed according to the fact that they have multiple races. Canifor and Brayers exclusively serve as infantrymen, mostly armed with shields and short blades and axes, with polearms being quite prominent, especially billhook and halberd. Swords are not common, and often seen as a prestige weapon created by the captive Silnarian population.

Armor of the Hasaapian tends to be less sophisticated than their eastern counterpart, with most commoners wearing a helmet, a linen gambeson or coat if they can afford them, and armor made out of mail or lamellar metal plates. The Hasaapian Canifors tend to not develop an archery tradition, leaving it as the traditional job of the brayers who tend to utilize large longbows and serve as archers - and often as local wardens or hunters.

The Hasaapian relies almost entirely on their centaurs for cavalry, who universally practice horse archery using composite bows and shock warfare with lances and cavalry mace. Most centaur cavalry tends to be light, with only the rich being able to afford decent armor - even then metallic armor on the horse body itself is uncommon.

History

The known history of the Hasaapian people is told from a Silnarian perspective - alongside existing Hasaapian historical records - the Silnarian are the first civilization that have made contact with the Hasaapian, alternating between periods of cooperation, trade and intense conflicts.

Pre-Silnarian Period (600 BS - 45 AS)

The first record of the Hasaapian lies around 600 BS - a time where the Silnarian have settled multiple cities around the modern Bay of Atshim - including the City of Atshim - but have not united into the single Silnarian Empire yet (nor were they called Silnaris). At this point, the Silnarian civilization has not pushed far west into the eastern basin of the Hasaapian river. Records of that time indicated that the Silnarian were very aware of the Hasaapian culture to the west. They traded with the neighboring Rulmi people who inhabited the less fertile land and plains to the southwest sparsely, and to the further west, the Silnarian made contact with the North and South Hasaapian people.

• North Hasaapian - The Hasaapian of this time was described as speaking a similar language, and mostly Ursinoid - they inhabited the land west of the river of Hasaap and several islands and peninsula around the outlet - they are noted to be master sailors and construct great ships and despite the distance between their domains and different tribes and kingdoms, appears to largely speak the same language.
• South Hasaapian - The other composing (and later dominant) group of late Hasaapian culture - Canifors, were noted as a free people who inhabited the middle reach of the Hasaapian river and a large amount of land to the west - staying away from the coast where the Ursinoid lived.

Generally speaking - historical records of these people did not change much over the years leading to Silnarian unification - with the exception that the North Hasaapian were noted to be expanding in power - gaining control over the Hasaap river. Records of Kings show a trend toward an increasing amount of North Hasaapian instead of South Hasaapian names - and mention of bears lording over dogs.

Silnarian Period (45 AS - 753 AS)

By 45 AS - the city of Atshim was already under the Silnarian Empire’s control. Further records from this era noted that in the south - along the Hasaap river, the Canifors have replaced Ursinoid as kings and rulers of the land - as here they far outnumbered the previous Ursinoid invaders - and suffer from coastal raids from North Hasaapian - alternating with amiable trading relationship. Yet it is noted they speak the same language. To the north and northwest - Hasaapian entities ruled by Ursinoids prevailed and continued to monopolize the sea. The forest people - who in previous centuries were noted as an independent entity, seems to have been forcibly incorporated into the Hasaapian Kingdoms and ruled over by Canifor overlord. The formation of modern Hasaapian culture was at hand.

During successive expansion wars in the 1st Century, Silnaria pushed west steadily - first gaining the Rulmi as tributaries who eventually submitted to Silnarian rule - under the belief that the Hasaapian to the west was even more threatening than elves who taxed their livestocks. The scattered Hasaapian Kingdoms and tribes were no match for the Silnarian Empire. Silnarian rule expanded to the eastern bank of Hasaap river - using the river as a natural barrier against further Hasaapian conclusion. The modern city of Meshet (Silnarian name: Meisead - pronounced MAY-Shed) - allegedly named after a local Hasaapian King, was established as the capital of Western Silnaria. The Silnarian did not manage to push west of the Hasaapian river or settle it for any significant period - instead fortifying the eastern reach and colonizing it.

While the Silnarian settled and colonized land in the east, they attempted to assimilate the native - however the Hasaapian were generally resistant to assimilation attempts - leading to successive years of rebellions, crushing of said rebellions, enslavement of natives and violence. Whereas the Hasaapian stayed rebellious and unassimilated, their Rulmi neighbors gradually adopted Silnarian customs and language - but mostly stayed true to their own religion.

At the end of the 5th Century, the land of Western Silnaria was about 20 - 30% Silnarian, with the rest of the land inhabited by Hasaapian who occasionally fomented unrest but largely tolerated their overlord. The Silnarian population were overwhelmingly concentrated in urban centers the further west you go - whereas in the eastern part near Suibuilime and Atshim the land were mostly Silnarian and Rulmi in ethnic composition.

Dozhabian Invasion & Aftermath (753 AS - 1011 AS)

In the early-eighth century, the Dozhab Federation formed amongst free Hasaapian west of Hasaap river - as a coalition of tribes to protect against North Hasaapian raiding, attack from [Culture A] herds to the south and slave raids by the Silnarian. Relationships between them and the Silnarian were cordial - until the Silnarian fell into a routine civil war. Seizing the opportunity to greatly expand their territories, the Dozhab Federation swept east and overwhelmed undermanned garrisons in most of Western Silnaria - with the civil war contender literally ignoring this invasion - figuring out that they can just handle this later. Most of the Hasaapian population in Western Silnaria gladly joined their brethrens whereas the Silnarian that failed to escape in time ended up lorded over by the Dozhabian. These left behind Silnarian would be vital in the rapid transmission of metallurgical and magical skills to the newly formed Dozhabian Federation.

The Dozhabian Federation didn’t last more than twenty years before being destroyed - but most of the Hasaapian majority land to the west remained ruled over by successor kingdoms and tribes that formed in its wake.

This period was one that was short on record - the former Silnarian population of the new Dozhab federation started to migrate out, whereas the Hasaapian people advanced technologically.

Modern Anushken Period (1011 AS+)

The Anushken dynasty ruled over one of the North Hasaapian Kingdoms off the map - an Ursinoid Kingdom like any other. One of the brother of the ruling King, Jarri Anushken - had a keen interest in religious study and preached a reformed and changed version of the Hasaapian religion. At first his preaching was tolerated and then eventually, his own brother considered him too troublesome and exiled him to South Hasaapian territory to preach.

Unexpectedly, he managed to convince multiple tribal leaders to accept his version of preaching - especially when he modified his message to start promising rich lands to the east. Eventually, a tenuous federation of Hasaapian entities were formed under him and united to invade Silnarian land in the east - pushing into Mentia and the upper reach of the Lur river at its peak. Unexpectedly, Jarri Anushken died in Year 1012 - breaking up the tenuous federation - the prominent Ritafil family - hailing from Mipmi - rebelled and took a large chunk of the coalition with them - forming the modern Kingdom of Kadrush and then invading Mentia.

Over the next 30 years - the Anushken Federation held together with a weak government and an Anushken leading them - Hasaapian culture flourished during this period, as the war with Silnaria ended and extensive trading between the Silnarian, Lymian and Hasaapian began.