The Rivan Codex

by David Eddings

  WOMEN

  Gowns of a Grecian cut. Color-coding is legally required, but the law is largely ignored except on formal occasions. The hair is worn in the Grecian manner.

  Tolnedrans customarily wear daggers (the sign of a free man) but the daggers are largely ornamental.

  WEAPONRY

  The short-sword—about 2 feet long—lances, javelins, the short bow.

  THE COMMONS

  Artisans are identified by color-code on their tunics

  FREEMEN (WORKERS)

  They wear no trim

  Wages are standardized; about $800 per year

  Slightly less for farm-workers

  Prices of staples are fixed by law

  Note: Rank in the priesthood is equivalent to rank in the nobility.

  Rank in the bureaucracy is equivalent to commercial rank. Academics rank with Artisans.

  Doctors and Lawyers have the equivalent of commercial rank.

  POPULATIONS

  7–8 Million Tolnedrans, mostly in villages or on farmsteads

  MAJOR HOLIDAYS

  Midwinter—Erastide—(the world’s birthday). Feasting, jollity, parties, gifts

  Midsummer—The Festival of Nedra. Prayers, religious observances

  Various—The current Emperor’s birthday

  Early Fall—Ran Horb’s Day. Celebration of the birthday of the greatest emperor. Military parades; patriotic speeches

  Late Fall—Mara’s Day. A day of guilt. Offerings to Mara. Pay all debts. Processions of penitents

  RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES

  The priesthood is comfortable and not very devout. Religion is formal and perfunctory. Prayers are largely for luck and profit.

  The Monastery at Mar-Terin—cloistered

  Mendicant Monks—beggars

  Most Tolnedrans aren’t very religious

  Appendix on Maragor

  The kingdom of the Marags which once lay in that pleasant vale in the southeast quarter of what is now Tolnedra is, as all men know, no longer in existence. The destruction of Maragor is, of course, our national shame. This is not stated out of some desperate need for guilt which we observe among some of our less stable colleagues, but is, rather, a cold and incontrovertible fact. The Marags were not by any means an admirable people, but their annihilation, as we now know, was an unnecessarily extreme response to a cultural aberration which might have rather easily been rechanneled.

  GEOGRAPHY

  The vale which was once Maragor is a mountain-surrounded and fertile valley at the headwaters of the River of the Woods measuring one hundred leagues by twenty-five leagues. It is dotted with lakes and watered by the sparkling rivers which form the upper tributaries of the River of the Woods. Those hardy souls who have traversed it report that it is truly one of the loveliest spots in the known world. The horror which dwells there, of course, makes Maragor totally uninhabitable. It is also, unfortunately, non-exploitable for precisely the same reason. The free gold still glitters on the bottoms of the streams, but none dare risk their sanity to claim it.

  THE PEOPLE

  The Marags were a short, olive-skinned people of the same racial stock as Tolnedrans, Nyissans and Arends. The single characteristic which all the world thinks of when the Marags are mentioned is, of course, the fact that they were cannibals. How extensive this practice was is the subject of much debate among scholars. The savagery with which the Tolnedran legions extirpated the Marag culture left little in the way of documentary evidence behind; and one may be certain that if no Tolnedran willingly would now enter Maragor for gold, he would be much less likely to go there in search of records or fragments of parchment.

  The archives in the monastery at Mar-Terin, however, do contain some few fragments which provide a sketch outline of the Marag culture.

  They were, it appears, a secretive people with little desire for contact with outsiders. They were also, insofar as we are able to determine, largely matriarchal, and the institution of marriage among them was strangely under-developed. No stigma seems to have been attached to out-of-wedlock birth, and casual liaisons appear to have been commonplace. Beyond these few tantalizing hints, little is known of the Marags.

  HISTORY

  We must assume that the Marags migrated to the west during the first millennium as did the other peoples of the west, although there is no way to substantiate this. Cities and temples of stone were erected in the Vale, but when they were constructed and by whose order, we have no way of knowing, only that the legions which destroyed the country did attest to their existence. The cities appear to have been oddly-constructed assortments of stone buildings without protective walls around them, and the temples, standing alone on the plain, were vast constructions of enormous stones erected with incredible amounts of primitive labor.

  The only body of historical documents we have relate to the nineteenth-century war between Maragor and Nyissa. The causes of that war are unclear, but the Marags mounted an invasion of the jungle-country of the snake people and pressed rapidly on to the Nyissan capital at Sthiss Tor. The reports of the field commanders of this invasion provide certain chilling hints about the nature of Marag religious practices. The conclusion of each report of the capture of a Nyissan city or town lists—by name—those luckless inhabitants who were ‘assumed’ for the greater glory of Mara. We can only shudder at the thinly veiled meaning of that term.

  The Marag invasion, of course, came to grief after the occupation of Sthiss Tor. The cunning Nyissans had, before evacuating the city, poisoned everything edible in the vicinity. Marag soldiery sickened and died in appalling numbers, and the desperate field commanders frantically appealed to their superiors back in Maragor for food. Ultimately, they were forced to abandon the city and flee back through the jungles to the mountains and thence across to Maragor. The trail of dead and dying soldiers they left behind them gives mute testimony to the virulence of Nyissan poisons.

  The only other contact between the Marags and outsiders came just prior to the destruction of the entire people. Tolnedran merchants attempting to enter Maragor in search of trade were driven out of the country. No amount of official remonstrance on the part of the Imperial Court could persuade the Marags to relent, and eventually the city of Tol Rane was constructed on Maragor’s western boundary to provide a suitable site for trade. The few Marags who took advantage of this commercial opportunity paid handsomely for the wares they purchased in fine gold. It was the discovery of this gold which sealed the fate of Maragor.

  The events leading up to the Tolnedran invasion and the details of that ruthless campaign have already been discussed and need not be repeated here.

  When the campaign was over, the few pitiful survivors were sold to Nyissan slave-traders who promptly chained them together and drove them in long columns across the mountains into the jungles of Nyissa. Their ultimate fate is mercifully hidden from us.

  Thus perished Maragor—the living Maragor at any rate. The horrid reality of the dead Maragor remains to haunt us fully three millennia after our ill-advised adventure there.

  Reports of the exact nature of the shades which haunt the vale which was once Maragor are hardly verifiable, since most who have been there and survived hover on the verge of madness. All confirm that the Spirit of Mara shrieks and wails throughout the land, but reports of the hideous phantoms who haunt the land vary widely. Curiously, all the more coherent accounts indicate that the ghosts are female, which seems to make their mutilated shades that much more horrifying. This latter observation is confirmed in part by the monks of Mar-Terin who (though madness stalks their ranks also) provide us with the most authoritative accounts of the ghosts who have made Maragor not only uninhabitable but unapproachable as well.

  Let Imperial Tolnedra resolve most firmly that never again will we allow ourselves to be pushed by our greed into such shameful acts, and let perished Maragor—an eternal rebuke—stand forever between Tolnedra and a repetition of this most monstrous crime.

  COINAGE

&nbs
p; No coinage. Marags had a barter economy. The costume was Greek. Men—short tunics and sandals. Women—short silk dresses.

  SOCIAL ORGANIZATION41

  Houses and land belonged to the women. Men were athletes, hunters and soldiers. The society was very loose and considered immoral by other races. The men lived in semi-military dormitories—when they weren’t ‘guests’ in the house of this or that woman. Men had no property. The Marags were very enthusiastic about athletic tournaments. Religious observances were orgiastic in nature. The society tended toward a lot of nudity because the Marags had a great admiration for the human body. Their temples doubled as athletic stadiums.

  THE CANNIBALISM

  This came about as the result of a mis-reading of one of their sacred texts. It was ritualistic in nature, and those consumed were all non-Marags.

  MANNERS

  Marags were good-natured and happy-go-lucky. The men were not interested in trade (which made the Tolnedrans crazy). The Marags were total Pagans with virtually no inhibitions. The women were very generous with both their property and their personal favors.

  There were probably no more than a million Marags.

  THE ALORN KINGDOMS

  NOTE

  The four kingdoms of the Alorn peoples, Cherek, Drasnia, Algaria, and the Isle of the Winds are a direct outgrowth of the Kingdom of Aloria which existed in antiquity and which was divided during the reign of the legendary Cherek Bear-shoulders at about the end of the second millennium.

  The Isle of the Winds

  GEOGRAPHY

  The northwest-most of the twelve kingdoms, the Isle of the Winds is a rocky, almost uninhabitable island to the west of Sendaria and Cherek and to the north of Arendia. Perpetual, gale-force winds sweep off the ocean to beat against the island’s west coast. Because of reefs and high cliffs, the island is totally unapproachable except at Riva, the island’s only city. A limited fishery exists at Riva, and there appears to be some mining in the mountains of the island—mostly in useful metals such as iron and copper, although there do appear to be deposits of gold and silver which do not seem to be extensively exploited.

  THE PEOPLE

  Although they call themselves Rivans (after their legendary first king) the inhabitants of the island are basically Alorn and descendants of a fairly substantial migration which appears to have occurred at about the beginning of the third millennium. Curiously enough, the migration to the island by the Rivans seems to have occurred as one single expedition, significantly unlike the customary migratory pattern of other peoples which is characterized by succeeding waves and periods of consolidation. The Rivans are markedly different from their Alorn cousins in Cherek, Drasnia and Algaria. They are generally called the Grey-Cloaks (from their national costume) by the common people of other kingdoms, although until recently they were seldom seen off the island. The Rivans are sober, even grim, and close-mouthed to the point of rudeness. Reported to be savage warriors, they are fanatically loyal to their ruler (called simply the Rivan Warder) and wholly committed to the defense of their capital at Riva.

  THE HISTORY OF THE RIVANS

  As previously discussed, the Rivans migrated to the Isle sometime in the early years of the third millennium. Amazingly, the line of Rivan royalty appears to have descended in one unbroken line from the legendary Riva Iron-grip to the last Rivan King, Gorek the Wise, who was assassinated in 4002 by agents of the Nyissan Queen. This unbroken succession marks the longest dynasty in the history of all the twelve kingdoms, apparently enduring for nearly two thousand years.

  Perhaps in keeping with their national character, the Rivans have formed no alliances with any of the other kingdoms, and have steadfastly refused to sign even the most rudimentary trade agreement with the representatives of the Tolnedran Emperor. This rigid stubbornness was a source of unending frustration to whole generations of Tolnedran diplomats and a continuous irritation to two complete Tolnedran Dynasties.

  Following the Accords of Val Alorn in 3097, efforts were made to establish normal trade relations with the Rivans but without success, and finally, in 3137, Ran Borune XXIV mounted the disastrous expedition to the Isle to force the gates of Riva. The adventure, of course, was an unmitigated disaster. Preparations were then made for a full-scale invasion of the Isle, until the now-famous note from the Cherek ambassador persuaded the Emperor to abandon the entire project.

  In time the Rivans grudgingly consented to the construction of a commercial enclave outside the city walls, and visiting merchants were forced to be content with that single concession.

  By custom, no merchant or emissary is ever permitted inside the walls of the city itself, and most certainly not within the fortress at the center of the city.42

  There are but two exceptions to this. The first is the Alorn Council which occurs once each ten years and during which the kings of Algaria, Drasnia, Cherek and sometimes of Sendaria (when the King of Sendaria chances to be an Alorn) journey to Riva and are conveyed—alone—to the Rivan throne-room where, it is rumored, they report to the Rivan Warder concerning the search for the heir to the Rivan Throne. The other exception to this rule is in accordance with the humiliating agreement of Vo Mimbre which requires that each Tolnedran Imperial Princess present herself in her wedding gown before a Rivan Throne for a three-day period on her sixteenth birthday.

  NOTE

  Tolnedran Princesses for the past five hundred years since the great Battle at Vo Mimbre have reported that the entire city of Riva is little more than a walled defensive position with individual houses forming salients, redoubts, bastions and the like, and that the streets are laid out in such fashion that they are overlooked by and exposed to overhead attack by each succeeding row of thick-walled houses. Moreover, the roofs of Rivan houses are all of slate, and there is nothing exposed within the city which will burn. The Fortress is a sheer tower with enormously thick walls and but one very narrow iron door. The throne-room is reported to be a very large chamber, musty and unused, in which sits the Rivan Throne, a large seat of black basalt with a rusted sword embedded, point downward in the back and having a large greyish-colored pommel-stone—possibly some artifact or souvenir out of the dim reaches of the Rivan past.

  For the first thousand years of its history, the Isle of the Winds was deliberately isolated, cut off from all contact with the civilized world. For reasons which are largely unclear, Cherek warships maintained a continual blockade of the port of Riva, allowing no vessels of any nation to land there. Convinced that there was enormous wealth on the island, Tolnedran and Sendarian merchants pressured the Emperor at Tol Honeth for several generations to force the Cherek Alorns to lift their blockade. This was finally accomplished in the Accords of Val Alorn of 3097, and a horde of Tolnedran and Sendarian ships descended on the harbor at Riva only to be met by unscalable walls and a silent, locked gate. The details of the efforts to persuade the Rivans to trade were discussed elsewhere (see The History of Tolnedra).

  The controversy ultimately was resolved peacefully, although for a time the west hovered perilously near the brink of open and general war.

  The single most significant event in Rivan history was the assassination of King Gorek the Wise by a party of Nyissan merchants, apparently upon the instruction of the Nyissan Queen in 4002. The incident is marked by confusion, and a factual, detailed account of what actually took place has never been forthcoming. It appears that the royal family was invited to the commercial enclave to receive a special gift from the Queen of Nyissa. Upon their arrival at the Nyissan compound, they were attacked by seven Nyissan merchants armed with the traditional poisoned knives of their race. The king, the queen, the crown prince and his wife and two of their three children were killed, but no trace of the remaining prince was ever found. Two of the Nyissan merchants survived the assault by the Rivan guards and were at length persuaded to reveal their connection to the Nyissan Queen.

  The resulting war between the Alorn Kingdoms and Nyissa was perhaps one of the most brilliant militar
y campaigns in the history of the west, which fact raises serious doubts about the customary dismissal of the Alorns as barbarian Berserks. A series of hit and run raids on the Nyissan coast by Cherek raiders diverted the attention of the snake people while a vast force of Drasnian Infantry and Algarian Cavalry made the seemingly impossible trek across the mountains of western Tolnedra and attacked down the upper reaches of the River of the Serpent. An expeditionary force of Rivans ascended the River of the Woods and made a swift overland attack on the Nyissan capital of Sthiss Tor, entering the city while a majority of the Nyissan army was in the east attempting to hold off the invading Algarians and Drasnians and the remainder of their force was trying to repel a major landing of the Cherek fleet at the mouths of the River of the Serpent.

  Before she died, Queen Salmissra XXCVII was persuaded to reveal to the leader of the Rivan force precisely what had been behind the assassination, but the leader, Brand (who was later chosen to the post of Warder of Riva) did not reveal that information to anyone but the Alorn Kings.43

  The Tolnedran Emperor attempted to intercede, but the Alorns proceeded to systematically destroy the entire kingdom of Nyissa, pulling down the city of Sthiss Tor, burning towns and villages and driving the inhabitants into the jungles. So savage was this Alorn extermination that for five hundred years the entire country appeared depopulated, and only after that length of time were the frightened Nyissans persuaded to come out of the trees and begin the process of rebuilding their capital.

  In some measure due to the enormous volume of trade which was being destroyed and the tremendous loss of revenue resulting, a Tolnedran force moved south to restrain the Alorn barbarians, but they were met at the River of the Woods by an overwhelming force of Drasnians, Algarians and Cherek Berserks. It was not until that point that it was fully realized in Tol Honeth the actual size of the Alorn army on our southern border. The commander of the Tolnedran Legions prudently decided not to interfere with the Alorns but merely positioned his force along the north bank of the River of the Woods to protect the integrity of Tolnedran territory.