An Unsigned Treatise - Debunking the Dasarian Myth

[Publicus]

A treatise circulates, unsigned by any author circulates through the Province...

Debunking the Dasarian Myth
Part 1: A Comparison of Freedom

In these times it has come to my attention that a mythology concerning the old Kingdom of Dasaria has been built up in the minds of many, as if it was some sort of idyllic kingdom that every effort should be taken to be emulated. While there were many good things about the now defunct kingdom it was not some perfect land, and the idea that it was will easily lead to a blindness into how to deal with the present and the future. Inspiration may be drawn from the past, but to use this mythology as a model for the present and future is ill advised, and so I have written this document to explore some of the faults and flaws with the old Kingdom, examine some of the myths surrounding it so that people may look at it with honest assessments instead of as a utopia, and help the people move on to the future with clear sight.

The first thing we will look at is the idea of equality and freedom that is often held up as an ideal by those who hold up these myths. There are three main areas that most consider critical to this ideal. First is the free worship of one's chosen deity, the second is freedom of existence, and the third would be matters of slavery. It is admitted that the Kingdom of Dasaria was freer in worship than Varana under Marcus IV, as the worship of the gods Rel and Tyrak were abolished by him. However, this was not the normal status quo in the Empire. Before Marcus, in fact, while not widespread, the worship of those deities was allowed, and even encouraged in its proper times. The reasons the Emperor had to abolish the worship of these gods and brand them as heretical is unknown to this scholar, but suffice to say, in the Empire's over five hundred year history, the worship of these two deities was only banned for barely fifty years, and was a matter of much consternation not just in the Province of Dasaria, but also in the rest of the Empire. Now, of course, the Church of Lochwar has always been favored by the Empire, but this is to be expected as Lochwar is the Empire's patron deity. Likewise, the old Kingdom of Dasaria clearly favored Tharon, whom they called Marduk, over the other gods.

As an aside, in my study of the speech and expectations of many of those who hold up the old Kingdom, I have noticed a belief that the worship of Lochwar was banned there. I am unsure where this falsehood originates, but I suspect it is out of a desire for revenge against the Lochwarian Church for their efforts to persecute what they see as heresy. There is no substance to this belief, as the worship of Lochwar, as Druaga, in Dasaria is welled recorded, legal, and, in fact, some traditional Dasarian practices were adopted into the Church of Lochwar after the annexation of Dasaria, specifically the order of the Maidens of the Mace.

Now, we touch on a subject that I am sure will offend many of the supports of the old Kingdom myths, that of freedom of existence. This is not a commonly used phrase, so I will define it, freedom of existence is the freedom to live as one is, without fear of the persecution of the law. In this regard, neither the Empire or the old Kingdom is completely clean; however, the Empire upholds it better. You see, while both societies have caste and classes, with the law favoring those of certain breeding and birth, in the Empire one's birth does not automatically consign one to death. However, within the old Kingdom, people with the misfortune of being born with trace amounts of the blood of demons or devils, as well as those of the Tel'gothrim, were not merely looked upon with suspicion like they are with the Empire, they were, as a whole, given a sentence of death by the Queen and ruled that every one of them were enemies of the state. This sounds monstrous, and perhaps Imperial Propaganda even, but it is well recorded even in the histories of the time. Provided this policy was controversial, but it was the official policy of the old Kingdom. Comparatively, the Empire, while it does treat those of impure blood with suspicion, they are allowed to gain citizenship and are not condemned to death for their accident of birth.

The final area that will be examined concerning freedoms is concerning the matters of slavery. This is a touchy area and becomes confusing. For starters, some of whom the Empire terms as "slaves" are not what Dasarians think of as slaves. There are significant numbers of slaves who have sold their freedom for a term of servitude to another. The reasons for this are wide and varied, and beyond the scope of this treasie, but suffice to say, most Dasarians would not define these as "slaves" and in fact, in some parts of the old Kingdom this same practice existed, though it was called "indentured servitude" rather than slavery. The other significant portion of slaves comes from the ranks of those who have been stripped of their freedom for crimes. Dasarian punishment for criminals was decidedly lenient (a point which I will address later) but even so they tended to simply imprison criminals at great cost to the Kingdom (well, more often the local lords, but that is another matter that will be touched on later), meanwhile slavery as punishment for crimes alleviates some of the cost of imprisoning those criminals, it can also serve to teach them useful skills so that when their term of slavery is up they do not immediately fall back into their same criminal ways. Many Dasarians seem to think of Varanite slavery in the terms of chattel-slavery, lifelong and irreversible. This can be the case for slaves purchases from outside the Empire and for criminals who have proven themselves to be irreversibly corrupt, but the majority of slaves in the Empire are working set terms.

In conclusion concerning matters of freedom, both the old Kingdom and the Empire are not perfect, and both have their flaws. Some might prefer certain flaws over others, but one cannot claim that the old Kingdom was freer than the Empire or even better than it. Not unless you claim that the arbitrary taking of life for reasons outside of a person's control is somehow more moral than the taking of freedom from people who are being punished for crimes.

[Karma]

Thayne Rhaz finds a copy of this brought to him and reads it with a VERY pleased expression upon his face. He instructs his men to bring him any more of this document that they can find...

[Cypher]

At his desk in Thrall's Gate, Ward Aylows reads the treatise before him with interest. His eyes are sharp, focused on the text in the yellowing parchment. With a contemplative frown, he leans back in his hard, wooden chair, intently analyzing the message.

[Publicus]

Another part of the treasie circulates, again unsigned...

Part 2: Goodness of Government

The next area that seems to be held up in some form of Dasarian myth is the "goodness of government," in the old Kingdom. This, of course, ignores much of history and is based on an idealized remembrance of the old Kingdom compared to an Empire that was dealing with multiple rebellions. The history of the Empire is well recorded, and I will make no attempts to white-wash its various failings and sins. However, the old Kingdom was not much better. Internally, the old Kingdom was often corrupt and mismanaged. Morell being a prime example of this corruption that existed under the old Kingdom. The argument can be made, of course, that the Empire continues to allow such corruption, and this is accurate; however, it does not change the fact Morell's status as a corrupt and poorly managed city well predates the Empire's conquest of Dasaria, and points to an inability of the old Kingdom to fully control its territory. It is also worth noting that the Imperial government has undertaken many efforts to stamp out the criminal element of the city, but the corruption is so ingrained that it is nearly impossible to do so, and this criminal culture became ingrained within the city not due to Imperial law and punishment, but the failure of Dasarian law and punishment.

The question that must be asked is why? Why did such divergence between the ideals of the Kingdom and the implementation take place? The first, and obvious answer would be to proclaim that this was caused by a lack of resources due to the long, ongoing war with the Empire of Varana. While this is, in part, true, it does not tell the whole story. To truly understand the underlying causes you must look at the underlying structure of the Kingdom of Dasaria: that of a feudal alliance, rather than a centralized Empire as we're used to.

It is interesting to note that despite their claims, most people who proclaim support for the ways of the old Kingdom come at it from a Varanite point of view, with a vision of a strong central government able to enact and enforce laws through the entire regions. This was not how the Kingdom of Dasaria operated in the least. This view, interesting, betrays just how truly these individual has been integrated into the Varanite way of thinking, and shows that what they want is not a return to the old way, as they proclaim, but rather something else. An Empire with their own as head and enforcing their views as the law, rather than ideas they find distasteful.

But back to the subject at hand, the old Kingdom was completely dependent on the local lords for support, granting them much more power than similar positions in the Empire. This meant, of course, that those lords could then grant favor and abuse that power. Most purveyors of the old Kingdom mythology point to the Baraan family as an example of great Dasarian morality, or, atl east they have an obsession the the Baraan family holding of Daris. While the last Baron of Daris, Bearis, was perhaps a brilliant and upstanding noble, he had only limited influence in the kingdom, his barony being one of the smaller and only noteworthy due to it become a central hub for adventurers who supported him and his town, greatly increasing its power beyond what it could normally support. Research into his familial line though shows that the Baraan family varied wildly from upstanding champions of righteousness to foul embracers of Culnul, as surveys of the family crypt show and recovered writings from the ruins of Daris bear out. This is to be expected, of course, as humanity and the other mortal species can vary wildly between good and evil, but those Dasarians who do not fit the mold of the Mythologists are discarded and ignored in their attempt to hold up their ideal. Other historical studies show much the same thing, a mix of good and evil throughout the noble families of Dasaria.

And this is critically important to understand, these local noble families were much more important and powerful than the actual Monarch of Dasaria. In many respects, the Monarch of Dasaria was really the first among equals, as their holding was the Barony of Dasar. This decentralization, of course, had some minor advantages. It meant that the Kingdom could adapt to the lack of monarch with relative ease. But it also had significant disadvantage in that the laws were applied differently depending on the barony and the beliefs of their ruler. Which brings us back to the true origin of Morell's corruption. Even had there been no conflict with the Empire of Varana, Morell's corruption could have taken root due to the weakness of the central government of Dasaria. The Mythologists fail to recognize this inherent weakness, instead believing that if we embrace the old ideals of the Kingdom, rather than the forms of the Empire, that suddenly the will of the righteous will be enforced throughout the land. Instead, what will happens is that each territory within the Province will shift to even more extremes, as each local governor implements their own ideals and ideology in their territory, just as it was in the old Kingdom.

Efforts to remedy this problem of decentralization by locals in Dasaria was also fraught with corruption. The most stunning example of this was the brief Council of Lords. Based on misguided idea that an oligarchical and self selected group could rule effectively, this Council quickly proved to be ineffective and corrupt to its very core, and incapable of managing anything, even itself. This was replaced by drastic actions, with a brief period of Martial Law that was ended with the return of the Queen (cum Empress) Nelina to the throne of Dasar. But even after her ascension, the Queen only had limited control over the baronies, and had to balance their desires to keep them in line. In the end, this system clearly failed, and not simply because of the conquest by Varana. General (cum Emperor) Marcus IV used the flaws in this system to divide and conquer the Kingdom, by subverting Morell and turning the Baronies against one another. This could only be done due to the weakness of the central throne's power in Dasar, and shows an inherent weakness in the system that should be avoided.

In conclusion, the Kingdom of Dasaria had a weak and ineffective central government that could exercise little control over the local lords, and instead allowed them exceptional leeway in rule. While this occasionally bore good fruit, it also lead to deep seated corruption in some territories. Further, a modern embrace of such governance would not remedy the grievances that so many of these Dasarian Mythologists rage against, but instead exacerbate them and result in the complete fracturing of Dasaria as the same weaknesses that led to the downfall of the Kingdom would be exploited by the Canites.

[Peregrinus]

((posted to the wrong thread...

[Publicus]

A final section circulates...

Part 3 - On Power, It's Use, and the Origins of It

The third area delves into deep matters that most have not given thought to, but form a major underpinning of the Mythologist's mindset. This is a new idea of the responsibility of the rulers and the origins of their powers. It is unspoken by them, for it is heretical in thought, and even they realize it. It is a twofold idea, the first part is that the rulers have a responsibility to care for those under them; and the second is that power to rule comes from the people below, rather than the gods.

I will first address this idea of the ruler's responsibility to the people. When I speak of taking care of them, I do not mean in the sense of protecting them from outside threats. That is clearly a responsibility of the rulers, and one which they have clearly embraced. At times do they fail? Yes, for rulers are only mortals after all, and can become blind to certain things, or have corrupt elements of society miss their notice (or become corrupt themselves). The fact remains though, that the rulers of the Empire do clearly follow this responsibility, providing city guards and a military. But this is not the type of care they speak of, rather, they seem to see the it as the responsibility of the rulers care like a father cares for their children, giving succor to those in hard times, to widows and orphans. Why they believe this, I will get into later, but for now, understand that this is a great motivating cause behind them.

And it is nonsense. The Empire has only so much resources, and to do what they ask would place a greater strain on the Empire, or even a renewed Kingdom like they seem to cleave to. Further, to implement such a system would require greater bureaucracy, greater knowledge and control by the rulers of the people, both of which they seem to rail against. Finally, of course, this steps into the realm of responsibility of the Churches, especially those called to service by their gods, like the Ineanians and Nuararians. For the government to usurp this role is not merely impractical, it is an affront to the order of things and those deities.

And this brings us to the other underpinning of their ideas, that somehow power comes not from the gods, as is well know, but from the people. If this idea is true, then it calls into question the legitimacy of all governments, old Dasarian and Varanite. It is a truly radical idea, and one that historically is unsupported, nor it is supported philosophically and stand in stark opposition to the apparent truth of the Mandate of the Gods.

Let us explore why. Firstly, the order of things was set forth by the gods in ancient times. The gods themselves have a hierarchy to them, regardless if you believe in the Varanite or Dasarian ordering of the gods, it is always that one rules the others, and the others that are ruled. Within the histories of both it is immediately recognized that it is the gods who recognize and deal with monarchs, and it is their signs that support them. To show this, let us consider four historical and one current monarch.

The first we will consider is the venerable Canas himself. Founder of the Empire, Canas was granted the power and right to rule and conquer by pact with Lochwar himself. Canas, though, was not content with this, and so has returned, but without the support of Lochwar and his Church. It is well recognized that the Undead Canas has no legitimate Right to Rule, for the Mandate of the Gods is clearly not with him, as it was when the Empire was founded.

And what of Canas' grant opponent of the past, the ancient ancestor to our beloved Empress, Siril? Ignoring, for a moment, the heresy of the Dasarian view of the Pantheon and accept it as true within their view. Siril claimed the throne by right of strength and arms. Within the Dasarian view of the land, this is clearly favor bestowed by Tharon, who is master of arms and war. Siril's right to rule came from defeating his enemies, not from the will of those beneath him, no, for he led them, and they followed, because they recognized in him one who'd been blessed to rule by the gods.

The Mandate of the Gods, however, is not set in stone and can pass even when the mortals involved do not wish it to. This is clearly demonstrated by the second Father of Varana, Emperor Enedtil Minilsuzyan, who's contributions were so great we still date from the time of his rebellion against the legitimate heir of Canas. Bear this in mind, the Mandate of the Gods can shift, but only from a ruler who has left the will of the gods behind and no longer serves them. Such was the case with Pellaithil Phazzan, who's tyrannical rule and incompetence led to Minilsuzyan's rebellion against him. The gods displayed their favor clearly, and so it was the Mandate passed.

Then as a last look at history, let us consider the founder of the current Imperial Dynasty, Emperor Siliron II, originally Amanfalas Dairamik. A cleric of Lochwar, Lochwar is said to have called him to stabilize Varana as its new Emperor in a time of chaos and strife, once again showing the will of the gods as critical for rulership. His success in bring stability and the continuation of his heirs on the throne also show that the Mandate of the Gods continues to sit with the Dairamik line. Further, Emperor Siliron II also demonstrates how the Mandate of the Gods shifts from in times where no clear line is drawn.

Finally, let us consider Queen Elara of Iryrod. In her case the recognition of the Mandate of Gods is not just in her ascent to the throne, but also in that the gods saw he as fit to bargain on behalf of all her people. As is well known to the Iryrodians, when their Rianian cousins cut them off from the heart of their woods and stripped them of their elven longevity, Queen Elara pacted with Lochwar to persevere their health, though not their lifespan. That she was considered fit to bargain for her people clearly show the Mandate of the Gods was in her hands, for it was not the people who chose the pact, but their Queen, and they benefitted, but had no say in the matter.

Through all these examples, it is clear that it is the gods' will that monarchs rule and that the power of the monarchs comes not from people, but from them. To argue otherwise and forward this notion that rulers rule at the consent of the people, is not merely historically false, but also outright heretical, for it questions the clear will of the gods themselves. This undermines one of the major ideas underpinning these Mythologists in their criticism of the current government. As also pointed out, the impracticality of the rulers provide succor to all those under them makes them seem more like idealistic utopians rather than people with a real vision and understanding of governance for the future.

-----------------------------------

In conclusion of this entire series, these three main subjects: Comparative Freedoms, Goodness of Government and the Origins of Power seem to be the main areas that those who spread the myths of how good the Old Kingdom of Dasaria misunderstand or misconstrue. As has been show, the Empire of Varana in many respects grants greater freedom to the people than did the old Kingdom, with the Empire only punishing people for choices they make in worship, while the old Kingdom punished people for simply their birth. The idea that the rule of Dasaria was inherently any better or functional than that of the Empire has clearly been shown to be false, with the weakness of the monarch of the Kingdom leading directly to corruption and its failure as an independent power. Finally, the deep philosophical underpinnings of these Mythologists have been shown to be at best blinded by idealistic zeal, and at worst heretical, for their calling into question the obvious hierarchy of the gods and their will. It is this humble author's fervent hope that these arguments will convince you, my readers, that the solutions pushed by those that seek to overthrow Imperial rule and return to the ways of the Old Kingdom are impractical and misguided, and instead that a different path must be taken.

The path that must be taken though, is not the one most of you will assume it is based on these writings. I will begin to lay out a proper vision for the future in my next series.

Until then, I remain yours,

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