[b]Name of Nation:[/b] Usharid Sultanate [b]Species:[/b] Humans form the bulk of the population and are the dominant “species”. Besides humanity, The Usharid also counts with a couple of notable Surabhi enclaves in the hinterlands. Which mostly exist to provide the Sultanate with specialist heavy infantry. [hider=Culture and Society:] The Usharid Sultanate is a young nation though its components are as old as its venerable neighbors. The Usharid tribes who have long dwelled in the desert hinterlands and the Hijarki peoples who made their home in the fertile coastal highlands. The Usharid themselves have been shaped by their eons in the desert. A culture of traders, raiders and survivalists, deeply immersed into the cult of Ushar, the god who created and named their people, and his priests. Whose powers bring forth springs from the depths of the earth and create oasis of life within the arid wastes of their ancestral homeland. To the Usharids, Ushar embodies the quintessential virtues a man should hold. a stern but caring father, even handed and wise. Willing to dish out terrible punishments when the situation calls for it but reward greatly as deserved. Below Ushar are the angels, his direct servants and emissaries. Some are named and are associated with a particular virtue, profession or aspect, a trend that has gained steam ever since the creation of the Sultanate and the conquest of the Hijarki coast. An astute observer might even find undeniable similarities between the newest canonical angels and some deities of the Hijarki pantheon. Ushar’s clergy is one that remains partly nomadic. Before the establishment of the Sultanate, temples were few and far between and most Usharid priests took apprentices at their own leisure, moving through tribes and oasis as they deemed necessary. The conquest of the coastline and the increased urbanization of the Usharid peoples over the last two generations, however, led to an increased hierarchization and organization within the Usharid clergy. Sponsored by successive Sultans, these reforms reshaped and expanded the structure of the Usharid orthodoxy. Several bloody purges and religious conflicts ensured that the Sultanate would, for the most part, follow this lead. Though several heresies still persist the further one goes from the capital and the coast. Besides greater religious structure, the new orthodoxy is also responsible for ensuring that the vast wealth of Usharid tribal lore could finally be collected and written down. On the other hand, the Hijarkis that inhabit the coast are for the most part a polytheistic people. Worshiping a pantheon headed by Tarun, the Mountain Father. The Hijarki faith is a heavily paternalistic religion and shares a few more similarities with the Usharid faith, which may speak of shared origins or mere osmosis due to proximity. The religion isn’t officially persecuted by the Sultanate, that officially isn’t interested in mass conversions either, as the infidel populations are more heavily taxed than proper Usharids. But the simple fact that the apparatus of state is controlled entirely by Usharids or the occasional Hijarki convert means that the stream of conversions, though not overwhelming, has been a constant fixture ever since the early days of the Sultanate. The societal pyramid, in simple terms, has the Sultan at its top. Below him is the aristocracy, who hold and rule lands in his name in exchange of military service and the clergy. Below them are the commoners, with merchants and skilled artisans and craftsmen above the mass. And then there are the slaves, household servants and bonded labor whose lives depend entirely on their masters and who have little if any legal protection. Criminals, prisoners of war, debtors, victims of raids and the like. Despite its rather feudal nature, the Sultanate does counts with a state bureaucracy. Though it can be considered rather small and underdeveloped when compared to the massive Imperial structures used by some of its neighbors, being entirely under the control of whichever aristocrat rules over the region. A system that has been created and used by the Hijarki themselves for centuries before, adopted by the early Usharid Sultans who did not deem the simple and often haphazard system of tribal organization good enough to rule over their new and greater state. As fitting for their origins as desert dwellers, water holds an important place within Usharid culture. Protecting the tribe’s water supply and ensuring everyone gets a fair share is one of the most important parts of a leader’s duty, and the strongest Usharid priests have long mastered the art of drawing water from the depths of the earth, making them well sought individuals all across the Sultanate. Engineering has also been long used to sate the people’s thirst, with the construction of Qanats and large reservoirs to provide for the masses. Among the Usharid settlers in the coastline, who have access to the Sultanate’s most fertile and irrigated land, the practice has become merely ceremonial. While the creation of sumptuous wet gardens has become something of a statement of power and wealth for the wealthy. The Hijarkis, original inhabitants of the coast, are a people far more versed in agriculture, construction, metallurgy and sailing. Their fertile highlands and mountains providing the Sultanate with the bulk of its food and a bounty of lumber and mineral resources. Their conquerors now exploiting their talents for all that they are worth. The old Hijarki warrior nobility irreparably crippled by the Usharid invasion and subsequent rebellions took out a vital chunk of pre war Hijarki society, coupled with the loss of independence and a considerable share of its material and cultural heritage due to the devastation wrought by the Usharids, this has guided the remaining intelligentsia into melancholy in the immediate aftermath of the Usharid conquest. Which led, surprisingly, to a new Hijarki arts renaissance. Deprived of their role as warriors for the first time in generations, the remaining Hijarki nobility turned to the arts and later, bureaucracy and administration. [/hider] [b]History[/b]: [b]Territorial Claims:[/b] [b]Economy[/b]: [hider=Army] The army is organized along feudal lines. The lords hold land on the condition they raise their [i]Junds[/i] to fight alongside the Sultan. These forces are raised from among their lands and generally vary in size and composition as no two lords rule over the exact same kind of land. Its the role of the bureaucracy to keep updated tabs on the state of these estates so that the central government can know exactly how big of a contribution each noble can provide, and together with army inspectors, ensure that they don't try to eschew their duties to the crown. Many of these aristocrats, both Usharids and the remaining Hijarki landowners, also count with their own mass production workshops within their lands. Allowing them to not only arm their troops to a decent extent but also to make additional profit by arming the levies of the lesser nobles who can't. Besides the landed nobility, the desert tribes are also obliged to provide military support to the Sultanate. To ensure that the rosters are kept up to date, inspectors are placed upon major oasis in the desert, places where the semi nomadic tribesmen will surely stop at one point in their wanderings. This system is not as effective as the one that deals with the nobility but it nevertheless does well enough for its purpose in providing manpower for the Sultan, especially excellent light cavalry and skirmishers. [/hider] [b]Navy[/b]: [hider=Traits] -Barren Land: Most of the territory controlled by the Sultanate is composed of deserts and dry lands. Survival is possible there, and many tribe still dwell in this vast territory as they did before the Sultanate rose, as nomads and semi nomads travelling through a circuit of oasis through the seasons. But that life is a harsh one, where there is little time for anything else than worrying about survival. -Learning from the betters: The Usharids are not above copying from others. The Sultanate was built on the foundations of Hijarki administration and bureaucracy and ever since then, the sons of Ushar haven't grown too prideful to admit that they have yet much to learn from others. Such as the traders coming from the divided lands of the Old Empire to the east. [/hider] [b]Foreign Relations:[/b] [hider=Rolls] Land Area: 11 Land Fertility: 3 (+4) = 7 Development: 12 (swapped with Magical Reserves): 16 Land Power: 19 (+1) = 20 Naval Power: 13 Economy: 16 Magical Reserves: 16 (swapped with development) : 12 Magical Sophistication: 8 [/hider] [hider=Tech trees] [img]https://imgur.com/pd9MJEM.png[/img] [img]https://imgur.com/dWQJIf0.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/D56puWP.png[/img] [img]https://imgur.com/vDIFWaR.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/igTi0Qy.png[/img] [/hider]