Member
Punished GNThe Kingdom of Arcanain
Geography:
|Geographical Location of Country:| Off the eastern coast of Geisel’s mainland clay. Marked in white on the map.
|Country Size:| Approx. 640,000 km^2
|Cities:|
Cante (Blue) - The capital city of Arcanain, situated at the inlet of the Monnow Bay. Renowned for its freshwater ports letting directly to the sea down the silt-laden Monnow Channel. Possesses the largest concentration of people on the entire island.
Blackcaster (Red) - A largely industrial and sea industry-based city, Blackcaster is situated on the far side of the (inactive) volcanic mountain chain on the northeast side of the island. Least populated of the major cities.
Presburn (Green) - As the main mooring station for the Royal Arcanain Navy, Presburn is a military town situated among the wilds of the peninsular lowlands. Boasts a respectable amount of land and population, albeit the facilities are subpar when compared to the rest of the island.
Keldby (Magenta) - As an inactive volcanic island, Keldby is home to a specific ethnic group similar to those of mainland Arcanain, although said ethnic people are much lighter skinned and shorter, averaging a whole head shorter than the average citizen. Popular spot for entrepreneurs due to its relatively untapped precious metals and extremely fertile soil.
|Natural Resources:| Arcanain is primarily renowned for skilled and efficient steelworks. With iron from the island of Keldby and coal from the Northern Mountains, Blackcaster’s steelworks can produce up to 45 million tons of steel annually. A noticeable absence of proper woodlands has made the lumber production of Arcanain sink to levels which fail to even satiate their own needs, requiring them to import much of their timber and wood products.
Arcanain’s food situation is stable, being mostly a sustainment industry, with most of the food coming from saltwater fishing and lowland wheat farming, with most non-seafood products being imported. Rich copper veins in the lowlands, large salt deposits on the coastal cliffs of the north, and flax plantations and textile mills on the southern coast are also staples of the natural resources on Arcanain. Additionally, a small crude oil supply exists upon Keldby, which often is enough to satiate simple civilian demand, however Arcanain has negligible military oil supply, relying on imports and inefficient synthetics to substitute.
People & Culture:
|Population:| Approx. 34 million people
|Demographics:| 68% Arcani, 15% Kelds, 4% Geiselian, 2% Sairish, 8% Other
|Government:|
Arcanain, as a kingdom, is undeniably a constitutionalist one. While the head of state is clearly the monarch King Liam III (born Edmund Liam Sheridan) of the House of Sheridan, the parliamentarian system dictates that the head of government is to be separate of the monarch. The head of government, as the chief legislator and executive power, is the Premier, a title held by one Davian Merrill, a staunch conservative who is a vehement activist on maintaining the status quo.
Under the King and Premier is the Parliament, divided into two houses and charged with drafting and passing legislature. The first house, being the House of Nobles, are a limited sort holding only 25 seats of no particular provincial allegiance, each member appointed by the King and approved or vetoed by the Premier. If the Premier vetos the appointment, the decision goes to a select council of 10 members of the lower house, the House
of the Public, who decides to support or overturn the veto. This lower house, the House of the Public, consists of 50 seats (3 per province), with each representative being elected in by the province in which they reside.
Finally is the Royal Courts, which interpret and apply laws according to the founding documents. Five members comprise this highest court, which handles the most pressing issues. Under them is system of federal circuit courts divided by province. Under the circuit courts in each province are the local courts.
Under the King and Premier is the Parliament, divided into two houses and charged with drafting and passing legislature. The first house, being the House of Nobles, are a limited sort holding only 25 seats of no particular provincial allegiance, each member appointed by the King and approved or vetoed by the Premier. If the Premier vetos the appointment, the decision goes to a select council of 10 members of the lower house, the House
of the Public, who decides to support or overturn the veto. This lower house, the House of the Public, consists of 50 seats (3 per province), with each representative being elected in by the province in which they reside.
Finally is the Royal Courts, which interpret and apply laws according to the founding documents. Five members comprise this highest court, which handles the most pressing issues. Under them is system of federal circuit courts divided by province. Under the circuit courts in each province are the local courts.
|Ruler:|
Head of State & Monarch - King Liam III (born Edmund Liam Sheridan)
Head of Government & Premier - Davian Merrill
|Volksgeist:| ”If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs, if you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two impostors just the same. Yours is the clay and everything that's in it, and - which is more - you'll be a man, my son.” -Arcani philosopher John Vaugh
The Arcani are a proud people, with the great virtue of continued and voluntary neutrality, along with stoicism which could make the steel from their mills look weak in comparison. The Arcani are not overly nationalistic, and by no means do most Arcani possess a jingoist bone in their bodies, having thus avoided war and true entanglements beyond trade and pacts of non-aggression.
By no means a world power, Arcanain has often had little say in any world events, only able to conduct influence through trade partners and those weaker than even them, and their reliance on imports in the modern day has left them at the whims of the market, a much contended state of affairs.
WIP
|Religion:| Most Arcani, mostly due to their roots, worship the Orthodox faith, housing their own Arcani branch, of which the reigning monarch is protector. However, other than titles and invokings of the names of the Gods, Arcanain’s government is rather secular, and the religious fervour of populace varies depending on the presence of the Church.
|History:|
The story of the Arcani begins millenia ago, as a travelling people. As the Geisel people left the lands of Zengrav, the Arcani had become them. Ethnically the same, it could be said at this point, the Arcani were of the Geisel. And though as many Geisel found Magna Geisel home, many tribes, the Arcani amongst them, did not. But where these other tribes made to fight their way through the kingdoms and duchies to the south, the Arcani found a solution more practical to them: the sea.
The Arcani took to the sea in the 700s, taking their nomadic lifestyle over the ocean. After probings of every landmass within their reach, they stumbled upon the island they had called Arcani’i (roughly Arcani’s, as in possessive), now known as Arcanain. Tribes and clans descended upon the haven, finding that other tribals had settled there: the shorter, paler, and hardier people now known as the Kelds.
But the Arcani were numerous, and the Kelds were not, and the foreign peoples descended upon the island with conviction. By the 1000s almost the entire island belonged to dozens, even hundreds of clans of the Arcani. The Kelds had been forced into the sea, as the Arcani had been forced into the sea by the Minga, and the Kelds eventually came to inhabit the island known as Kelderbie (Land or Clay of the Kelds), now known as Keldby.
The Arcani clans, now in firm control, had none else to contend with but the other clans. A quasi-feudal society had emerged by the mid-1100s. The petty clans contented with each other for centuries, until, in the 1300s, the southern portion of the island came under the control of a single clan, the Sherdugh (meaning Clan of Order), under a chieftain by the name of Bhaltair Sherdugh. By conquests and intermarrying, Bhaltair came to control a fair portion of territory. Unfortunately, he promptly died in 1379 of illness, leaving the clan to his son, Willem.
Willem is the man most often credited with the founding of the modern Arcani nation. Given chieftainship at 17, Willem raised the levies of his territory and engaged the interwarring northern clans. The campaign was easy pickings, most of the clans falling by 1385. Despite this, a pact of six clans formed in the volcanic mountains and cliffs on the northern coast, calling themselves the Northern Alliance. Holding out for six years, their final hold was overrun in the year 1391. At the age of 29, in the Orthodox abbey at Cante, Willem was crowned King Willem I of Arcanain
Having conquered the entire northern half of the island in 12 years, and made many reforms in the civil, government, and military sectors, his rule stagnated once he reached the age of 50. He retired to his manor in Presburn and left his governmental machine to rule. He eventually died at the age of 67, leaving his kingdom to his son, Liam.
After multiple monarchs reigning supreme and sitting complacent, the feudal system began to break down as it had in other places. The people grew restless, and the feckless and inept monarch King Jermaine II witnessed the ultimate result on June 18th, 1653. The long neglected standing military could not stop angry peasants marching on the Royal Palace at Cante. Jermaine II retreated to the Royal Manor at Presburn as the thin line of Royal Guards blocked the mob’s path.
Later that month, Jermaine II and his advisors eventually met with the peasant leaders, drafting the charters which would eventually become the founding documents, including the Charter of the Parliament, establishing the legislative branch in earnest. Also, in 1688, a treaty with the vassalized island of Keldby brought it into the kingdom as a province.
The June Revolution served as a wake-up call to the Crown and the government as a whole. The amassed coffers were dumped into practical projects, like infrastructure, and a new army model was devised, all under King Liam II, crowned in 1703. The pike and shot formations supplanted by peasant levies were traded for a proper regimental system with provincial quotas, and the cavalry reserve was tripled in size. Roads, bridges, and other public works were completed with royal coin.
And better yet, Arcanain would see its first involvement in proper international conflict, albeit in proxy. Mercenary rifle companies sprung up, men with a lust for coin and glory hiring themselves within and without the kingdom. And by the beginning of the 1800s, these mercenaries, known often as ‘Hesske’ (Hes = Coin, Ske = Warrior) were widespread on both the land and seas. Their most notable involvement was in the Unification Wars of Geisel, where Hesske riflemen and sappers supplanted the Jagers of the Geisel kingdoms.
However, after this, the concept of the Hesske died out. Arcanain drifted slowly from world affairs in the second half of the 1800s, and by the turn of the century was seldom seen interacting with any nations beyond the Geisel and the Sairish. This continued up until the death of King Jermaine IV from tuberculosis. As his son, Liam III, took power in 1927, he slowly built relations with those of the Commonwealth once more, enforcing what is now the status quo.
The Arcani took to the sea in the 700s, taking their nomadic lifestyle over the ocean. After probings of every landmass within their reach, they stumbled upon the island they had called Arcani’i (roughly Arcani’s, as in possessive), now known as Arcanain. Tribes and clans descended upon the haven, finding that other tribals had settled there: the shorter, paler, and hardier people now known as the Kelds.
But the Arcani were numerous, and the Kelds were not, and the foreign peoples descended upon the island with conviction. By the 1000s almost the entire island belonged to dozens, even hundreds of clans of the Arcani. The Kelds had been forced into the sea, as the Arcani had been forced into the sea by the Minga, and the Kelds eventually came to inhabit the island known as Kelderbie (Land or Clay of the Kelds), now known as Keldby.
The Arcani clans, now in firm control, had none else to contend with but the other clans. A quasi-feudal society had emerged by the mid-1100s. The petty clans contented with each other for centuries, until, in the 1300s, the southern portion of the island came under the control of a single clan, the Sherdugh (meaning Clan of Order), under a chieftain by the name of Bhaltair Sherdugh. By conquests and intermarrying, Bhaltair came to control a fair portion of territory. Unfortunately, he promptly died in 1379 of illness, leaving the clan to his son, Willem.
Willem is the man most often credited with the founding of the modern Arcani nation. Given chieftainship at 17, Willem raised the levies of his territory and engaged the interwarring northern clans. The campaign was easy pickings, most of the clans falling by 1385. Despite this, a pact of six clans formed in the volcanic mountains and cliffs on the northern coast, calling themselves the Northern Alliance. Holding out for six years, their final hold was overrun in the year 1391. At the age of 29, in the Orthodox abbey at Cante, Willem was crowned King Willem I of Arcanain
Having conquered the entire northern half of the island in 12 years, and made many reforms in the civil, government, and military sectors, his rule stagnated once he reached the age of 50. He retired to his manor in Presburn and left his governmental machine to rule. He eventually died at the age of 67, leaving his kingdom to his son, Liam.
After multiple monarchs reigning supreme and sitting complacent, the feudal system began to break down as it had in other places. The people grew restless, and the feckless and inept monarch King Jermaine II witnessed the ultimate result on June 18th, 1653. The long neglected standing military could not stop angry peasants marching on the Royal Palace at Cante. Jermaine II retreated to the Royal Manor at Presburn as the thin line of Royal Guards blocked the mob’s path.
Later that month, Jermaine II and his advisors eventually met with the peasant leaders, drafting the charters which would eventually become the founding documents, including the Charter of the Parliament, establishing the legislative branch in earnest. Also, in 1688, a treaty with the vassalized island of Keldby brought it into the kingdom as a province.
The June Revolution served as a wake-up call to the Crown and the government as a whole. The amassed coffers were dumped into practical projects, like infrastructure, and a new army model was devised, all under King Liam II, crowned in 1703. The pike and shot formations supplanted by peasant levies were traded for a proper regimental system with provincial quotas, and the cavalry reserve was tripled in size. Roads, bridges, and other public works were completed with royal coin.
And better yet, Arcanain would see its first involvement in proper international conflict, albeit in proxy. Mercenary rifle companies sprung up, men with a lust for coin and glory hiring themselves within and without the kingdom. And by the beginning of the 1800s, these mercenaries, known often as ‘Hesske’ (Hes = Coin, Ske = Warrior) were widespread on both the land and seas. Their most notable involvement was in the Unification Wars of Geisel, where Hesske riflemen and sappers supplanted the Jagers of the Geisel kingdoms.
However, after this, the concept of the Hesske died out. Arcanain drifted slowly from world affairs in the second half of the 1800s, and by the turn of the century was seldom seen interacting with any nations beyond the Geisel and the Sairish. This continued up until the death of King Jermaine IV from tuberculosis. As his son, Liam III, took power in 1927, he slowly built relations with those of the Commonwealth once more, enforcing what is now the status quo.
|Armed Forces:|
Ground Forces
The M1919 General Pattern Fatigues (M19 GPF) are the standard fatigues of the Arcanain Royal Services, primarily that of the infantry and logistics staff. Made primarily from flax and wool, the fabrics of the uniform are suited well to the overall temperate climate of Arcanain. The uniform is printed in two patterns, khaki and olive drab, suited to the southern lowlands and the northern highlands, respectively. Accessories to the base uniform include: campaign hats, kepis, M15 helmets, M24 helmets, frock/trench coats, and lightweight campaign packs.
The M1911 Marine Pattern Fatigues (M11 MPF) are the primary fatigues of sailors and Marines of the Arcanain Royal Services. Colored a deep navy blue, it is patterned to blend with the darker southern sea. It is made from mostly cotton and wool, with flax threading. The accessories include: peaked caps, service caps, kepis, M24 helmets, frock/trench coats, and campaign packs.
The M1905 Line Pattern Helmet (M5 LPH) is the outdated helmet design of the Arcanain Royal Services. Often made with cheaper iron or copper and banded with leather, the M5 was designed to be struck by bullets, unlike its newer counterpart, the M24. However, the intent was not to tank the modern spitzer-tipped bullets, but rather the low-velocity flatheaded rifle rounds and rounded pistol rounds. It rarely worked, but provided some reassurance that the soldier’s brains wouldn’t end up on the opposing wall.
The M1924 Line Pattern Helmet (M24 LPH) is the new standard helmet of the Arcanain Royal Services. Made of steel and bowled with a wide brim, the M24 is optimized not to be struck by bullets, but artillery. By the brim covering the nape of the neck and going well over the ears and neck, any shrapnel from above will rarely be fatal, save for the shockwave. But hey, it’s the difference between an open and closed casket funeral.
WIP
Be prepared to write a lot. I’m leaving this fairly open to what you guys want to do, but I want at LEAST infantry arms, premiere vehicles, navy/airforce details, military uniforms, organisational structure, etc, etc, etc. This is an RP heavily based around combat, after all.
|People of Interest:|
POV characters. A short description as well. Feel free to update this as you want to.
Stats:
|Industrialisation:| I’d like a percentage. 0-20% is tsarist Russia. 80-100% is a modern country like the UK.
WIP
