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Dardanos

Overview
Original image from Trip Advisor
Geography
Capital:	Marport
Area:	3,516,696 sq mi (9,108,200 sq km)
Climate:	Mild to subtropical
Demographics
Government:	None
Population:	211,001 (0.06 per sq mi)
Races:	Anyeli (14%), Dracovari (16%), Humans (17%), Nymphs (23%), Therians (12.5%), Vampires (0.3%), Zanaryans (17.2%)
Languages:	Elysian (Dardanian dialect), Sylvan, Anyeli, Zanaryan

Dardanos is almost the land that time forgot. Though much smaller than the mainland, the continent is still large enough that, with less than a single person for every square mile due to the dangers of the active volcanoes, it can seem vast and even desolate.

Yet Dardanos is also one of the most fertile regions in Elysia — a direct result of the very volcanoes that scare people away — and it boasts perhaps the most colourful variety of flora and fauna in the realm.

Physical Geography

Dardanos is only a third of the size of the mainland with just 3,516,696 square miles (9,108,200 square kilometres) to its name. Sandwiched between the mainland and Elysia's south pole, its northern shores are blocked by a series of jagged, rocky islands and torrential ocean currents while a crescent of destructive volcanoes blocks the south.

Those volcanoes can be seen hundreds of miles away as the majority of Dardanos' landscape is made up of gently rolling hills or flat grassland. The soil here is exceptionally fertile, in large part thanks to the same volcanoes that cause such destruction, and this is only encouraged by the geothermal energy that keeps the ground warm and the temperatures mild long into the Dardanian winter. (Indeed, it is a curious fact for mainlanders that Dardanians have never seen snow, as even the very tops of the tallest volcanoes are too warm for it to settle.)

Life here has been forced to adapt, however, to the frequent eruptions and the often poisonous gasses boiling out from lava tunnels and cracks in the ground. Though the majority of the continent is covered in greenery, this doesn't always equate to "safe for humanoid consumption" and several settlements have been lost to sudden bursts of carbon dioxide or sulphurous steam. For this reason, the majority of settlements and farms stay fairly close (within a 1200-mile radius) to Marport in the north-west.

Inhabitants

The volcanic activity scares off many potential immigrants so the population of Dardanos is very small and scattered for its size (an average of just 0.06 per square mile compared to the mainland's 78). However, the highly fertile soil in most of the habitable areas of Dardanos produces some of Elysia's most rare and expensive goods, making life and work here immensely satisfying and profitable.

The Racial Divide

Perhaps more so than on the mainland, Dardanians don't mix between the species and the balance shifts. There are much fewer Anyeli here (just 14% of the population compared to the 31% on the mainland) because the mountains are too dangerous to settle, but there are more humans since they aren't forced to deal with as much lingering racism here as they would in the more populated areas of the mainland.

The same volcanoes that make the mountains too hazardous for the Anyeli means there is great demand for fire elementalists to channel the lava flows, especially in the south where the majority of the volcanoes tower over the plains, so Nereid and Ifriit will always be welcome. As a result, there is a much greater percentage of Zanaryans here than anywhere else in Elysia.

However, Dardanians are so scattered, particularly in the south and east, that it's inevitable they cluster together (usually as family units on small farms as there are few villages on the continent). Languages have become somewhat idiosyncratic across the generations, with very distinctive dialects for each, but this is perhaps most noticable with the more common Elysian than with the other, more racial-specific tongues.

Politics

Dardanos has only one town, Marport, and very few other villages, scattered as they are throughout the northwestern region of the continent away from the more destructive volcanoes. Subsequently, even more than the mainland it is a wild and lawless land where inhabitants decide for themselves what should and shouldn't be done on their own land. To date, there has been enough for everyone interested, so territorial disputes have been few and far between (though when they do occur, they can be very bloody).

The Capital

Strictly speaking, Marport is just a town like any of those on the mainland, but its location (at the closest viable landing site for ships from the mainland) make it vital as a merchant's haven. All things — people included — must go through Marport to get anywhere in Dardanos, and likewise must go through Marport to get to the mainland. Consequently, despite the town not having nearly a long enough reach to govern even the closest villages, it has become known as the capital of Dardanos and certainly is at the heart of the wildland's economy.

Sadly, this makes the port town a prime target for Elysia's pirates who view the cargo ships crossing the Espur Straits as a buffet. Shipwrights are constantly looking for ways to shore up their defences and crews usually include at least one elementalist for protection, but the town itself is just as vulnerable. Plans are in motion for a wall that will jut into the open ocean as a way to protect incoming ships as well as those already docked, but Dardanos just doesn't have the resources to build one from local materials nor the coffers to import them.

Military

Out of necessity, Marport has built up quite a formidable navy to defend its port against pirates, but Dardanos itself has no military at all, and very few settlements have even a Guard to watch over them. Fortunately life here is simplistic and doesn't really lend itself to crime, but when it does the people must help themselves or turn to strangers (and they rarely turn to strangers).

Foreign Relations

Dardanos is largely cut off from the other realms and is closely tied to Espur as the only route onto the mainland. As a result, Dardanians have in general become sturdy and self-sufficient, to the point where many shirk outside help no matter the cost.

The dangers of the volcanoes and the difficulties accessing the continent mean that, despite its fertile plains and unusual wildlife, Dardanos is not a desirable territory, and that ultimately means that Dardanians have no official enemies to speak of. Unofficially, however, the north-western shores, particularly around Marport, are plagued by pirates who are the bane of a Dardanian sailor's existence.

These pirates are the reason for Marport's navy, a natural and perhaps inevitable measure of protection, yet some mainlanders worry that this growing armada will someday be used against them. Espur, as the closest port, is particularly concerned so there is a certain level of tension between the two cities though this is usually far outweighed by greed and the mutual benefits resulting from their trade pacts.

Economy

The people of Dardanos are by necessity self-sufficient and live a very simplistic, rural lifestyle. They could easily survive without help or even word from offlanders, but their economy is irrevocably tied to the larger continent since Dardanis rarely have a use for their own goods (especially the rarer or more specialised products, such as taroch or bithanium).

Dardanians follow the same rules of ownership as do mainlanders, with the added caveat that "what's yours is yours, and whatever the volcanoes destroy is also yours" (basically, you better hope you have a large enough family to help rebuild after an eruption, because everyone else will be too busy with their own concerns — if they're even close enough to notice you're having problems — to help you out).

Banking

There are no banks on Dardanos, even in bustling Marport where foreign merchants might expect to find one. This is partially because volcanic eruptions could readily destroy the town's entire wealth in one blow if the money was stored at one site, and partly because those foreign merchants rarely stay long enough to need one. Why risk building something that most likely will never be used?

Culture

Dardanos has a "every family for itself" mentality, evolved out of a need for self-sufficiency and the fact that settlements and farms can be hundreds of miles apart. It really is very much a country where hard work and manual labour is most honoured, family is vital and close-knit — and if you don't have at least half a dozen kids to do all the chores and help rebuild after an eruption, then you won't last long at all.

For that reason, farmhouses in Dardanos are usually much bigger than those on the mainland (though still no more than two storeys high), simply to house all the children (and in many cases the extended family as well). They're also made of wood from local trees so they're easier to rebuild (although it has been suggested that imported limestone might stand up to the lava flows more vigorously).

History

The first settlers arrived on Dardanos only eight hundred years ago in 9,194 XA, as before then would-be immigrants were scared off by the then near-constant eruptions.

Marport wasn't founded until almost five hundred years later in 9,656 XA when settlers had learned the ways of the volcanoes and that the north-western region was the most stable. Prior to that point, the continent was even more of a wildland than it is now with no villages to speak of and the population scattered far and wide. In fact, mainlanders had all but forgotten anyone had even moved there in the first place, and it was only when Dardanian products began to appear on the mainland that people started to consider the southern continent as anything more than a steaming blight on the horizon.

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