History of Solentia

The History of Solentia is something convoluted and confusing. Such is the nature of Solentia in the current day that its radical masters have distorted its history and erased much of the certainty about past events for their own political purposes. It is one of the few nations where knowledge about historical events has become less certain as time goes on. Nonetheless, a great deal of information has been preserve outside of the nation well before the coming the many totalitarian regimes. Most of the early historical sources is available from the ancient libraries of Dorvik and Rildanor. The issues concerning the legitimization of primary sources is a major topic of its own, known as Solentian Ortho-Citation. However, we can begin with the very earliest history in 50,000 BCE.

The Kal'Nai Cultures: 50,000-20,000 BCE
In Kal'Nai river basin in Fuwan, a race of peoples closely related to the Deltarians spread forth at some point around 50,000 BCE. The earliest Archaeological records show that these peoples were the first to inhabit Solentia. Spreading North from Fuwan, the Kal'Nai culture flourished for some 30,000 years. Their life was comprised mainly of hunting, gathering, and a strange series of religious rituals known by modern historians as "hiera" (after the Greek "ἱερα" for "holy rites"). These rites were depicted on numerous cave paintings from Fuwan to Teshuen to Orame. The only clear part of the rites is that it involved the sacrifice of some sort of cattle to a river god; cattle of some kind are shown thrown into a raging river that often has symbols indicating divinity. Apart from this trivia, the Kal'Nai cultures are very much a mystery to the modern world. They inexplicably died out around 20,000 BCE.

Proto-Agricultural Civilizations 6,000-3500 BCE
With coming of a cooling period in 15,000 BCE, traces of human inhabitance in Solentia dwindle. They reemerge in 6,000 BCE with the return of a warmer, more prosperous era. In Orame in the North and Teshuen in the South, proto-agricultural societies emerge prominently. They seem to have been most involved in cattle-herding and a semi-nomadic life style. The records are found in various rock inscriptions that are a combination of illustration and an enigmatic alphabet of some sort that has not yet been fully deciphered. The existence of a written language at this time is remarkable and a testament to the relative advancement of the peoples of this period. Through the fragments of text that have been translated, scholars have shown that there is some ancestral memory of the Kal'Nai, and perhaps even an older culture than that.

Sample Proto-Agricultural Inscription
From inscription II-A.1

Transliteration to latin text:

"Kol-re-phe ... no-biw- ... ku-le-qw yu-wur-al-m- ... mi-sa-lw ... m ... uruc- ... ka ... phe-le ... h"

Hypothetical translation to English:

"Horse people of Uruc-... known to me, not of wandering pasture but... without..."

From inscription VI-D.4-5

Transliteration:

"Mar-if-kol-h phe-le-...-mi-ka ... mur-wur-al...m siw Als-h-re-no-...sa-mi-ka qwil ... umn"

Translation:

"Gods of Ple...mka spare herds of ... snowy winds ... grass in ripeness"

Early Agricultural Period: 3500-1500 BCE
The Proto-Agricultural civilizations either withered and died or modified with the coming of the agricultural revolution to Solentia. Archaeologist from 2100 found a number of agricultural settlements from this period that were markedly different from their pastoral nomadic predecessors. For one, there seemed to be a centralized governing system: life must have been centered around the estate of the ruling lord, termed the "Anax" (from Greek "αναξ," for "leader"). While the Anax controlled trade and market life, farmers and peasants lived in a decentralized manner, settling broadly around the fortified estates of the Anax. The crops were generally wheat and olives, with sheep and goats still playing a prominent role in agriculture ever since the proto-agricultural cultures.

The main civilizations at the time were the Maenemoi, centered in Teshuan, and the Urghu, centered in Nukeya. There was no centralized nation state during this era, and the only unifying factor among the Maenemoi and Urghu were their culture. The former were more focused on peace and technological advancement while the latter were more war-like and brutal. While the Maenemoi appear to have gained some political stability by 2000 BCE, the Urghu were still in constant war throughout this era.

There are also instances of tomb inscriptions coming from the Urghu that have become rather famous in the field of ancient comparative linguistics in Terra;

Urghu Tomb Inscriptions
From Inscription K-203

Transliteration: "BAL-MAT AKDULAS MURKIR URTOS BA..LU TURAT SIL PROTUMNA ERUS ... SIL ARKAT"

Translation: "Bal-mt the higher raise to fortune(?) the battle-shinning Urtus whether Protumna ... or calls with grace"

From Inscription K-406-8

Transliteration: "VERTAGOI NAS NEFOS OILA VERSU JUR OILA O NEF TUR-KA O KALPR...T...RE FSUEPHE MURKUL"

Translation: "Brave Versu, dear brother of a [VERTAGOI] take a sip, Oh dear (son of) Tur-Ka, Oh [KALRP...T...RE] raised by Fsuephi"

Maenomian Period: 1500-1150 BCE
The rapid and marked rise of the Maenemoi ended the Archaic era and launched Solentia into a period of growth and prominence that would drive the course of the next 2000 years. The Meanemoi had taken on a level of advancement and sophistication by 1500 BCE that out-shinned all neighbors. Through trade and learning they had grown past the simple decentralized Anax system and had begun the development of genuine cities. Although the cities were ruled by Kings for this entire period, the wealth and prosperity of the upper classes drove the development of the Republics of the middle Classical Era. Civilization excelled to a point at which their ideas and knowledge imprinted itself on all Solentian culture and ideas. The Maenomian model of city-states was the status quo in most of the land by 1350, and the previous Urghu cultures were wiped away in the ensuing changes. Military might had partly to do with it, but colonization and the spread of ideas played a larger role in the permeation of these ideas across Solentia.