Nation History: Lautian historians have divided the history of Lautia into several distinct periods which share common features. The Imperial Library’s expansive repertoire of books holds the exact history of the nation, notably altered to be biased into the Lautian’s favour.
The first era is the fabula. This was the time before records began, and is largely, if not wholly, based upon oral tradition. The story goes that Lautia was created by the gods in the Creation Story. It began when the Primordial Deities, Anius, Jehulianus, and Fulfarra, first made contact. The brothers, Anius and Jehulianus, each represented two opposing forces – change and stasis. Each existed in the void of nothingness until they met and began a companionship that, despite their fundamental differences, was fruitful and lasted an eternity. It happened that Jehulianus, in his infinite capacity for change and passion, fell in love with Anius, whose infinite capacity for stasis meant he could not reciprocate his companion’s love. It happened, anyway, that the two intermingled, and Jehulianus bore the two god’s daughter, Fulfarra. She was a perfect intermingling of her two fathers, and, capricious as he was, Jehulianus fell in love with her. Unfortunately, she loved her other father, Anius, who rejected this wholly, troubled by seeing his onetime companion ignore him for his daughter. Jehulianus took this time to ask Fulfarra to marry him, but she refused, claiming she loved Anius. In a storm of rage, Jehulianus drew his sword and went after his old friend, and the two battled for another eternity, before both fell. Fulfarra, lamenting over their bodies, cried furiously, and her tears mingled with the blood of her fathers, creating the gods which the Lauti now worship. Through their birth from the blood of the Primordial Deities of change and stasis, as well as the tears of an intermingling of both, these new gods had a finite capacity for both change and stasis. The first to emerge was Dolibane, who pronounced himself King of the Gods. Another eternity passed, and the gods and Fulfarra grew bored in the void, and it was Tubliano, a god made of more blood of Jehulianus than Anius, who first acted on this boredom. He rallied the other gods, including his brother Dolibane, and convinced them to pour their magic into the creation of a world. They agreed, and the Architect Praefus drew the schematics to this new world. Thus the world was made.
The Lauti believe their city, Lautia, was made when Dolibane becoming pregnant with a dragon creating the first Lautian. Their history has it that the dragon created Lautia to house these people, famously citing “For so long as my love to you, my god, should burn as brightly as does the sun which rises softly in the morning to blaze gloriously in the noon, then so shall my love for our children, and their children and their ancestor’s, forever burn as strongly, and so let them have, for their own designs and plans, to cradle them through infancy and glorify them in adulthood, a fitting and most powerful city with which to hold.”
And with the first Lautian given birth to in the Palace of the Emperors, the fabula era ends.
The next era is the sequestrationis, where the Lautian people were confined in their city and left to their own devices. At this stage, the Lauti had a single Emperor, and none of the other political aspects seen today. Their military was rag-tag, and similar to other islanders’. They were a city-state which was regularly attacked and owned by foreign city states. Still, their magics began to take shape here, and the Imperial Cynosure was built at this time.
Little is known of the sequestrationis, only that it was a time when enchanted items and almost clockwork wonders which ran on magic were created. This practise of clockwork automaton creation has never been rekindled.
The sequestrationis ended abruptly when a foreign power invaded the island which Lautia rested on, thus starting the interregnum.
The island which Lautia resided, called Lapillus, was a patchwork of different city states. Before the beginning of the Lautian interregnum, the foreign presence of Arvale took to Lapillus’ shores and began to conquer the cities with alarming speed. Of them all, however, it was unlikely Lautia which proved the most troublesome. Unique in its use of magic, Lautia was able to keep the Arvalians out of the city for three years, before finally sustaining too many causalities and failing. The First Armistice was signed, and thus began 200 gruelling years of occupation, whereby Lautia became a protectorate of Arvale. Interestingly, Article 4 of the Armistice regulated the previously unregulated Synod, who now had a member cap on who learned magic, and were directly controlled by the Arvalian Governor. It was Article 4, and others, which rallied support under the rebel Publius Gabbinius Aufero, who successfully, over a year long War of Independence, deposed the Arvalians from Lautia, and, taking up the old title of Emperor, which hadn’t been held for 200 years, lead the Lauti into the next age: the age of sarcio.
The sarcio was a glorious, if staggered, age of Lautian history. In a nutshell, it saw the Lautian people establish their current government system, refine their army, and expand their magi. It also saw Lautia engage in a system by which it actively opposed Arvalian expansionism, inciting other Lapillus cities to rebel, or – as the case of South Lapillus – simply steamrolling the Arvalians and the other islanders. The beginnings of the Empire were set, and Lautia was firmly dedicated to removing Arvale. So much so that, soon, Arvale was removed from Lapillus entirely, which sparked Arvale to muster a great Armada to invade the island – that was in the process of now becoming entirely Lautian, as Lautian forces now betrayed the islanders and fought for a united island – and remove Lautia.
The invasion was a flop. The Arvalians established a beach head, and even took the North-Western city of Nolichi, but the Lautian military, headed by the enigmatic General Titus Narci Ursus, routed the great Arvalian war host, and sent them into retreat. It was here that Ursus’ ward, Legate Sulla, decided to attack the Arvalians at sea, using the ships the Arvalians had not managed to salvage and flee on. With no prior experience of naval combat, the Lautian fleet was destroyed, but Arvale did not return to attack for many centuries, allowing the age of sarcio to continue, until the tragic death of the Emperor, and another bout of Arvalian interference.
The Emperor at this period of time – known as the simulacrum - was, despite the sarcio reforms, hereditary. Elections were held for other political posts, but not the Emperors. As such, when the Emperor died heirless, a succession crisis began. Arvale was quick to capitalise on the chaos, and cited their previous rule of Lautia as an excuse to declare their own King as Emperor of Lautia too. The Fifty Year War began, and Arvale – which met no real resistance as the Lautian factions vied for control – had the Imperial City under siege, and the island’s north under control. The siege lasted a year, and the Imperial City starved, and reports detail Lautian stopped would eat the dead. Tides turned when the provincial Marcus Julius Cato and the urban Gaius Tullius Curio each took the field and, styling themselves both as duae imperatores, the two set off to unite the squabbling, disparate Lauti against the Arvalians. With Cato spearheading the political scene outside of The City, Curio took to honing his military skills, winning several victories over Arvalian armies on the island. Within several months, relief came to the City, and the people welcomed the two Emperors. While Curio fought and eventually removed the Arvalians once more, thus ending the Fifty Year War, Cato altered the Emperor-system, ensuring that two Emperors would rule, and also that they were to be elected.
Peace lasted for many years after the end of the simulacrum, and this peace was broken by a brief, yearlong war with Arvale known as Proculus’ War. This peace and war was called the cataphasis period, and is marked by Lautia reaching political, judicial, and military stability, as well as achieving a severe victory over Arvale.
The most noteworthy aspect of the cataphasis was the building of the Proculus Bridge by Emperor Sissena Aburius Proculus. The Proculus Bridge was a masterpiece of Lautian design. Suspended by fantastic architecture that has never – can never – be replicated by Lautian people, as well as wondrous magic, the Bridge stretches a total of fifteen miles, and is a huge fifty metres wide, and has a garrison of soldiers planted firmly in the middle. It’s a wonder of an ingenious, often called mad, Emperor, and one which struck a severe blow to the Arvalians, while raising Lautian morale. The Bridge was, of course, designed to stop Arvale from crippling Lautia through naval blockades. With their fear of navy – due to their spectacular loss in their only naval battle – the Lauti instead sought to create another manner of reaching the mainland. Thus the Bridge was formed. In response, Arvale began a yearlong series of attempts to destroy it, but ultimately failed.
With the cataphasis over, Lautia entered the era it’s in now, which has yet to be named. So far, Lautia has had relative stability, and an embassy to Arvale has been opened once more.
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