everything that is

worldbuilding blog for my fantasy project | Issadai is the world's name; it means "everything that is" | main is @bocceclub

[bocceclub]

writing a story with a nonhuman protagonist who sees himself as human and insists that he is even as every other character repeatedly denies his humanity and it's kind of like huh. we're tapping into some real emotions here, wonder what that could be about.

[bocceclub]

I tend to get pissed off at sff media where a nonhuman being created by or in some way related/connected to humanity resists being perceived or referred to as human, and I think it's because my personal definition of the concept is apparently much broader than most sff writers'. to me it's a subjective rather than ontological category. which is how I can have a protagonist who's not human by origin, who is in fact an extraterrestrial parasite that survives by assimilating the memories of its host, but who by his subjective experience is "human". it's all he's ever known, so of course that's how he's going to define himself. no one has ever regretted starting a philosophical convo with me when I'm a little drunk btw.

[elodieunderglass]

I feel like people need to know the Great Moose Truths.

Despite people in Canada/New England feeling a strong pride and sense of ownership surrounding moose, Europeans have the exact same moose. English speakers completely fucked up the naming conventions for the animal because we fuck EVERYTHING up. 

The Eurasian elk is the exact same animal as the moose. It is Alces alces. Here is a depiction of a Swedish soldier riding a moose into war in the 1700s.

Figure 1. The Swedish army used moose as cavalry animals at various points in history. I don’t know what the armored boar is all about.

However, the English caused a lot of confusion by originally calling it an “elk.” This comes from the older English word eolc/eolh, which shares roots with elhaz/algiz, which, if you know your runes, is the antler-looking rune ᛉ. 

So the English had moose, they just called them elks. But there haven’t been any moose in the UK since the Bronze Age, so the English just started using the word “elk” to apply to “really big deer” - and they forgot that there was a specific animal they used to call “elk.” 

Today, modern people from the United Kingdom have overwritten their own understanding of “elk” with Elk (USA), which are wapiti (Cervus canadensis). 

This is a wapiti, which everyone calls “elk” now:

Figure 2. The wapiti, or elk  (Cervus canadensis)

“Hmmmmmmm,” British people may be saying right now. “That is a vaguely familiar animal. I feel like that is a STAG. I feel like it needs to be selling me a bottle of whiskey.”

YES. The wapiti is very similar to the UK’s red deer. This is what UK people call a “stag” : 

Figure 3. A stag, or British red deer (Cervus elaphus) - actually slightly less red than the wapiti.

The explanation for this is that the UK colonizers found the wapiti in the USA, but the problem was that red deer were rarely seen by the common people at that time, so they thought they were Unusually Big Deer. And so the colonizing bastards said “Hey, what are these, Nigel?” and Nigel was like “IDK, stags?” and they were like “Yeah but they look really big, don’t they?” and Nigel was like “well, what about calling them big deer, then” and they called them “elk” which at that point had come to mean “big deer” in English. 

Cervus elaphus (name meaning: deer deer) and Cervus canadensis (name meaning: Canadian deer) are very similar animals, and many people muddy the waters by calling Cervus elaphus an “elk.” The word ran all around the world, and American influence meant that it is losing its own definition in its own land. 

Cervus canadensis are also found in Asia, where the subspecies are called wapiti, from the Shawnee word meaning “white rump.” This is to prevent confusion. If you see one in Mongolia, you must properly call it a “Canadian deer, aka ‘white butt,’ from the indigenous North American word” to prevent this kind of confusion.

Figure 4. The global range of Cervus canadensis, the wapiti, or elk. 

Okay. Enough about what happened to the word “elk”. The point is that other European countries have reasonable amounts of moose, which they call elk. The “Eurasian elk” is Alces alces, the moose. 

Figure 5. A Swedish army representative wearing Swedish flags and riding a Swedish moose. ALSO, SOMEHOW, THE MOST CANADIAN THING EVER

So when the English settlers colonized Canada and New England, they continued their long history of fucking the fuck up. But in the middle of this, they saw Eurasian elks, had no idea what they were, and went with the local Algonquin word “moose.” 

They also called the same moose “elk” at the same time, and went into a slight confusion where they tried to differentiate them into “grey moose” and “black moose” and “black elk,” but when the dust settled, the world was left with British-colonizers-turned-Americans applying random names to everything, and winning. Wapiti are now called elk, and now red deer are also kind of elk. Eurasian elk are now moose. Wikipedia attempts to explain the moose fuckups here and the elk fuckups here.

The word “moose” is Algonquin in origin. This is why it doesn’t pluralize like English words do. In English, the plural of “goose” is “geese” and thus many people feel that the plural of “moose” should be “meese.” However, “moose” is not an English word. If you wanted to treat it as one, you could remember that moose are hoofed animals of a specific class, and you could follow the rules already laid down for moose relatives: The English plural of elk is elk. The English plural of deer is deer. The English plural of sheep is sheep. You can call multiple moose “meese” if you want to. But that’s why it is the way it is.

Figure 6. The global range of moose, or Eurasian elk.

So there you have it. Moose are an important, scary and hilarious part of Canadian/New Englander culture, but they aren’t just ours - we share them with Eurasian cultures too.

Figure 7: a Russian moose farmer with a promising crop

Figure 8: Finnish people provide a dark warning. “Hirvikolari” is a specific Finnish word describing a road accident involving a moose. There are many dashcam videos of hirvikolari on the Internet.

And now think about all the amazing Moose News you have access to now! You can now enjoy stories of moose destruction, mayhem and general fuckery SO MUCH MORE when you realize they aren’t about deer:

Figure 9: every line of this story is perfect?

Actually, you know what?

 That’s still the most Canadian thing ever.

[shredsandpatches]

I’M SO CONFUSED

(also, which one of them does Thranduil ride on?)

[skeleton-richard]

@shredsandpatches from how I remember the first Hobbit movie, I think it was a wapti?

[elodieunderglass]

A few people have asked this. Thranduil’s mount is a perfect Irish Elk (or more correctly, Irish Giant Deer), known as Megaloceros giganteus.

It’s a prehistoric giant deer, and not a close relation to the wapiti. (which is why paleontologists hope that we’ll start calling it an Irish Giant Deer instead of Irish Elk. TO PREVENT CONFUSION. IT IS NOT AN ELK!MOOSE OR AN ELK!WAPITI, IT IS A GIANT DEER. AND IT EXISTED.)

Figure 2. HOLY FUCK THE IRISH ELK.

Megaloceros went extinct about… 7000 years ago, and certainly did once coexist with humans.  There is a potential Folklore Ghost in the Irish word segh and the German work Schelch suggesting that Europeans may have kept their word for it, similarly to how the word aurochs is still extant, despite the Giant Fucking Killer Bull now being extinct. Anyway, it was definitely an animal and the prehistoric Europeans, Asians and North Africans who knew it definitely noticed it and thought about it, the same way that we all once knew mammoths. The Lascaux deer with palmate antlers was probably a Megaloceros.

Figure 3. HOLY FUCK THE IRISH ELK. Cave painting from Lascaux depicting a prehistoric deer with palmate antlers. Could be a reindeer, could be Megaloceros. The palms aren’t very reindeerish, though.

The LotR and Hobbit designers made the good decision of using prehistoric European animals as bases for the designs of the “fantasy animals” in the movies. Lots of fantasy designers do this. George RR Martin didn’t invent dire wolves, for example. The oliphants in LotR are based on prehistoric elephants, ditto and the orc’s war rhinos and the dwarves’ war pigs. The “wargs” aren’t actually dire wolves - which would be TOO CUTE AND BEAUTIFUL to be scary - but Dinocrocuta or Pachycrocuta, two kinds of giant prehistoric ancestral hyena.

Figure 4: Holy FUCK Dinocrocuta.

Anyway, it’s a good path to do down, because you can be incredibly lazy with the creature design, and take credit for all the cultural resonance it evokes. There is something about an Irish Giant Deer that just looks RIGHT, like EXTREMELY CORRECT AND PROPER, in a way that a made-up fantasy animal doesn’t always evoke.

Figure 5. Dire wolves weren’t actually that big. Smilodon (the sabertoothed cat) is smaller than a Cave Lion. Megaloceros is definitely big enough to ride, as is the spectacular wooly rhino, which always has my heart. The Aurochs (Bos primigenius) is there, looking fab.

And personally I think prehistoric megafauna are just so cool, and they just RESONATE. We spend all this time and energy inventing elves and aliens, looking to the stars and a fake fantasy past for cousins and creatures. Are there other humans out there that look like a different species but are still weirdly hot, and could we have sex with them? Are there recognizable animals that are like our animals, but with weird knobs and jaws?

But we did used to have them. We once had horse-sized war-pigs, giant wolves, lions the size of horses, elephants that bristled with teeth, armored beasts. We once had Other Human People, The Little People, the Neanderthals, with their own culture - and we totally slept with them. We had strange shamanic connections and early spiritual practices and ritual magic surrounding beasts, beasts that have only left ghosts. Because the world changed.

Figure 5. THE SCENE IN “BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD” WHERE SHE TOUCHES THE AUROCHS. I CRIED. IT FUCKING RESONATED. I MEAN THE AUROCHS IS MORE OF A GIANT PIG BUT IT RESONATED. 

But that’s why Thranduil’s war mount is not a moose (IT’S NOT A FUCKING MOOSE LOOK AT ITS FUCKING FACE) and not an elk (WHAT KIND OF FUCKING ELK HAS PALMATE ANTLERS) but a VERY SPECIAL AND MAJESTIC MEGAFAUNA.

[thecinematichorse]

normal saddle horse

normal saddle horse

another normal saddle horse! they’re killin’ it!

and… ah… found the Friesian…

[illuminaidan]

For those, like me, who didn’t know what a “Friesian” was and had trouble spotting the difference:

[illuminaidan]

I know nothing about this show, but I was curious about everyone calling the inclusion of Friesians anachronistic, so I looked it up.

Based on reverse image search, these screencaps are from a show called Cursed, which is an Arthurian fantasy that takes place as late as the 11th century:

That’s a time period when Friesians actually were being ridden by knights, and even an English king:

It’s entirely possible that horsetorians (horse historians) have other reasons to complain here – maybe Friesians were very expensive and the monks(?) in the show couldn’t have afforded one. But to me, this looks plausible enough to give the fantasy show a pass.

[thecinematichorse]

Hi. I’ve mostly been on hiatus from this blog for mumble mumble reasons, but I did want to reply to this because it felt like an earnest attempt to fact check and it’s an excellent teaching opportunity for me to explain a little more about why Friesians are generally anachronistic in films that depict a medieval time period.

The thing about the modern Friesian is that it is, in fact, modern. The breed characteristics we associate with it: solid black, minimal white, upright carriage, long flowing locks, baroque appearance, etc – were by and large developed circa the late 1800s (1879, to be exact), and the type was really calcified circa 1906-1907. While I wouldn’t necessarily recommend Wikipedia as your primary research point, it does provide an indicator that should make anyone’s eyebrows raise: “By the early 20th century, the number of available breeding stallions was down to three.” If you look at the the Friesian Horse Association of North America Website, it’ll tell you the name of the three stallions: Prins 109, Alva 113 and Friso 117.

As a pedigree nerd, the thing I found myself look at immediately was the available pedigree data, because a problem that plagues virtually all Western breeds as an artifact of Victorian-era breed codification practices is a limited founder pool and a relatively high level of consanguinity, owing to the fact that many traits that are stamped are done so through an increasing level of homozygosity. Prins and Friso are both paternal grandsons of the founder stallion Nemo 51. So, functionally – 2 sirelines.

Above: Frisio 117

Above: Prins 109

Above: Alva 113

Above: De Regent 32, sire of Alva 113

Above: Graf Adolf 21, damsire of Alva 113.

And they all pretty much funnel in through the stallion Paulus 151, dropping it down to a single sireline, because for whatever reason, Alva 113 failed to perpetuate his sireline. Friso 117 was the sire of Paulus 151 and Prins 109 was the damsire of Paulus 151. Paulus 151’s 2nd dam, Daisy, was also closely related to Alva 113.

Above: the stallion Paulus.

So, a genetic bottleneck in the late 1880s-1990s.

Also from the FHANA website:

1889: Radboud 67 became the last of only 5 brown Friesian stallions approved for the registry. The other four were David 11, Keizer 18, Minister Thorbecke 34 [one source includes Membrino] and Bruno 38.

1918: The studbook ended registration of brown Friesian mares.

A fascinating choice for a breed with an already extremely constricted genepool of sirelines as, if we choose to Ignore the fact that different colors are a form of genetic diversity in and of itself where we no longer have variation on the Agouti factor, this removed a significant % of the population of mares from the genepool, as well. Anyone with an exposure to the Friesian breed will also know that Friesians are not allowed to be Chestnut, which is similarly a fascinating choice because the Extension factor for chestnut is a recessive allele that requires both parents pass it on.

Take this really simple Punnett Square for the Extension.

Anytime you breed a Friesian with a copy of the recessive Extension factor (Ee) to another Friesian with a copy of the recessive Extension factor (Ee), you run a 25% chance of producing chestnut Friesian every mating. The only way to get rid of that is to completely eliminate that from the gene pool.

That’s also how they eliminated bay horses from the gene pool – so now every Friesian has two copies of the recessive Agouti factor (aa) and not one horse carries a dominant Agouti factor (AA or Aa).

The FHANA timeline also tells us this: they kicked another stallion horse out in 1935, named Cremer, because he threw too much white markings. Never mind that white spotting mutations are yet another form of genetic variation, never mind that they often spontaneously mutate and you will never be able to completely eliminate them because they will always be able to potentially recur.

The Friesian breed experienced a second genetic bottleneck in recent history in the 1960s, according to a 2007 paper by Marike Boer, who wrote on the genetics (and specifically the relationship between inbreeding and fertility) of the Friesian for her thesis. She was herself citing a 2004 paper that was studying the effects of inbreeding on mares and retained placentas during parturition. There are… oodles and sqoodles of papers on the lack of genetic diversity of the modern Friesian, and if you want to read some of them you can follow these links:

Genetic diversity in the dutch friesian horse

The Friesian horse breed: A clinical challenge to the equine veterinarian?

Evaluation of breeding strategies to reduce the inbreeding rate in the Friesian horse population: Looking back and moving forward

The Genomic Makeup of Nine Horse Populations Sampled in the Netherlands

The fact remains, the modern Friesian is not actually the Friesian of the early 1800s, or really even the last 1870s when the studbook was formally codified.

Dutch Friesian,“ in: M Czapski,“Atlas to the universal history of the horse,” Poznań 1876. Creator: Czapski Hutten, Marian (1816-1875). Date: 1876. Artwork mediumpen lithography; paper. [x]

Look at that white blaze and three white legs, including the high white on the nearside hind.

It would likely shock anyone with a passing familiarity with the breed to discover that this horse, Tello, (below) was a Friesian horse – back when the stubook also included the Warmblood types.

Sporthorsedata link, where the photos is sourced from.

Allbreedpedigree link, which calls him an Oldenburg (his sire is also a Friesian).

Check out Tello’s sire, Thor, and look at the white markings:

Check out Tello’s 2nd sire, Martin, who was “brown” aka a bay horse:

Not one of these stallions would be allowed in the modern Friesian studbook, because: a/ Tello is grey and b/ Thor has too much white and c/ Martin is bay, not black.

Some more East Friesian horses:

We can see that the modern Friesian also pulled very heavily from draught type horses – horses that were designed not for the saddle as a riding mount, but for pulling a plow or pulling a carriage. In the 1700s and the 1800s, trotting harness racing became quite popular, and so in addition to being used for carriage work and plowing the fields, they were bred for trotting in a harness. I did read a paper that indicated that they were raced for shorter distances, for example, 325 meters, and that as of 1979, it was believed that between 1800 and 1850 over 2,800 newspaper advertisements were printed to promote races, but I don’t know how accurate that really is.

What I can say, is that there’s been something of a reinvention of the Friesian as a saddle breed. A lot of people credit the 1980s film LAKYHAWKE for popularizing the Friesian as a medieval horse type, and it certainly did generate a lot of interest in the breed that has propelled it to 2025. Some of this movement toward the breed as a saddle horse is selective breeding, and some of that is also that the Friesian does naturally lend itself well to modern dressage because of the history of dressage as a riding discipline and the way it has been codified specifically for the benefit of the taproot of modern Warmbloods, which stem from similar roots as the Friesian breed: heavy draught types with an emphasis on trot action.

That said, if we look at historical photos that the taproot studbook stock was pulled from:

^ Held 140, foaled in 1928. (He was, by the way, the product of a full-sibling mating.

Photo: Het Friese Paard It Fryske Hynder. M.J. Barones can Heemstra & F.C.D. Popken.

Here’s a gallery of approved stallions, including older historical stallions.

This is such a textbook example of the way the codification of breeds takes what was fundamentally a regional landrace type of horse – that is, a heavy cart horse type that used to pull carriages and the plow from the Friesland region of the Dutch Netherlands – and turned it into a pedigreed breed with a registry. Dog people in particular will understand what I am talking about here. Here’s an essay from 2015 discussing the historicity of the Friesian horse vs the Frisian horse, and the way that the Friesian as we know and understand it is a modern invention. Page 10 begins discussion on a breed vs a landrace type.

The author of the 2015 essay cites a lot of papers I’ve also read, but I’ll just throw some highlights up. Claims that the modern Friesian is effectively the same as the Frisian horse the Romans rode are at a genetic level patently false, but it goes even further – at the phenotypical level, there’s not even remotely comparable.

“It may be of note that a horse’s mature height is affected by genetics, selection and environment 29 A combination of selective breeding and rich fodder would have affected the size of horses 30 As a result, withers height in horses varied from one location to another Horses found in terp sites were small, but Roman finds in the Netherlands and Germany, particularly in romanised areas, often exceeded a withers height of 140 or even up to 150 cm in the Mid Roman Period 31 It would have been rare for a horse in Europe to have a height at the withers exceeding 150 cm during the Roman Period and Early Middle Ages.”

You can read the book author J Savelkouls is citing on Jstor, the book of which which at this time is open access – Animals in Ritual and Economy in a Roman Frontier Community: Excavations in Tiel-Passewaaij by Maaike Groot.

For a frame of reference: 140cm is roughly 13.3hh, and 150cm is roughly 14.3hh. Large pony size to very small horse size.

If we look at the FHANA website and their breed inspection requirements, we see the following: Stallions are required to be a minimum of 1.58m (15.2 1/4hh) as 3 year old and a minimum of 1.60m (15.3hh) as a 4 year old or older. Mares for all registration types are required to be taller than 1.54m (15hh). Geldings are required to be 1.56m (15hh) for the studbook and 1.58m (15.2 1/4hh) for the Ster (a registration predicate which is like… gold-star above average registration.)

The Friesian Horse Society registration criterion also offers these height requirements: Mares must be at least 1.54 meters (15.0 ¾ hands) at the withers; Geldings must be at least 1.56 meters (15.1½ hands); Stallions must be at least 1.58 meters (15.2¼ hands) at age 3 and at least 1.60 meters (15.3 hands) at age 4.

Behold, the Bayeux tapestry and William the Conqueror riding a Friesian. That’s definitely a Friesian. We know this for sure for real. Because the Friesian studbook, founded in 1879, certainly existed in circa the 1070s CE.

It just makes me laugh when people say, “oh, medieval knights rode Friesians” when no, we don’t actually know that, and no, they likely did not, because the Friesian as we know it literally did not exist. The evidence cited fundamentally boils down to “horses that look like Friesians” which is by definition a landrace type rather than a codified breed, and certainly wouldn’t have been the sole purview of the Friesland – after all, those genetics do come from somewhere.

This is the same level of evidence we see presented by proponents of the Straight Egyptian Arabian who look at horses from Ancient Egyptian artwork, see a landrace type with commonalities, and proclaim their horses an ancient breed, the daughters and sons of the pharaohs, which completely ignores the actual history of the breed as codified by Arabs and the specifically the Bedouins AND also ignores that the Straight Egyptian taproot genetics stem from Abbas Pasha’s collection, which he specifically pulled from the Bedouin tribes of the deserts.

But if that’s a comparison the Roman era, the medieval period, what if we go a little further ahead in time to the 1600s.

The Friesian horse. Origin: Netherlands. Date: 1652. Creator, Paulus Potter, mentioned on object, print maker, Noord-Nederlands (1625–1654). Artwork medium etching (paper). [x]

Ah, another heavy grey daught type, like Tello.

And what of John of Austria’s Frisian horse?

As a stallion, with a star? He wouldn’t even be allowed in the modern Friesian studbook.

I’ve actually run out of my limit for photos, so I am going to post this and then reblog with more historical photos and artwork of the Friesian horse.

-Mod M

[thecinematichorse]

More photos of the taproot stock the modern Friesian is pulled from, dating up to the 1960s which is when the second major bottleneck of Friesian breeding occurred:

Above: That last photo really shows the trot action that’s designed for a roadster type of horse.

Above: Hearke 254 Preferent and his son Reitse 272 Preferent

Some stallions – they’re built long, with high, steep croups and laid back shoulders for pulling into the harness with a powerful rear push.

And should anyone like to take a gander, this book (The Oldenburg Horse By J. Schuessler, 1914) has a decent overview of the difference between the East Friesian (really.. just… Friesian) and the Oldenburg warmblood. Starts on page 45, the chapter entitled: ”7. The Oldenburg Horse in the Neighbouring Breeding Districts of Bremen and East Friesland, in the Army and Abroad.“

I’m going to reference the medieval war horse again, because the Arthurian legend era is set circa the 5th and 6th centuries CE in England (well, specifically Wales, but the geographic region is close enough that their horsestock from the concurrent time periods were likely roughly analogous) – so, around 400-500 CE. There’s a paper from 2021 entitled In search of the ‘great horse’: A zooarchaeological assessment of horses from England (AD 300–1650) which looks specifically a medieval English warhorses, which examines archeaological evidence of horses throughout the time period referenced. They include a really nice graph on sizing:

And for the Arthurian era, specifically, which falls in the time periods defined as the Late Roman (300–410 AD) and Early Saxon (410–700 AD) periods:

As you can see, anything over 15hh, which is roughly the minimum studbook height requirement for a modern Friesian horse, was really unusual in the Late Roman period and has not been discovered in the Early Saxon period. Much more commonly seen were horses between ~11h and ~14hh, aka, pony and very small horse heights.

Friesian horses are, on the whole, too tall for a medieval Arthurian time period on the British Isles. So, alas, no, this horse doesn’t get a pass for the type of film and type of story it is presented in.

The larger point being made is, the type of horse the modern Friesian presents as is by and large a carriage horse from the late 1800s and into the 1900s, and you could probably go find a random vaguely draughty grade horse in a field that has been bred for saddle riding and get a more historically accurate type of horse for medieval England or Wales than you ever could with a modern Friesian.

The other problem, which is an even larger point of gesticulating toward Friesian horses in media, is that the trapping historical films have rarely been about historical accuracy or utilitarian practicality, and typically try to present a fantastical retelling. Friesians look cool. They’re tall and upright and hairy with long, flowing, wavy manes and tails, and they’re generally very visually distinct from other horses. it’s such an easy shorthand in film to put someone on a Friesian horse as a way to visually signify that this is someone important that you should pay attention to – they did this, for ex, in the first Gal Gadot Wonder Woman film where inexplicably, WW was riding a Friesian while everyone else had some generic cob type. This is also why we see Ciri in the trailers for The Witcher 4 riding a Friesian type named Kelpie: our super special protagonist on her super special horse.

Fantasy in general (and to some extent, a lot of historical fiction is, really, fantastical) has latched onto the imagery of a Friesian type of horse as special. I see it all the time in books, as well.

The less we care about historical accuracy, the less important it is. If it’s all about vibes, sure. This is why I’m fine with Galavant’s war horse being a Friesian, because the whole point of the show is that it’s a deeply unserious piece of media. And this is why the more ~realistic~ a piece of historical fiction tries to be, the more I will scrutinize it.

-Mod M

[thecinematichorse]

@pourpasserlamelancholie thank you for my life, actually. in my migraine-induced fugue state, i forgot reverse google image search existed. Including a link to your source. Wildly enough, some scholars actually believe Schout’s horse is an Andalusian from Spain. The source for this claim appears to be in S. G. A. van Leeuwen’s PhD dissertion, “Geschiedenis der Nederlandsche Paarden fokkerij in Nederland” published in 1922 circa page 70-72.

So which is it – a Friesian, or an Andalusian? lkdfalghsadkhg

[sibirsibir]

Horse wearing reconstructed 2500-year-old Scythian horse armor unearthed in the Altai Mountains in Siberia

[serpentface]

TRADITIONAL FOODS OF THE HIGHLANDS

The Highlands or 'Greathill' is a region in the central north-northwestern territory claimed by (but almost entirely uncontrolled by) the Wardi Empire. They are inhabited by a network of peoples collectively referred to as the Hill Tribes, who are not a unified or monolithic group but share ancestry, similar means of subsistence, and a common traditional diet.

The highlands are regionally unique for their altitude and relatively cool temperatures (and is the only part of the region that can expect snow on a yearly basis, with some of the highest peaks receiving snowfall year-round). The climate is overall dry, though the rivers are usually well fed by high altitude rains and snowmelt, and the river valleys are wet enough year-round to sustain woodlands and more delicate agriculture.

Most vegetables can only reliably farmed in the river valleys, and these key regions are typically under the control of specific clans or tribes who dominate intra-Highlands trade networks. Those living outside of the river valleys have only occasional access to most farmed vegetables, and foraging is an important supplement to the core diet. Hardier crops are grown on terraced slopes, and the vast majority of the landscape is used as grazing pasture.

The regional cuisine revolves around grain (especially barley and most often taken in the form of bread), meat, cheese, milk, and yogurt. The flavoring stands in stark contrast to the surrounding Wardi cuisines, traditionally being only lightly seasoned (few spices are natively available) and mostly reliant on subtle herbal flavoring, though both palates are in agreement on the value of capsaicin.

Many of the Hill Tribes (or individual clans) have trade connections outside of the highlands, but food (aside from livestock) and spices are not common imports. The majority of the population have maintained traditional culinary practices that are unique among the wider region (though with some inevitable cultural cross-pollination).

Most dishes are eaten by hand out of serving plates and bowls, with spoons used for some soups and porridges. Almost every meal is served with flatbread, which is torn off and used to collect and eat the rest of the food. It is considered good manners to save a piece of bread for last, which will be used to soak up any remaining juices after a plate is cleaned (not doing so is a mild insult to the cook).

Tea is an important part of the daily routine, and is served alongside each meal. Traditional teas in this region are exclusively herbal and consumed for both taste and medicinal purposes, and none are caffeinated (though one has a stimulant effect). Tea is by far the most popular edible import in trade with the broader Imperial Wardi region (along with salt), with imports of tea leaves being desirable and having become quite popular in the last century.

Staple foods:

Barley- the absolute most important staple grain. Most barley grown in the region is a strain that better tolerates the highland’s regionally unique combination of seasonal cold, dry climate, and high altitudes.

Wheat- more delicate than barley and not as widely grown, but a key crop in the more fertile river valleys

Kulys- a native hardy, spiny plant that stores water in its trunk and is tolerant to dry and cold seasons. Its young stalks are edible, but the fruits and flowers are of greater regional importance. The flowers are used for a lightly sweet herbal tea, and the fruits are a important to the diet and usually eaten on their own.

Amaranth- a species of amaranth is regionally native and domesticated, with seeds eaten whole or ground into flour and leaves being used for green vegetables.

Squash- grown only in the river valleys and a key item in trade within the highlands. Squashes are found nowhere else on this side of the Viper seaway, and were likely brought along overseas by the original migrant population.

Chili peppers- several strains are grown in the region (ranging from very mild to chiltepin levels of capsaicin) and mostly used to create spicy yogurt sauces and to flavor stronger dishes.

Wild onion- a region-specific onion species, tolerant of harsh growing traditions but difficult to propagate, mostly foraged.

Magah- a farmed. potato-esque tuber, more strongly flavored and bitter than potatoes.

Dairy products- dairy is foundational to the diet and used to create a variety of yogurts, creams, butters, and cheeses, and milk is often consumed on its own. Cattle and horse milk is preferred, khait will be opportunistically milked but have much lower yields.

Cattle- Cattle are of utmost and absolute importance to the diet (in the form of meat and milk) and overall lifestyle. Wealth is primarily measured in the size of cattle herds. The native landrace of cattle is well accommodated to altitude and seasonal cold, though many breeds have been obtained in trade.

Horses- (the small, three toed kind) They are of secondary importance to cattle in terms of livestock, used for meat, wool, and milk.

Taarn- a type of pheasant native to the region that has been domesticated for meat, fares best in river valleys.

Honey- Beekeeping is a well established practice, and honey is the sweetener of choice and highly valued. Bee larvae are also sometimes roasted and eaten.

Bread- made with wheat, amaranth, or barley flower (or all three), a part of most meals. A type of flatbread is used as a base to scoop up other parts of the meal.

Wild game:

gazelle, antelope, hippegalga, and deer.

aurochs (sometimes found in the low river valleys and foothills)

crocodiles (mainly found in the Erubin river valley)

ducks and geese

unkata (a genera of cassowary sized flightless birds, a smaller subspecies of which can be found here as a grazer)

grynaig (a native species of pidgeon which nests among boulders)

piispiispi (a lagomorph that can be found at high altitudes, somewhat resembles a marmot. The name is onomatopoeia based on their shrill calls)

fish (especially trout), frogs, freshwater mussels, and crayfish from the rivers.

Native fruits: wild plum, dirrucag (a shrub that produces small fruits, roughly comparable to autumn olive), wild rose hips (used for tea and jams).

Other vegetables (cultivated and wild): cabbage, onions, garlic, carrots, rapeseed, peas, wild amaranth, mustard greens, nettles (the latter two also being regionally unknown and likely brought in the original migration).

Herbs/spices: relatively few spices are natively produced. Fennel is reliably grown. A type of sumac can be obtained in the river valleys, and a couple native sages and mints can be found throughout the region.

Alcohol: murre (a relatively strong (8-10% abv) alcoholic beverage made with fermented fruit and horsemilk), mead, kulys wine, and a few wheat and barley ales.

Teas/non-alcoholic beverages:

-Kulys flower tea (a mildly sweet herbal tea with nuanced, delicate flavors, usually consumed on its own without a meal)

-Brolge tea (a bitter tea made with the brulge leaf, which has a mild stimulant effect (comparable to coca in composition, but a different kind of plant) and is often consumed in the mornings. (This plant is known as bruljenum in Imperial Wardin))

-Floral tea (tea made with a variety of edible wildflowers, with plum and rose flower being especially favored, and rosehips added for tartness. Often served with milk)

-Nettle tea (favored as a soothing evening tea for its rich, earthy flavor)

-Mint tea (it's mint tea)

-Roasted barley tea (an everyday staple, often taken with milk or butter and honey, or mixed with herbal ingredients).

-Honey-garlic tea (usually uses roasted barley as a base, boiled together with garlic that has been fermented with honey. Preferred by herders for a warming effect on cold nights).

-Green tea (the preferred untreated variant of imported tea leaves)

-Fermented tea (a combination of imported tea leaves and a native preference for fermentation)

-A sour fermented horsemilk beverage, best taken with salt and/or honey.

-a fermented cowsmilk and yogurt beverage, taken with mint.

-A beverage made with mead, extra honey, hot peppers, and chopped garlic boiled together. Consumed for its warming qualities and to treat colds.

Examples of Dishes:

-flatbread (the base of most meals, made with wheat, barley, and/or amaranth flour. Assume that most non-grain based foods described here are served along or atop it)

-a spicy yogurt sauce made with finely chopped hot peppers, sometimes garlic

-a sour yogurt sauce made with sage, mint, or fennel.

-A type of thick dumpling, stuffed with a variety of foods (beef or horse, wild game, onions, fennel, magah, cheese, etc) and used as a common element of meals. Most comparable in shape to a pierogi.

-fried or baked dough balls with cheese and herbs

-taarn pheasant with a butter and plum or dirrucag sauce.

-beef stock soup with dumplings, onion, and curd cheeses

-beef or horse tartare with melted butter. Sometimes eaten on its own, sometimes sprinkled with herbs or topped in a spicy yogurt sauce.

-wheat or barley porridge with milk, yogurt, or butter, sometimes sweetened with honey.

-broth made with beef trotters and lightly flavored with herbs, often used as a base for other dishes but usually sipped.

-savory barley porridge cooked in beef or horse stock (often as a base for meat dishes)

-cheese, beer, and meat stock soup, often with peas, onions, magah, barley, and/or amaranth.

-yogurt, mint and fennel soup

-plain yogurt with mint and honey

-a mildly sweet porridge made with mashed squash, barley, and milk

-sweet snacks made with amaranth seeds, honey, and dried fruit.

-piispiispi stuffed with herbs and onions and roasted

-mashed magah, basic dish of thoroughly cooked magah, mashed with butter, cream, or yogurt.

-boiled, minced magah with minced meat, mild peppers, and fennel, best topped with a sour yogurt sauce.

-mustard and other wild greens, usually cooked down with butter or beef fat and mixed with onions

-an absolute litany of cheeses, often made with delicate herbs or strong peppers. Soft cheeses are generally favored and most widely used in cooking, hard cheeses are eaten on the go.

-Beef or horse testicles, usually cooked in a butter sauce as part of a larger meal. (most commonly obtained as a byproduct of gelding, in which case it is thought to uniquely boost fertility in ways that testicles obtained in slaughter do not)

-a mild pastry stuffed with soft cheese and topped with honey

-a nettle soup and onion soup, best taken in a fish or shellfish broth for enhanced umami flavor.

-Cow head that has been de-haired and de-brained, smoked, and slowly cooked with herbs and vegetables until tender. This is eaten at wedding celebration- the husband's family will have slaughtered the cow as a bride price. The husband and wife are given the choice, fatty cuts, the marrying families share the rest of the meat, and the broth is sipped by all guests.

-cow or horse brain, minced and fried in butter with onions and served atop mashed magah.

-blood sausage, with grain or magah and wild onions for filler.

-a spicy soup or stew made with boiled crayfish, onion, hot peppers, and cream.

-smoked trout with honey

-roasted honeycomb with larvae

[what-even-is-thiss]

When inventing a fantasy religion a lot of people a) make the mistake of assuming that everyone in fantasy world would worship the same gods and b) assume that polytheistic religions see all of their gods as morally good

[what-even-is-thiss]

Some types of religions for your world building (any of these ideas can stand alone or be combined with each other):

One god, don’t play with any others.

Everything is God

One big god or small group of gods made everything but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other smaller ones that work for the big one(s)

There’s one god but all of these hundreds of gods are aspects of that one god and the aspects of the one god can absolutely marry each other and have marital squabbles

Individuality is an illusion and the universe is a series of vibes experiencing itself

The world used to be an egg but then that egg became a god and then that god made some other gods and then those gods became bored and made the universe and then they got to screwing each other to make even more gods and now there’s hundreds of them and exactly what gods are worshiped changes on who you ask in a particular region

Everything has a soul. Act like it.

Someone or something spoke the world into existence and we’ve been stealing other people’s stories ever since we’ll take whatever gods you have

A bunch of regional gods got smushed together and now there’s a state mandated religion that’s trying to make this smaller pantheon more popular than local folk religion

The difference between a god, a nature spirit, and a legendary person is extremely unclear even to worshipers but there’s shrines to all of them

A god chose these people to be their special guys and their special guys are gonna have a tough time. That god may be the only god or it may be one of many those people believe exist

Humans were kinda stupid until this one spirit or person showed up and taught them how to do stuff so now we do stuff to thank the person or thing that taught us how to do stuff

The world will keep on ending and being rebuilt it just does that sometimes nobody knows when it started or if it ever did

You can learn a lot from talking animals.

People were made to do work the god(s) don’t wanna do

People were made because the god(s) were lonely/bored/drunk

This river in particular is the most important thing in the whole universe

You need to get better philosophy. This guy was good at philosophy. Read his book.

[deletingmyself]

(by Job Savelsberg)| Vik, Iceland

[uzlolzu]

Sevan. Storm demon, war correspondent, single.

[eliotbaum]

The Siphoner 🩸 A character class for The Hidden Isle. You can preorder the TTRPG here

[worldhistoryfacts]

Mongolian “deer stones,” engraved with images of flying deer or reindeer. These were likely erected by steppe nomads around 1000 BCE.

{WHF} {HTE} {Medium}

[bocceclub]

Orion Magazine - Landscape, Change, and the Long Road Ahead

In Ursula K. Le Guin’s classic The Left Hand of Darkness, her main character, Genly Ai, lands on the remote planet called Gethen, also known

JEFF VANDERMEER ESSAY ON CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS????

[bocceclub]

this in particular struck me

[bocceclub]

this too

[sitting-on-me-bum]

During volcanic eruptions, (above, Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano) colliding particles of ash create immense levels of electricity, released as volcanic lightning.

PHOTOGRAPH BY SIGURDUR STEFNISSON

[kurhanchyk]

horses in qazaq steppe near almatı, 2013

[shredsandpatches]

For reference: colors produced using dyes available in the Middle Ages. [source]

[bocceclub]

I haven't drawn this guy in ages wow (sorry for the quality lol I was at work so this was drawn in autodesk sketchbook mobile with my finger)

A lot of new people have followed me since the last time I talked about him – this is the protagonist of my low fantasy WIP, Bitter Days, and probably my oldest oc. His original name is Tomrin but that's now an alias in-story; his real name is Ithelrel. Features of note: wears an evil eye despite being a self-professed skeptic, has a silver streak from childhood illness, never smiles.

[gestaltaggregation]

September 11th, 2020

[ps1]

Harbor Seals in the Fog