The Axva, Chapter 6
Chapter 6:
The Collapse of Sokash:
Around 7350 BCE, Ila the Great of Sokash died, leaving the united Tele Region to her daughter Keshu. Keshu proved not as politically deft as her mother, and the Empire of Sokash fell into a civil war between two claimants to the throne on her death ten years later. Steles from this time period are largely absent - no doubt reflective of the difficulty in funding or creating monuments in a time of war. Archaeform records of the Sokash civil war are poetic in their language, claiming that the waters of the Tele turned red for ten rhythms each year with the blood of youth, and that the war itself lasted for twenty years. Some of this is exaggeration, but it is certain that the Sokash civil war was both bloody and destructive.
Further developments in the implementations of war seem to have assisted greatly in the deadliness of the war - bronze weaponry had been percolating through the Tele River Region prior to this time, but up until now had not been adopted by a standing army. It seems both sides of the Sokash civil war began to incorporate them into the arms of their ranks. Strong bronze maces called shusem have survived from this era, including one that clearly was built to serve a Tele of noble birth.
In addition to shusem, it is likely that the transition to the famous spear and shield form of warfare, which would become commonplace along the Tele in the years to come, first occurred at this time.
In the midst of this destruction, new warlords rose up from the formerly conquered cities to challenge the central bureaucracy of Sokash. Around 7320 BCE, the city of Sokash was sacked by a minor power in the rightward - probably from a local town that had gathered enough of a militia to raid the depopulated city. With that, the dreams and memory of Ila the Great fell, leaving a patchwork of cities to populate the Tele River once more.
Hope in Trying Times:
After and during the fall of the empire of Sokash, there was a period of about a century during which the gates of the Court of the Recluse in Ike closed to protect the monks inside from the ravages that the outside world faced. New monks were born of those women who had sought refuge within the Court before its closing. The worship of Ninush became unavailable to the people of the Tele. Offerings of food and drink piled up outside the Court of the Recluse, but the Court would not break its solitude.
The temple of Sasishkan likewise became defunct around this time, as it was largely seen as complicit in the conquest of the free cities by Sokash. Though it would later reassert its influence over the religious landscape of the Tele, it would take many decades to rebuild its tattered honor - not to mention the treasures that had been looted from it during the chaos of the collapse.
Instead, in the minor town of Akshetse, a small-time cleric whose name has been lost to time is credited with the creation of the Temple of the Five Gods. These gods, who started life as local deities of the natural landscape around Akshetse, would later become the core of a unified Tele Pantheon worshiped by the extended area of Tele River valley influence. In later times, these gods would be known as the Vasi - an archaic Aulan exonym meaning “Old Ones”.
The rise in popularity of the Temple of the Five Gods was attributed in its time by the chroniclers of Akshetse as being due to its emphasis on seeing to the welfare of the common person - something desperately needed in the chaos following the collapse of the Sokash Empire. Both Sasishkan and the Recluse had largely been cults that catered to the needs of the upper strata. In time, the Vasi would grow as distant from their roots as the other gods, as corruption took root within the religion. But for the first few centuries of its existence, the Temple of the Five Gods spread roots across the Tele River cities, and the worship of the Vasi became ubiquitous.
The First Invasion:
In the half-century following the collapse of the Sokash Empire, war was endemic to the Tele River System. Constant minor conflicts fought between the different regional powers led to a corrosion of the collective military strength of the Tele city-states, which in turn left them underprepared for the first great expedition by Sunward tribes against the Tele.
Around 7300 BCE, a great horde of the Geshikan flooded darkward from the coastal forests that they had originally occupied. Their recorded strength is once again shrouded in poetic license, but modern estimates put their number easily around ten thousand warriors, plus a baggage train of tribe members following the main force to support the expedition. Their first target was Aner, dealing the second sacking in one century to the dilapidated husk of a city. From there, the main force split into two branches to attack along different routes. One followed the trade routes upstream to lay siege to and ultimately sack the cities of Dat’Ha and Ike. The other crossed the Tele River and wreaked havoc on the cities centered around the Kande.
In the end, the walls of the Tele proved ineffective against the hordes rampaging outside their limits. This was largely due to the lack of supply - caused by incessant conflict - within the cities that would have enabled them to withstand a protracted siege. Every city that the invaders laid siege to fell, and were subject to thorough pillage. The spoils of this invasion would be carried back sunward by the rightward arm of the invasion, but the leftward arm would occupy the darkward city of Telenkha, and change its name from Telenkha (“Far from Tele”) to Gyurmo (“Newness”).
The bypassing of Akshetse in the invasion route, and the raiding of the more populated cities in the region, is partly responsible for the growing prosperity of Akshetse. Waves of refugees from the sacking of Dat’Ha and Ike brought with them a cultural renaissance of sorts, and a blending of different elements of the Tele, both rightward and leftward. In the coming centuries, this would lead to the slow but steady rise of Akshetse as a major power on the geopolitical scene.
It is speculated that the Geshikan of the first invasion were driven out of the sunward lands by internal displacement. In search of a new homeland, the invading hordes turned their attention to the long-raided cities of the darkward in a desperate attempt to find a replacement for their lost homeland. In the case of the leftward branch of the invasion, they did. These Geshikan would become the ancestors of the darkward Arguyuma peoples that would continue to be a thorn in the side of the Tele.
The New Order:
From 7270 BCE onwards, the political ecology of the Tele cities gradually returned to a semblance of normalcy. New settlement grew up around the old city of Aner, cannibalizing the paving stones from the former center to create new buildings for its residents. While Dat’Ha and Ugash never recovered from the invasion of the Geshikan, Aner displayed a remarkable resilience in the face of its adversity.
Ike likewise survived and rebuilt the catastrophes of yesteryear. Around 7250 BCE, the gates of the Court of the Recluse opened again, and provided the religious and economic impetus for new growth in Ike’s population.
Ekashu, founded during the reign of Ila the Great, transformed from a backwater outpost overlooking one of the minor tributaries of the Tele, into a regional power that strung together the former populace of the leftward Tele. Across the Telen Mountains, Akshetse and Ike jockeyed for ascendancy and extended their influence rightward into Kalan and the weakened Sokash.
The period was referred to in the annals of the Tele as the time of the Three Kingdoms. However, the complexities of the time period often defy this label. In reality, the cities and towns of the Tele region often split into several entities centered on different loci of political power. Each of the Three Kingdoms themselves was led by a rotating door of dynasties that didn’t last for long, at least until around 7130, when the structure of the Three Kingdoms was more conclusively ossified under the rule of three separate ruling families.
The adoption of bronze as the material of choice for toolworking enabled societal changes on a grander scale. Bronze was more easily fusible (more readily melted), and hence, easier to cast. Everything from common tools to religious idols was shaped out of the new metal. In turn, more durable tools meant an increase in industry during this time. The new demand for tin in order to produce bronze led to the copper mines of Kalan losing their centrality in the economy of the Tele, and trade routes towards the rightward descendents of the Microlith Culture taking their place.
Learning and Medicine:
From roughly 7200 to 7100 BCE, the conditions in and around the Tele River gradually improved to a point that increased focus was put on the welfare of the ordinary citizenry. Having made it through the crucible, the Tele had a chance to thrive as the relatively stable times that followed enabled the collation of knowledge from around the known world.
In Ekashu, two major public works were constructed around this time: the library of Atshunem, and the baths of Ekashu. A large portion of the chronicled history of the Three Kingdoms period is sourced directly from the tablets that survived the destruction of the library. So much remains of the library that Tele-ologists have not properly translated the entirety of the contents that have come down to us. The process of detailing the history of this time continues to the present, with new discoveries made each rhythm.
The library of Atshunem was also the center of one of the first institutes of learning, wherein pupils were taught the five classical subjects: Persuasion, Arithmetic/Writing, Astrology/Religion, Substance, and War. Records of exercises done by students on clay tablets survive, detailing a grueling daily regimen of learning broken only by the bored doodles of pupils with the end of their styluses at the margins of their tablets. Punishments were liberal. One detention record lists 50 strokes with a cane for a minor joke by a student directed at their teacher. In context - in a society where parents held life or death power over their children - such punishments were quite tame in comparison.
The library of Atshunem was also a center for the very first practitioners of the legal profession. Around the time of the library’s founding, the ruling king Atshunem of Ekashu, for whom the library is named, promulgated the code of Ekashe. This code was fairly simple in content, listing a series of crimes accompanied by their prescripted punishments. As time went on however, the legal rulings surrounding the code and its applicability to unique situations became increasingly complex, leading to the rise of lawyers. These lawyers could end up, as in our time, with extremely profitable cases. One record of a certain “Kennu Nunnu” of Ekashu indicates that he earned over forty honeyed cakes, twenty sacks of gold currency, and one hundred acid goats from a single case.
The public baths of Ekashu were the first serious effort at seeing to public health on any subsidized scale. While it is clear that the Tele valued their hygiene in the years before the Three Kingdoms period, it is also clear that after the pioneering effort by Ekashe to create spaces for the citizenry to maintain their health, the welfare of their citizens was somewhat ameliorated.
Medicine in this time was crude, relying heavily on astrology and superstition, so the public baths of Ekashe represented a quantum leap in the field. Still, the presence of amulets inscribed with archeoform blessings to ward off evil spirits at the public baths indicates a continued reliance on the spiritual comforts of animism to solve medical problems rather than anything we would recognize today as good science. Likewise, precious minerals and stones were regarded as sources of potential healing - in particular, lapis lazuli was prized for its healing properties.
Ward Against Evil:
Atshu of Akshetse, health and healing are your domain.
Atshu of Akshetse, offspring and desire are your domain.
Atshu of Akshetse, purity of skin and straightness of bone are your domain.
Atshu of Akshetse, peace of mind and wholeness of body are your domain.
Extend your domain through my person, and ward off the demons that plague the waking world.