The Kingdom of Vale
The Kingdom of Vale is one of four major states within Remnant, and is the cultural and economic hegemon of the modern era.
Structure
Vale is a Federal Republic composed of 85 provinces and headed by a 5 man Council, with 3 elected Councilors and 2 appointed Consuls. Each province has its own local council which governs most day to day affairs, with the Valean Council focusing on foreign policy and a handful of national issues- the exact boundary between local autonomy and federal authority is a key political issue within the Kingdom.
History
Key Dates
- Writ of Union: March 24th, 418 BGW (Created the Kingdom of Vale as an elective monarchy headed by House Verdun and House Azure) - Core Unification: December 14th, 318 BGW (Consolidated the Great Valley of North East Sanus as its core territory) - Civic Charter: August 26th, 185 BGW (Formalized the rights of citizens across all fiefs and territories, abolished slavery) - Vytal Reforms: January 1st, 1 AGW (Transitioned from a Constitutional Monarchy to a Constitutional Republic)
The Great Valley of Northeast Sanus, for which the Kingdom gets its name, has long been a center of human civilization. Bounded by oceans to the the North, West and South, and with the might Alcyrenes guarding its Eastern Flank, the territory has strong natural defenses and access to maritime trade routes. The River Simes runs from the snowcaps of the Alcyrenes to the Sea of Marselle- straight through the Kingdom's center-and is navigable, with predictable flood patterns, making its alluvial plain an ideal location for agriculture. The river also connects the Kingdom's interior to seaborne trade. Its climate is temperate and mild; its coastal and central plains are generally separated by rocky foothills, lush forests, smaller rivers and tributaries of the Simes, creating numerous internal barriers mild enough to allow trade and communication but substantial enough to complicate conquests and foster smaller political units. Valeans are one of the oldest and most enduring cultural and phenotypic groups in Remnant, but the Valean nation has rarely been unified under a single government. Only two such states are recorded, one in history and one in legend. The Emerald Empire is a semi-mythical polity that is hypothesized to have existed between 25,000 and 20,000 years before the Great War. Its core was in the contemporary Emerald Forest, but sites in the proper architectural style have been found across modern Vale an even extending inland across the Alcyrene Frontier, but archeologists are uncertain as to whether these ruins represent a common culture or common political organization. The few stone inscriptions that remain, etched into their monuments, are unintelligible- the glyphs are undeciphered and unrelated to any modern written language. Oral traditions, however, tell of a unified empire, prosperous, peaceful and in harmony with nature, with cities, fields and forests intermingling under the care of wise and powerful men. The same legends are filled with tropes such as magic, gods, witches and monstrous beasts, however, and contemporary scholars suspect these tales to be little more than an idyllic arcadian fantasy of a lost golden age. The difficulty separating wilderness from settlement may well be a product of millennia of encroachment, with all but the sturdiest stone structures having eroded to dust. The myth has been retold and reworked for numerous purposes, by preachers tying the fall of the Empire to the inherently fallen nature of man, and by revanchists recalling a bygone era in a call for early Valean Nationalism, making the separation of fact and fiction so long after the event equally difficult. It is generally agreed, however, that this culture, and a few others like it scattered across Remnant, exceeded all but the most recent modern states in scope and sophistication. Then, almost simultaneously, they collapsed, without any warning beforehand or any trace left afterwards. Little is known about the event historians call 'The Cataclysm', but there would be no signs of Human settlement on the planet for millenia, and those that did eventually emerge were simple, fleeting and poor, replacing marble and brick remains with ashes and dust. This sense that we were once more than we are and the world we inhabit is merely a hollow relic of what came before is universal to almost all Human cultures; the names of the world in countless languages are synonymous with 'fragment', 'shard', or, in our own tongue, Remnant. Nevertheless, embers of light continued to burn in the ashes of the old world, and over the millenia smaller Kingdoms would rise and fall. These states either lacked written language or their records did not survive, but either way we know precious little about them. The ruins they left behind were smaller and shabbier than their predecessors, and while the Emerald Empire seems to have been abandoned, signs of violence are invariably found at later digs. Historians hypothesize that the period was characterized by perptual, fierce, internicene warfare, as the weapons found at these sites as a rule are so similar as to make distinguishing which side they were on impossible. Some sites would seemingly persist for a century or more and grow to become regional powers, but inevitably they collapsed, leaving only broken bones and bloodstained iron as their epitaph. Progress was piecemeal over the millennia until about 2000 years ago, when the average size and longevity of settlements rose dramatically. This was followed by proportionately larger wars, but gradually these too faded in intensity and frequency. By roughly 1000 BGW our first written histories were being composed, giving us access to data beyond archeology, myth and conjecture. In the centuries leading up to Valean Unification the area was divided into several hundred small fiefs, which waxed and waned in influence and were in constant competition with one another.
The 2nd and 1st centuries Before the Great War also represented a shift in focus- with Vale now unified and reorganized into a well defined and powerful state, its influence began to expand beyond its borders. Increased contact with Mistrali naval and merchant vessels and the rapid growth of the new Kingdom of Mantle in the far north led to a scramble for control of overseas territories. Valean armies began exerting their control over Eastern and Central Sanus, while the Valean Navy fought for control of islands, ports and choke points across the world. Vale established garrisons in Vacuo and carved out parts of Coastal Menagerie for themselves, controlling much of the territory surrounding Kuo Kuana (captured in 128 BGW). Domestically, conflict with foreign powers increased Valean Liberalism- the individual freedoms and democratic norms of their Kingdom differentiated them from their autocratic rivals and these characteristics became even more central to their national identity. However, these rights were only partly extended to the Valean colonies, and were not extended at all to conquered peoples. Over the course of this period Mantle became increasingly authoritarian, repressing art and self expression nearly out of existence within their borders. Mistral, which had by this point forged a strong alliance with Mantle, followed suit selectively, forcing Mantle's policies on its outlying possessions. This drift towards totalitarianism, and its imposition on Valean travelers and traders, greatly aggravated most Valean citizens. This sentiment was not universally held, however. King Domitian was the 2nd of 3 Arcs to hold the throne and the 2nd to last King of Vale. House Arc had since its inception been a power player within the Kingdom, but their relative youth as a bloodline and perceived intemperance were considered liabilities when considering who should hold the purple: the previous Arc King, August, had the benefit of inheriting the reputation and political alliances forged by his father Claude, who was a key player in the creation of the Civic Charter, and both father, son and grandfather had a reputation as fair minded and more even keeled than their bloodline's founders (none of them being 'True Arcs' as the Blessing passed over the firstborn, surviving in their more virile 'cadets'), 'rehabilitating' the House in the eyes of the other nobles. Domitian, by contrast, was as more stereotypical Arc- his accomplishments as a general endeared him to his men and his tenure as Governor of Kuo Kuana was effective, if brutal. Elected in 30 BGW at the comparatively young age of 39, it was expected that Domitian would go on to be one of the most influential kings in the history of Vale. Unfortunately, Domitian had come to admire the Kingdoms he had been ordered to fight against. The absolute power of the Lord Protector and the extravagant lifestyle of the Jade Emperor both appealed to him- no man could match a True Arc in martial prowess, and and an official court harem would sidestep the issue of legitimacy and allow him to cherry pick a proper heir, ensuring a Blessed would always inherit the throne. To that end, he began to radically reorganize and expand the military, sent overtures to Mistral and Mantle floating the idea of a 'Triple Alliance' and began to increasingly sideline the Council and various nobles, collecting taxes directly and outright ignoring their edicts. This alarmed the Valean nobles, who were not keen on turning centuries of power sharing into an Arc Empire. Privately, they began plotting to 'remove' their new monarch, but with the army firmly on his side, rebellion seemed hopeless. Their salvation would come from an unexpected source. History sometimes hinges on chance, and the nature of a single man. Norman Arc was one such man. By all accounts a brilliant mind and a virile young man, Norman, bookish and reserved as he was, seemed the natural successor to his father's legacy. But while his Domitian was laying the groundwork, Norman became a key member of the plot to assassinate his father. No one knows exactly why: some claim the boy feared usurpation from a rival heir his father would inevitably sire if he had his way; others claim he was motivated by a patriotic belief in the Valean system. Whatever the reason, in 24 BGW, Domitian, the 41st King of Vale, was found dead- the only Valean King to have ever been assassinated. The cause of death, however, was unclear at the time. The army, distraught at the untimely demise of their beloved King, made it clear they would only accept his heir as his successor. The conspirators, reluctant to set the precedent of violently seizing the throne from a Princely House, and secure in the secret knowledge that Norman was one of their own, agreed. In 24 AGW, at the tender age of 16, Norman was the youngest King of Vale ever crowned. Contemporary correspondence suggests that both officers in the army and prominent nobles thought the young, inexperienced boy would be easy puppet for their own interests. But Norman was wise beyond his years, and rapidly acquired a power base of his own. He gained a reputation for total devotion to the wellbeing of his people: focusing on commerce and reform, walking back his father's policies and becoming a patron of the arts and sciences, negotiating peaceful resolutions to kinds of disputes that would have led to small scale wars and saving many lives in the process, even forgoing marriage in order to focus on matters of state. So beloved was the boy king that he gained the honorific 'Valerian', a title that would eventually supplant his birth name in the historical and popular imagination. Mistral and Mantle, however, were not amused by the quiet coup d'etat, and perceiving the new King as a weakling, began a series of increased provocations on Vale. Import duties on Valean goods were doubled, and continued to rise in the years leading up into the war. Unauthorized Valean vessels that entered alliance waters were routinely captured, their cargoes siezed and their crews impressed into alliance navies. Mistrali and Mantlian colonies began pressuring their Valean neighbors to abide by the alliance's restrictive cultural sensibilites. The Valeans were not inclined to comply, and began agitating for more and more aggressive retaliation. Valerian was initially able to limit these conflicts to small scale proxy wars between clients, but tensions were especially high on the Eastern Coast of Sanus. Vale had established colonies in many of the peninsulas and islands of the region, but Mistrali settlement soon followed, starting with Catamaran Island and ballooning out from there. A riot between neighboring towns on the island of Graecia escalated into a full blown war between the Kingdoms, beginning the Great War. Valerian's accomplishments in war eclipsed his record in peace. His strategic acumen, battlefield prowess and sheer force of personality held the Valean Army and Valean People together under the onslought of two rival Kingdoms during the early yeas of the war. Once Vacuo expelled the Alliance occupiers and War Queen Hypolita forged her own covenant with Vale, the tides of war began to turn, and at the Final Battle of Vacuo, Valerian personally led his forces to victory. Rather than establishing outright Valean superiority, Valerian took the opportunity of having all four Kingdoms under one banner to fundamentally alter the political structure of Remnant. The Kings would abdicate, and no man would replace them. Democracy would take their place. The Valean aristocracy once again took exception to this, but once again there was little they could do. The Warrior King had the support of ALL the armies who had been battle hardened by a decade long war. Valeans, already more egalitarian and democratic than other nations, viewed monarchic and aristocratic tyranny as being responsible for the war. Furthermore, Valean nobles had traditionally been warriors, carving out and protecting their own fiefs personally, so their young men were disproportionately killed in the bloodiest war in recorded history. Not strong enough to oppose the extremely popular, extremely powerful King of Vale, and with many of their heirs and futures gone, the noble houses of Vale relinquished their status, and much of their lands, liquidating what wealth they could and vanishing into obscurity. There was contemporary effort to hide which of the surviving members were the rightful heirs: every House had produced dozens of offshoot lines, which typically shared the family name, and with nobility suddenly a liability instead of an asset, obfuscation of the genealogical record became common practice. Valerian would live for 12 more years after the war, serving as head of the Vytal Organization, to give the fledgingly body legitimacy and influence that would persist into the present day, and dying as a private citizen in a new world he had built. Valerian ruled the Kingdom of Vale for 34 years, as its longest serving, and, unanimously, its best King. He was the 42nd, and the last.
- Writ of Union: March 24th, 418 BGW (Created the Kingdom of Vale as an elective monarchy headed by House Verdun and House Azure) - Core Unification: December 14th, 318 BGW (Consolidated the Great Valley of North East Sanus as its core territory) - Civic Charter: August 26th, 185 BGW (Formalized the rights of citizens across all fiefs and territories, abolished slavery) - Vytal Reforms: January 1st, 1 AGW (Transitioned from a Constitutional Monarchy to a Constitutional Republic)
Pre-History
The Great Valley of Northeast Sanus, for which the Kingdom gets its name, has long been a center of human civilization. Bounded by oceans to the the North, West and South, and with the might Alcyrenes guarding its Eastern Flank, the territory has strong natural defenses and access to maritime trade routes. The River Simes runs from the snowcaps of the Alcyrenes to the Sea of Marselle- straight through the Kingdom's center-and is navigable, with predictable flood patterns, making its alluvial plain an ideal location for agriculture. The river also connects the Kingdom's interior to seaborne trade. Its climate is temperate and mild; its coastal and central plains are generally separated by rocky foothills, lush forests, smaller rivers and tributaries of the Simes, creating numerous internal barriers mild enough to allow trade and communication but substantial enough to complicate conquests and foster smaller political units. Valeans are one of the oldest and most enduring cultural and phenotypic groups in Remnant, but the Valean nation has rarely been unified under a single government. Only two such states are recorded, one in history and one in legend. The Emerald Empire is a semi-mythical polity that is hypothesized to have existed between 25,000 and 20,000 years before the Great War. Its core was in the contemporary Emerald Forest, but sites in the proper architectural style have been found across modern Vale an even extending inland across the Alcyrene Frontier, but archeologists are uncertain as to whether these ruins represent a common culture or common political organization. The few stone inscriptions that remain, etched into their monuments, are unintelligible- the glyphs are undeciphered and unrelated to any modern written language. Oral traditions, however, tell of a unified empire, prosperous, peaceful and in harmony with nature, with cities, fields and forests intermingling under the care of wise and powerful men. The same legends are filled with tropes such as magic, gods, witches and monstrous beasts, however, and contemporary scholars suspect these tales to be little more than an idyllic arcadian fantasy of a lost golden age. The difficulty separating wilderness from settlement may well be a product of millennia of encroachment, with all but the sturdiest stone structures having eroded to dust. The myth has been retold and reworked for numerous purposes, by preachers tying the fall of the Empire to the inherently fallen nature of man, and by revanchists recalling a bygone era in a call for early Valean Nationalism, making the separation of fact and fiction so long after the event equally difficult. It is generally agreed, however, that this culture, and a few others like it scattered across Remnant, exceeded all but the most recent modern states in scope and sophistication. Then, almost simultaneously, they collapsed, without any warning beforehand or any trace left afterwards. Little is known about the event historians call 'The Cataclysm', but there would be no signs of Human settlement on the planet for millenia, and those that did eventually emerge were simple, fleeting and poor, replacing marble and brick remains with ashes and dust. This sense that we were once more than we are and the world we inhabit is merely a hollow relic of what came before is universal to almost all Human cultures; the names of the world in countless languages are synonymous with 'fragment', 'shard', or, in our own tongue, Remnant. Nevertheless, embers of light continued to burn in the ashes of the old world, and over the millenia smaller Kingdoms would rise and fall. These states either lacked written language or their records did not survive, but either way we know precious little about them. The ruins they left behind were smaller and shabbier than their predecessors, and while the Emerald Empire seems to have been abandoned, signs of violence are invariably found at later digs. Historians hypothesize that the period was characterized by perptual, fierce, internicene warfare, as the weapons found at these sites as a rule are so similar as to make distinguishing which side they were on impossible. Some sites would seemingly persist for a century or more and grow to become regional powers, but inevitably they collapsed, leaving only broken bones and bloodstained iron as their epitaph. Progress was piecemeal over the millennia until about 2000 years ago, when the average size and longevity of settlements rose dramatically. This was followed by proportionately larger wars, but gradually these too faded in intensity and frequency. By roughly 1000 BGW our first written histories were being composed, giving us access to data beyond archeology, myth and conjecture. In the centuries leading up to Valean Unification the area was divided into several hundred small fiefs, which waxed and waned in influence and were in constant competition with one another.
Unification
By the 5th century BGW the two most powerful of these were led by House Verdun and House Azure. Verdun had conquered most of the southern bend of the Simes, and was the most populous and agriculturally productive fief in the valley. Azure possessed the finest heavy infantry in the valley with rigid military discipline and finely made equipment. After decades of warfare the two powers realized together no other fief could match them and negotiated a power sharing agreement which bound them and their vassals into the Kingdom of Vale, on March 24th, 418 BGW. Old fiefs were subordinated to the new monarchy and became the modern provinces. As the Kingdom expanded particularly valuable or troublesome fiefs were offered equal status to the founders in return for their loyalty, with their masters being designated as ‘Princes’ rather than mere ‘Lords’ (though as Valean history progressed this title was rarely used outside of formal settings). The city-state of Oran brought in an unparalleled intelligence network and mastery of urban warfare, the city of Dore offered strategic control of a chokepoint at both bends of the upper Simes. Perelle offered the island of Patch and an important counterweight to the various mercantile Capulet strongholds that dominated much of the coast. Merlot’s ascension came with the near total envelopment of many weaker fiefs who then surrendered without a fight on far less favorable terms. Montague sured up the frontier and brought in valuable overland trade through the passes to rival the Capulets. The Capulets brought the aforementioned port strongholds and their ascension undercut Perelle and Montague politically. House Reiss had its own coalition with Spencer, Sylvia and Leyen [The Nerthan Four] and all four were offered Princely status to avoid a costly war and put up a united front against the Faunus, who were beginning to rally after decades of displacement by the young Kingdom, under the leadership of a powerful warlord known as the Beast King. House Arc, unlike its peers, did not exist prior to the Kingdom of Vale, but the commoner Arc I had rallied a scattered and demoralized army and became a national hero after routing and capturing the army of the Beast King, so he and his descendants were granted land, title and a shot at the purple in order to prevent him from outright taking it. The survivors of the Beast King's forces were settled as serfs in the depopulated regions, as the lowest of subjects, but subjects of the Vale never the less. Arcadia and Frontera Nord were created by the crown (the former out of the depopulated and disbanded provinces devastated by the Final Valean Feral War, the latter in a sparsely populated border area to act as a buffer against foreign incursions) but all other fiefs pre-dated the Kingdom, though over the course of its expansion cooperative fiefs were allowed to annex and absorb their more recalcitrant neighbors. By 322 BGW, less than a century after its founding, Valean Unification was complete, and its core borders and subdivisions would remain more or less intact into the present day.Organization and Liberalization
The period of Valean History between 418-322 BGW is generally defined by the Unification Wars and later the Feral Wars, but in the subsequent centuries the heartland of the Kingdom was largely pacified. There were some overseas conflicts where Vale asserted its dominance, most notably the Destruction of Ilos (275-272 BGW) which eliminated a local rival and assured Vale's supremacy in the region, but at home Vale was free to catch its breath for the first time in millenia. Domestic focus was concentrated on economic growth and internal reforms. Vale began as a semi-constitutional monarchy, bound by custom and with a great deal of local autonomy retained by local princes and lords. The King acted as the Commander-in-Chief of the Valean Military, the ceremonial Head of State, and Supreme Justice for Vale's final court of appeals. Legislative powers were gradually ceded to a series of Councils, and most monarchs delegated extensively to their various ministers, but to some degree the King remained the nation's chief executive until the Post War Period. The Laurel Throne was initially occupied by a mutually acceptable prince of either Verdun or Azure, but as the number of princes expanded the office of King became an elected one- though only a son of one of the 13 Princely Houses or their cadet lines was eligible. The election was first conducted by the 'Princely Council', composed of the 13 Heads of House for the families eligible for the Crown. The selection process was fraught with politicking: powerful princes would sometimes try and elect either their sons or a young cadet male rather than themselves, so their family could control the throne for decades, but the majority of the time one of the Princes themselves was selected, and the weaker the consensus the older the chosen King typically was, under the logic that such a compromise candidate could be replaced more quickly. This selection mechanism is often credited by historians as the reason why Vale had very few succession crises compared to other, purely hereditary monarchies. Over the Kingdom's history 42 men would sit on the Valean throne for an average reign of 9.95 years, but the median reign was 2.8 years. As a result the strength of the King varied greatly across time- ranging from a largely symbolic position held by distinguished old noble to a hugely consequential ruler who would set policy for decades and alter the course of the Kingdom's history. The monarchy was a core element of the government, but the stability of Vale was grounded in its other, permanent institutions. Monarchs would come and go, but councils, judges and local nobility would endure and expand their power whenever a king was weak. In 369 BGW a permanent capital was constructed with the City of Vale, to distance the king from the house he belonged to and create permanent instruments of government. Valean Liberalization was a process that happened in fits and starts. Over the millennia Vale had developed common customs regarding the rights of citizens, general legal principles and due process, not as a result of a non-existent central authority but as a sort of common law. These rights were sometimes flagrantly violated, but the sense that these were violations of a proper order and not normal policies was widespread and enduring. Local lords still had a great deal autonomy over their subjects, but freedom of movement and competition for skilled professionals and artisans forced them to offer increasing concessions to their subjects. Just as the King had to make concessions to the Lords, the Lords had to make concessions to townships and guilds and the wider gentry, which increasingly demanded a share of political power. By 185 BGW these forces had become powerful enough to alter the unwritten constitution, replacing it with a written constitution, the Civic Charter, which guaranteed basic legal protections for due process, property rights and limited political rights for all citizens. There were high minded reforms: slavery was abolished, all laws had to be written, ratified by a representative council and publicly displayed to be considered binding, ex post facto laws and bills of attainder were prohibited and the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man was given the place of pride in the new Charter. There were also more practical adjustments: units of measure were standardized across the Kingdom (and again, remain in place to this day, while the rest of Remnant has adopted the International Standards of Measurement), administration of the provinces became more uniform and many feudal privileges were phased out, the federal character of the Kingdom became a formal part of the government rather than a tacit principle. Legislative power was generally divided by Councils of varying ranks and responsibilities.- The Princely Council: A Council of the Thirteen Princes. The oldest and most aristocratic of the councils, it acted as an advisory body to the King and also elected the new King upon his predecessors death. In the Civic Charter many of its powers were redelegated to the lower Councils: even the election of the King became subject to ratification, with the Princely Council 's nominees subject to approval or veto by the Council of Elders. Never the less, it retained a prestigious ceremonal role, and its members wielded wide influnce by virtue of their wealth and holdings, if not through the Council itself.
- The Council of Elders: A national parliament of 100 members, which became the Federal Legislature. The King presided over the Council and acted as its 101st member, but only voted in the event of a tie. The King could veto the Council's proposed laws, but that veto could be overridden by a 3/5 supermajority vote.They had the sole power to levy taxes, and all federal ministers and magistrates had to be approved by the Council. The King could refuse to call the Council to meet, but the government could not operate for long without them. Voting rights for the election of Elders were initially restricted to members of the nobility, but over time the suffrage was expanded to include all adult males above a property threshold, which became lower and lower over time.
- The Provincial Councils: Local bodies which were to Lords what the Council of Elders was to the King. With 85 examples, generalizing is difficult, but suffrage was broad, ranging from all property owning males, to universal male suffrage, to universal suffrage for all citizens in some provinces. These were the councils everyday citizens would have interacted with the most, and the ones they had the most influence over. Because of the autonomy granted to each province they held serious influence, and it was ultimately their norms and practices which would inspire the international standard that has become the dominant form of government in Remnant.
The Imperial Age
The 2nd and 1st centuries Before the Great War also represented a shift in focus- with Vale now unified and reorganized into a well defined and powerful state, its influence began to expand beyond its borders. Increased contact with Mistrali naval and merchant vessels and the rapid growth of the new Kingdom of Mantle in the far north led to a scramble for control of overseas territories. Valean armies began exerting their control over Eastern and Central Sanus, while the Valean Navy fought for control of islands, ports and choke points across the world. Vale established garrisons in Vacuo and carved out parts of Coastal Menagerie for themselves, controlling much of the territory surrounding Kuo Kuana (captured in 128 BGW). Domestically, conflict with foreign powers increased Valean Liberalism- the individual freedoms and democratic norms of their Kingdom differentiated them from their autocratic rivals and these characteristics became even more central to their national identity. However, these rights were only partly extended to the Valean colonies, and were not extended at all to conquered peoples. Over the course of this period Mantle became increasingly authoritarian, repressing art and self expression nearly out of existence within their borders. Mistral, which had by this point forged a strong alliance with Mantle, followed suit selectively, forcing Mantle's policies on its outlying possessions. This drift towards totalitarianism, and its imposition on Valean travelers and traders, greatly aggravated most Valean citizens. This sentiment was not universally held, however. King Domitian was the 2nd of 3 Arcs to hold the throne and the 2nd to last King of Vale. House Arc had since its inception been a power player within the Kingdom, but their relative youth as a bloodline and perceived intemperance were considered liabilities when considering who should hold the purple: the previous Arc King, August, had the benefit of inheriting the reputation and political alliances forged by his father Claude, who was a key player in the creation of the Civic Charter, and both father, son and grandfather had a reputation as fair minded and more even keeled than their bloodline's founders (none of them being 'True Arcs' as the Blessing passed over the firstborn, surviving in their more virile 'cadets'), 'rehabilitating' the House in the eyes of the other nobles. Domitian, by contrast, was as more stereotypical Arc- his accomplishments as a general endeared him to his men and his tenure as Governor of Kuo Kuana was effective, if brutal. Elected in 30 BGW at the comparatively young age of 39, it was expected that Domitian would go on to be one of the most influential kings in the history of Vale. Unfortunately, Domitian had come to admire the Kingdoms he had been ordered to fight against. The absolute power of the Lord Protector and the extravagant lifestyle of the Jade Emperor both appealed to him- no man could match a True Arc in martial prowess, and and an official court harem would sidestep the issue of legitimacy and allow him to cherry pick a proper heir, ensuring a Blessed would always inherit the throne. To that end, he began to radically reorganize and expand the military, sent overtures to Mistral and Mantle floating the idea of a 'Triple Alliance' and began to increasingly sideline the Council and various nobles, collecting taxes directly and outright ignoring their edicts. This alarmed the Valean nobles, who were not keen on turning centuries of power sharing into an Arc Empire. Privately, they began plotting to 'remove' their new monarch, but with the army firmly on his side, rebellion seemed hopeless. Their salvation would come from an unexpected source. History sometimes hinges on chance, and the nature of a single man. Norman Arc was one such man. By all accounts a brilliant mind and a virile young man, Norman, bookish and reserved as he was, seemed the natural successor to his father's legacy. But while his Domitian was laying the groundwork, Norman became a key member of the plot to assassinate his father. No one knows exactly why: some claim the boy feared usurpation from a rival heir his father would inevitably sire if he had his way; others claim he was motivated by a patriotic belief in the Valean system. Whatever the reason, in 24 BGW, Domitian, the 41st King of Vale, was found dead- the only Valean King to have ever been assassinated. The cause of death, however, was unclear at the time. The army, distraught at the untimely demise of their beloved King, made it clear they would only accept his heir as his successor. The conspirators, reluctant to set the precedent of violently seizing the throne from a Princely House, and secure in the secret knowledge that Norman was one of their own, agreed. In 24 AGW, at the tender age of 16, Norman was the youngest King of Vale ever crowned. Contemporary correspondence suggests that both officers in the army and prominent nobles thought the young, inexperienced boy would be easy puppet for their own interests. But Norman was wise beyond his years, and rapidly acquired a power base of his own. He gained a reputation for total devotion to the wellbeing of his people: focusing on commerce and reform, walking back his father's policies and becoming a patron of the arts and sciences, negotiating peaceful resolutions to kinds of disputes that would have led to small scale wars and saving many lives in the process, even forgoing marriage in order to focus on matters of state. So beloved was the boy king that he gained the honorific 'Valerian', a title that would eventually supplant his birth name in the historical and popular imagination. Mistral and Mantle, however, were not amused by the quiet coup d'etat, and perceiving the new King as a weakling, began a series of increased provocations on Vale. Import duties on Valean goods were doubled, and continued to rise in the years leading up into the war. Unauthorized Valean vessels that entered alliance waters were routinely captured, their cargoes siezed and their crews impressed into alliance navies. Mistrali and Mantlian colonies began pressuring their Valean neighbors to abide by the alliance's restrictive cultural sensibilites. The Valeans were not inclined to comply, and began agitating for more and more aggressive retaliation. Valerian was initially able to limit these conflicts to small scale proxy wars between clients, but tensions were especially high on the Eastern Coast of Sanus. Vale had established colonies in many of the peninsulas and islands of the region, but Mistrali settlement soon followed, starting with Catamaran Island and ballooning out from there. A riot between neighboring towns on the island of Graecia escalated into a full blown war between the Kingdoms, beginning the Great War. Valerian's accomplishments in war eclipsed his record in peace. His strategic acumen, battlefield prowess and sheer force of personality held the Valean Army and Valean People together under the onslought of two rival Kingdoms during the early yeas of the war. Once Vacuo expelled the Alliance occupiers and War Queen Hypolita forged her own covenant with Vale, the tides of war began to turn, and at the Final Battle of Vacuo, Valerian personally led his forces to victory. Rather than establishing outright Valean superiority, Valerian took the opportunity of having all four Kingdoms under one banner to fundamentally alter the political structure of Remnant. The Kings would abdicate, and no man would replace them. Democracy would take their place. The Valean aristocracy once again took exception to this, but once again there was little they could do. The Warrior King had the support of ALL the armies who had been battle hardened by a decade long war. Valeans, already more egalitarian and democratic than other nations, viewed monarchic and aristocratic tyranny as being responsible for the war. Furthermore, Valean nobles had traditionally been warriors, carving out and protecting their own fiefs personally, so their young men were disproportionately killed in the bloodiest war in recorded history. Not strong enough to oppose the extremely popular, extremely powerful King of Vale, and with many of their heirs and futures gone, the noble houses of Vale relinquished their status, and much of their lands, liquidating what wealth they could and vanishing into obscurity. There was contemporary effort to hide which of the surviving members were the rightful heirs: every House had produced dozens of offshoot lines, which typically shared the family name, and with nobility suddenly a liability instead of an asset, obfuscation of the genealogical record became common practice. Valerian would live for 12 more years after the war, serving as head of the Vytal Organization, to give the fledgingly body legitimacy and influence that would persist into the present day, and dying as a private citizen in a new world he had built. Valerian ruled the Kingdom of Vale for 34 years, as its longest serving, and, unanimously, its best King. He was the 42nd, and the last.
The Vytal Era
But Vale continued on. Like the rest of the world, the post war economic and population boom profoundly affected Vale. Vale remains the cultural and political world hegemon in the post war period. Its highly fertile farmlands have made it a leading exporter of agricultural goods, and the cities, especially the Capital, have attracted migrants from all over Remnant. The City of Vale, which had initially been confined to the province of Lutetia, rapidly expanded to absorb or contain multiple provinces, with the city government making its host provincial governments nearly irrelevant. The increasing cosmopolitan nature of Vale's urban core has led to some political tension with the more rural and traditional areas- the cities generally favor a more expensive national government while the outlying areas support the existing Valean federalism, this being the wedge issue that defines the modern partisan split between the Reform and the Lawful Peace Party (or the 'Blacks' and the 'Greens'). Tensions between Humans and Faunus are also acute- Faunus have historically been concentrated in the province Arcadia and the coastal cities, but their sizable population has outpaced the Kingdom's overall growth because of migration, intermarriage and a higher fertility rate- about as many Faunus live in Vale as Menagerie. Vale was the first of the Kingdoms to break from the Coalition and sue for peace during the Faunus Rights Revolution, but tens of thousands of Valeans were killed in the fighting and untold trillions of lien in property damage and lost economic output have left deep scars in the psyche of many Human Valeans. With Atlas consumed by Civil War, in the last few years Vale has become even more central to Remnant as the world's most important economy and is seen as an idyllic standard of peace- a beacon of hope for all mankind.
Choice Is Our Crowning Glory
Founding Date
March 24th, 418 BGW
Type
Geopolitical, State
Capital
Demonym
Valean
Government System
Democracy, Parliamentary
Power Structure
Federation
Economic System
Market economy
Currency
Lien (Ⱡ)
Land Area
464,890 sq. miles [1,202,060 km2]
Sphere of Influence
Eastern and Central Sanus
