Clan Beth

Slayers of the Aernigh and High Lords of Revellia

Sigil: A white boar, rampant, with a powder blue eye
Colors: Scarlet and Sky
Current Patriarch: King Bethraal, Reynar of the Leante and the Siiari, Lord of Revelback and the Boarswood and the Cape of Monsters, Overlord of the Frontier and the Green Isle, Shield of the Southern Promontory, High Lord of all Revellia Clan Beth traces their ancestry back to King Baarach of Beth, the legendary hero who supposedly destroyed the Aernigh. They are renowned as great warriors, brave and stout, and honest to a fault. Their detractors call them barbaric and easily manipulated. The Beths have ruled Revelback since its creation, supposedly on the site where the last of the Aernigh was executed: a Revali king who summoned up the wells that water the capital as a concession of surrender. Because of their reputation as barbarians, the Beths were consistently underestimated by the more ambitious families. It was this very trait that allowed them to slowly gather their power and seize control when Clan Ainros was destroyed. The Beths traditionally honor the Gods of the Aernigh in some rituals, as part of traditions honoring their legendary forefather. Yet in every real sense, they are loyal Host Keepers.

VASSAL CLANS

Assets

While most Swine are produced by Clan Swinnerd, the new breeds of Crommucs and Callyds are the sole prospect of Revelback.

History

According to legend, King Baarach of Beth conquered the Cape of Monsters and possibly all of eastern Revellia in the Age of Miracles. Two great conflicts are credited to Baarach: the war with what are now Clan Odon and their allies, and the conquest of the last of the Aernigh, which culminated in the foundation of the mythical forebear of Revelback ("Revelback" meaning "end of the Revali" in the Aernigh Tongue). King Baarach supposedly ruled over this magical city for centuries before passing into legend. Clan Beth does associate itself with other heroes of legend such as the celebrated Laoch Torin, but there are no other mythical Beth kings preceding the Orckid Conquest and the Imperial Age. This knowledge and reverence for King Baarach is found throughout Revellia, even in the west, leaving many to wonder how Clan Beth spent so much of the Promontory's history in a supporting role. This was almost certainly due to the influence of the Orckids, who restructured all of Milos for a thousand years until it was finally delivered by Cenedras' Conquest, which began the Royal Age in Milos. In the Early Royal Age, supporting the Host Keeping Faith was the chief means to power, and existing accounts suggest Clan Beth was chief among these supporters, but this support necessitated submission to the King of Kings, effectively reproducing the hierarchies of the Old Orckid Empire in Revellia. By the time the direct influence of Monos began to wane, history was leading into the massive and mysterious conflict that ended with the Burning of the Great Spellery at Cantef, which led Revellia and all of Milos into the Lost Age. In Revellia, the Lost Age was ended largely by the internal conflicts of Clan Bastion and the conquests of Clan Ainros (and their alliance with Clan Graunt). The Beths emerge from the Lost Age as the undisputed masters of Revelback and the entire Cape of Monsters, a position consistent with their legends, yet they seem to play very small roles on the political stage up until Barthos the Beneficient seized the crown, following the death of Gwynt the Ghastly. The Beths squabbled some, particularly with the central settlement of what is now Swining, and they are often credited with the death of the Wizard Anna Chains, but otherwise the wheels of Revellian history were largely moved by the Ainros and their allies, and their conflict with the now extinct Clan Wulk. There were a few renowned members of the family, such Harmoc Beth the Barefoot Lord, who gave up the chiefdom after less than a year to become a hosterman, or Lambent the Gall, who supposedly dyed his hair green and claimed descent from the celebrated Tranton of Gall, and especially Sabrina Screamer, who took up arms and armor and attempted to take Revelback from her younger brother Norraigh, the heir. Yet the only ancestor whose fame truly rivals that of King Barthos is his great-grandfather, Lord Fiion, called the Blazing Boar. Lord Fiion was a celebrated war hero in both the First and Second Brothers Rebellions, who fought with a flaming maul like the ancient Baarach of Beth. Fiion was a warrior's warrior who outlived his heir Danraigh and his heir's heir, Benneragh, and whose courage and pride are thought to have influenced young Barthos greatly. Less celebrated, though no less vital, was Barthos' great-uncle Walter, a conniver who masterminded a failed secret alliance with Gwynt the Ghastly when the dreaded monarch was still a boy. These traits, courage and cunning, would mold Barthos into the man who overthrew Clan Ainros, who played a vital role in the First and Second Great Concords, and who saved the realm from King Gwynt's destructive nature. Henceforth, the history of Clan Beth is a history of the crown and the canton. The brief reigns of Barthos, Bennerog, and Collium would yield the golden age of Dorreon the Magnificent, then the turmoil of the Four Crowns that followed the death of his son Garland IV. Ultimately, the turbulence of these times would bear the fruit of Bethraal the Beloved and his long, bountiful reign. Though we have suffered the tragic deaths of the King's sons Prince Bennerog the Black Boar and Prince Dorrenog the Daring, the King's surviving grandson Garland the Heir, and the King's impending marriage to Lady Olwen Braer, are great causes for hope. Clen Beth has survived greater reversals than this.

Heroes of Clan Beth