Tor Golgottli (tor gohl-goht-lee)
Isolated on the island of Golgottl, the academy of Tor Golgottli has stood in some manner or another since halfway through the First Age. Many of its faculty and tomes disappeared in The Smiting, due to their close contact with the supercities. Luckily, the academy itself was not affiliated and managed to recover quickly, though it is tough to know exactly how large it was before it. Tor Golgottli became the leading scholars on The Smiting and its aftermath, and much of what the world knows of that event is due to the researchers at this academy.
For many centuries of the Second Age, everything in the academy existed in the same singular tower, but eventually as the school grew so too did a town around it. The island has very few natural animals creatures other than birds, small rodents, insects, and the occasional snake - but its land is fertile and its climate mild. This has created almost perfect conditions for farmers and herders to bring livestock to the island, to provide food for the academy without having to import it.
The academy is not focused on any specific branch of magic but prefers a broad approach to learning and experience. Scholars from other academies frequently take fellowships at Golgottli as part of their memberships in The Erudite Sages. As much as that organization has a headquarters, it is located here. The university even permits limited study of traditionally forbidden magics such as necromancy, which must be closely supervised and is usually only performed on small animals. The exception to this is a handful of corpses the university maintains for experimental purposes - corpses of scholars who willed their bodies to the university for exactly such purposes. These are only available to high-level scholars who have proven trustworthy to the deans and have conducted significant study in other areas of magic. Many scholars and leaders around the world criticize this acceptance of necromancy, arguing it gives practical experience to aspiring necromancers too easily and too out-in-the-open.
The actual tower itself is somewhat of an architectural marvel. It stands just over 1,000 feet tall, with a base 200 feet in diameter tapering to a top floor 50 feet in diameter, and is made of brick and concrete. Its construction date and process is unknown, leading many scholars to believe at least one supercity of the First Age was involved, which would have scrubbed those records from the tomes during The Smiting. Within the tower are 25 floors (roughly one-third of the tower) dedicated to lodging for various professors and higher-ranking scholars; each of these quarters includes an attached study for their research and crafting. The library occupies another full 25 floors - open in the middle with towering shelves and platforms - while classrooms, labs, and various utility rooms make up the remainder of the tower's floors and rooms. A series of permanent portals and floating discs assists scholars in moving about the building, all of which can be controlled or shut down from a central control room in the tower's uppermost reaches.
The academic part of the college is divided into nine different colleges, which are each headed by a Dean. The colleges mainly reflect the different schools of arcane magic: Abjuration, Conjuration, Divination, Enchantment, Evocation, Illusion, and Transmutation (note: Necromancy is practiced so carefully and rarely it does not have its own college). The other two colleges are: Bladesinging (which also encompasses more general aspects of using magic in combat) and Experimental Arcana, which covers things like graviturgy, chronurgy, the rare necromancy experiments, and other nontraditional approaches to magic.
Demographics
Despite its relatively small size, the academy tower and surrounding town are as cosmopolitan as any major city in the world. Scholars of talent come from all backgrounds, regions, races, and peoples to study here, and Golgottli even has several scholars from other worlds or planes. Around 50% of the population are students, conducting research or practicing their magecraft and earning little to no wages doing so. They are supported by a robust suite of benefits from the university, including free meals and lodging. The farmers, herders, and other food providers - as well as tavern and inn keepers, smith and carpenters, and a variety of other service professions - on the island are under the jurisdiction of the university and provide food for the students and other townsfolk in a very self-sustaining arrangement for the town.
While on the island, residents live comfortably and have access to some of the nicest common food in the world. When traveling away from the island, however, all but the wealthiest Golgottliers struggle to afford any accommodation or food. Most of the townsfolk have very little cash or wealth except their houses and what their crops/livestock are worth; while the students and lower-ranking professors tend to have no money until they get promoted to higher positions or leave to take a position in a distant town or nation.
Government
The town and university are controlled by the university's hierarchy of leadership, with the Premier of the university at the head. Below this rank are a small number of Vice Premiers who oversee various non-academic departments, as well as the Deans of the colleges. The Vice Premiers are in charge of things like The Athenaeum, Taverns, Janitorial Maintenance, Groundskeeping, and Agriculture - to name a few.
The Premier is the ultimate word on all policy and law enforcement within the university and surrounding town, though the Deans have a decent amount of power as well. It is as much a political position as an academic one, and only the most respected sages can even hope to win over the Deans, who elect new Premiers by popular vote. Any serious criminal matter is judged by the nine Deans, while civil complaints are the purview of one of the Vice Premiers.
Defences
Apart from magical defenses on the tower and whatever magics the inhabitants could conjure, there are no recognized defenses on Golgottl. With no large, dangerous beasts the town has no need for a perimeter wall - not that one would fit within the island's small area anyway. The port facilities are not large enough to host most ships, so the threat of piracy is low, and maritime defenses are unnecessary.
The law enforcement and general security of the city is performed by a trained group of 20 guards called the Sigils. Working in shifts, these guards patrol the town and parts of the tower, ready to intervene and take down rogue mages that dabble in too-powerful magics. These guards are all specially trained in combating mages and wear unique equipment that renders them far less vulnerable to spells, making them the ultimate guards for a highly arcane university.
Infrastructure
Due to a lot of mages needing practice with various magics, the infrastructure of Golgottl is superb compared to most other small towns. The transmutation trainees regularly go through the streets turning churned dirt roads into solid stone, and bad weather is no match for evocation mages who can heat, thaw, dry, or dampen any road as needed.
The same principle applies for the town's water supply. The farms have cultivated plants over the centuries to grow in saltwater, which the island is surrounded by. A small portion of the town's drinking water is supplied by wells that access underground rainwater reservoirs. For all other needs, there is a network of mages that create water for themselves and several friends or colleagues every day, on a set rotation.
Districts
There are five basic districts or areas within the island of Golgottl. The central Tower Ward speaks for itself and its main inhabitant. The others are directional based on their location from the tower: North, South, East, and West. The farmland stretching beyond the urban area is not part of this distinction and does not conform to the directional labels.
History
Not much is known about Tor Golgottli from before The Smiting. The few scholars at the academy who were not 'raptured' had no recollection of the other members, the history of the academy, or any of its political ties. The only bits that survived were that the academy was founded in 1500 1A and had provided lodgings for up to 700 mages at at time - though no records survived to indicate if there were ever that many mages concurrently. With no other advanced nations around, the surviving scholars set to work rebuilding the academy's vast archives and making sense of what had happened to the world.
As people began to settle eastern Ayndrinor and cities began to pop up, the tower established contact with these various proto-nations and began training the next generations of mages. At that time, studies were very free-form and individualized, with students taking general classes in all manner of arcane practices and selecting an instructor to mentor them in their chosen specialization. This general education system lasted until 527 2A, when the Premier at the time decided to establish different colleges and appoint a Dean to head each one. Since that time, the organization and hierarchy of the university have changed several times, with the current iteration having been adopted about 105 years ago.
Apart from the town surrounding the central tower, there have been no construction projects at all since the dawn of the Second Age. Whoever built Tor Golgottli in the First Age ensured it would not need maintenance or reconstruction for a very long time. The first semblance of a supporting town came in 679 2A, when the tower's dormitory floors were full but more students had sought to attend. These students set up tents and other haphazard shelters outside the tower and 'commuted' to classes every day. In time, the tents turned to permanent housing, and people came to support the non-tower dwellers with food, booze, entertainment, and other services.
The town has grown somewhat slowly over the centuries, but with no major wars threatening the island it has never seen its population shrink. Not everyone is excited about relocating to what essentially is a commune, with no money to be earned or wealth to be saved and passed on. But plenty of people are excited to live and work near one of the greatest arcane academies in the world and see magic performed daily.
Politically, the university and surrounding town have always been neutral, but that changed recently with the Everyn War and the massive changes that brought to eastern Ayndrinor. As the Dominion conquered most of its neighbors, its leader set his sights to the island of their eastern coast. He knew attacking the island taking it by force would be costly, if possible at all, so he made the Premier a deal: Golgottl would be part of his new Federation but would retain their usual autonomy, in exchange for providing several promising mages to serve the various cities of his new nation and establishing small satellite campuses across his land. The Premier faced backlash - and still does frequently - to this decision by scholars who would have preferred to stay out of the continent's affairs; and many believe the Premier is getting money on the side to support this arrangement, putting his needs above those of the university.
Architecture
The tower itself is a massive spire of white concrete and white stone, built by unknown people in a time long past. It has many windows spiraling up its height, but not on every floor. Its main roof and that of the tower's base are made of red metal tiles, the composition of which no one knows.
The town surrounding the tower is eclectic and varied, representing the variety of cultures and backgrounds of people that have settled her over time and brought their unique styles and traditions to the island. Japanese style houses with paper walls and lots of air flow sit next door to brick houses reminiscent of Elizabethan England. Adobe buildings like those from the American Southwest are juxtaposed with tall wooden A-frames, similar to those of the Medieval Norse. Color and style are everywhere, and the differences in houses drive people from all over the town to befriend others with different style dwellings, just to experience all the different styles of the town - and by extension, the world.
Founding Date
1500 1A
Alternative Name(s)
Golgottli Academy
Type
Citadel
Population
2,239 (700 in the tower)
Inhabitant Demonym
Golgottliers (gohl-goht-leers)
Owning Organization
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