The Founding of Andaen

Founding

After initial small-scale expeditions, the first Northerner settlers made landfall on late Jaatin of 3422 at the site where they would build the settlement of Andaen. That this site quickly became known as a "crusader citadel" is attributed to the early violent encounters between the Northerners and those who were indigenous to the region (likely Haifah predecessors), as well as the Northerners' subsequent expansionist tendencies and their projects to assimilate local populations into their religion and culture. Thus, the founding of Andaen is now considered to be the initiating event of the Continental Crusade.

The first sightings of Northerner ships took place in late Nashuru or early Jaatin of 3422, and the sailors may have launched small expeditions on foot throughout the month of Jaatin, but it was sometime in late Jaatin that the main landfall event took place.   The first Northerner settlers chose their landing site for its strategic proximity to a strait connecting the Boundless Ocean from which they came to the Haifatneh Sea; several hills overlooking the strait also made an effective site for the placement of defensive structures. The Reborn Theocracy's official narrative has it that its founders built what would be the Citadel of Andaen "from nothing," displacing only a few fishing villages, archaeological finds have since affirmed Haifah folklore claiming that the Northerners in fact assimilated or destroyed a sizable existing settlement there. This forceful expropriation of land by force of iron of superior quality, military discipline and highly developed logistics, and formidable magic via priests' incantations would play itself out repeatedly across the coast and throughout the Haifatneh Basin.