Grove-pod balaceti
About three hundred years ago, all the balaceti pods of Teshelyn viewed each other as close siblings. The heroic Saint Kebria had brought together families, friends, and rivals and given them the gift of unity. But as time wore on, changes in ideals began to deepen and calcify. Interactions between the balaceti and the other races of Teshelyn had not always been peaceful, and there were differing opinions on how best to move forward.
The balaceti groups who eventually became the grove pods favored a diplomatic approach, hoping to gain insight from the magical and technological prowess of the dolphins. The eventual drift pods instead wanted to assert and maintain their independence, as they were the groups most affected by clashes with the merfolk. The grove pods settled in the western Balacen, making their home in the mangrove forests that lined the coast. These forests lent them their name as well.
The grove pods subsist primarily on fish, and have developed several techniques to farm and capture them. They have shared some of these techniques with the human villages that sprung up near their home waters, and this developed into the tree magic practiced by human shamans to generate material for ships.
Naming Traditions
Feminine names
Feressa, Sotalya,
Masculine names
Kogia, Tenos,
Family names
As with all balaceti, a family name is used to link oneself to the matriarch of their pod. If a matriarch dies, or is replaced for some other reason, everyone in the pod takes the new matriarch's name as their family name.
Culture
Funerary and Memorial customs
Historical figures
The grove pods claim to have been founded by Saint Kebria himself. This is partially true - Kebria is credited with the formation of the first pods by unifying the smaller and disparate family groups that existed at the time, but it is difficult to say whether these developed into what are now the grove pods. The drift pods may have just as much claim to this lineage, since it was long after Kebria's death that the schism between the grove pods and the drift pods occurred.
Encompassed species
Related Myths
Related Locations
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