Tanorite Imperium
"Never had one man changed so much in so short a time."The Tanorite Imperium was a proto-empire centred on the city of Mirrelum in Western Tanoron. At its height just under 300 years ago, it stretched from Ormond in the west to Karana in the east.
-inscription on Garcien Lyons' statue in Mirrelum
Structure
The Imperium was an absolute monarchy underneath an Emperor who ruled by decree. The Emperor was advised by a council composed of regional governors, generals and civic ministers.
Culture
The Imperium was in many ways a precursor to the current day Tanorite culture. Like the Kingdom of Mirrelum before and after it, it was deeply religious, and emphasised the importance of the Elemental Gods and their priesthood.
History
The Imperium began as the Kingdom of Mirrelum, a state in western Tanoron. For most of its existence, Mirrelum was a powerful but solitary kingdom, holding surrounding lands but beyond the occasional short skirmish with its neighbour holding little intent for conquest.
This changed in 161 TE, with the ascension of King Garcien Lyons to the throne of Mirrelum at the age of twenty-nine. At the time of his ascension, Mirrelum was involved in a territorial dispute with the City-State of Ormond, and Garcien spend the next two years waging war against them. Garcien had a natural head for tactics, and brought in military reforms that allowed Mirrelum to turn the tide of war and decisively defeat the army. Ormond relinquished their claim in 163 TE, but Garcien made the unprecedented decision to go on the offensive, invading Ormondese territory. The already demoralised army were defeated, and Garcien besieged and took Ormond in 164 TE.
With the conquest and occupation of Ormond, Garcien returned to Mirrelum, integrating Ormond into his holdings and inaugurating the Tanorite Imperium. The Exarch of the Essene Templar, with no other choice, crowned Garcien as the Emperor of Tanoron. The next five years were spent putting down rebellions and integrating Mirrelian culture into Ormond, then in 169 TE, Garcien marched east on various small cities and petty kingdoms, rolling over them with his combined Mirrelian-Ormondese forces. By the time smaller cities in Tanoron were able to band together, Garcien's army had become virtually unstoppable, and in 175 TE, Garcien's forces entered the Vessene Mountains and took the northern city of Karana.
At this time, Garcien focused on consolidating power, ensuring that Karana was brought into the Tanorite fold and that the central cities and territories were properly integrated. After a decade of consolidating the western and northern holdings, the Imperium now covered most of Tanoron, with Garcien's attention drawn to the south.
Garcien Lyons, King of Mirrelum and Emperor of Tanoron
Garcien finally met his match when crossing into Arpium, where the Imperium came face to face with the Kingdom of Mayoka. The Mayokati had prepared for this, and had shored up their own professional army to confront the forces. They were not expected to win, but would easily be the toughest fight the Tanorites would have. While the Royal Army of Mayoka lost the first small skirmishes, once Garcien entered the Attanine Mountains in 179 TE, the full force of the army descended upon him.
The battle itself became a stalemate; the first ever battle Garcien had contended that was not a crushing victory. It was not this, however, that became his undoing. While the battle had raged, Garcien was assassinated in his own command tent by a Volkian Ranger who had managed to infiltrate his war camp. Without their Emperor, the Imperial army was devastated, and after the Royal Army counterattacked the next day, their mastery of the terrain combined with the Imperium's morale broke and routed the forces, chasing them back out of Arpium.
Garcien's daughter, Helera, attempted to take up her father's mantle as Empress, however squabbling immediately broke out between Garcien's generals and the governors he had installed in the conquered cities, preventing her from immediately taking charge of the situation and paralysing her forces. The conquered cities immediately took advantage of the loss of stability to revolt, with Ormond chasing out their governor and garrison just two years later in 181 TE. A chain reaction broke out throughout the cities, while Mayoka itself, unwilling to risk another invasion, mounted their own punitive expeditions into Imperium territory to assist the other cities.Disbandment
As city after city and territory after territory revolted, a temporary alliance formed between Mayoka and the rebel states, and their armies quickly descended upon the capital, and Mirrelum found itself surrounded and outnumbered by 183 TE. Rather than risk a siege, Helera chose to parley with the Imperator of the Royal Army, who guaranteed the independence and safety of Mirrelum and its ruling royal house in exchange for the dissolution of the Imperium, Helera's abdication of the title Empress in favour of Queen, and the renunciation of all claims outside of Mirrelum. Helera agreed, putting an effective end to the Imperium.
Even after Garcien's defeat and the dissolution of the Imperium, its influence lives on, and its shadow still looms over southern Arikanda. Mirrelum's brief dominance over Tanoron spread its culture to both conquered cities and other cities on the periphery, and aided greatly in the spread of the Elementalist faith to become the dominant religion in southern Arikanda. Even Mayoka, despite defeating the Imperium, took on many of its cultural trappings, art and faith. During its own rise centuries later, the City-State of Helik took inspiration from both the Imperium's operations and its fall when creating the framework for the present-day Helikan League.
Mirrelum itself remains a powerful and influential kingdom, and while it is but a shadow of the Imperium it briefly led, it has great influence in the Helikan League, rivalled only by Mayoka and Helik itself.
Territories
Prior to its incursion into Mayoka, the Imperium controlled the entirety of Western Tanoron, and had also added most of Northern Tanoron to this territory.
Military
Under Garcien, a number of reforms were made. Unlike other Tanorite cities, which used citizen-soldiers, Garcien instituted a professional armed force alongside the citizen force. This gave the Imperium's army a decisive edge in tactics, equipment and training. Only the Mayokans, who also deployed a professional army, were able to match this.
Comments