Great Exodus
The Great Exodus is one of many terms used to describe the departure of what is estimated to be as many as 225,000 Elves from an unknown region of the western coast of the continent of Thrae that led to the occupation and settlement of what is now known as the Elven Realm of Naru nearly 130 years later.
Much of this event is shrouded in legend, myth and misunderstanding but what is known for certain is that at some point around the Imessian reckoning year 2,900 BF, a huge number of Elves departed from a region of the western shores of the continent and made a slow and dangerous journey across the vast empty spaces of Thrae's interior regions over the course of no less than 128 years. Tradition now has the date of the establishment of the Elven Realm in 2,738 BF with the discovery of the sacred lake Naris All by the advance elements of this migrating horde of Elves. This makes the estimated length of the Vytuian migration trek at least 9,300 miles of wild, uncharted and untouched wilderness over the course of more than 125 years by about 200,000 Elves of all ages.
Where these Elves were originally from and what drove them to leave on such a long and perilous journey is not clearly understood by non-Elven scholars, but it is thought they probably originated in a mountainous region of the western continent with a temperate climate and ready access to navigable waters. Gnome historiographers have noticed terms, phrases and the use of descriptors in the most ancient of Vytuian documents that indicate a cultural familiarity with both the sea (from regular references to tides, salty water and shellfish) and sailing (from regular references to hulls, sails and anchors), as well as the same regular references to such temperate climate indicators as honey, frost, apples, wool and snow. Some circumstantial evidence exists (from several conversations with Iron Dragons that claimed familiarity with the far western regions of Thrae) that there are still several areas of the northern coastal mountains that have very large and populus countries made up entirely of Elves to this day. However, these conversations have never been corroborated or even investigated.
If the Elves of Naru know exactly where they originated from, they have not shared it with the rest of the peoples sharing the eastern coast of Thrae with them. They have also not shared the exact reason for the exodus that brought them to Naru. What is known is that they seem to have come looking for some lost knowledge or item that their western culture was aware of but wasn't willing to go and search for. Whatever this lost item or knowledge was is unknown now, but it was determined to be in the vicinity of the Naris All by the grand mystic and seer of the migrant population at the time, Ghan'a Nari.
Countless scholars and historiographers have attempted to map this incredibly epic journey across the supercontinent of Thrae, but the details are either lost to time or still secreted away in vaults and archives within the Vytu Realm where they cannot access them. What they do have to follow are the epic songs, poems and sagas of the modern Vytuian Elves that tell of the heroic acts and tragic events that befell the Elves of that Age. Since the bulk of these poems, songs and tales (roughly 60%) speak of dark, thick jungles, wild endless swamps and remarkably few mountains, it is thought that the greater part of the Exodus skirted the southernmost edges of the great central desert of Thrae. Where the tales tell of desert environments, it is within the last century of the Exodus and this thought to be the arid regions between the headwaters of the Nyst River and the headwaters of the Arial River, perhaps 500 miles northwest of the western-most extent of the Arak Mountains.
This portion of the Exodus is critically important to the overall understanding of the entire long event. Nearly all the chronicles that describe this portion of the Exodus tell of a schism within the Vytuian people. Roughly 2/3 of the Elves refused to continue on the chosen course into the arid regions of the great central deserts and insisted the way forward was further south along the banks of the Nyst River. The remaining Elves, all devout and dedicated followers of Ghan'a Nari herself, would continue on her intended course into the deserts and on to the lands foreseen by Nari in her visions. These Elves would be known as Narra or Narru ever after and would give the Realm they would found that name as well.
The roughly 70,000 Narru would end their 130-year journey somewhere around 2,730 BF when they reached the shores of Naris All and declared an end to their wandering. The more than 140,000 Vagarru (an ancient Elven word meaning wanderer) wouldn't reach the Vytuian Realm for another 150 years, having wandered the western extremes of the Arak range of mountains for more than 90 years. Eventually, sometime around the year 2,600 BF, the two halves of the Vytuian Exodus reunited and settled as a single people within the lands we now know as Naru.
