Language
There is a common trade language which is spoken across almost all of the Verdant Kingdoms. It’s a formal version of Lyrian, highly adapted and streamlined in order to be learned and picked up quickly, while still providing enough flexibility and nuance in order to make due in most situations. One can go anywhere in the Verdant Kingdoms and have a reasonable expectation to be understood while speaking common Lyrian.
Only small pockets of wildermen on the independent and contested south-eastern islands off the coast of Mazuria have refused to adopt the language. Also there are some hard-line Daerlanian expansionists who have refused to speak it, preferring to push for High Daerlan to become the dominant language across the kingdoms, and certainly across the empire.
Calendar
The same calendar is used across the Verdant Kingdoms. There are twelve months, each of thirty days, divided up equally in three rides of ten days. After every two or three months, a special day of celebration would occur that would stand outside any rides or months.
Month | |
1 | Winter Night |
Midwinter (celebrate friendships, renew vows and alliances) | |
2 | Winter Deep |
3 | Spring Dawn (10th day, 2nd ride, spring equinox) |
4 | Spring Storm |
Greengrass (celebrate the coming of spring, gifting of flowers) | |
5 | Spring Blossom |
6 | Summer Light (1st day, 3rd ride, summer solstice, midsummer, midaëte) |
7 | Summer Flame |
Midsummer (celebrate love and music) | |
8 | Summer End |
9 | Autumn Harvest (10th day, 2nd ride, autumn equinox) |
Highharvestide (celebrate the harvest, abundance of food, last time to travel before winter) | |
10 | Autumn Red |
11 | Autumn Twilight |
Moonfest (celebrate the start of winter, honor ancestors, remembering the dead) | |
12 | Winter Eve (1st day, 3rd ride, winter solstice, midwinter, midinváerne) |
The year is 1262. It has been a little over fifty generations ago that all the twelve Verdant Kingdoms agreed upon and adopted year zero as the start of the verdant calendar. It was during a time of relative peace and stoic reconstruction after the last conjunction when the long waning set in.
Archaic Pre-Lyrian Calendar
Before the Great Waning, there was a different calendar which was adopted by the Silver Crusade. It marked the start of the crusade as year zero, had 36 days in a mōnaþ (month), following the cycle of the Silvermoon, four wikōn (weeks) per mōnaþ, and 9 days per wik (week). These were the months:
Month | |
1 | Æftera Gēola (After Yule), The Tanning |
2 | Sol-mōnaþ, The Gathering |
3 | Hrēþ-mōnaþ, Spring |
4 | Æster-mōnaþ, The Grasses |
5 | Þrimilce-mōnaþ, The Flowering |
6 | Ærra Līþa (Before Midsummer), Summer |
7 | Æftera Līþa (After Midsummer), Pasture |
8 | Weod-mōnaþ, The Harvest |
9 | Hālig-mōnaþ, Autumn |
10 | Winterfylleth, The Vintage |
11 | Blōt-mōnaþ, The Sacrificing |
12 | Ærra Gēola (Before Yule), Winter |
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