cedh audmanh wrote:Corumayas actually wasn't disputing this; rather, the idea was that the Affanonic and Lotoka peninsulae kind of look like "a single ecosystem" whose cultures would not easily remain fully distinct for several millennia.
Hmmm... in my view, we have less than *one* millennium, and that may turn out to be rather dense in events :)
Also, I think the term "culture" is a bit too fuzzy in this context.
Indeed, the Affanons paid little attention to the origin of various groups getting involved in their clan system; a lot of cultural difference was tolerated on the level of individual clans.
But the political system of the state of Affalinnei was rather rigid and traditionalist, and very important for self-identification on the individual level, since it all revolved around clan honor.
The idea of "clan hierarchy" came as an answer to the question, how a relatively small community managed to become something worth being aware of (so e. g. names of continents were borrowed from their language rather than from some other source) for their much more powerful neighbors. I needed some simple consolidating principle, which would prevent too rapid assimilation by the surrounding cultures, would have some assimilatory potential itself (so a robust state could emerge out of nothing in less than a millennium), and would occasionally turn the group in question into a real thorn in one or another powerful nation's side.
The system could emerge in an area of great ethnic diversity and no certralized government; no organization other than kinship-based existed, and every conflict created the threat of long-lasting bloodshed. Treaties between kinship groups were invented as a way to moderate bloodshed in the first place, and it was primarily in this context that a clan's obligations were originally viewed by its members.
When an early state formed on this fundament, the attitudes haven't changed much. In the historical times, whenever individual Affanons dealt with people who weren't of the same clan, they perceived themselves primarily as their clan's representatives. The honor of one's clan, including the projections from the obligations between clans, was still taken dead seriously; every offense and every promise was seen from that perspective. The whole system was rather centralized and did not allow for manipulation by external agents. Basically, it made the Affanons amazingly faithful allies and reliable partners - but also madly stubborn opponents, if you weren't their ally or partner. Also, it was the right organization for people easily involved in risky enterprises, like piracy or oversea trade.
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I think the clan organization had to do with the way Affalinnei contributed to the fall of Huyfárah. One can imagine that vassality to Huyfárah was a difficult decision, and the Affanons viewed it from their customary perspective: they expected from their new suzerains the same irreproachable faithfulness to obligations as was the norm among their own clans.
At the moment when the treaty was concluded, the Fáralo rulers were well aware of this attitude; but later on, the logic of a centralized empire demanded more unification. At some point, new rulers attempted to apply their standard legislation and govern Affalinnei as just another remote province; special privileges stipulated in the original treaty were withdrawn unilaterally - an unforgivable sin in the eyes of the Affanons. This immediately mobilized the clans for a full-scale war which effectively blocked maritime trade in the whole region, and contributed a lot to centrifugal tendencies in neighboring provinces of Huyfárah (especially in those whose economics depended on such trade, and especially because the Affanons were open to separate negotiations with individual communities and trade houses - from the clan hierarchy perspective, the traitors were primarily the ruling dynasty).
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One problem with the clan system was lack of scalability. I think it was the ascension of Affalinnei soon after the disintegration of Huyfárah that created a serious crisis of the former political system: when the kingdom subdued some adjacent areas, it turned out that the Affanons have little experience in governing peoples that knew no clan honor and could not be easily integrated in the traditional hierarchy. During a subsequent millennium the clan system was eroding, new methods of government replaced it, and Affalinnei evolved into a more familiar type of monarchy. Nominally the clans were still there, but more as a type of territorial government; membership in a clan could be a matter of buying some real estate in the clan's domain. And the special vigor of this small nation faded away together with clan system and clan honor. Without the cementing factor of clan organization, Affalinnei quickly became just another small kingdom in a strategically important region; I am not sure if it survived 1500 YP as an independent political entity.
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Even though not easily scalable, the clan system - while it was alive - was easily exportable, e. g. to colonies. I am particularly interested in exploring the various bizarre ways it could influence state building on Ttiruku; the extreme ethnic diversity of the latter might create a good soil for its imitation and spreading.
cedh audmanh wrote:In the pirate age at the latest (i.e. from 400 YP on), one of these cultures would probably try to expand its influence to the other area.
I think piracy was most topical *before* the Affanons became vassals of Huyfárah. That is, before the heyday of the empire.
cedh audmanh wrote:So actually the situations shown for Affalinnei & Lotoka on the -800 and -400 maps could equally well date to -900 and -799 respectively. :)
And that would be closer to my vision :)
But let's feel the extremes...
The political organization of Affalinnei was traditionalist - that is, something that had existed "always", in people's perception. To be so perceived, it needed centuries of previous relative stability - as many as possible. Plus a prolonged period when it was being born in pain (while the coastal culture might indeed represent the type of "mixed ecosystem" you discussed with Corumayas). That is, the earlier the (pre-)Affanons arrive, the better; the general timing of Isles migrations might allow for a date as early as -1000 YP.
However, the (pre-)Lotokans had to arrive still earlier, and split from their parent group no earlier than around -1500 YP (probably later).
It seems that this is the limit: when could the (pre-)Lotokans reallistically reach Affanillei and the Lotoka Coast? -1200 YP? -1000?
cedh audmanh wrote:Basilius wrote:Can "Siixtaguna Culture" be identified with PNT? I rather like the idea that at some point it spread to the islands between Sumarušuxi and the mainland, or maybe to Sumarušuxi proper. At any rate, this would help identify at least some early influences on pre-Affanonic :)
EDIT-2: what are Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna?
Taláhanutina and Tâhasūna are groups mentioned in TzirTzi's
Siixtaguna culture article, both "located some way to the south of the Takuña and Núalís heartlands." Given that Núalís is spoken quite far to the north, PNT itself was probably located near the eastern tip of the subcontinent, i.e. on the mainland right across Tymytỳs. The idea of the Siixtaguna culture is basically that NuTak groups were constantly moving southwest between -2500 and -1500, eventually occupying almost all of the coast between Tymytỳs and Sumarušuxi. Basically what you wrote above:
Basilius wrote:My impression was that the whole SE coast of the subcontinent of Siixtaguna was occupied by the Takuña speakers or their very close relatives.
Thank you! I could not locate that page via wiki search for some reason :(
It would be interesting to consult with Tzirtzi on possible linguistic divergence of these groups. PNT is really fascinating protolanguage to work from; I'd try to sketch their languages, especially since they may be important sources of early cultural loans in Affanonic.
Apart from the vowel harmony, Cəssın is quite conservative phonologically, which it makes up for with innovative morphosyntax and a fairly divergent lexicon. Which means that I would very much welcome more information about derivation in Affanonic. It'd also be great if we could work out at least some detail about Doroh, which will be a fairly important contact language in the area. Maybe Lotoka too.
