Tuesday 16 September 2014

Kyrwedhin

(The problem with writing Eriau names is knowing where to write the "h.")

Kyrwedhin is:

Hand of the Vach Mannoch;

moot-lord of the steadcaptains of the Obala;

the wealthy owner of seareaping and mercant fleets;

a graduate of the Skhola;

a member of the House of the Zmayi in the Schkopstina;

a correspondent with Korvash, Hand of the Vach Rueth on Merseia;

a confidante of Lazar Eistich, voivode of Kom Kutchki and member of the House of the Lords, who has friends on Terra.

As often in such cases, when I started to list facts about Kyrwedhin, I did not realize how long the list would be.

Kyrwedhin's career might count as a measure of the extent of ychan-human integration on Dennitza:

Vach organization, with its symbolic Handships instead of Headships, came from Merseia;

"moot-lord" is an ychan title;

Skhola (University) and Schkopstina (Parliament) are human institutions;

Merseian immigrants arrived four centuries ago to be labourers in new industries but this descendant of theirs is a wealthy owner of fleets;

he has direct contact with Merseia and indirect contact with Terra.

Thus, Krywedhin has intelligence on whether the imperial powers are likely to go to war and can advise the Obala steadcaptains at a time of crisis. He says:

"'...I never doubted [the Roidhunate's] masters wish us harm...'"
-Poul Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (New York, 2012), p. 545.

This view seems to be unanimous among the ychani: not a happy relationship with their home planet, but it is also an informed view:

"'...we have always kept a special interest in our mother world, many of us have gone there to visit, some to study, and the inhabitants are of our species.'" (ibid.)

Disaffection from the mother world is not of the ychani's choosing but a result of the Wilwidh culture that became dominant there.

1 comment:

Sean M. Brooks said...

Hi, Paul!

I'm not sufe if you have notice, but Korvash is Hand of the Vach Rueth, the same clan Tachwyr the Dark later became the Hand of. No inconsistency needs to be thought to have been made, THE GAME OF EMPIRE is set some twenty years later, plenty of time for Korvash to have died and been succeeded as Hand by his son, grandson, or nephew Tachwyr.

Sean