Galdos & Deglos

When the dwarves were first created by Gorethar, they occupied the inside of a very large mountain range in the center of the continent. This vast network of underground cities, towns, and villages comprised the nation of Galdos, which was united under a single king. The royal family of the dwarves passed the crown from generation to generation, and still continues to do this until today.

Once upon a time the nation of Galdos was very large. The dwarves of northern Galdos were subdued, quiet, a little greedy, and very hierarchical.... not to mention a bit xenophobic. The gnomes and dwarves of southern Galdos no longer shared these traits. They became more open and cosmopolitan, and in the eyes of the northerners... liberal. Many of them even started to live on the surface of the mountains instead of inside them! And on top of that, they began to establish deep trade ties with nearby human and elven populations!

The trade guilds of the north could not abide by the new attitudes of the southerners, and the first evidence of a split came about in the guilds themselves. They divided into separate northern and southern trade guilds. This fractionation soon spread to the government, and even the royal family.

At times it looked like there would be a war between the north and south, but this was thankfully avoided by the good natured people of the area. The King of Galdos allotted the southern part of the nation to his younger son, who married a gnome. The new King of the South split his country from Galdos and called it Deglos. Thus the dwarves in the new nation called themselves the Dubgaldokin. In appearance they are much the same as the Galdokin, except they are often tanned by the sun from being outside, and their ideals are often more open-minded.

The new King of Deglos did one more act soon after splitting the nation away from Galdos: he transferred control of the country to the guilds, and abdicated his throne. Naturally this outraged his father in the north, but there was nothing to be done about it. The guilds had already set up a governing council that still works to this day.

Deglos lies north of the elven nation of T'Nanshi. It is a vast area covered by two whole mountain ranges and part of a third with two major canyons. To the east are parts of Drotid, Jechran, and The Wastelands. To the west are the nations of Tyedu, The Kurathene Empire, and the orcish nation of Dubunat. On the north side is the other dwarven nation of Galdos.

When it was part of Galdos, Deglos was a monarchy. However, its principle inhabitants of gnomes and dwarves have long since gained independence from Galdos to form their own nation. As a nation, Deglos is fairly neutral aligned, but they have some chaotic tendencies.

The government of Deglos is a system of trade guilds. Every trade imaginable has its own official national guild that concerns itself only with its own trade, and nothing else. These guilds never try to outdo another or achieve more personal gain than another guild. They merely exist for the purpose of existing and teaching their craft to anyone who wishes to learn, sometimes for a fee, sometimes not. When it becomes necessary in a time of war, or just when a decision of some sort is needed, the guilds pick representatives to send to a High Guildhall Convention (HGC). The HGC is merely a means of setting some order among the inhabitants of Deglos. It can pass laws, though it rarely does. The individual guilds are more than able to handle their own members, and they do. If there is a war, the HGC will attempt to coordinate the interactions of the various armor, weapon, and other munitions guilds to arm enough soldiers to fight. For the most part, this is unnecessary, however, because Deglos has enough of a volunteer army to meet its current needs fivefold.

As a society, the gnomes and dwarves live in close proximity. Often there is no distinction in their cities between where the dwarves live and where the gnomes live, although communities where one or the other race is sparse do exist. As individuals, dwarves tend more towards the "hard labor" crafts such as smithing, leatherworking, armoring, etc., whereas the gnomes tend to focus more on the "esoteric" crafts such as alchemy, astronomy, invention, and other sciences. This is not a rule, but it is the norm. Crossovers are found very often, i.e. gnomish blacksmiths, and dwarven astronomers. Society tolerates these without much trouble.

About one in ten dwarves and gnomes do not take well to any craft, or find an interest in working with their hands. These members of society may or may not be looked down upon, depending on their personal history, or the village they live in. But Deglos always has a use for them. It is these folk that tend to become the traders and the adventurers, as well as the ones who do the upkeep in the inhabited areas, i.e. the odd jobs. They may never happen to join any official crafting guild, and they usually don't seem to mind. On some occasions they may even move out of Deglos altogether. It all depends on how their family units view them. Crafts are often passed down from father to son. It is much easier to enter a crafting guild if your father was in one. This is mainly true of the dwarves and their guilds. Gnomes are a bit more lenient because they are more likely to try to learn more than one craft, or as many crafts as they can. Multiple guild membership is not unheard of.

Although it is rare, the close proximity of the dwarves and gnomes sometimes produces unorthodox family units made up of a dwarven and gnomish spouse. These unions will sometimes bear children. Oddly enough, the children appear mostly dwarven, albeit slightly skinnier and lighter. Females however, do not grow beards when they are hybrid. These members of society are often referred to as "Stone dwarves" because it is thought they look more like their Galdossian cousins. This is true to some extent because the gnomish race evolved from the Galdossian dwarven race with the help of some magic. The Deglossian dwarves, although still dwarves, have changed a bit as well over the years. They became a bit more stockier and heavier than the Galdossian dwarves. When combined, the two races wind up making offspring closer in proportion to a Galdossian dwarf. The name "Stone dwarf" refers to the Galdossian xenophobic tendancy to stay in their own isolated nation of stone. Galdossians often refer to the Deglossian as "Grass dwarves" to reflect their more ebullient and sociable relations with creatures from the surface.

As a nation, Deglos is a heavy trader. Those one in ten non-craftsmen assure that. It trades most heavily with the Seven Cities, although that is often made difficult because it has to go through Dubunat to get there most easily. Unfortunately, the orcs of Dubunat are constantly plotting to take land from Deglos in an effort to dominate the continent and regain their ancestral homeland on the other side of the landmass. Skirmishes happen, but the gnomes are quite adept at protecting their caravans with the help of dwarven warriors. Trading with the Kurathene Empire also happens frequently, however the Deglossians often get very confused with all of the human maneuvering and politicking among the nobles over there, so they often purposely trade less with the humans to not become involved. Trading with T'Nanshi is very brisk, second only to the Seven Cities. The relations between these two countries are very peaceful, though the Deglossians are careful not to meddle in elven affairs either.

Small hunting parties from Jechran and Tyedu are known to frequent the trading posts the gnomes have set up near their lands, but this amount of trade is somewhat negligible. Trade with Galdos occurs at times, but relations with them are often a bit cool, though not bad. The main reason why trade is not big with Galdos is because they really don't have any commodities to exchange.

In Deglos there are many cities or towns of varying size. Usually, each town is run by one of the crafting guilds. Often, the guild that runs the town actually makes sense to run it. For instance, a town run by the Mining Guild may be located near a large mine, and a neighboring town may be run by the Weaponsmithing Guild with a route between them. Other times, it is just what guild happened to be there at the time to run the place.

Most of these towns are underground within the caverns of Deglos. However, there are quite a few towns located either entirely or partially above ground. These tend to be near trading centers with other nations, however another place they often pop up is near a volcanic area where the gnomes are dwarves happen to be collecting a resource of some sort.

If you are not located in a town in one of the caverns, but instead you are walking in the caverns between the towns, you are considered to be in "The Deeps". This is just a generic term that the Deglossians use to represent an underground cavern area that is uninhabited (by them). Some of the caverns in Deglos can be quite dangerous, although the army regularly cleans out the heavily traveled ones. Still, one never knows when they will be walking through caverns to stumble upon a small guild village. The dwarves and gnomes of Deglos are very self-sufficient when they want to be, and can live far apart from other inhabited areas with no problems.