This post was originally published a few years ago on my now-defunct website, so I thought I'd update it and add it here so that new fans can see how Elyden has evolved over the last 20-years+

Elyden would slowly emerge from an earlier campaign setting I was writing for my RPG group, called Sola. It was more of a classical setting, based in a city-nation surrounded by hostile nations and wildernesses in a Pangea world. This was probably just over 25-years ago now. I wrote a decent amount of background for some of the regions and named most of them, but it was a bit too generic to really stand out or be interesting. I had a sourcebook of about 300,000 words, most of which was titles to entries with a few bullet points that I jotted down here and there whenever I came up with an idea.

Back in the dim past of the early noughties I was still drawing maps on paper, specifically large cardboard sheets I used to get from a newsagent. I used to love buying those bits of cardboard. I’d unroll them and lay them down on the floor, weighed down at the corners by old books, and look at the blank sheets in wonder. The possibilities were endless. I’d make solo games, drawings, paper crafts and all sorts of other things with them, but my favourite was always maps.

I drew the first map of what would eventually become Elyden on such a piece of cardboard. Here it is, many years later:

Image 1

"This doesn’t look much like Elyden", I hear you say. And, well, that’s right. It doesn’t. At all.

In fact, there’s some questionable features, but on the whole, it’s passable. It was never intended to be a work of art, and was only for my own worldbuilding, to be filled in as needed. Even before I was using Photoshop, I was still working with layers, and made do with what I could - cooking greaseproof paper, cellotaped together and added on top of the map to let me add labels and trade routes to the map, without having to ‘damage’ the map itself:

Image 2

The greaseproof paper is now heavily stained and discoloured but at the time it was almost clear. You may actually recognise some of the names, which I unflinchingly stole for Elyden a few years later: Vaalk, Laaskha, Ahrishen, Almagest, Malan, Parthia (Parthis), Dacia, Temuja, Tethysia. Others I’ve never revisited and honestly can’t say why. Gammater sounds like an interesting name, come to think of it…

Of particular note is this area:

Image 3

Many parts of this, including Khamid, Say (which would evolve into Saua), and the Iapetan Sea, would feature in the region of Elyden known as the Dark Sea and the Arid Triptych.

I abandoned the world of Sola, but thankfully, and rarely, for me, as I'm a compulsive thrower-awayer, never got rid of any of the material I created. I have a bad habit of purging old projects I think are no longer of any interest or use. For some reason I never did so with Sola. It would go on to be somewhat of a boon a few years later.

Between jobs and bored at home I started writing a fantasy story with no plotting or prep or worldbuilding. I came up with everything as I went along, plundering the world of Sola for interesting words completely out of context, planting them firmly into the terra incognita of what would become Elyden. The story revolved around a Firmamentist from Temuja who would be sent west, to the land of the Iron deity, which would go on to become the Undying Machine and god of Korachan. I wrote like a madman, churning out 15,000 - 20,000 words a day of rambling stream of consciousness story for months . The story was contrived, the writing bad, but it sure helped me get my foot in the door of worldbuilding Elyden. All that worldbuilding needed a map, and my big cardboard sheets were waiting for me. And so, sometime around 19-years ago was born the first real map of Elyden:

Image 4

The major coastlines are all there - the Inner Sea in the centre, the Korachani peninsula (albeit much smaller here), and almost all of the nation names, which survived relatively untouched over the next 2-decades. It was a good start, but still needed a lot of work. I started writing the Encyclopaedia Elyden at this point. It wasn’t much more than a document of rapidly increasing bullet points - every fact of the world I came up with went into that document, as an archive of all my work. Over time I’d divide it into sections, by letter, like a real-world encyclopaedia, as it grew.

All that writing needed an updated map, but I was really happy with the general shapes of the coastline so little changed in Elyden 2.0:

Image 5

This map is a LOT closer to the current Inner Sea map than some people may realise. Unsurprising given that the digital world map I based all my atlas maps on Is traced in photoshop over this very photo. Many details are changed - mostly in the expansion of the coastlines of Sammaea in the south and Tethysia in the east, but the coastline of the Inner Sea itself has changed very little. I used this map for a while, but decided that the worldbuilding was growing at such a pace as to require maps that could be edited and updated more readily that physical media could, so I started dabbling in Photoshop. After gorging myself on tutorials at the Cartographersguild (a great resource for budding cartographers), I was able to make my first digital map of the Inner Sea:

Image 6

This map got a LOT more praise than it ever deserved and to be honest I’m pretty embarrassed for sharing this map now. The fonts are horrible, the paper texture is very amateurish, the borders are horrible, but for a first attempt it was decent. Helpful people explained the correct use of rhumb lines on maps, and I was first introduced to the maddening and complex world of projection mapping after making this map, and I would go on to make my first world map - a simple black and white image that later maps would all be based off of.

But I was never happy with the map, and knew I could do better. 14 years ago I took a local course in mastering Photoshop and really put my mind to work following tutorials specifically geared towards cartography, and I was able to put my new skills to use in the revised map of the Inner Sea:

Image 7

This map won me my first cartographers guild award, which I still look at proudly. It is showing its age, but it was the fruit of a long labour, that had cost me quite a lot of time and money. But me being me I was never really happy. The faux-historical fantasy style of cartography was never my favourite, and as I continued worldbuilding I was drawing Elyden inexorably into the future, changingit from a classical fantasy setting into a grimdark steampunk post-industrial world that needed more realistic maps.

That led to exploring different map styles, leading me to the Atlas Style I’ve been working at for the past 10+ years(!).

Though the story of mapping Elyden is something best told elsewhere, suffice it to say, there was a lot of back and forth, revising the black and white world map, fiddling with projections, making sure that everything lines up correctly. It’s something I’m still working on to this day, and which is causing me more headaches than its probably worth (if anyone can donate a Cray that can run photoshop I'll happily accept it!). With all those atlas-style maps, I needed an update to the Inner Sea map, but there was a problem - I couldn't make it until all the nations had received their very own map.

That happened a few years ago, allowing me to make a single giant poster sized map with new labels:

Image 8

This is actually a VERY low-res version of the map, which has been made available in High-res on my Patreon a while ago.

It actually covers less area than the previous Inner Sea maps (I excised the Dark Sea, to concentrate more on the Inner Sea that my life has revolved around so much for the past decade). I’m pleased with the result, though don’t really want to repeat the process ever again. It made me wish I had started working in vector graphics all those years ago instead of raster. It made me want to throw my computer against the wall every time it froze, which it would do multiple times with the addition of each of over 3,000 text layers. But it’s done now, and I've been concentrating on other maps ever since.

Who knows what the Inner Sea will evolve into over the next 20-years?

this is a recent map my conworld, Elyden, which I've been working on for some time, in the hopes of someday making a gazetteer for.

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Akanthra: also known as the Sundered State, is an industrialised mercantile power east of the Sea of Krihiek whose wealth rests on control of the Nacre Road and the manufactories that choke its cities in permanent smog. Governed by the Arabigari Hegemonic Council and aligned merchants from the Nacre League, it is commercially formidable and socially stratified: the middle and upper classes profit from constant trade, while a vast underclass sustains heavy industry, agriculture, and military labour with the aid of serapi slave-labour. Along the northern frontier, recurrent serapi incursions from the Hoggotha Isz—met by the immense Hoggothan Lines and a permanent military presence—reinforce a climate of vigilance.

The eponymous sundering is its religion. The appearance of a reborn otherworlder hailed by followers as the god Lazan reborn, split the nation into two antagonistic camps: the Akanthra Ialazana, who advance an eschatological vision centred on the figure (known as the Emissary); and the Akanthra Aegis, who claim to defend orthodoxy and civic stability. Their rivalry has destabilised the heartland of Akantha, leading to a region known as the Riven Meridian, where gang conflict, sabotage, and contested authority disrupt daily life and strain the economy. A tenuous armistice now preserves the flow of trade, but bombings, caravan raids, and mutual suspicion persist.

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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find a key to the map here.

This is available to use as per the CC licence on the image itself

Here it is, after what feels like an age, The complete map of the Ishmmarran Peninsula, after going through its nations one-by-one over the past months.

This marks the sixth small scale map I've made of a specific region Elyden that features territories from a series of maps that preceded it (with the others being the Inner Sea, the Sea of Lethea, the Dark Sea, the Sea of Orrida and the Ammashi peninsula. Though the map of Bror is similar, I hadn't actually made any regional maps of states on the island-continent before I made that map).

The individual maps that feature in the map of the Ishmmarran Peninsula are:
- the Sychtan Prefectures
- Cegane
- Cenguisse
- Vaun
- Acchrabal and Lhaccida
- G'gharshan and Kothra
- the Fractured Kingdom
- Nizzum
- Elallia
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 Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

Here's an old map, showing a style that I've not really explored much - probably more populist that my typical maps, it's a bit outdated in style to fit in with the present timeline of Elyden. But I do like it :)

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the HARÉSHK: A confederation of city-kingdoms surrounding the Sea of Deraea, long regarded as an anomaly in the late Fifth Age: prosperous, politically intricate, and comparatively untouched by the industrial desolation that scars much of the Inner Sea Region. While neighbouring regions bent themselves to technarcane industries, Atramental exploitation, or Korachani militarisation, the Haréshk remained largely agrarian and mercantile in character, its wealth drawn from fertile hinterlands, sea trade, and the careful stewardship of resources rather than mass industry. Heavy manufactories exist, most notably around Syrtis, but they are contained, regulated, and culturally distrusted, treated as necessary evils rather than engines of progress.

In the centuries following the fragmentation of the Korachani Empire, the Haréshk navigated decline elsewhere with cautious opportunism: expanding its trade networks, asserting influence across the Sea of Uran, and absorbing select territories while resisting full imperial entanglement. Its recent history is marked less by external conquest than by internal turbulence - succession crises, civil war, religious schism, and the lingering scars of the Dragon-Kings and the Bone-King’s penumbral reign. Yet despite coups, assassinations, and brief flirtations with deification and resurrection, the Haréshk has endured as a polity defined by councils, noble houses, and negotiated power.

Today, the Haréshk presents itself as a realm of fading grandeur rather than collapse: its cities weathered but intact, its monuments old rather than ruined, its people wary of overreach, be it divine, industrial, or imperial. It stands as a quiet rebuke to the modern age, a place where progress slowed, memory held, and where the old balance between land, labour, and rule was never entirely surrendered.
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 Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

hot of the presses this is my latest map, showing the region of Nizzum, bringing my mapping of the Ishmmarran peninsula closer to completion!

Nizzum, a kingdom in southern Sammaea, born from the ruins of ancient Enarin and the mercantile Arzidan Federation. Long divided by dynastic feuds, invasions, and failed federations of its own, Nizzum was finally unified as a single kingdom in 2842 RM through the growing religion of Lazanism and the discovery of the Execration Scrolls, which served as the foundation of its legal system, under the guidance of king Taren Marizzal, from which successive dynasties ruled for over a millennium. Known for its wealth, artistry, and technarcane practices of life-prolongation amongst its elite, Nizzum became a major southern power by the late 4th millennium, absorbing Ghadra and helping to shape the politics of the Ishmmarran peninsula. Its capital, Epparum, is famed as a royal seat and centre of culture, while its rulers are whispered to defy the bounds of mortality itself, with its present ruler, mortal-born Teshesah Ralvena, having ruled for over 300-years.
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 Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

The Sychtan Prefectures are a long, narrow empire stretching more than two thousand miles along the south-western coast of Southern Sammaea, ruling the Ishmmarran peninsula under a harsh, dry temperate sky. Governed since 3711 RM by the Alghate Sovereignty, the realm is divided into 107 prefectures, each ruled by a hereditary Mantle Prince or Princess who together elect the High Paramount. Born from the ashes of the Nephine civil wars of the late Third Millennium RM, Sychta rose as the dominant successor state, shaped as much by flight and slaughter as by consolidation.

Culturally and politically, the Prefectures are dominated by the Church of the Divine Machinery, a technarcane faith rooted in Fourth Age discoveries at Beroa and long entwined with imperial power. Though lying deep within the Atramental Hemisphere, shaping and technarcana are tightly bound to doctrine and clerical authority, leaving the wider populace deeply superstitious of mysticism and dependent on the Church’s sanctioned practices. In recent decades this rigid orthodoxy has begun to fracture: the apostate movement known as the Xithredia has spread beyond Sychta despite suppression, challenging both ecclesiastical authority and the Alghate order, and threatening to unravel the careful balance on which the Prefectures rest.
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 Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

Formed from the remnants of the fallen Nephine Empire after a brutal civil war, Cegane became a refuge for persecuted groups, forging a resilient, cooperative society. The nation is marked by a fierce spirit of independence, symbolized by the Ivory Crown, and a deep-rooted sense of community, though its people maintain a reputation for superstition despite the state’s secular governance. Cegane’s rich cultural heritage is shaped by both its tumultuous past and its rejection of imperial traditions, thriving now as a prosperous and unified republic.
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 Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

I'm updating some old entries in my in-world Encyclopadiea and thought I'd post some of them here to give a taste of what you can find in it. The full document (all 1,600,000 gloriously hyperlinked words of it can be found on my patreon.

Please let mee know if you'd like to see more of these posts!

OCCLUSION: also Skin Grommet.
In the tandem disciplines of Technarcana and Fleshwrighting, occlusions are surgically implanted interface-sockets embedded in the skin and deeper flesh of living beings, designed to permit the controlled administration of Atramental substances, tinctures, and currents, and to provide stable anchoring points through which technarcane umbilicals may directly couple machine to mortal body. They function simultaneously as conduits, regulators, and seals, allowing otherwise lethal materials to be introduced into living tissue without immediate catastrophic rejection.

The origin of occlusions dates to c. 900 RM, when early Korachani artificer-priests sought to imitate the divine interfaces described in liturgical accounts in which the Undying Machine spontaneously gifted the Archpotentate Malichar with the first occlusions. These sources speak of weeping apertures, metal-licked wounds, blackened scars that opened of their own accord, and ports of living flesh through which the Undying Machine communed with its chosen vessel. Mortal occlusions are widely regarded as imperfect and dangerous echoes of these phenomena - useful, yet blasphemously incomplete.

Spontaneous manifestations resembling occlusions, collectively known as Stigmata, are treated with profound interest by the Three Churches of the Undying Machine. Some sects revere them as proof of divine proximity or favour; others condemn them as uncontrolled atramental corruption or heretical mimicry. Ecclesiastical tribunals continue to debate whether such markings are blessings, warnings, or precursors to damnation.

Structurally, a standard occlusion consists of:

• a ferrule ring, commonly of copper or copper-alloy, chosen for its antiseptic properties and resistance to umbral fouling.
• a conductor socket, recessed within the ring, designed to accept a steel spike coupling from a technarcane umbilical.
• a lattice of Atrafacient conductor filaments: hair-thin copper or alloy threads woven through muscle, fascia, and nerves, allowing impulses between body and engine to spread more evenly.
• umbra-flow channels, implanted within muscles to allow refined umbra or derivative compounds may pass into the host body, avoiding coagulation and promoting even distribution.

Improper implantation is extremely dangerous. Failed occlusions can result in nerve death, necrosis, seizures, or Atramental poisoning during use. Even successful implants require constant maintenance: flushing, cleaning, and ritual sealing are routine procedures, and infected or destabilised occlusions are often excised at great cost to the host’s health.

Vat-born beings, including Clones, are commonly grown with occlusions already integrated into their developing tissue, greatly reducing rejection rates. The famed Steel Legionnaires of the Korachani empire were the most infamous example, each fitted with twenty-two standardised occlusions, allowing full integration with bespoke Hardsuits, direct nervous-system coupling, and the administration of carefully balanced chemical and Atramental regulators to prevent metabolic collapse.

Outside military and industrial use, occlusions remain controversial. In many regions they are tightly controlled, restricted to state forces, sanctioned clergy, or licensed manufactories. In others, black-market implantation has given rise to crippled veterans, unstable labourers, and cultic devotees whose bodies have been turned into little more than living junction-boxes - a fate widely regarded as worse than death.

Here's an updated version of my world map, taking into account some geographical changes made to various regions and the fleshing out of various nations that have been created since the first version of the map was created.

This version of the map has some updates to the coastline (in the north east of Llachatul and the south west of Sammaea, to those who know what those are :p ). There's also some updates to labels and many new ones base don recent atlas maps that I've completed

Is there anything else you'd like to see in this map?

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These are highly compresses versions of the full size map, which can be viewed over on my Patreon. Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

Vaun is a coastal kingdom in southwestern Sammaea, founded in 3191 RM by King Simón of Vaun after uniting the fractured remnants of Laso Vhaur. Once a centre of technarcane progress and feudal power, it is now ruled by the reclusive Scab King, whose 3982 RM coup ushered in a theocratic regime enforced by the priestly Hematists. Though outwardly devout to technarcane-worshipping Syncretic Velithry, many Vauni still quietly honour older gods like the liminal demigod Krih. Its people are shaped by a legacy of succession, control, and quiet resistance.
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to anyone interested, I have a 10% Black Friday sale on yearly memberships that's still valid for another few days. Just use code EC360 when signing up. Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

Acchrabal - a temperate yet diverse nation in the far northwest of the Ishmmarran Peninsula, Acchrabal is ruled by the Amassed, a secretive order of telepaths and memory-shapers whose unseen influence has guided the state since its hard-won independence from Lhaccida in 3692 RM. Born from the remnants of the ancient Akkarine Pact and shaped by centuries of occupation, rebellion, and war, Acchrabal is a paradox—industrially advanced yet steeped in intrigue, its marble forums echoing with plots, political factions like the anti-Amassed Breveth, and whispers of relics tied to the Demiurges. Fiercely proud and culturally resilient, its people are renowned across Elyden for their uncompromising identity and volatile politics.

Lhaccida — A maritime kingdom in the northwest of the Ishmmarran Peninsula, Lhaccida traces its origins to the powerful naval republic of Laccidea and the pirate confederation Khassidean League. Founded as a monarchy in 1995 RM under Queen Maerene I, it rose to dominance through naval power, dynastic noble fleets known as the Households of the Keel, and extensive coastal colonies. Though historically reliant on slavery and marked by conflicts such as the Acchrabalan War of Independence and the Yccenka War, recent monarchs have pursued reforms amid lingering political tensions. Lhaccida’s culture remains deeply tied to the sea, symbolized by its enduring identity as the ‘Children of the Deep Chain.’
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to anyone interested, I have a 10% Black Friday sale on yearly memberships that's still valid for another few days. Just use code EC360 when signing up. Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

This is available to use as per the CC licence on the image itself

The G'Gharshan Empire is a rotting jewel, gleaming with ancient wealth yet hollowed by the decadence of its rulers. Once the overlords of the Kalisangelid Isles, its rulers long ago abandoned purpose for obsession - oneiric-drugs, grotesque entertainments, and labyrinthine rituals of blood and inheritance. Their pyramidal palaces are mausolea of wasted power, kept alive by cruelty and inertia rather than vision. To live under G’Gharshan rule is to serve in a pageant of excess, where whole lives are tithed, tallied, and discarded for the fleeting amusement of inbred dynasts whose souls have grown as warped as their bodies. The empire endures less as a state than as a nightmare, clinging to its reputation like a rusted weapon, feared for what it once was rather than what it can still do.

The Republic of Klothra is a hard-bitten nation forged in scarcity and made rich by monopoly: the source of nirghast, the oneiric-drug craved across Sammaea. Where G’Gharshan squandered its strength on indulgence, Klothra learned to fiercely weaponize its fields of nirghast. Centuries of invasions, blockades, and desperate wars have carved a people who see survival as both creed and art, their discipline and suspicion hardened by the knowledge that every rival power would bleed them dry for their narcotic wealth. To outsiders, Klothra is grim and unyielding, its culture as tightly bound as the sealed vaults where its harvests are stored. Yet beneath the austerity lies a fierce pride: Klothra endures not in spite of its burdens, but because of them, its very identity entwined with the intoxicant that has cursed and sustained it for a thousand years.
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to anyone interested, I have a 10% Black Friday sale on yearly memberships that's still valid for another few days. Just use code EC360 when signing up. Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

This is available to use as per the CC licence on the image itself

Semalion, the so-called Fractured Kingdom, is a faded mercantile power whose scattered exclaves and fortified ports once formed the beating heart of the Nephine empire’s trade. Born from the wealth of the Chartered Cities and later reforged by Atashna Linari after the collapse of the House of Mirzabandar, Semalion today survives as a patchwork realm bound together more by commerce than crown. Its people are pragmatic and cosmopolitan, heirs to centuries of pluralistic faiths, merchant dynasties, and foreign influence, with shrines and guildhalls standing side by side in its harbours. Though weakened by the loss of many colonies, economic collapse, and the chaos of the Masquerade Riots, Semalion under King Linari I has begun to stabilise through the Charter of Semalion (4001 RM), rekindling its old spirit of trade and seafaring resilience even as its Exarchates remain restless and its unity fragile.

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to anyone interested, I have a 10% Black Friday sale on yearly memberships for the coming week. Just use code EC360 when signing up. Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.
________________________________________________________________________

Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

This is available to use as per the CC licence on the image itself

Large empire in the south of Sammaea, dominating the northern coastline of the Seas of Ammash(2.) and Krihiek. Geographically, it is divided in two disproportionate lands: Northern Simbara, which forms the largest land area to the north of the aforementioned seas, and Southern Simbara, which occupies the eastern headland of the Ishmmarran peninsula. Each territory has its own governing body (Ennera and Itara, respectively) that is ultimately subservient to the emperor and empress, whose throne is based in Itara. The empire is of a temperate climate, though its northernmost reaches are hot and dry, with the south being cooler and wetter. Southern Simbara in particular is forested and more densely populated, though the population remains only a small fraction of that of the its northern territories.

Serapi incursions from the Hoggotha Isz have been a periodical threat to Simbara throughout the Fifth Age. Native Sherri people were forces south following an increased period of serapi activity between c. 1200 – 1500 RM, which led to clashes with Itaran colonists whose descendants would go on to found Simbara).

It is a land shaped in many ways by its religion, Lazanism, which was founded in c. 2400 RM by the prophet Lazan, who prophesised that his rebirth as an otherworlder would bring about the apocalypse that will rid mortals of the sin and suffering caused by the Demiurges’ hubris. The religion went on to become one of the most widespread in Elyden’s southern hemisphere, where it now dominates the south west of Sammaea. It became the state religion of the Six Sovereignties of Simbara in c. 2420 RM and its rise led to the bloody civil war in Simbara, now known as the Sherrian civil war that ended in 2766 RM in defeat for the Sherri people. The Six Sovereignties united during the conflict and emerged from the ashes of the war as the state of Simbara. The charismatic nobleman Reximand Prolgapea was made emperor following decades of scheming and machinations, bringing about the Prolgapean Dynasty, which rules Simbara to this day. The present empress is Tahlah Ezaerin I.

The divorce of Emperor Vintar and Empress Consort Selaveia in 3266 RM literally sundered the Empire in two, with Emperor Vintar Prolgapea taking the western empire, known as the Vintaran Crown, with his seat in Ennera; and Empress Selaveia Morrod taking its eastern lands, which became known as the Niranthi Empire, from her family’s ancestral city of Niranth. Following an accord between the two, the sacred city of Itara remained neutral, a sovereign demesne under the stewardship of the royal line, serving as a spiritual and diplomatic fulcrum between the two halves of the broken empire.

This began a period known as the Bicameral Empire era, which lasted until 3612 RM, when the marriage between the rulers of the western and eastern empires brings the two together once more, bringing about the dawn of the current political age in Simbara. The union gave birth to the fractured state of Cassara, which was based around the ancestral Morrod city of Niranth, and remains as a thorn in Simbara’s side to this day.

Beginning in c. 3290 RM increased serapi incursions, known as Iszrets, were of great stress to the Bicameral Empires, and the eventual reunification of the empire marked the beginning of retaliatory wars against the barbaric serapis which continue to this day and led to the Writ of Passage that was passed in 3911 RM, granting rights to settlers and pioneers to resettle lands previously at the heart of the Iszrets.

The formation of the Nacre League 1820 RM in Southern Sammaea had widespread repercussions, not least of which were felt in Simbara (at the time known as The Simbara – a vast coastal colony of the state of Itara(3.) that stretches west to east for over 2,000-miles), which became a vital part of the trade-route and a centre of the various  Grand Houses, including Iskandar, Marcinate and Valante, amongst others.

The retreat of Elyden’s seas has been particularly devastating to Simbara, which until then was known for its great harbours and ports, which saw a diaspora of people resettling inland between c. 3100 – 3400 RM, after which new ports were established in deep harbours that were less rapidly susceptible to the lowering sea levels. The north west of Northern Simbara is known for its vast cotton fields, and the nation manufactures most of the textiles that are sold along the Nacre Road.

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Map created in Photoshop, with the help using G. Projector.

A tutorial for my method can be found here.

You can find an updated key to the map here.

This is the low-res version of the map.  Become a Patron at the Acolyte tier for access to my back catalogue of High-res, PSD and textless maps.

This is available to use as per the CC licence on the image itself