Valmer

Name - Republic of Valmer

Flag -A white pine tree with the top branches replaced by a ship's mast, spar, ratlines, and a sail, on a violet background with the white north star at far upper right corner

Currency - Gold coins referred to as Oars - GAC Hilts are widely accepted as well.

Capital - Vortigaera

Geography - A large island south of the GAC and Oscrow and North East of the Bay of Lunas. Is heavily forested with a mountainous interior.

History - Valmer had been populated in the past by a mixture of people and races, mostly humans and Melunans, who came from the west and south. For most of their early history they lived peaceful lives. The people were bound together by their Searover culture, with many close ties. Valmer, like so many other nations, lost it's independence when the Iraygion Empire arrived. For a very long time, Valmer laid under their boot. Hope was raised when the Northern Iraygion Empire collapsed, but the Empire, while loosing most of the north to the Elves, still kept a firm grip on it's northern outpost island.

Valmer, being one of the farther corners of the Iraygion Empire, was the first target for Lord Vortan's revolution. He set out there with a small fleet of ships. Unfortunately, his intentions were noted and he was harried by an Iraygion fleet, causing him to have to bypass Valmer, eventually crashing onto the coast of Nordironia. Here he found a community of exiled Valmerians, who he convinced to join his army to make up for lost men. However, Nordironia had it's own wars to fight, the Elves moving into this previously uncharted place to hunt their escaped Avianid servants. Vortan could not unite the tribes of the area until the Elves were driven back. Ever fighting for freedom, he took his sword up against the elves, eventually united forces with the Avianids. It is said he even met an aged Hoarmister before the latter's death.

Eventually his new force was ready. The Valmerian exiles returned home with a vengeance, joined by all their brothers and sisters that had been scattered on the waves. With their combined force, they drove inland, easily taking the shores but having a horrid time with the mountains and the Capital city, especially the fortress. Aid arrived from a strange source - a small group of Avianids came to repay the aid the exiled Valmerians and Vortan's forces had given them. They flew Vortan and a small group of his best soldiers into the city by night. Vortan opened the gates of the city and his army rushed in. He then bade goodbye to this land, wishing them the best of luck in the future, taking his men and a good number of new volunteers back south, to Mefreet and Selemond, to continue his revolution. The nature of Valmer's freedom is the origin of it's close ties with Nordironia and it's eventually alliance with that nation when it was strong enough to strike back against the elves.

Today - Valmer's close ties to the GAC have remained. They fought with the GAC, Oscrow and Dalysium during the Elf Wars and are generally a protectorate state of the larger and more powerful GAC.

They heavily forested and have a good trade in their lumber- they also specialize in building small ships made of kerf-fitted lumber, which they sell at a high profit and are especially popular in the northern cultures. They are heavily forested, but past deforestation led to the trees being farmed, literally; entire tracts are planted with young seedling trees and seeds that have been artificially liberated from the cones. The trees are such an important resource that it is illegal to cut one down except in designated public harvesting areas, and then three seedlings must be planted for everytree harvested. This is because old-growth pine (meaning 100 years or more) tends to be less sound for structural purposes than trees of 5-20 years; which is directly opposite to the principles applied to hardwood harvesting. Pine is the fastest-growing usable source of yellow and white softwood, therefore, pine is what is used for the "agrarian" cycle of planting and harvesting trees.

Much of the island's human population is comprised by the Searover culture, which anchors and ties together several kerfed-joint boats to serve as living and livelihood quarters for individual family clans called "pods," which are often tied together with other pods to form seaborne settlements called "claves". Thus, the trees are a major political issue because of cultural concerns. The lumber from the farmed trees is also superior to wild trees, and thus is prized by builders and craftsmen who make implements and build wooden buildings. The common tendency is to use castoff and public-harvest trees for fuel for heating.

Much of population is sea-borne- the Searover culture also includes a closely-interwoven and integrated subset of Melunan origin; the cultures are so closely allied that much of the human population is at least 30% Merlunan in genealogical origin, and much of the Melunan culture is at least 30% human in genealogical origin; in short, they all visit and intermarry with each other and other pods and enclaves. As well, a huge percentage of the human population of Valmer is Merlunan/Human mixed.