Nobility in Lannonia

Nobility in West Borea (known indigenously as plemstvo or tominovi) is an ancient institution with great political and social significance that is considered to have begun with the Neo-Sepcan Empire's Pantocracy period. Today nobles are one of the main social classes in West Borea and represent much of society's most affluent and powerful.

History

In the early days of the Neo-Sepcan Empire, an aristocracy comprising entirely of Sepcans known as the thoming ('high name', origin of the Vitrian term tomin) was fundamental to the Empire, comprising the most powerful Sepcan clans whose armies and wealth formed the bulk of the new Empire's strength, and carried out much of its early campaigns. After the incorporation of Vitrians and conquest of the Zasem river valley, the non-Sepcan local lordships of those areas retained their authority, but at the highest level the thoming nobility remained the most important and powerful. Emperor Mukemilaym began permanently entrenching the Sepcan nobles as an administrative class in 30 BCE by granting them substantial control over formerly non-Sepcan domains, empowering them further.

This system expanded into a matured practice of sualny after the conquest of the Lysandrene Empire and several other successes in the 1st century CE which saw the Neo-Sepcan Empire double its territory and find even more prosperous regions under its control. Most of these conquests were granted to members of the Vitrian-dominated soldier and bureaucratic class, who then ascended tremendously. This policy was practiced by the throne perhaps to control and counter the traditional thoming, and also possibly due to Vitrian officers being generally more capable in both military and administrative matters, having been the main group with such experience since the maturation of the Empire. A both political and religious consecration of the Vitrian generals' authority over former Lysandrene lands ensured them hereditary and unchallenged control of very productive lands. These rewarded generals were essentially the ancestors of the modern nobility.

Although conflicts plagued the new conquests well into the 4th century, once rule of those areas stabilized southern West Borea became a powerhouse and correspondingly the Vitrian nobles who controlled them gained unprecedented influence in the imperial court, and eclipsed the Sepcan aristocracy. Well before a Vitrian became Sepcan Emperor, Vitrian nobles had became the predominant group in Neo-Sepcan politics.

• Fragmentation/chunqiuization of NSE
• Repression by Bibliocracy

The social order with which the nobles endured with contempt came to an end with the Panoles plague, which destroyed the basis of much of Bibliocratic institutions. This was followed by a mass revolt of disgruntled peasants in Razaria who converted to Costeny and were intent on demolishing Tastanic ecclesiarchy for good, initiating the Cositene expansion. Such religious rebellions threatened to spread throughout the ravaged West Borea, and what remained of the nobility could sense that although the grasp of the church had dissipated, their own position would too be threatened. Ostromysl, a Zesmynian nobleman, exemplarily converted to Costeny and campaigned against Tastanists in the Zasem valley; he was emulated by much of the region's nobility, mainly to preserve their own statuses as much as to join in on the destruction of the Bibliocracy. 'Convert-empires' would come to dominate Costenized West Borea.

• conflict with clergy
• Repression by centralization
• modern transformation

Titles

Below is a list of West Borean noble titles in descending order of importance and honor.

• Duke (praporovode): the highest noble title used, literally translates to 'banner-lord'. Duchies were typically the largest of internal divisions.
• Voivode
• Hemev: from the older Sepcan title hemphu, or 'lord'.
• Count (bavfjen): from Sepcan title meaning 'head of army'.
• Despot: Inherited from Lysandrene titles - often equivalent to Count.
• Župan: Often equivalent to Count.
• Viscount (bavkvoj): from Sepcan title meaning 'head of wing [military unit]'.
• Baron (kamraj): from Sepcan title originally equivalent to a village head.
• Presbyter (presvitar): Inherited from Lysandrene title (literally means 'elder'), typically landless.
• Honorable: Common landless title.