Yajawil of Maok'ab

Yajawil of Maok'ab Maok'ab
1680–1841
The Yajawil during the 18th century
Status	Former province
Common languages	Yokot'an
Religion	White Path, traditional religions
Government	Monarchy
Historical era	Mutulese Ochran
• Established	1680
• Disestablished	11th June 1841
Preceded by Succeeded by Tahamaja Empire Arthuristan Malaio

The Yajawil of Maok'ab, more often shorten as "Maok'ab", was a Mutulese colonial province corresponding to much of the eastern coast of the Malaio continent. It notably encompassed the modern country of Onekawa-Nukanoa and the Province of Sina’uia. It was established following the development of the Mutulese presnece in Ochran and merged together a number of trade ports into a single administrative unit.

Economy

Slavery

To serve as labour in the plantations or as dockers in the ports, the Mutuleses needed an increasingly larger workforce that could not be simply provided by Nuk Nahob employees and Natives workers. In Maok'ab like in other provinces of the Mutul, the Nuk Nahob resorted to slavery to compensate for the lack of free labourers.

At first, slaves were imported from Oxidentale. These generally were indentured servants who entered slavery following a legal punishment or economic desesperation. As the status could not be inherited, the descendents of this first slaves would form the core of Maok'ab urban lower classes.

In the aftermath of the Shambalan Great War, the Mutuleses Nuk Nahob found themselves in the possession of many war captives and other prisoners. They were displaced all over the Mutuleses possessions and even to Oxidentale, to be sold as prized exotic possessions. The majority, however, would serve in the Nuk Nahob as rowers or end up in Maok'ab recently established plantations. War captives did not enjoy the same rights as other slaves and could be freely sold by their masters or sacrificed during religious ceremonies.

After the establishment of the Yajawil n 1660, the plantation owners and urban centers continued to import slaves from all over the "Mutulese World" to support to the growth of the economy. The application of the Divines Laws brought by the Yajawil also allowed for the apparition of "local" slaves, who were generally either convicts or gamblers forced to sold themselves, or family members, to repay their debts.

Slavery in the Mutulese fashion would continue until the official end of Maok'ab in 1841.

Government

Maoji Nalil

The "Maori Wards" (Mahoji Nalil in Mutli) were an administrative division created during the 18th century to solve the administrative and legal problems posed by the Maori emmigration to the Mutulese trade-ports. Maori who had settled in these cities were officialy granted citizenship and grouped into their own Wards. These Wards had their own leaders, bearing the official title of "Aj Kuchkab" like it was traditional for district leaders in the Mutul, and had their own School and Court of justice. In the following decades, smaller Maori settlements distant from the urban centers were also granted the official status of Nalil, with the citizenship it implied.

The Maori Wards greatly helped the Mutul root itself in Malaio and integrate the Maori to the larger "Vespanian Network" of the Mutuleses. It also eroded the traditional tribal lines and diminish the power of some of the more "Mutulese friendly" Iwi, which had their populations integrated to the cities and accounted in the census, while their leaders and "aristocracy" was integrated into the colonial administration.

Veterans Grants

A major policy of the Nuk Nahob was that all sailors and soldiers who served a full 7 years was elligible to receive a patch of farmland. They were not allowed to chose the location of the granted lands, and thus this policy resulted in a vast, Vespanian wide, intermixing of populations. There were two major "colonization centers" : the Protectorate of Ankat and the Maok'ab Yajawil, mostly because of the vast expands of widelands to clear and organize in both of these regions.

The Lands were generally granted so to form small autonomous communities, generally between two to three hundreds people, with their own Temples and School. The position of Aj Kuchkab, or Warden, of a new colony was granted to whoever had reached the highest rank during his service. To favour the implementation of these ex-soldiers, their settlements were often close by, or just in contact with, an older Ward or a large plantation owned by a Mutulese trader. These Wards were thus kept under Mutulese control by both vertical (their administrative and judicial existence, their clientelist relationship with large plantation owners who could loan them equipment, seeds, and offer insurances in case of disasters...) and horizontal ties (the "brotherhoods" formed with older implanted communities...) within the Mutulese structure.

The Veterans who were implanted in Maok'ab were almost never of Oxidentaleses origins. In fact, historians and demographs have sometime described the Yajawil as a "continuation of the Tahamaja Era": the colons were often of Pulaui and Tsurushimese origins, with a minority of Janatāva people. What tied these people together were their common veteranship and long service within the Nuk Nahob, a common tongue (already called Mutli but closer to Yokot'an than its modern counterpart), and a common religion as most, if not all, had converted to the White Path during their service by careerism or mere cultural osmosis. As a result, these colonies proved to be powerful vectors of transmission of the Mutulese culture.

Client Iwi

The Iwi were the tribes of the natives Maori, large congregations of originally independent clans tied together by a mythical genealogy and more pragmatic political and economical goals. They first emerged during the Tamahaja Era as a response to Pulaui influence and pressure. When the Mutuleses arrived in Malaio in 1575, they recognized each Iwi as its own Ajawil or Kingdom. Each Nuk Nahob then established its own treaties with each individual Iwi, leading to a vast and complicated patchwork of diplomatic and economic ties. The creation of Maok'ab and the arrival of the first Yajawil greatly changed the situation.

Early on, the Iwi were recognized as sovereign and independent entities, distinct from the Mutuleses trade-port. There was no requirement of military service, nor tribute to be paid. However, many Iwi found themselves entirely dependent economically on the Mutuleses traders who had become the sole buyers of their productions. This dependency became more and more visible as the economy of each Iwi grew. Many demanded further political recognition and integration into the Mutulese system, which led to the expansion of the Maoji Nalil, a legal status at first only reserved to the districts formed by the Maori immigrants in the Mutuleses trade-ports which was then extended to the Hapū of the Iwi that demanded such integration. After that point, the integrated Iwi lost all political power, becoming purely a matter of culutral identity. Most inland tribes however would continue to exist as "states" distinct from, but allied with, the Mutulese's Yajawil, and be treated as such by the latter in their economic and diplomatic relations.

Client Republics

Before the arrival of the Mutuleses, there were around thirty independent polities in the region of modern Zanzali. These city-states were the source of the Majambazi, a cast of pirates who organised raids across the Karaihe sea and the Ozeros. The Great Enterprises and their Pulaui and Maori allies united in a great fleet which gained the upper hand over the Pirate Republics during the 1620s.

The Mutuleses negotiated the peace with the religious orders that dotted the MaZanzi coastline and countryside. Coastal city-states were forced to open their ports to Mutuleses traders and help finance the construction of forts manned by troops of the Enteprises within their cities. The Republics themselves were maintained as independent polities, the Mutul being explicitly forbidden from intervening in their political lives by the peace treaties.

By the 1650s, the city-states had organised themselves into a single Federation. The Federation was recognized as an Economic Partner by the Mutuleses with which treaties, agreements and contracts were negotiated, notably in the establishment of factories, the purchase of lands, construction of infrastructures, loans, and the recruitment of mercenaries. In 1680, all the lands, trade ports, and factories owned by the Lakamb'eob came under the jurisdiction of the Viceroyalty of Maok'ab but the Federation remained.

Military

At first, the Mutuleses Great Enterprises showed little interest in the Maori themselves, because of the low density of their populations and their lack of a naval tradition. With time, the Malaio natives ended up finding a place in the Mutulese military machine as low ranking soldiers, workers, and crew members. Generally, they were recruited to replace men lost during the journey from Oxidentale.

With the constitution of Maok'ab as its own Yajawil and the growth of the coastal cities, the Mutuleses were now able to create and levy specific "Maori Regiments". The "Mao Fusilliers" were all-volunteers recruited from the Nalil but also from the Iwi allied to the Mutuleses as well. Officers of these Regiments were originally either Oxidentaleses or Ochraneses people affected to these units, but as the integration of the Maori people grew, so did the portion of officers originating from a Maoji Nalil, while the "Oxidentaleses" were slowly but surely replaced by volunteers from the "Veterans Wards". Maori from "allied Iwi" however almost never rose above sub-officers because of their lack of education and poor grasp of Yokot'an.