Rhakhataa

Rhakhataa
Flag of Flag
Capital	Arhvjata
Official languages	Arhfatal
Demonym(s)	Rhakhese, Rhakhataa
Government
• Ljarhvene	Arhkhuvanatal Valaanida
Legislature	National Council of Rhakhataa
Population
• 2017 census	136,689,128
GDP (PPP)	2017 estimate
• Total	$3,806,655,525,672
• Per capita	$27,849
GDP (nominal)	2017 estimate
• Total	$1,895,878,205,360
• Per capita	$13,870
Gini	35.1 medium
HDI (2017)	0.847 very high
Currency	Tjaaros (RTJ)
Time zone	RHT
Date format	yyyy-mm-dd (CE)
Driving side	right
Internet TLD	.rh

Rhakhataa is a developed country with a population of around 137 million in southwestern Euclea. It is not technically a one-party state as political parties are banned, however, constitutionally and in practice it follows Administrative Statism. It is generally considered a regional or secondary power, and its primate city and capital is Arhvjata.

Etymology

"Rhakhataa" is a compound of "rhakha", a variant of "rhakh" meaning realm, and "Tae", an older word referring to the lands and people of a large, nebulous area of the region, itself ultimately coming from likely "Thaibara", being the name for a particularly powerful tribe or kingdom just over four thousand years ago. The compound was allegedly coined by Orlidada, emperor of Okhatulja around 910 C.E. with the "taa" component lengthened from "ta" to indicate grandeur; while this process is known to occur in proto-Arhfatal, the etymology is still spurious, especially as proto-Arhfatal was not that widely spoken at the time. It has been proposed and accepted by some that "Thaibara" is related to the name of a river located in their territory, the name of which has been reconstructed as /tʰɔc-bʰ/ in proto-Jirvatal from around 500 C.E.

History

Main article: History of Rhakhataa

Pre-Kootaba

Modern humans came to occupy the area of modern Rhakhataa from around 50000 B.C.E. to 45000 B.C.E. Agriculture, proto-writing and proto-cities were all present around 8500 B.C.E., and Avanaarhdja I came into existence around 8000 B.C.E., widely considered to be the first city (certainly the first walled one). Bronze came into use in this Khovono civilisation, and the area was united a few times through conquest, the first time by the Havartan Empire. Around 1300 B.C.E. the Khovono Collapse saw mass depopulation and decline in societal complexity.

Middle

About 1200 B.C.E. the Kootaba people and cultures appear, likely out of some degree of migration and intermixture with natives; iron comes to complement bronze, and cities begin appearing and growing again. A period of disunity is ended by Okhatulja in the 500s C.E. before it falls, with a Great Interregnum from the 800s to 1100s. Thereon Tjabaranha, Kateebini and Bororatule as empires united the region successively after interregna, with similar extents and degrees of power. In 1855-1857 the Dourgan Rebellion broke out, seeing a million spontaneously massacred in 1857 after it was suppressed. In 1922, a succession crisis affected Bororatule; various factions, separatists, civil institutions and others attempted to assert power, resulting in splintering.

Modern

In 1924 or 1925, the National Functionalist Party of Rrakhatar seized control of Arhvjata, the largest city in Rrakhatar (exonym of the region before 1939) at the time. From there, due to its competent governance and some degrees of foreign aid, it was able to unite the rest of Rrakhatar mostly militarily mostly 1932-1934. From 1936-1939 there was a period of liberalisation, followed by purges known as the Decade of Terror 1939-1948 (during which the so-called Warlords' Revolt occurred). From there on in, Rhakhataa (reform was promulgated in 1939) developed peacefully in relative isolation; peaceful protests were resolved in 1950. In 1986, three to three hundred domestic students were killed owing to protests, which caused a diplomatic incident.

Geography

The climate of Rhakhataa is generally temperate, with only extremely rare snows, moderate rainfall and warmth for most of the year.

The centre-west is dominated by the Khovono River basin, whose watershed covers over half of the country. The east tends to be drier and rockier. Small pockets of the country are marshy, or desert either from natural causes or through manmade desertification over the millennia.

Politics

See also: Government of Rhakhataa

The state bans political parties and factions, and officially and constitutionally follows the ideology of Administrative Statism, which was put in place after a coup near the end of the Great War. There have been some notable calls to rename it due to its association with the Gaullican regime of the Great War.

The country is unitary; legislative power is vested in the National Council, which elects a Ljarhvene to serve as a kind of first among equals, though at points in history this role has been more or less dominant. Members come to the National Council by being nominated by the National Council and appointed by lower bodies.

Economy

Rhakhataa had a nominal GDP of $13,870 for 2017, giving it a total GDP of $1,895,878,205,360. Its GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power parity for the same year was $27,849, total $$3,806,655,525,672, according to the Global Institute for Fiscal Affairs. It is considered an industrialised, developed country with an advanced economy, albeit only recently.

The country extracts and exports moderate amounts of oil and natural gas. It also has small deposits of uranium which it uses for power generation and a nuclear weapons program.

Agriculture is moderately significant; the country is generally a net food exporter. A relative variety of grains are grown, and cash crops include sarsaparilla, honey and cotton. There is also some forestry.

The country's mineral resources are relatively distributed, with iron ores, anthracite, lime, various salts, zinc ores, magnesium ores, bauxite, copper ores and titanium ores all available in usable amounts, in addition to silver and mercury. However, some deposits are close to exhaustion, particularly those of copper, zinc and mercury, driving investment in recycling. Rhakhataa further possesses what are believed to be the world's largest sand deposits, contained in both inland dunes and beaches. There are also some rare earth mineral deposits which are understood to be barely unprofitable to extract.

Major manufacturing industries include oil refining, smelting, arms, medicine, glassmaking, fertiliser, industrial chemicals, cement, vehicles, white goods and electronics. These tend to be concentrated in the western and southwestern coast areas, and some inland valleys.

Demographics

Rhakhataa in the middle of 2017 had 136,689,128 residents, and a birth rate around replacement rate in addition to some immigration. The gender balance is roughly even and the literacy rate is 99%.

Culture

The preferred eating utensils in Rhakhataa are chopsticks. The culture is generally considered a colder one. Modern architecture tends to be utilitarian in nature, even brutalist. The kaabolaa is a symbol of Rhakhataa and elements of its culture.

Funerary customs

Premodern Rhakhataa's most prestigious method of body disposal was ingestion, seen as a noble and elegant way of passing one's body onto the afterlife. This was typically done raw, though customs around seasoning varied, in as large pieces as possible, and as soon as possible after death. Specially raised priest-slaves would consume the entire bodies of the highest echelons of society on their death (e.g. royals), with this being their only duty; they would train to swallow larger pieces whole. Mortality was reportedly above average among them. Animals of various types were used for those with lower social status; the parts of the body would still be prepared for the animals as if for a human, however, in cuts, and the animals like the priest-slaves were considered holy, and were raised only for this purpose (they were not slaughtered but allowed to live until old age, and they would be cremated or fed to other animals funerarily themselves). The vast majority of the population, however, was cremated, as were inedible parts of those eaten; the ashes were given to the families or stored in the kharbooda. The kharbooda were the large ornamented religious complexes, characteristically blocky in overall profile, built in or around cities for these processes. The practice of corpse eating had its roots over two thousand years ago, through the idea of the soul being attached to the flesh; the fastest, neatest method of the disappearance of the flesh would provide the smoothest journey of the soul to the afterlife. Burning fulfilled speed and neatness but still involved the visible singing of the flesh, and burning was understood to be painful to the dormant soul within the flesh. Kings thus began to request to be consumed, first only various organs believed to be the seat of the soul but the practice was extended to the whole body later on. The custom began to decline in prestige with Eastern influences and reformism during the late Bororatule dynasty, and was almost completely wiped out in the Rhakhataa era, in part by government policy.