Sochvel

Sochvel Sočvəł 빠른 강 ppaleun gang Balungang
City
Downtown Sochvel
Logo
Etymology: Oroshan, "fast river"
Motto(s):  Qitjak vəkənts Hearth of the nation
Country	Oroshia
Department	Sočvəłvək
Founded	1592
Incorporated (town)	1673
Incorporated (city)	1696
Population
• Total	518,021

Sochvel (/ˈsoʊ̯t͡ʃvɛl/; Oroshan: Sočvəł pronounced: [sɔtʃˈvəɬ]; Jogin: 빠른 강 tr: ppaleun gang), historically also known as Balungang, is the capital and largest city of Oroshia. It is also the seat of the department named for it. The city is located at the confluence of the eponymous Sochvel River (Oroshan: "fast river") with Ol-omol Bay, part of the Demontean Ocean. In 2018, it had a population of 518,021, accounting for more than a quarter of the total population of the country, and it is the largest city of its latitude in the Eastern Hemisphere. The southern coast of Oroshia experiences large temperature swings, and Sochvel experiences cold, wetter winters and hot, dry summers.

History

Earliest settlement

It is known that Sochvel has been inhabited by Indigenous peoples of the area since the first human habitation of eastern Surucia. The city occupies a strategically important location for trade and shelter from the harsh climate typical of the Oroshan peninsula. Archaeological artifacts have been found from the Go-dayin culture, a pre-Oroshan group hypothesized to be the ancestors of the modern-day Namchog people, dating back nearly 20 thousand years, followed by proto-Oroshan cultures upon the latter's migration into the area some 3 thousand years ago.

Jogin colonization

Jogin explorer Sun Jin-Ho first sighted an encampment of nomadic Oroshan herders at the site of present-day Sochvel in the winter of 1590, while mapping and charting the coast and rivers of the peninsula. Noting its potential for settlement, Sun would return two years later in the summer of 1592, with a party of 3 ships carrying 65 men. They anchored their ships in the bay, rowed to shore, and made to set up camp next to a resident population of reindeer herders. The native Oroshan populations had grown fearful of Jogin encroachment, having heard of kidnappings by Jogin sailors, and attempted to stop the sailors from setting up camp. The sailors, after little time, returned to their ships, however they would soon row back to shore, where they torched the encampment of reindeer herders, slaughtering every inhabitant. By the fall of 1592, Sun had erected a wooden palisade around a small settlement, which he named 빠른 강, "fast water", unknowingly a calque of the native Oroshan Sočvəł.

Over the next century, the settlement would continue to grow, as colonization efforts on behalf of the Jogin expanded. Native Oroshans began to inhabit the settlement, too, as its importance as a centre of trade was enforced when Jogin hegemony over Oroshia was declared in 1634. In 1673, it had grown enough that it was incorporated as a town, and not 20 years after that, it was incorporated as a city.