Khitan (Levilion)

The Khitan people (Chinese: 契丹; pinyin: Qìdān) are a people living in northern Shang Fa and counted among the Tartares. They first appeared in Huran during the 13th century and by 1364 had established their own state: Khitay which would go on to rule over most of modern day Shang Fa for close to two centuries and would leave a strong impact on the Huranian culture through clothing, theatre, sport, music, and cuisine. Nowadays, they live essentially in the region known as Northern Tartary between the southern slopes of the Sky Pillars and the northern expanses of the Shang_Fa#The_Great_Plain.

History

Khitay

Known as the Kitai huldʒi gur in their language, the state of Khitay was founded in 1364 after the failure of the Kuang Dynasty to repell the Khitans. Their leader, Yarud Saladi, took for himself the title of Heavenly King and established a dual administration to rule over his vast and culturally diverse state: a Northern Administration in charge of nomadic peoples (the future Tartares) and a Southern Administration for the predominantly Huranian sedentarized populations. Through the Dual-Administration, the Khitans also hoped to do away with the feudalism of the previous dynasties, and they did succeed in creating the class of gentry-scholars required for this new system to work.

The elites of Khitay adopted a mixed Khitan-Hua culture known as Huaner which would survive the state and continue to influence the following dynasties and even modern Shang Fa. Khitay is considered to have been a golden age for music, poetry, theater, and sculpture. Huranian theater notably can trace its history back to the Zaju Opera which first emerged in Khitay.

Yuan and Lin Dynasties

The Tegregs, or People of the Carts, overthrew their Khitan overlords in 1544 and established their own, short-lived state: the Yuan Dynasty. The Tegregs seized the Khitan' elites properties , from their urban palaces to their agricultural properties. Surviving Khitans were thus those who fled northward to adopt back a nomadic lifestyle or never abandoned pastoralism in the first place. After a short period of submission to the Yuan Dynasty, the Khitans allied themselves to the Tabgachs people another nomadic people inhabiting northern Tartary. This confederation rebelled against the Tegregs and would be the main threat to their rule until the Tabgachs began supporting the future Li Clan of Huranian descents. The Khitans did not recognize the Li as Heavenly Kings, even after they had managed to overthrow the Yuan Dynasty and establish their own state in 1571, and it's only after five Khitan Wars that the entirety of Northern Tartary submitted to the Lin Dynasty.

Despite their military defeats, what really brought the Khitans into the fold was the Lin' sensible diplomatic and dynastic policies, marrying into the Khitan clans and offering court positions and lands to those who submitted. While most of the Khitans would remain under a Tabgach dominated Northern Administration, the Lin Dynasty would take on a distinct Khitan-Hua Huaner identity.

It's during the Lin Dynasty that Auressians first arrived in Huran, establishing trade ports and missions on the coastline under the strict overwatch of Imperial Supervisors. Unfortunately, the Lin Heavenly King would end up losing most of their powers in favour of the gentry clans and scholarly families they relied on for their administration. The two main clan where the Zheng and the Tan. At first contained to courtly intrigue, the disputes between the two clans soon grew into an all out war which tore down the imperial institution. During this Tan-Zheng Disorder (覃鄭亂; Tán-Zhèng Luàn) most Khitan clans sided with the Tan as a way to break away from the Northern Administration, dominated by the Zheng-alligned Tabgach families.

But in the 1740s began a minor Hua farmers rebellion that would prove capable of defeating the troops sent to crush it and establish their own Kingdom. Led by the three Ruan Brothers, the rebels waged war against the Zheng clan, their direct overlords. In 1750, the rebels took over the Lin' capital, overthrowing the dynasty. Gaining the support of the Tabgachs and Tegreg people, the brothers proclaimed their own state: the Hong Dynasty.

The Tan, up until then spared by the Uprising, tried to profit from the chaos by launching large scale assault. The Tan columns were soundly defeated, losing their patriarch in battle. The survivors, led by the new Prince of Tan, were forced to flee north to escape the Hong troops who were now besieging their clan' capital. Isolated, the Khitan clans recognized the Hong' claim to kingship before founding their own Principality. But when the Hong began to fall prey to dynastic infighting between the Ruan brothers and their descendents, the Khitans began their own civil war to re-assert their independence as well as establishing which clan had the primacy over the others. It's ultimately prince Kutlugh Iktman, allied to the remnant of the Lin' Northern Army, who emerged victorious before submitting to the re-merging Tan clan and their Auressian supporters.

Tan Dynasty

Kutlugh Iktman received the honorific titles of "Duke" and "Pillar of the State" (柱國, zhùguó) from Tan Yandi. Not only was he Duke (or Prince) of the Khitan, but he also received the direction of the Northern Administration as its Prime Minister (北府宰相; Běifǔ zǎixiàng). From there on, the Northern Administration would be mostly staffed by Khitans with a few Tabgachs remaining either because they had acquired vital experience in their positions or because their clans seeked early on the Khitans' favors. Other nomadic people were more or less excluded from the Administration. But Iktaman died a few years after the Dynasty' founding and rather than nominate a successor Tan Yandi reformed the government' structure into a single Central Administration (中府; zhōngfǔ). Nonetheless the right-hand man of Kutlugh Iktman, Daur Abgar, inherited the position of Pillar of the State and received a position within the Privy council as Minister of Works.

Tan Mingdi, son and successor of Tan Yandi, wish to get rid of foreign influences within his country led to civil war when Viceroy Dujue proclaimed that his Mingdi' nephew as the legitimate monarch. Khitans and Tabgachs ministers and officials for the most part simply fled the court to return to their home regions where their Principalities became de-facto autonomous if not outright independent. Dau Abgar for example resigned from his post as Minister of Works and became the new Prime Minister within Kutlugh Ongulaï, Iktman son and successor as Duke of the Khitans, government. Ultimately, Ongulaï would accept the offer of Princo-Huranians to join their Grand Covenant where he became one of the Four Great Kings (the Kings of the Tabgachs, Khitans, Manchus, and of Bian).

Great Covenant

The Covenant represented a Economic and monetary union as well as a joint military to which all member states needed to contribute men, but only the Tan Dynasty, the Bian Kingdom, and the Principean League were required to participate in its finances. While at first the control of the Covenant' institutions was balanced between its constituent members, after 54 years of existence they had all been taken over by the Principean League, from the military to the diplomacy. When Paul Moisson, a Principean Odoque who was campaigning for reforming the system and for a better integration of the non-Principean and non-Huranian people, was murdered in December 1860 the Grands Rois Tartares ("Great Tartares Kings) left the Covenant and formed a League of their own. Nonetheless, the League quickly found itself incapable of presenting a coherent front, divided between the Nationalists, the pan-Tartarists, the Monarchists... by 1866, the Principeans no longer had to manage many other fronts and were now both outnumbering and outgunning the Tartares. The last pockets of resistance would be crushed in 1868.

While their Monarch was forced to abdicate, many Khitai clans found solace in Armand Dupic, the new strongman and leader of the Principean League, promises of integration, social elevation, and wealth redistribution. They would all be present at the coronation of Armand Dupic as Hegemon King (霸王; Bà Wáng) in 1871 and would be greatly rewarded by their new patron with military and civil positions within his new administration.