Nordic peoples
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| c. 545 million (2020) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
 Acrea 189,900,000  Æþurheim 129,700,000  Shalum 100,000,000  Delkora 73,900,000  Northern States 15,760,000 Cacerta 13,100,000  Ossoria 9,000,000 | |
| Languages | |
| Nordic Gothic Venetian Northian | |
| Religion | |
| Valstígr Vallyar Fonδaiš Wīštā̊ |
The Nordic peoples are a group of ethnicities in Tyran who trace their lineage back to the Nordic-speaking regions of Eracura. The wide array of different national ethnic groups within this label have caused some anthropologists to refer to the Nordic peoples as a "super-ethnic group". Although Nordic and its national and regional dialects are the predominant language for the greater majority of Nordic peoples, the group encompasses a variety of languages spoken including Nordic, Gothic, Venetian, and Northian and is not considered an ethnolinguistic group.
Modern Nordic peoples are descended from populations who originated in northeastern Eracura, in what is now modern-day Acrea and Nordkrusen, with the largest being the Acrean-Nordlander subgroup which spread to assimilate practically all other Nordic groups in the area, eventually spreading into Delkora. Various Nordic peoples practice a variety of religions, though almost all are formed from Old Nordic religion, with the largest being Valstígr and Vallyar.
Etymology
The term "Nordic" originates from the Old Nordic term Norður, simply meaning north, and was used in different forms meaning Northmen by other ethnolinguistic groups in Eracura to describe the peoples of North Acrea and Nordkrusen. This description was eventually co-opted by Nordic groups themselves, who adopted the label Norðmenn.
History
Origins
The Nordic peoples have a largely agreed-upon single ethnogenesis, in a region spanning across Northeastern Eracura around the Gulf of Åland. The proto-Nordic peoples are considered to be descendants of the Erani-Eracurans diffused amongst local populations.
Classification
Ussterians
Languages
Nordic
Gothic
Venetian
Northian
Northian, an Erani-Eracuran language, has been argued to be a Nordic language, and their hypothesized, albeit disputed, common ancestor is Proto-Nordic-Northian (PNN). Where this language was spoken is hard to define, though most authorities that support its existence place it in the late 3rd to early 2nd millennium BCE, in or near Acrea. According to Stanton et al., around 3,500 years ago, dialects of PNN separated into two groups, the Nordic languages identified with the Nordic Iron Age and the Northian languages identified with the Register Pottery Culture in Silua and Shalum. Not all scholars accept Stanton's theory, on the grounds that PNN as reconstructed is too similar to PEE to be considered the product of shared innovations.
If Nordic and Northian are connected via Cowgill's law, it seems some laryngeals, when flanked by a sonorant and *w, become /k/ in both families. While /k/ remained in situ in Elder Nordic, it would have become /s/ in Galic Northian by regular sound change. Though the correspondence is not exceptionless, examples in agreement between the two branches outnumber those in variance considerably, leading some authorities to identify a relation between the two language families. On the other hand, the two languages share no identifiable grammatical innovations or other phonetic ones, and this contrast has led others scholars to consign the apparent reflexes of Cowgill's law as an aerial effect or an unrelated reflex of Erani-Eracuran laryngeals.
The oldest attested Northian texts are a scattered body of hymns, known as Gales, that are at the fundament of the Fonδaiš Wīštā̊ religion. The language of the Gales is called Galic Northian. Gales are mainly found in the Didaskalic material, words attributed to wise men living in the 8th to 7th centuries BCE, in Epic poetry from the 7th to 2nd century BCE, and later, in more compendious ritual texts that describe the exact context in which Gales were used. Though most Gales are found in ritualistic prose, they also show the most evidence of later editing. It is evident that the Gales were not well understood by the priests that chanted it, though this probably had the effect of preserving the archaic text against later emendations.
The communis opinio is that the oldest Gales (Period I) must have been given a thorough redaction circa 1500 BCE, while the time of their original composition cannot be known certainly. Some authorities, on the basis of such archaic word-forms like accusative singular θxā̊ "into the Earth", whose perfect congnates could be found in branches as distant as Anatolian, posit a date of composition of 3000 – 2500 BCE. However, as Cramer points out, Northian is very good at the conservation of allomorphs, so the presence of a few that escaped analogical replacement does not require an excessively early date of composition, which cannot be supported by history. Period II and III Gales have been dated to around 1350 BCE and 1200 BCE; after this period, it seems the Gales were canonized, and new compositions thence were no longer added to the canon.
Religion
Fonδaiš Wīštā̊
Fonδaiš Wīštā̊, literally "known ways", is a belief system that venerates both natural and anthropomorphic deities and the community, ceremonies, and study that manifest it. Fonδaiš is thought to have developed during the Middle Bronze Age by Northian-speaking precursors of Ussterians, with heavy influence from the Erani-Eracuran religion, and venerates above others six paired gods—Ziiōš, θaɣā, Hāuuərə, Mā, Agnō, and Āfš—representing the deified Sky, Earth, Sun, Moon, Fire, and Water. The Bronze-Age form of the religion is not well attested, and classical Fonδaiš is effectively built around the teachings of the three Didaskaloi, priest-philosophers who lived between 800 and 650 BCE, which is understood to have reformed the religion's theology in fundamental ways.
A key thesis accepted by the Didaskaloi is that human beings owe no worship or sacrifice to any deity; all the world, as it was created and even now being regenerated yā̊ yaēni "from year to year", is for their use and enjoyment, free of conditions. Accordingly, Fonδaiš followers, called Hakiyā "allies", aknowledge this work of creation and regeneration and give thanks to the deities, and they do so out of their own free will, for the love of Truth, and not out of a superstitious fear of punishment. Since humans are not bound to serve any god, and since they do it out of their free will if they do it at all, a person's religion is thus wholly and solely an exponent of their wisdom and morality; the Didaskaoi ask the Hakiyā to "study all the gods" and see whose worship is closest to the Truth, each according to their natural judgement.
The Fonδaiš gods, as described by the Didaskaloi, are transcendent and do not possess physical forms or exist in the physical world. Sacrifices, as understood by the Didaskaloi, are not of worldly goods, since the material world is created by the gods and therein is nothing that the gods cannot themselves create. Humans can make a meaningful offering in their approvals of the gods, expressed in two ways—the singing of hymns, which expresses their approving mentality, and the re-enactment of the work of creation and regeneration by the combination of material elements, as representations of the spiritual elements, which were used by the gods to create the world. Many of Fonδaiš ceremonies are dedicated to the "consecration" of elements, which imbues materials with spiritual power.