Portal:Kylaris/Features
A gowsa (/'gaʊzə/) is an emigrant from Dezevau (or sometimes nearby parts of Southeast Coius) who has migrated to work in manual labour overseas for economic reasons. The term is especially applied to those who moved in the 19th and early 20th centuries to the colonial holdings of Euclean empires, many of which had a want of labour because of the abolition of slavery.
Most gowsas migrated to the parts of the Asterias around the Arucian Sea (especially Asteria Inferior) where the wide availability of land combined with suitable climates meant many colonial empires had found it profitable to set up plantation economies. However, gowsas also frequently worked as servants, and in mining, construction, forestry and smallholder agriculture (in particular, market gardens). Large numbers also went to parts of Coius and islands of the Vehemens Ocean, and even further abroad such as to Cassier. Their contribution to labour-scarce colonial economies was often significant, and they also came to occupy political and cultural niches. It is estimated that from the end of the Asterian War of Secession to the Great Collapse, over a million gowsas emigrated from Dezevau and its surrounds. Satucin received 450,000, as the single biggest destination, followed by Caluchia with 200,000. Gowsa migration was in decline by the time of the Great Collapse in 1913, owing to a range of factors, but it essentially ended as a mass phenomenon then. (See more...)
