History of Dzeia

Various nomadic, and sedentary, states and nations have ruled the present-day area of Dzeia.

Prehistory

Paleolithic

The archaeological record shows that the mountainous lands near the Inner steppes had been inhabited by an ancestor of the modern dze, Tenacitherium anthropopsius, from around 2,500,000 years ago until evolving into the modern dze, Tenacitherium terrible, around 500,000 years ago. Both a species of paleolithical industry, it is thought that they mostly stayed around the eastern reaches of the Greater southern range, travelling in small bands of nomadic hunter-gatherers. By around 110,000 years ago the archaeological record shows that the first proper material culture arose among the dze during the middle paleolithic, the Ŋ́ynƚaq culture, named after a valley in the near eastern reaches of the greater southern range; this culture's name also comes from the name given by scientists to the arrow and spear tips found, which bear a distinct leaf shape in their shape and cutting technique to them, both for practical purposes of streamlining the flint and with an apparent religious meaning, as burials in places of known ninlaqian industry are known to contain Flint mounds, piles of arrow and spear heads arranged in various shapes; a tradition still carried to this day in certain clans.

It was generally thought that early on this culture absorbed much, if not all, of the dze populations due to their small range of inhabitation during this period due to the lack of findings of other paleolithic industries. This would however be disproven with the discovery of the middle paleolithic Pax̣ŋ́eç culture in the southernmost edges of Polykarya, which put into light the inhabitation of the dze in areas much further than what was originally expected, with some artifacts even being found on the other side the P.E.L. itself; the deepening of genetic studies also showcased that the amount of haplogroups and haplogroup diversity was much broader than previously thought, both in Y-DNA and mntDNA haplogroups, of which most arose during this era and later suffered still un-explained bottlenecks, isolating these until after the neolithic.

The ŋ́ynƚaq culture spread throughout the mountains along river valleys and cliffs where they carved caves into moon-like shapes, these sites nowadays called Tx̣edlał̣, that are still frequented in the present day, some of the oldest being carbon dated to around 110,000-90,000 BR; although it is unknown how a prehistoric people manually re-shaped natural structures to this scale, it seems to have been a seasonal process, where each winter they would inhabit these caves, and shape them, to then leave in summer for warmer places. Other distinguishing factors of this culture are an affinity towards temporarily inhabiting mountainside cliffs rather than caves properly and their hunting method, which is depicted in some paleo-art, which puts more emphasis in persistance hunting in combination with either driving or calling methods as a coordinated maneuver between archers and spearmen rather than the expected scavenging or ambush hunting. This would all allow for them to slowly fill the gaps of deserted lands once inhabited by peoples of the same species. The ŋ́ynƚaq culture managed to mantain a continuity until around 50,000 BR when it began to splinter with the start of the Mesolithic, with a similar transition occuring to the pax̣ŋ́eç culture

Mesolithic

By 50,000 BR there is evidence for a change in the style and production of stone tools as well as the start of ceramic pottery, distinguished by their simple shapes and square painting patterns made with dark dyes or ocre. It is also around this time when the dze population began to spread into the Central plateau and Coastal range, as evidenced by the surging of several related haplogroups theorized to come from this area, however appearing to mostly remain in the eastern reaches of the land as evidenced by a higher abundance of archaeological remains in those areas compared to the western areas of polykarya as well as the evidence for mass migration towards the oriental fjords. In this era the old paleolithic cultures began to splinter towards epipaleolithic or mesolithic industries, with those who remained in their original range retaining the highest degree of conservatism in their styles and industries. The most commonly found artifacts during the first milennia of the Mesolithic belong to the Ḳyxq́içyw and the Ḳopł̣oq́ cultures, which are part of an eastern set of ninlaqian offshoots, the former inhabiting much of the Oriental steppes and the Eastern Range.

There is also evidence for advancements that could be called Proto-Agriculture, with signs of land clearing and selective placing of several species of flora or the mass culling of species in certain periods, suggesting an artificial increase in populations of game and careful management of populations. These developments support the later cultural and technological advancements that occured during the neolithic and signals the start of the dze's signature lifestyle, transhumanism. Lastly, it is in the late mesolithic when pottery begins to be used, though it's use is restricted to figurines, as pottery vessels dating to before the neolithic have not been found and the development of these is deeply entrenched with the cultures that arose after the mesolithic, rather than those in this time period.

During this age it seems the pax̣ŋ́eç culture both survived and later splintered as well as evidenced by the rise of the Ŋ́eçnuł̣ń culture. The mesolithic also was defined the start of the transition from fully nomadic to a semi-nomadic lifestyle as evidenced by the recent discovery of massive stone circle-shaped structures throughout the steppe regions and later in the western and southern areas, in appearance like prehistorical walls and laden with pottery figurines and material remains, surrounded by ditches near river valleys which are thought to be temporary summer refuges, later abandoned in preference for warmer places in winter like the various mountain hotsprings that dot the eastern range.

At the end of this era however the southern and western industrial complexes dissapear as well as some ninlaqian descendants, that left only the eastern cultures alive. The reasoning for this occurrance the end of the mesolithic and the survival of only the ninlaqian descendants is unknown. One theory suggests early human-dze conflict brought about their end by the late mesolithic in most areas due to pressure as they began to expand beyond the reaches of the P.E.L., where food sources were less nutritious and they were not given enough time to adapt due to heavy competition with early humans, this theory is favoured by many dzeologists given the lack of evidence for intra-dze conflict this far back in time, contrasted with the evidence for human-dze conflict throughout their written history. Enviromental disasters can be factored in, yet the lack of findings of truly catastrophic events provides little substance to any theory that discusses the mesolithic bottleneck.

Neolithic

Around 35,000 years ago there is evidence for the rise of different stone cutting and polishing techniques, starting the Neolithic period; it is during this era that the Dze populate all of the lands inside continental polykarya and reach their first population peak, with estimates ranging from 5,000,000 to 15,000,000 after having recovered from the mesolithic bottleneck. It is also during the Neolithic that the first concrete evidence for animal husbandry and agriculture arises in the lands of the Confederation, with the evidence of domesticated herds showing in paleo-art, with agriculture being quickly abandoned, or so it seems, in favour of continuing the development of a transhuman lifestyle; reasons for this are unknown, but from skeletal remains we can see that in older, early agricultural settlements the bones show signs of malnutrition and several vitamin deficencies, whilst later nomadic burials have much healthier remains.

It also seems that during this era is when the tradition to build stone pens at permanent locations to signal winter and summer camps for the safekeeping of herds began as evidenced by an abundance of animal remains and coprolites near sites or directly in them. During the middle to late neolithic there is archaeological evidence for the first usage of true pottery vessels, these were few, somewhat porous, made of earthenware and the usage of pottery vessels remained a rare occurance until later eras due to the lack of need for such, though they are helpful in more accurately identifying dzeii cultures and groups.

The archaeological findings of the Neolithic period end abruptly around 20,000 BR with the Late Neolithic Collapse, an event of unknown causes that led to the abandoning or destruction of the stone circles and the spreading of Dze populations westwards. A possible trigger of this event is the evidence for continuous volcanic eruptions in the eastern range around this era that triggered particularly cold years that might have caused the mass death of the game the Dze hunted as well as the deaths of most of their livestock or simply forced an emigration westards, the ending of these winters coinciding with the flooding of several rivers from the accumulated snow and ice, causing the destruction of most stone circles as evidenced by the abundance of polished pebbles in a thin layer of ground sediment dating to this period.

Despite the cultural collapse, populations seem to have more easily recovered from the disaster than the earlier mesolithic populations that vanished before them. By the end of this period the Dze began to undergo surprisingly fast cultural changes at a rate almost 10 times as fast as what had happened in the early stone age, which formed the basis for the Dze Cultural Hibernation hypothesis, and which may have allowed for their survival; though the Neolithic is thought to not have fully ended until 10,000 BR in some areas. In these milennia of archaeological darkness what little has been found, mostly dze remains and occasional pottery shards, show us that the population dispersal allowed for the complete control of polykarya by the dze by the start of the Chalcolithic once these recovered.

Chalcolithic

After the Late Neolithic Collapse, the archaeological record shows us that after population levels recovered a few thousand years after the collapse there appeared many chalcolithic cultures almost simultaneously, around 15,000 BR, including the Moonblade, Caveshrine and Lowmound cultures, each of which began to participate in localized forms of trade, slowly expanding until the Steppe roads arose, a collection of several trade routes that led from the westermost points of Dze inhabitation all the way to the eastfjords. One evidence of this is the usage of the Dze Hieroglyphic script by the Woodhut culture in the far west by a few hundred years after the script was first developed from the earlier pictographic and logographic forms.

Key developments that occured in this time also include the start of the usage of wheels and carts as depicted in art and evidenced in writings by the Early Moonblade period at 14,500 BR which allowed for the true start of the semi-nomadic lifestyle the Dze prefer nowadays as well as the invention of the stirrup, a localized development that occured in the Moonblade III period around 12,000 BR. By the end of the chalcolithic the Dze managed to spread back to most of their currently owned lands, now also inhabiting the open prairies that define the landscape of their territories. Around 25,000 BR a second collapse occured in where population levels seem to have decreased, though a much more tame event compared to previous catastrophes, evidenced by the partial dissapearance of writing in some areas as communities fled instead of the complete anihilation of peoples and cultures; this one we know was caused by increased volcanic activity that forced the Dze out of many of their traditional homelands for extended periods of time.

Kraterolithic

By 10,000 BR the remnants of the Moonblade culture seem to have fully recovered from the collapse and evolved into the Flower Stirrup culture, named as such by the shape of the steel footing and the intricate bronze decorational patterns of their stirrups. By 9,000 BR the usage of Bronze alloys had spread to all corners of Dze inhabitation and there is extensive findings of items made with this material, which quickly superseded traditional copper as a tool material; of the alloys used the most common by far was tin bronze, as arsenic bronze was deemed to be weaker and tin bronze to be cleaner and easier to mold, though tin itself was found in high concentrations it was still nontheless rarer than copper. Other alloys were too rare, though we occasionally find items in these rarer combinations, such as the famous Swords of Alx̣tśan, a collection of swords made with aluminium and silicon bronze allows that belong to the rulers of the alx̣tśan clan to this very day that were made during this early age.

The most important developments of this age are the various blacksmith gears that have made the caste so famous with outsiders, with elaborate masks, gloves and equipment that allow for the trade to be as safe as possible, which allows, against most expectations, for blacksmiths and forgers to avoid organ or blood poisoning from metal or fumes. These gears have remained mostly unchanged since this time and they mark one of the most important developments of Dze technology and they are special too in that they are cremated or molten with the blacksmith, as they are deemed to be magic in nature, with scant findings of burials or skeletal remains showing that the health of bones belonging to blacksmiths was much healthier in the kraterolithic than in the chalcolithic.

By this time the Old Liturgicals had evolved into entire families of languages and, starting with the Flower Stirrup people, these began to be written as well, starting a literary revolution and the development of several new scripts to adapt these languages which led to a cultural golden age from about 9,000 to 8,000 BR, from which we have the bulk of liturgical findings of the Dze's early history, both in their old liturgical languages and these new evolving ones that were exquisitely codified, though much of their content remains undeciphered still.

Older Era

Arrival of humans

Human arrivals to the Dze lands begin to be documented from 8057 BR in the Çunyw Stelai in the far south, which tell of meetings between Dze chieftains and the chieftains of four migrating tribes of Çunyw, "Short Folk", as they are referred to in the carvings which, have been identified with the Longplow, Broadaxe, Highstone and Red Arrow cultures. The arrivals were both of peaceful and agressive nature and texts unearthed in nearby localities and dated to the same time period reveal that by the end of the 9th millennium BR proper Human-Dze conflict arose, specifically with peoples of the Longplow, Broadaxe and Highstone cultures, which led to the slow creeping of humans into the territories of bronze age dze cultures in the south and west as these were unable to keep up with the numbers of arrivals into their territories; the Red Arrow culture however seems to have settled around the north-western shores and the westernmost edges of the eastern range without evidence for conflict during those times.

The Red Arrow culture was a collection of different peoples, thought to be the first proper human arrivals north of the P.E.L., who settled as refugees, rather than migrants or conquerors, due to their noted distaste for the human groups that followed them; a still hunter-gatherer, mesolithic culture, these would adopt metalworking from the dze in the coming centuries, yet some of them would seemingly retain their old lifestyle rather than becoming sedentary or transhuman, though in the modern day most of these have died out.

Initially it seems that humans had the upper hand due to their larger population numbers as they constantly migrated northwards, driving the descendants of the Woodhut and Caveshrine cultures from the western areas of polykarya into the Hammerfall peninsula. These early aggressions began to propel the dze into more organized forms of tribal governance; while the title of Tʿaan had risen up among them as a word for a chieftain or general ruler during the Dze Golden Age, it was during the start of The Invasions that it began to become a universal term for the ruler of a clan, akin to a king. After some generations the Dze clans slowly coalesced into the First Dze Confederation under Tsotʿaan Quƚaq (7274-7231 BR) of the Alx̣tśan clan in 7274 BR, who had spent fifty years uniting the clans through diplomatic means, to avoid the spilling of blood between his people that would have otherwise occured, via duels to first blood and pacts.

The first confederation

Upon rising to power throughout the 73rd century BR, Quƚaq would for the first years consolidate his power through a series of decrees that would end up becoming prevalent or even universal cultural practices for the dze, of these the most famous of which is the forbiding of murder, penalizing the murder of a dze with either mutilation or exile. Although later on inter-dze conflict would occur, for many tribes and, later on, for the entirety of the country, it became one of the pillars of dze societies to almost entirely forbid murder, with direct first-degree murder being viewed as one of the highest sins one could commit. Through this he would unify the dispersed clans, prefering to duel the tʿaan of other tribes to first blood rather than fight to the death or with armies, instilling a code of honor known as the Tśal that would later dominate the martial aspects of many dze cultures.

Under the leadership of Quƚaq the armies of the first confederation would score several victories against the forming human kingdoms during a swift campaign known as the Thunderstride (7271-7270 BR) which culminated in the Battle of Bones in where a coalition of human kingdoms were soundly crushed by Quƚaq, the site of which was then made into a pile with all of the corpses of the defeated, which began the practice of Corpse mounds in dze warfare. After the Thunderstride the rest of Quƚaq's reign was spent warding off human expansion, weakened by the thunderstride, into the central meadows and eastern steppe, resorting to more defensive, guerilla style warfare to deter invaders rather than offensive military campaigns. Succeeded by his daughter, Tsotʿaan Tx̣eńat (7231-7182 BR), the confederation mostly kept to this policy, however during the Jhu'kan Campaigns (7190-7180 BR) they faced off against the forces of the Jhu'kan Empire in the Battle of Alx̣ḳyx in which the Dze managed to defeat the forces of Ka'sun I, dealing a decisive military defeat and securing peace between the dze and the jhu'kan for the following centuries. Both campaigns assured the Dze periods of relative peace, the first one lasting 88 years whilst the later lasted for 278 years, while having minor skirmishes were present, these periods represented unparaleled levels of tranquility that would not be achieved again for over three milennia.

During this time, the peoples descended from the Red Arrow Culture were also victim to the Jhu'kan campaigns, like the people of the Bör Kingdom, which led to an exodus of these peoples who, seeking protection, came to the lands of the Confederation, inhabiting the hammerfall peninsula or the mountainous slopes at the edges of the eastern range.

The confederation and the Jhu'kan empire spent the rest of the 8th millenium at peace amongst eachother however at the start of the 7th millennium BR, tensions began to arise as the Jhu'kan desired a region known as Latuq, meaning "The Lake" in Old Dze, as well the surrounding Lat highlands due to these being less desertic than the warm steppes that characterized the south-central areas of polykarya, which culminated in the devastating Latuq War (6902-6893 BR) in where the lands of the confederation, under the rule of Tsotʿaan Tx̣eł̣eeq, great-great grandson of Tx̣eńat, were invaded and ultimately driven from the central meadows and steppes, resulting in the death of the Tsǫt'aan after a battle in where the dze, outnumbered 7 to 1, fought a last stand and the disbanding of the confederation; the jhu'kan however, weakened by the war, also faced a period of strife in their lands due to the cost of the war, which allowed for the emerging confederations and clans of the dze to be left alone in the aftermath of the latuq war.

The Strifes

The term "The Strifes" is a Dze terminology for the period between the first and second confederations, lasting a little over three thousand years from 6983-3281 BR, and it is used to represent both the Dze's inability to unite, being the period where the most notorious intra-dze conflicts occured, and for the constant warfare between human entities among themselves and against the dze, with periods of large scale peace being a rare occurance.

The Strifes are divided into the following periods: The Human Hegemony (6983-6429 BR), The Long Chaos (6429-3407) and The Dze Renaissance (3407-3281), which are defined as the periods in where one or the other race had a dominance over the other politically, with the largest period being the long chaos, in where no group held true dominance over the other, whilst the latter period of dze dominance thought by the dze themselves as a transitional period between the strifes and the start of the second confederation.

Human dominance

For little over 5 centuries after the Latuq War the landscape would be dominated by human polities, the most notable events surrounded the declining jhu'kan empire and the rise of the Kingdom of Gharat, one of the several entities that arose during the aftermath of the war and cultural successor of the Amaghi Kingdom destroyed in the thunderstride, as well as the Zálltá Chiefdoms, a collection of small states nominally subservient to the Jhu'kan that inhabited a region that would later be known as the Mannish frontier.

During the first half of this hegemony the gharati monarchs would slowly expand their influence between the wintry ocean and the western range, being blocked by human polities descended from the Bör to the north and east and the Jhu'kan sphere of influence to the south, however being limited to the inland regions. Through this weak spot would successive gharati rulers expand their territory and reach in the coastlines during the 68th to 66th centuries under the radar of the Jhu'kan who were more focused with rival entities in the sunlands and the southernmost areas of Polykarya such as the Vatan Empire.

During this time the Dze were thought utterly crushed and the eastern frontiers were neglected by human entities. However, during those 5 centuries, some tʿaan began to slowly unify the clans as the Dze recovered from their defeats and by the end of the 66th century BR the Jhu-Gharati War (6507-6472 BR) had started, a massive conflict that burned through the human inhabited lands and weakened both states significantly which would open the opportunity for the Dze to take their revenge on their human enemies. By 6450 it was reported by Gharati scribes that roaming bands of Dze horsemen had begun to return to their old ranges and by 6441 BR a tribal confederation known as the Taaxdze had subdued the kingdom of gharat and entered the Jhu'kan lands, the event later known as the Scouring of the West (6443-6429 BR), this mysterious confederation managed to destroy the Jhu capital of Loran, laying down it's foundations and destroying the Jhu'kan empire. This would end the human hegemony that dominated the earliest stages of the the strifes which would lead to the longest stage of this period, the Long Chaos.

The long chaos

After the fall of the Jhu'kan and the emergence of the Taaxdze, the following milennia were ones of warfare and constant shifting of the balance of powers In this vacuum of power one of the first entities to arise was the Kingdom of Buri which, after supplanting the decaying Kingdom of Gharat as the main power west of the hammerfall peninsula and weakening the Zálltá chiefdoms, managed to carve out a decent territorial expanse in the 64th century BR. During the first centuries of the strifes there occured small dark age in the human inhabited areas, for the exception of the Kingdom of Buri and the northwestern polities, descendants of the Bör, due to the chaos after the scouring that caused the Vatan to collapse due to the mass migration of Jhunic peoples southwards, destabilizing the sunlands.

In the year 6192 BR the Zálltá coalesced into the Mako Tetrarchy and created a more stable balance of power with the Buri in the central regions, later amplified with the surgence of the Kingdom of Lugar in the early 61st century BR in the coasts west of the Buri, descended from the Lûxari City States destroyed in the Jhu'kan campaigns, who managed to successfuly revolt and earn their independence, securing a large portion of the coastal territories west of the hammerfall peninsula.

During the first centuries of this period the balance of powers between the Buri, the Tetrarchy and the Lugar was mantained as the outer human polities in the south and west, such as the Manath Thalassocracy and the Ojore Kingdom, which rose to prominence during the last years of the 7th milennium BR in the vacuum left by the Vatan, were more preoccupied with stabilizing the region after the collapse of the later. The Great winter of 5957 BR, which primarily affected the human regions due to their unfamiliarity with such cold snaps, brought about the end of the Buri Kingdom after the winter caused a famine that left it open to invasion by the Mako Tetrarchy, its lands occupied mostly by the Lugari and the Mako states and it's people driven eastwards. During this time too the Shore War (5921-5916 BR) began between the Kingdom of Rogar and the Tłdze, an amalgamation of coastal tribes that fought for control of the northern shores with the Kingdom of Lugar utterly crushed and it's people driven westwards towards the lands of the Manath, which had also fought in the conflict despite previous animosity towards the Lugari and was left severely weakened as well, which opened the way for the Iematu Kingdom and the Kingdom of Nimsin, the descendants of the Buri, to overtake them as the main powers in the north-west.

In the southern edges of the western range the Kingdom of Yam, using the vaccuum left by the Buri, rose to challenge the Mako Tretrarchy during the Makian Civil War (5932-5907 BR) by pitying the clans against eachother, reducing the Tetrarchy's power significantly and even vassalizing it. At the same time, more waves of human immigration were arriving from the far south and eventually, this allowed humans to invade Dze territory again in the Eastern War (5901-5872 BR), in which the Taaxdze and the Łiqdze, another confederation, defeated the human incursions and even managed to reclaim some of their previous southern holdings near and around the Lat highlands during the latter years of the conflict; this however did not stop human migrations to the south and west in the coming centuries, which helped to de-stabilize the realms there further, but by the 57th century BR the situation had turned into political chaos, resulting in the collapse of the Manath, Ojore and the weakening of several other states, which caused the Long Silence, a period of more than 200 years of almost no written records in the west, caused by the collapse of most human entities due to the increased migrations in their territories; however, various Dze stelai date to this era, specially in the south-east, where attempted migrations by humans were repelled by the Alẋtśan and X̣'onyw clans between the years 5872 and 5808 BR that came from the Ocre Pass.

The next records of large human activity appear in the year 5632 BR with the Mako Tetrarchy, one of the few states to survive the collapse, defeating the neighbouring Ñalçi Kingdom and managing to even beat back the Yamian attempts at conquest, having broke free from their yoke in the Great Makian Revolt (5832-5825 BR) a few centuries prior. Another event of note came with the ascension of the Kingdom of Mvadi in the central coastlines to the west as well as the establishment of the Yegin Empire to the far south near the lands of the old Jhu, which had extended beyond the Biote Limes into regions mostly unknown to the Dze at the time. During this time the Dze-Human conflicts had become rarer, with a tense period of peace arising after the Long Silence due to the focus of the human kingdoms to contain their own invasions and the subsequent collapse of human society, as well as the Dze's focus being shifted to stop the migrations into their own lands. With the brunt of the chaos however being taken by human polities, the power disparity led to small Dze advances in the north in their reconquest of their lands.

The re-emergence of the Mako Tetrarchy brought about a renewed war effort against Dze tribes with the Eastern Incursions during the 56th century BR, which had to be halted afterwards due to several conflicts with the neighbouring states between 5572 and 5487 BR, the resulting century of constant warfare leaving a power vaccuum as the devastation lead to the eventual and final collapse of the Mako in the following centuries, with most states outside the sunlands suffering similar collapses. Descended from the Jhu'kan, the Yegin empire quickly absorbed their once ancient rivals and managed to provide a temporary base of stability in human dominated realms, with the Dze and humans sharing an uneasy truce after the eastern incursions. The Dze themselves would spend centuries preparing until a coalition of confederations, named the Tsǫdze launched a massive invasion into human territory in the Southern Fires, a series of military invasions that devastated human populations nearing their territory and would only be halted at the Battle of Ćǫhŋxalx̣ where the Dze, achieving victory and killing the last Sungi emperor, would then ride back to their homelands, their objective thought complete. Being a war of destruction, it was one of the bloodiest conflicts for humans since the Latqom war and it brought about the end of most human entities, including the destructions of most human entities and the weakening of the Yegin empire and the Mvadi, which however profited from the destruction of several rival powers.

The Yegin empire, under the second and third dynasties, managed to recover from the collapse during the following centuries in what became a surprisingly peaceful period following the Southern Fires, with both Dze not commiting to more wars and the Human polities focused in repairing the damages caused by the last two centuries of war. One notable event was the 1st Mvadi-Yegin War between the years 5273 BR and 5259 BR, caused by the repeated Mvadi incursions into tributaries of the Yegin, such as the Ürol Confederation, and would begin the rivalry between the two dominant human powers of the late 6th and early 5th milenniums BR. The total destruction of the coastal nations during the early 6th milennium BR also brought about a second period of migrations to the far west and central regions of human inhabited lands, upon which rose several kingdoms of peoples related to the Manath.

At the latter years of the milennium, the 2nd Mvadi-Yegin War brought about the temporary defeat of the Yegin as the last emperors of the third dynasty with true authority perished and brought about the Era of Red Soil between the years 5082 BR and 4976 BR which concluded with the transfer of power by the last emperor of the third dynasty, Lhat Yuk, to the first emperor of the fourth dynasty, Gesun Namgi, who then embarked on a war of revenge against the Mvadi, scoring several victories before a peace treaty was signed in 4971 BR. Following that defeat, the Mvadi were then subject to attacks by the Ürol and a newborn Ngatad Thalassocracy during the Hammerfall War, which also involved several eastern peoples who, with support of the coastal Dze tribes, conquered vast swaths of land near the Hammerfall Peninsula, for which the war is named upon. Taking advantage of this, emperor Lhasun Namgi launched a final invasion into the lands of its ancient enemy, at last conquering or vassalizing it in its entirety and becoming the sole great human power.

In the aftermath of the fall of Mvadi, the peoples allied to various Dze tribes commited to further conquests and migrations into the lands west of the Hammerfall peninsula from the north, such as the Marugi conquest of Jhilat, in where the Yegin empire, still recovering from the Mvadi-Yegin wars, was unable to fend off raids or protect those under its vassalage, nor keep its vast tributary system under its yoke as evidenced by the Ürolian War between 4902 and 4896 BR, in where several vassal states of the Yegin in the east broke off after defeating the fourth Namgi emperor; the subsequent era, which lasted over three hundred years, was one of chaos and small conflicts between smaller polities, until the twenty-fifth Namgi emperor, his state fully recovered from the long gone Ürolian War, launched an invasion of the once tributaries of the Yegin and later successfully expelled many Dze of their western territories in the mannish frontier and the lat highlands further into the east. This was also around the same time the Kingdom of Görlos from the southlands launched a series of invasions into Dze lands from the Tx̣etʿe pass, which failed in conquering new lands but succeeding in weakening them further. The turmoils of these wars would lead to a second Yegin golden age, titled the Era of Gilded Thrones.

The base of power of the Yegin remained intact for many centuries, with the Görlos and Ngatad being among the few human nations who dared oppose it. During this time there was also an increased settling of borderlands with the Dze by what the Yegin called the Trun Gryak, commonly translated as akin to Foederati, which were a collection of tributaries settled by migrating peoples from the south, created so as to provide a territorial buffer between the Yegin and the Dze in case they returned. The stability of the fourth dynasty would end with the Era of Gilded Thrones being ended by an invasion by several Dze clans into the territories held by Yegin tributaries, beginning in the year 4105 BR and only ending when the Namgi emperor was killed in battle a few decades later, resulting in a subsequent invasion by the Oradii tribes, leading to the formation of the fifth dynasty in 3982 BR.

In the aftermath of these conflicts the balance of power in the north too would collapse as the Ngatad and neighbouring states faced a string of plague that arrived from the south, leading to the occupation of many lands by tribes friendly to the Dze and Dze peoples proper as the latter recovered from the period of inner conflict and the Yegin were too weakened by the plague to stop them as well. By the year 3802 most of the human populations had recovered from the plague and the ninth Orad emperor decided to expand further upon the Trun Gryak system, inviting several peoples that had previously fled to the south and re-settled much of the borderlands near the hammerfall peninsula and stabilized that area, even vassalizing several peoples between the years that had established themselves in the area after the plague. It was during this time that in the southwestern portions of the land arose the Zhasi Kingdom, first of the great entities in that area, which rose to contend with the Yegin empire as well.

It would be during the 4th millenium BR that the Eternal Peace would be signed between the eleventh Orad emperor and several prominent Dze tribal confederations of the time in 3754 BR after repeated incursions and invasions which forced the Orad emperor to either face further invasions or secure control of his own lands via diplomatic means. In the immediate aftermath of this treaty the Yegin empire, with it's north and east secure, managed to repel several invasions from the south west and the far south, once again stretching beyond the P.E.L. and expanding the Trun Gryak system, standardizing its administration and creating more official demarkations of borders with the Dze, as well as between it and other human states. In the first half of the millenium a period of relative peace, mantained by the hegemony of the Yegin, which drew a wedge between other human powers, and their peace with the Dze, was achieved, although the Görlös would finally collapse at the onset of this era, leaving only the westlands as primary human territories, whilst the deserts in the south-central regions marked a loose border to maintain the peace.

During this time the relations between the Dze and the Yegin would normalize and, by the time of the fourteenth Orad emperor, there were diplomatic treaties regarding trade between Yegin and certain clans, which improved the standing between the two races for a while. The following two centuries marked the most peaceful period for the Dze as the Yegin focused all of their attention towards the south, launching several expeditions which would mostly result in defeats however and by the end of these the Yegin would be forced to sign a peace treaty that limited their influence in the far west. In the south, beyond the P.E.L. the Yegin also suffered numerous setbacks and by the year 3449 BR the Orad Dynasty would be dethroned after further failures in the west.

This would cause a period of chaos in human lands as the hegemony of the Yegin, now broken due to the war, caused the mass splintering of the empire, with all of the foederati seceding and numerous factions now vying for power as the Lhekyi struggle to recover the entirety of the empire. Another effect of this is that, now with the Eternal Peace broken as the upkeeping of the peace by the Orad is no longer feasible, the Dze clans begin to prey on the frontier regions further. The first 12 years of this period would see numerous, small scale wars, that culminated with an invasion by a coalition of Dze clans that sought to vassalize the Yegin, although failing at this specific objective, the invasion proved to be just enough to cause the final collapse of the Yegin thirty years later.

The dze renaissance

The total collapse of their main immediate rival, compounded by the previous centuries of peace, allowed for the Dze to regain their strength and permitted for them to begin retaking their lands at a rate that would make their gains definitive, rather than the back-and-forth experienced in the previous eras; the fall of the Yegin would also bring an era of peace amongst the Dze, who had begun to experience regular internal conflicts at this point, and would allow for a complete renaissance of the species as a whole. This second golden age of the Dze began in 3407 BR with the fall of the Yegin Empire after more than two milennia of continuous existance.

Various Dze confederations and clans would then during the 34th century BR conquer the lat highlands, the mannish frontier and began expanding into the westlands, with only the Zhasi being able to successfully stop them, with it's sphere of influence resisting these continuous migrations. The violet river would then become the definitive border between dze and humans south of the western range due to its width making invasion by either side a hard task and the area of most conflict would then switch to the ocre pass, a prominent spot of human migration attempts from the 5th milennium onwards, and the lands between the hammerfall peninsula, the wintry ocean and the western range where human kingdoms would attempt to regain their lands near the mannish frontier.

Around the year 3379 BR a wave of human migrations arrived from the south towards the sunlands, defeating the Zhasi and pushing them back towards the westernmost edges of Polykarya and founding a multitude of kingdoms, the most powerful of which was the Kingdom of Chalaur that managed to carve out a hold in what previously was yegin and jhu'kan lands and becoming the new holders of the frontier between the humans and dze while also condemning the Zhasi to collapse less than a century later as more migrations, choosing to enter via sea rather than land and face the potential attacks from the dze, began to quickly collapse the weakened mannish realms in the wake of the collapse of the yegin.

During this time, the Mxétʿtsé clan, hailing from the forests south of the cloudspear peninsula, began a process of unifying their neighbouring tribes and clans starting from 3382 BR onwards, with their leader, Qińux̣, being declared tsotʿaan by over thirty tribes at the start of his reign in 3304 BR and subduing the rival Caŋ́xdze confederation by 3281 BR which, at last, birthed the Second Dze Confederation.

The second confederation

Ruling the lands between the violet river and the fjord massif, Qińux̣ would focus the first years of his reign on solidifying the frontiers between himself and his human rivals, as well as subduing any remaining tribal entities to the east, comprised of dzeioi so distant removed from war after the fall of the first confederation that their alliegances would have to be taken by more than word. Seven years after being proclaimed tsotʿaan Qińux̣ would launch an invasion towards the newly established kingdoms in the western meadows and the sunlands, launching several campaigns and imposing on bordering states the responsability of protecting the border, emulating the trun gryak system of the yegin and subjugating several human peoples in the westlands.

By 3265 BR, Qińux̣ achieved total control of the borderlands and a nominal control and authority over the sunlands, however before he could fully establish himself there he sought to march eastwards to subjugate the oriental clans, defeating clans in the fjords and the X̣'onyw clan in the oriental steppes, however he could not subjugate the Alx̣tśan, with its tʿaan even defeating Qińux̣ in a duel to first blood, causing both him to avoid challenging this clan again during his lifetime and revolts in the west after news of his defeat, preventing him from a quick conquest of the east and allowing these clans to prepare for any future conflicts.

Having quelled the revolts in the borderlands by 3258 BR, a second campaign to the east would be launched, aimed towards the Xét Confederation, a massive entity in the lake-dense woodlands of the middle eastern reaches of Polykarya. After initial skirmishes, a campaign from two fronts would be launched by Qińux̣ from the steppe and from the fjords towards the forest, however the first assaults proved unsuccessful in drawing out the main Xét force to direct combat during the first years, however in 3255 BR the two confederations fought at the Battle of a Hundred Lakes, with the tsotʿaan of the Xét challenging Qińux̣ to a duel to the death in the midst of the encounter, with the latter coming on top and forcing the successor tsotʿaan to submit.

After this the rest of the clans in the far east would nominally submit to Qińux̣, however he would die of his wounds less than a week later, succeeded by his third son, Ḿo'ntłiwun, who would not pursue total control of the far east, but would rather focus on consolidating his father's gains, yet his laid back attitude would cause most of the sunlands and the oriental clans to slowly drift from his influence until achieving de facto independence by the end of his reign in 3196 BR.

He would be succeeded by his first nephew, Weł̣qtł̣uŋ, who embarked on a project to retake lost influence in the west by launching a series of invasions throughout the early decades of the 32nd century BR, successfully bringing all human domains inside polykarya to submit to his rule by 3183 BR and, with his later campaigns in the east, bringing back all dze clans east of the fjords into total or nominal submission by 3152 BR, although he would be unable to fuly subdue the Alx̣tśan and Xét, who would constantly undermine his and his descendants' rule in the area. Even with setbacks in the east, eventually culminating in a peace treaty that severely limited the influence of the second confederation in 3097 BR between it and revolting clans, the confederation's hold of the west would remain uncontested for centuries.

The descendants of Weł̣qtł̣uŋ would not pursue conquests in the east until the turn of the 3rd milennium BR, with Tsotʿaan Ḿƚekʿaaḿ engaging in conflicts with the Alx̣tśani and the X̣'onyw between 2861-2843 BR, being able to subdue the latter and temporarily vassalize the former. Under her reign a second truce would be signed with the Xét in 2837 BR, establishing clear, defined border; the treaty however would be broken by her successor, Tṡudlał̣, who would be the one to finally defeat the Xét by besting their tsotʿaan in a duel to first blood in 2799 BR, opening the way for further expansions eastwards. This expansion was halted after a revolt in the west, which would be brutally supressed and result in a depopulation of certain areas of the lii expanse for hundreds of years, causing the economy of the confederation to temporarily collapse.

In the following centuries, the confederation would heal from the first two centuries of active combat in a period known as the Five Generations of Peace, which refers to a line of five tsotʿaaniq who would refrain from offensive military actions, prefering a defensive policy and fully consolidate the gains of their predecesors.