Themiclesian addressing system

The Themiclesian addressing system refers to the method in which houses are numbered and described with reference to their locations.

Rural system

There was no uniform system of labelling and describing houses in Themiclesia prior to the first half of the 19th century. While there is a household registry and a land survey maintained by local magistrates, the exact locations of households were not recorded, and land surveys generally described properties (家, kra) with reference to other properties, natural features, and so forth. In rural areas this system seems to have persisted without major change for many centuries since the Meng Restoration and remained a land registration system, but in urban areas survey properties evovled from reflecting current properties into fossilized, permanent divisions on land, irrespective of the actual land title. It is thought that dynasties may have retained the underlying land right, while permanent leasing rights above it changed hands more readily. The underlying right thus became a convenient way to refer to the area.

Enrolling of addresses is no longer done on the basis of property registration, so no new addresses can make use of this format. But in rural areas, the ancient address system is still used and can be legally transferred, where addresses take this format:

滷挳
庇家

Raq [county], Kreng [village], the property of Bryits

Note that Themiclesian addresses are written without divisional categories like "county" or "village"; these are implied based on the order in which the names appear, which place larger units ahead of the smaller ones.

Urban or road-based system

Road numbering logic introduced in Kien-k'ang as of 1823

The most common system in use in Themiclesian cities follows the logic illustrated to the right.

Since providing names to all thoroughfares would be artistically straining and impossible to memorize, some thoroughfares are given numbers based on the houses adjoining its opening onto a named street. Thus, a thoroughfare that opened to A Rd. between houses 10 and 12 would be written as A 10/, and house 2 on this thoroughfare would have the address A 10/2. This system neatly accommodates thoroughfares that do not open to named but other numbered thoroughfares, by the extension of the same logic. Thus, if a thoroughfare opened next to the last-mentioned house, it would be named A 10/2/, and house 5 on this thoroughfare would be numbered A 10/2/5. This system moreover conveniently functions as a navigation guide, as its structure explicitly gives the direction one should take, from a given named street.

Under such a system, the address can be written as follows:

A述 10/2/5 晉成//懷家

A Rd. 10/2/5. Tsinh, [the neighbourhood of] Dring, the property of Grui.

Since the time this rule was imposed, many urban properties have been divided, consolidated, or redeveloped from single households into condominia. A divided number, e.g. 3, is appended by the heavenly stem in the order the properties appear on the thoroughfare; thus, the lower end would receive 3-kerap (3甲), the next 3-qrut (3乙) etc., and the number "3" is retired. If multiple adjoining properties are consolidated, a range of their former numbers is provided, e.g. 3 – 7, indicating this property encompasses three formerly separate properties numbered 3, 5, and 7 (but not 4 and 6, which are on the opposite side). If subdivided properties are consolidated, the same logic applies when consolidated; unless all parts of the subdivided property is consolidated back together, the retired number is generally not brought back.

If a subdivided number is again subdivided, the notation of 3-kerap-1, 3-kerap-2 is used. If, however, the following number on the same level is available, that may be used preferentially as opposed to going into the next level. For example, if 3 has been divided only into 3-kerap and 3-qrut, and 3-qrut is divided again, the new property may be called 3-prang; on the other hand, if 3-kerap is divided again, its only option is to use 3-kerap-1 and so forth, since 3-qrut is already in use.

If a property is redeveloped as a condominium, several strategies have been used. The most basic is to number each unit sequentially, which is convenient only for small blocks of flats. Another is to give the floor number or, if the block has two units on each floor, additionally to specify "left side" and "right side", based on the orientation when looking out from the stairwell or shaft. If there are more than two units on a floor, the usual method is to give a unit number that combines the floor and a serial number local to that floor. Note that Themiclesian practice for flats is that the ground level is not given a floor number, and the first floor is the one above ground level.

History of addresses

Following the opening of the Public Post, it was realized that without a consistent way to label buildings, delivery of mail would be inefficient. Thus, between 1823 and 1832, the city's authorities maintained a special commission to name the city's streets and number the houses along it; odd numbers were given to one side of the street, and even to the other. There was no firm rule which side of the street received even or odd, but after 1872 the north or east side of the street always received the odd number. It is understood this scheme originated in Ostland.

While all thoroughfares were labelled this way by the 1830s, the numbering aspect was not carried out as fully since some houses already had well-known names that the postal system recognized. Most obvious of which were the royal palaces and government departments, and letters can reach them merely by their names; to this day, royal palaces are not numbered, while government departments have widely adopted numbering because offices are no longer restricted to the medieval premises that were in use when the scheme began.

As thoroughfares are generally not planned, it is a matter of judgement whether two or more thoroughfares should be assembled and put under the same name. All thoroughfare that are not cul-de-sac have at least two possible ways to be named (or described under the system), and the rule is that the shorter name should prevail. As well, on two sides of an intersection, the general rule is that a numbered thoroughfare should not continue beyond a named one, albeit various exceptions have developed as numbered thoroughfares gained names. A named thoroughfare can continue (as far as numbering is concerned) even if the "intersection" is so badly aligned that its next portion appears as a physically different road. This work of road assembly was carried out quite arbitrarily and without reference to roadusers' habits.

Under this system, if a thoroughfare (particularly after assembly) is particularly long, then house numbers could obtain large figures. While this is not a problem per se, it reduces the added value of street navigation that the system is thought to have brought. As such, in the 1898 renumbering prompted by the Great Fire of 1898, streets were segmeted into "section 1", "section 2" and so forth, and numbering would restart at 1 and 2 after each section. The places where streets are sectioned is uniform in inner Kien-k'ang, though beyond the city new sections are generally added before a four-digit house number becomes necessary. The highest number of sections in current use is section 17 on the Periwinkle Road.

Road types

The general name for a thoroughfare in Shinasthana is 述 druts, and this word is appended to odonyms to denote them as such; in discourse, the word druts can be omitted given an appropriate context.

• 道 meluq means a highway in the sense of a road that leads to a particular destination. In Anglian it is officially translated as "way".
• 路 keraks means "mall", i.e. a road that serves as a marketplace. Translated as "mall".

Themiclesian roads are generally not classified into types based on their width. Both the New West Road, at 60 metres wide, as well as the Merek Road, at just 1.4 metres, are called druts. New roads are often planned with multiple use cases in mind, leaving the canonical meanings of meluq and keraks irrelevant. The local authority is in charge what name to give to a new thoroughfare.

See also

• Themiclesia