The Marches territories

The Marches is blessed with good quality soil and home to those that know how to work it. Most of the open space in populated areas is farmland, whether it is field upon field of golden swaying wheat or rows of river-side fruit trees. It seems that everywhere where people live is ready for harvest. Five territories made up the Marches in the time of its glory, although two of them are no longer in Marcher hands.

Upwold, The Silver Chase

Upwold was the first true Marcher territory, taken by yeomen who'd left Dawn before the days of Empire. Here the first Landskeeper openly declared themselves, the first of the new Dolmen raised, the first free yeomen managed their own affairs as households, not noble houses.

The quick growing silver birch woods on the northern borders of Upwold are the source of a deal of income. Charcoal-burners live there, turning wood into easily transportable fuel for smith and heath alike. The bark of those trees is used in the tanning industry, to cure the hides of the cattle that graze on the river pastures. It's one of the few areas where anything other than beer is drunk. There's a drink made of the sap of those trees that warms their hearts in the cold winter nights. Or drives them mad. It's definitely one of the two. The people who live up here have closer links to the Navarri that many in the Marches, and more need for Beaters than most.

Through the dark heart of those woods are paths no Marcher treads. From these secret ways come raiders, thieves, and rustlers to take what honest folk have brought from the soil. Painted men, tattooed and wild, held back by the yew bows and staunch hearts of the Beaters. Further north, cousins to these forests decay into the marshes that form the southern border of Kallaveset, of Wintermark.

Mitwold, Pride of the Marches

The largest settlement in the Marches is the market town of Meade in Mitwold. Crowded around the mouth of the eponymous river, this bustling hectic port is the main gateway for import and export of the Marches' many and plentiful foodstuffs and merchandise, by sea at least. Here trade and commerce flourish and wealthy merchants and exotic foreigners are commonplace. It is said that prices in Mitwold are double that of any in the smallest market town in Bregasland.

Mitwold's substantial coast, populated by small fishing villages along the shore, gives way to fertile chalk-soiled downs further inland, with rich game-filled woodland and larger farms and market towns beyond. There's gold in the soil of the north-western portion of the nation; the gold of summer's harvest.

Mitwold was last conquest of the expansion west in the days of the Empire's glory, some two centuries ago.

Bregasland, the Dour Fens

Sandwiched between the lost territory of The Mourn and the sea lies Bregasland, an area comprising partially of fenland leading to the coast. Home to “Bregas” (fenlanders), this is a place of small islands of abundantly fertile soil, surrounded by seemingly endless marshes where eels are caught. Here the people are particularly hardy, and often show Merrow lineage.

The Marches is not a naturally sea faring nation, but pirates and wreckers are not unheard of. The thousands of small inlets and secluded bays along the coast lend themselves to nefarious dealings and disreputable characters Shunned by right-thinking folk.

Bregasland was added to the Empire by conquest, and granted to the Marches by The Senate.

The Riding (LOST)

The Riding is a rich land, the hunting grounds of Dawnish royalty before the time of Empire, and a sore loss to the Marches and the Empire. Its Warden burned in shame when it was lost to barbarians from the west, shouldering the responsibility for their own failure and that of their troops. On open downs and in sheltered copses stand ancient and numinous stone circles, stalwart markers of the sites where the veneers between the worlds of Mortal and Eternal are at their thinnest. At these powerful primeval places, Landskeeper and commoner performed rites on festival and holy day alike, bringing health to the land and those who lived there. The land lost, the rites go unsaid.

It was the road to the League cities of Catazarria, and its loss is felt keenly by traders both sides of what was a busy border.

The Riding was made a formal part of the Marches by the first Empress at the foundation of Empire.

Mournwold (LOST), the Mourn

Mournwold was taken by Imperial forces in the early days of Empire, more than 300 years ago, securing the western flank of the route south to Catazarria through the Riding. Here the Navarr walked closest to the Marchers, and deeper into the forest lies Liathaven.

It was known as The Mourn even before its final fall to the barbarian hordes after a hundred years of conflict. Originally the name referred to the sound of the wind in the trees and across the craggy hills. Now it seems a more fitting name for the loss which Marcher folk feels at the March's passing. The conquest of The Mourn is fresh in the hearts and memories of many a Marcher, less than a generation ago. Orcs, beastmen and the twisted creatures in their company amassed for months in the mountains beyond the borders. An army was mustered and troops arrived in their thousands to fight off the invaders. Despite the numbers of brave and sturdy Marchers, the horde was so numerous and ferocious that Mournwold was lost in pitched battle.

As the troops withdrew heavy hearted from a battle they could clearly not win, the hordes did not pursue, they stayed in those hills and valleys, scurrying down the mines, slaughtering and devouring the cattle, defiling and tainting the holy places for their own dark ends. With the loss of the Mourn, the Marches has lost much of its mining.