Kzmr

'Kzmr Confederation' redirects here. For the state prior to accession to the Democratic Union of Baphia, see Kzmr Confederation (1624–1815).

Kzmr (Kzmr: KZMR` Smph Kzmrk, pronunciation: [səmapa kəzamrak]), officially the Kzmr Confederation, is a sovereign state in western Ukilen, sharing a land border with Jkawi to its south and Baphia to its east, and a maritime border with the Union island of Sakle to its southwest. Its capital, largest municipality, and sole inland permanent settlement is Srn.

Organized as a confederation of nomadic clans, of which there are currently seventy-four, the Kzmr Autonomous Country was formed when the earlier Kzmr Confederation joined the Democratic Union of Baphia in 1815. In 2024, it was removed from the Baphian union due to the Yugim crisis.

History

Main article: History of Kzmr

Prehistory

The first inhabitants of modern-day Kzmr were most likely proto-Kaneeds who left the Jyosti Islands during the Third Ukilen Migration circa 2500 BCE. These early settlers eventually diverged genetically to form the xeric Kaneed subspecies.

The earliest artifacts whose date can be properly ascertained are those from the Mount Rknu archaeological site, which includes a variety of objects such as ceramics and jewelry dating to roughly 2300 BCE. This is the type site for the eponymous Mount Rknu culture, who unlike the modern Kkzmrš, are thought to have led a sedentary life at an extremely small population. Artifacts associated with the Mount Rknu culture are no longer attested after circa 2100 BCE, and some scholars propose that the sudden collapse of this culture resulted from a famine.

Cold-worked stannite head of a Kzmr herder's crook, from the Museum of Early Ukilen in Turku.

The nomadism of the modern Kkzmrš ostensibly began around 2000 BCE, as artifacts such as herder's crooks and tent stakes begin to become attested in this period. These proto-Kkzmrš eventually separated into the ancestral groups of the three modern morphs of xeric Kaneed, with the sophonts in the far northern tundra adapting as the Beringian Kaneeds and those in the desert and shrublands forming the Blanfordian and Karagan Kaneeds. In Kzmr oral traditions, the common ancestors of each of these groups are known as Mntmr, Þsnmr, and Fkshmr respectively.

Protohistory

Though internal historiography of Kzmr is extremely sparse until the formation of a unified Kzmr identity in the 16th century CE, precipitating the establishment of the Kzmr Confederation, there exists a rich body of oral history with relatively little variance between clans. In addition to this, sources from Baphian antiquity provide an external view of some eastern Kzmr clans.

East Ukilen raids

A set of modern-day bbxvi from northern Kzmr.

A great wealth of historiography, both internal and external, exists regarding the participation of various Kzmr clans and septs in the East Ukilen raids, particularly the Raid of Bongsibon circa 100–250 CE. Unlike the longstanding tradition of oryx raiding, which to this day remains a typically nonviolent variety of theft, the actions of Kzmr razzieurs during this period were quite devastating to the local population, causing roughly half of the Kali casualties in the Raid of Bongsibon. Smaller-scale trans-Baphian razzias continued well into the Nth century. The spoils of these incursions, often goods which were unavailable or difficult in the desert climate, were particularly valuable to the Kkzmrš in this era, and the legacy of this unilateral transfer remains in Kzmr culture to this day. For instance, the bxvi, a stringed instrument of Kzmr folk music, is derived from the Kali viol, first brought to Kzmr during these raids.

Warring Clans Era

The Warring Clans era began with the decline of the East Ukilen raids, a trend that led to an increased population from returning razzieurs in conjunction with the gradual exhaustion of Bongsibon’s more important resources. The resulting resource crisis, roughly lasting from 270 to 285 CE, is known as the Kzmr Famine. Exacerbated by historical overgrazing and the resultant period of sandstorms known as the Years of Dust, the paucity of reliable food caused an upsurge in oryx raiding. Even after the Kzmr Famine, retaliatory actions prolonged the warring clans era.

The remains of Nmþþ'ibžnu Kkršn Manor.

These new inter-clan raids, ranging from minor skirmishes to standard warfare, stimulated the development of a tributary system in Kzmr, in which more vulnerable septs or clans paid levies, usually in the form of dairy, livestock, or forageables, to their more militarily adept counterparts in exchange for a guarantee of protection by the suzerain. In some cases, suzerains could themselves be tributaries of other septs or clans. This system allowed some suzerains to live a sedentary lifestyle off of these levies, prompting the construction of manor houses which constitute the earliest permanent examples of Kzmr architecture. After the decline of the tributary system, the multiple manor houses at Srn and their surrounding villas remained inhabited by the courtiers and servants of their respective suzerains due to the existence of supporting agriculture and horticulture made possible by its oasis location.

Pax Casambriana

Roughly concurrent with the peace era in Baphia, the Pax Casambriana is generally accepted as beginning in 687 CE, with the armistice of the Hnþ–Bkršsg'attcsu feud. This era was characterized by extensive technological, artistic, and infrastructural development which set the groundwork for the eventual establishment of the Kzmr Confederation. The development of the portable forge in the early eighth century allowed for the spread of more sophisticated forms of metallurgy to non-manorial groups, and writing became similarly widely accessible in the tenth century with the design of the Kzmr alphabet as a supplement to the traditional Ukilen script.

This era of technological progress was also stimulated by the formation of independent trades. In this period, members of a given clan had greater autonomy and could visit other clans without diplomatic concern, allowing for peripatetic work in exchange for food or goods, especially in the fields of textiles, metallurgy, and delivery. These itinerant workers eventually formed guilds which later evolved into the occupational pseudoclans.

Detail from a pre-rococo robe, c. 1533, from the Srn Fine Arts Center.

The arts also flourished greatly in this period, with Kzmr music notation being invented by Phmihgþs in 922 CE, originally to transcribe Nrþk'irdu liturgical music. Eventually, it was extended to the creation of new motets, and soon after to the composition of secular music. Music of the Pax Casambriana was extremely varied and characterized by heavy experimentation, and the era gave rise to some of the most prolific composers in Kzmr history. The visual arts also underwent a revolution of their own, with the burgeoning guild system allowing specialization in textile art and metalwork. Artifacts from this time period include jewelry made from finely woven copper wire as well as oryx leather and felted rabbit fur embroidered by hand, of which the vegetation-inspired ornamentation was the prototype of the Kzmr rococo movement.