The Tashalar - Region History
Tashluta and the Tashalar were first settled by Lapal field hands from Lapaliiya and Calishite merchants in the Year of Plentiful Wine (583 DR). The Tashalar quickly grew to rival its easterly neighbour in wealth, thanks to its lucrative vineyards and olive groves, although both realms coexisted peacefully.
In the Year of Clutching Dusk (–375 DR), rat-laden Calishite trading ships spread the Empire Plague throughout the ports of the Shining Sea, wiping out more than half of the Tashalar’s population. Thus, when Sseth founded the Serpentes Empire in the Year of Erupting Crypts (–304 DR), human resistance against the newly resurgent serpentfolk was weak and disorganized. By the Year of Sunned Serpents (–189 DR), the lizardfolk armies of Serpentes had conquered all of the Tashalar, and most of the wealthy Calishite expatriates had fled back to their native land.
After Sseth’s disappearance in the Year of Dreams (10 DR), infighting among the yuan-ti tribes enabled the enslaved Tashalarans to overthrow their yuan-ti satrap and drive the Se’Sehen tribe from the Tashalar over the next ten years.
The resurgent Tashalarans then marched eastward, liberating the Cities of the Seabreeze one by one. In the Year of Purloined Power (34 DR), the Oligarchs of Tashluta proclaimed the Confederation of Tashtan and claimed dominion from the town of Narubel to the Sheir Peninsula, plus all the Shining Sea coastal lands in between. The diverse Lapalians, Calishites, Chultans, and Shaarans dwelling in these areas became known collectively as Tashalans.
For two centuries, the merchants ships of Tashtan plied the warm waters of the Lake of Steam and the Shining Sea, making their owners fat and wealthy. This period of prosperity came to an end during Ergith Klavulgrun’s reign as Magister (276 DR to 278 DR), when “the Kingslayer” slaughtered nearly a dozen merchant lords of Tashalaran cities and neighbouring realms. The resulting leadership crisis left Tashtan ill-prepared to handle demands from Qysara Shoon V (281 DR to 300 DR) that the Cities of the Seabreeze each garrison a legion of imperial troops.
A failed uprising in Untisczer in the Year of Wasteful Pride (285 DR) was all the excuse the qysara needed to initiate the longplanned Tashalar Campaigns. After destroying Untisczer in a show of imperial might, the qysara’s troops quickly installed military governors in every city along the Tashtan coast. The reach of the Shoon Imperium was then extended westward into the savage land of Thindol, which had long been claimed by the barbaric humans of the Thinguth tribe and certain warring tribes of lizardfolk (loosely controlled servitors of the yuan-ti tribes in Serpentes).
The Lizard Wars in Thindol marked the end of the Tashalar Campaigns and sharply reduced the number of lizardfolk on the central Chultan Peninsula.
By the death of Qysara Shoon V in the Year of the Late Sun (300 DR), Shoon satraps ruled greater Thindol, the Tashalar, the cities of Lapaliiya, and all the major settlements of the Shaar as far east as the Landrise. A steady stream of tribute flowed west and north to the coffers of Shoonach. Less than a century later, the crumbling of the Imperium under the careless reign of Qysara Shaani (367 DR to 427 DR) left the Shoon satraps all but independent. Of all the Shoon Imperium’s southern holdings, only Tashluta remained strictly loyal, largely because the wife of the reigning satrap was Shaani’s youngest daughter.
Despite the increasingly unstable situation, trade still flowed between the Chultan Peninsula and the heart of the Imperium to the north, thanks in large part to the alliance of the Tethyr- and Calimshan-based Knights of the Shield with a local Tashlutan merchant corporation known as the Rulnadeen.
When the Shoon Imperium fell in the Year of the Corrie Fist (450 DR), a quick death for the reigning viceroy of Tashluta and his haughty Shoon wife marked the Tashalans’ return to independence. Backed by the Rulnadeen, the merchants of Tashluta quickly formed a ruling oligarchy to administer the Tashalar and keep the peace. Soon afterward, angered by the Knights’ efforts to take over the Rulnadeen (and hence the Tashalar), leaders of the Tashlutan-based faction confronted the Knights and demanded that they sever all ties with one group or the other. Most stayed with the Rulnadeen.
The Tashlutan merchant consortium, which had became known as the Rundeen, then began extorting protection money from ships sailing the Shining Sea. All who resisted were “coincidentally” set upon by pirates from the independent city-state of Narubel, which was secretly financed by the Rundeen. By the Year of the Crawling Vine (502 DR), the Rundeen had established a monopoly on all trade entering or leaving the ports in Calimshan and the Chultan Peninsula, as well as all slave trade along the southern shores of the Shining Sea.
Rundeen-backed rule by the wealthiest merchants of the Tashalar continued for centuries, although the Rage of Wizards briefly threatened the status quo in the Year of the Sword’s Oath (1142 DR). In the Year of the Bridle (1349 DR), the Harpers succeeded in killing three Rundeen leaders and fifty lesser agents.
This “Treacherous Stab” broke the Rundeen monopoly in Chult and Calimshan but left the organizational heart in Tashluta whole. Today, Rundeen-backed merchant ships still dominate the traffic across the Shining Sea, but the Rundeen’s centuries-old monopoly on such shipping and its control of Calishite ports has been shattered.
Eager to regain control of Calimshan’s port cities, as well as Lapaliiya and the cities of the Lake of Steam, Rundeen has recently begun to take a more active and visible role in the region’s affairs. To that end, the ruling Yrshelem (leaders of the Rundeen) have reforged their old alliance with the Knights of the Shield. In a deal of unprecedented treachery, the Rundeen has also forged a trade pact with the yuan-ti of the Se’Sehen tribe and admitted several yuan-ti into its rank-and-file.
