Maeris
The world four hundred and seventeen years after Acts 9 and 10, as a village schoolteacher draws it on a hanging map.
Ch. 243 is the saga's first and so far only geography lesson. Everything here is Master Hobbes with a pointer stick.
The seven provinces
Recited by a girl in the front row, in this order:
Astoria, Castelgard, Corvane, Drennick, Lassiter, Valdrun, and Eskandar.
| Province | Style | What Hobbes says |
|---|---|---|
| Astoria | the Sworn Kingdom | "westernmost of all the provinces, where the sun sets last across the whole of Maeris". Where the village is. |
| Castelgard | the Walled March | "guards our eastern border" |
| Corvane | the Free Holds | "along the southern coast, more villages loosely bound together than a proper kingdom" |
| Drennick | the Iron Reach | "where most of the metalwork and mining comes from, harsh country, harsh people, though I'll deny saying that if any of you repeat it to a Drennick trader" |
| Lassiter | the Merchant Republic | "straddles both continents [...] controlling most of the trade across the Sea of Serenity" |
| Valdrun | the Old Dominion | "at the very eastern edge of the world". Fallen. See valdrun.md. |
| Eskandar | the Sunward Realm | "warm and golden in the south, or so I'm told. Never been myself." |
The shape of it
Two continents, separated by the Sea of Serenity. Lassiter straddles both and controls the trade across it. Astoria is the far west of the western continent; Valdrun is the far east of the eastern one.
That matters for the far future. The Sea of Serenity is the centre of the world, and Mount Ebott is raised from its seabed by the final clash of Arthur's saga. See ../volumes/far-future.md.
What is missing from the map
Every place name from Acts 1 to 10. Bloom Valley, the Hall of Heroes, Ravenshollow, and Point Null do not appear on it, and no child in the room asks about them.
Ch. 238 warned of this: "New names had replaced old ones on maps that had been redrawn more times than any single historian could properly track."
Places named later
- Solmere, capital of Astoria, first named in text at ch. 252.
- Beckwith, a village northeast of Solmere.
- Portvale, an eastern city, in the author's notes.
Open questions
- Where Arthur's village sits inside Astoria.
- Whether any Act 1 to 7 location survives under a new name.