- Instructor: Professor Dmitri Marikov
Introduction
Greeting students. I am Dmitri Marikov, and I am the instructor for Introduction to Alwyn History. I have been teaching this class at St. Laudine's for over 40 years now, but this is the first time I will be having students who are not in the same room as me! Before I came to St. Laudine's, I studied both Alwyn and Human histories in Russia, where I was born, and in other of Europe's great cities. I continue to do more research - there are always new discoveries to make!
For this course, we will be concentrating on what humans call "Western" history. The first class will be on September 22. There will be one class posted per week, and one assignment for each class.
I hope you will find the subject as fascinating as I do!
Lesson 1: Prehistory and very ancient history of dragons
Evolution
It is a common misconception that the modern dragon is an evolutionary descendant of dinosaurs. In truth, the ancient dragons and the terrible lizards were genetic cousins, much as modern humans and, say, lemurs are related but very distinct species. While the dinosaurs were definite precursors to modern lizards, and were cold-blooded, the dragon has always been warm-blooded, yet reptilian in appearance.
To date, no archaeological evidence has been discovered to shed light on the appearance or behavior of ancient dragons. Therefore, all that is known of them comes from later sources, mainly oral tradition eventually recorded in art or writing. Fortunately, the longevity of dragons lends much credibility to their accuracy. Our knowledge comes from analyzing these sources for common factors. While the body of experts of this subject are far from being in complete agreement, there is enough agreement to draw certain conclusions.
Art
Judging from the most ancient pictorial representations, (a series of engravings now held in the Hernandez collection in the United States), the very ancient dragons look a lot like elongated stegosaurs, with slightly less pronounced spinal protrusions. It is unclear from the engravings as to what covering they had. Most interpret the markings to be scales, but there are groups that argue they are feathers or fur. Yet another group claims the ancient dragons were covered in all three. Those with no direct knowledge of the modern dragon may scoff at the last claim, but given their shape-shifting abilities, it is as plausible a theory as any other.
Later artworks reveal more details. Several tablets in the famous Castro collection contain series of pictograms known as “noclugi”. According to dragon lore, these were a record of the “identities” of an individual dragon. The initial figure shows the dragon in its native form; often this individual is show to be bipedal in this pose. The subsequent images show “characters” that dragon was known to take, sort of an ancient ID card. It is also widely believed that these tablets may have been the inspiration for Egyptian hieroglyphs.
Most interesting about these tablets is how uniform they are in the depiction of the dragons' natural form. On nearly every known tablet, the dragon is shown clearly visible folded wings, standing on its hind legs, with its tail wrapped around its feet. The stegosaurus-like scales are considerably less prominent than in the Hernandez engravings, and in general the features are more mammalian than reptilian.
Also worth noting is the list of characters the dragons morphed into. The oldest examples feature primarily birds; probably this was for hunting purposes, or to get through confined spaces. Others include woolly mammoth, saber-toothed tigers, early incarnations of the genus Homo, and forms of crocodiles. (There is much conjecture as to the practical purposes of a dragon taking on the form of a woolly mammoth; the leading theory is that the dragons were merely showing off.) The later known tablets, dated about 8000BC, show mostly modern humans and animals.
There are, of course, many other artworks regarding the ancient dragon, but the dragons are understandably cautious about letting non-dragons near them. They have also throughout history tended to guard their libraries closely. This is probably the origin of humans' belief in dragons' treasure hordes.
Written Works
The earliest known written works connected to the ancient dragons date to about 10,000BC. Known as the Rock of Trac Toth, it was originally carved in the side of a mountain in present day Turkey, and proclaims the surrounding area to be under the “observance” of the dragon Trac Toth. It lists Trac Toth's parentage, the dragons who had agreed to her dominion, and a geographical description of the area's boundaries. Most important about this rock is the indication of a very ancient common dragon written language, and a least a nominal government and social structure for agreeing to conditions for the general dragon population. An interesting footnote to this decree is a clay tablet written a few thousand years later by a descendant of Trac Toth which provides some additional information. According to this descendant, Roat Nac, Trac Toth had for some years been having problems getting along with the other dragons. The community apparently decided they would all be better off if she just kept to her corner and the others stayed out of her way for a while. This strategy must have worked, because Roat Nac and her contemporaries report Trac Toth as a key figure in the wars that began late in her life.
Assignment
Next week we will be discussing, among other things, the first and second dragon wars. Most families shy away from discussing these wars and obviously human history lessons completely avoid them. Please discuss anything you know about these wars and provide feedback/discussion on this week’s subject. You may discuss other human stories, fables, or legends that you have heard during your short existence.
Lesson 2 – The Ancient Middle East
The Mesopotamian area is the recognized cradle of human civilization, and it is here that dragons and humans began their millenia long relationship. The dragons' ability to morph into human shape greatly facilitated cooperation between the two races, and while the lore of the dragons report some early misunderstandings (mainly the dragons mistaking humans as non-sentient beings and therefore food, and as a result, the humans fearing the dragons as aggressive monsters), they managed to reach a reasonable arrangement for living side by side. As the humans at this point had no written records, and the dragons apparently didn't find the details important enough to remark upon, it is left to speculation exactly how the two races got dealt with each other on a day to day basis. It is known, however, that for several hundreds, if not thousands, of years, humans and dragons mated on a regular basis.
Now, today it is generally known that it is a “bad idea” for humans and dragons to intrebreed, but at the beginning, there was no reason for the species to know producing offspring from their trysts was even possible, much less what the outcome of such a pairing could prove to be. Today, the image of a human-dragon hybrid brings to mind Hydra, Bata, Mushussu, Medusa, or Grendel – individuals of grotesque form and frequently mentally unstable. And it is an established fact that a large portion of such individuals do meet this description. However, many of these offspring proved to be function members of their parents' communities; it is from these individuals that today's Alwyn descend.
It wasn't until about 9000BC that this interbreeding became a problem. Some of the dragons became annoyed with the humans and the hybrid offspring. They cited the monstrous nature of some of the hybrids as a danger and nuisance, and to the comparatively high reproductive rate of humans as a sign these hybrids would become more numerous. A group led by the dragon Tabzurol began to plot the extermination of all humans and part-humans. This plot was accelerated when one of the “monsters” went on a rampage and destroyed three dragon eggs. The dragons' reproductive rate was already in a steady decline, so this was a serious blow to the dragon community. In response, the offender was literally torn apart, and a decree issued that his name be struck from all records. His human mother was apparently already deceased, so the dragons avenged themselves by setting fire to the area she lived in, and banning his dragon father from the community.
As the anti-human group gained support, they made the mistake of trying recruit a dragon named Eankilor, whose mother had several half-human children. Eankilor initially tried to protect his siblings by attempting to convince Tabzurol's mate Tea Mata, who also had at least two half-human children, to confront Tabzurol and talk him out of his plot. She apparently did try this, but was unsuccessful. After this failure, Eankilor resorted to more drastic means, and killed Tabzurol while he was sleeping. Kingoru, the son of Tea Mata and Tabzurol, apparently witnessed his father's assassination, but many of Eankilor's allies claimed both Kingoru and Eankilor were with them (apparently partying) at the time of Tabzurol's death, and so the dragon community took no action. The rest of the conspirators kept quiet and dropped their plans to eliminate humans and Alwyn.
Eankilor and his friends continued to protect their human family, and formed a council meant to act as a buffer between humans and dragons. Originally, they intended their council to be simply a safe haven for airing greivances, but it eventually morphed into a sort of government, which oversaw both dragons and humans. Because dragons have much greater longevity over humans, the council was comprised almost entirely of dragons, with a few Alwyn, and was therefore known as the Dragon Council.
Meanwhile, Kingoru managed to convince Tea Mata of Eankilor's guilt, and she went into a very quiet rage. Over the next several decades she plotted her revenge, and gathered supporters. She convinced the Council to accept Kingoru as a member, where he eventually was placed in charge of maintaining the records of decisions (known as the Tablets of Destinies). Tea Mata gathered her own group of conspirators, including at least eleven other dragons, and several of her Alwyn relatives, and at a meeting of the Dragon Council, Kingoru led this group in an attack on Eankilor and his allies. In the following battle, Eankilor's son Meroduk killed both Tea Mata and Kingoru. Tea Mata's body was literally torn apart afterwards, and her bones later used to build the boundary walls for the Council's new meeting place, including the walls of the “Vault of Heaven” where the dragons kept their unhatched eggs. Medoduk used his martial prowess as a springboard to take over as the first official leader of the Dragon Council, apparently with his father's approval. Eankilor continued to advocate for the humans and Alwyn.
Meroduk's first official proclamation as leader of the Council was to issue an general amnesty for all surviving members of Tea Mata's conspiracy. He also acknowldged that Tabzurol's group had had good cause for concern about the stability of some of the Alwyn. He and his father negotiated an agreement with Tabzurol's main supporters which simultaneously protected the existing hybrid offspring, and made it illegal for dragons to mate with humans in the future. The “monster” offspring were to be placed under the guardianship of a relative, and sent from the area. A hierarchy was set up, in which the dragons would “assume responsibility” for the remaining Alwyn, who were in turn charged with merging into the human population and doing their best to keep the humans from annoying the dragons too much. A number of dragons were dissatisfied with this, and left the area; many of them settled in Asia or the Americas and refused any further dealings with the Council dragons.
The Alwyn in Ancient Human History
Some of the Alwyn were more successful at blending into human culture than others. While mostly human in appearance, at least most of the time, there were enough incidents of accidental morphing to become blips on the social radar. The human reactions towards these blips tended towards one of two categories: fear or awe. In Mesopotamia, fear was the main reaction, and in general the Alwyn lived as nomads on the outskirts of civilization, or hid themselves in the priesthood, although several individuals left their marks on human history.
The kingdom of Kish, a city in Sumeria during the third millenium BC, had a fairly close relationship with the Alwyn, who they regarded as gods and their priests. A king of Kish, Etana, went so far as to marry a Deiticus priestess, who bore him at least one child, Balih, who ruled Kish after Etana. The mother's name is not known, but she is described as having eagle wings. In Egypt during this same period, many of the Morphicus clan had set themselves up as local gods. The vampires Bastet and Anubis, who have been immortalized in Egyptian mythology, were actually mother and son.
The first of the Alwyn to take an active, undeniable place in history was Gilgamesh. He was born to the Alwyn “priest” line about 2700BC to a Daemon priestess of the god An, and a warrior king named Lugulbanda. Gilgamesh had inherited his mother's powers and his father's brawn, and used both to sieze the throne of the city Uruk after the death of the previous king (who was unrelated to either Gilgamesh or his father). With his close friend Enkidu, a werewolf, Gilgamesh set about conquering the surrounding area. ( Interestingly, the dragons' history records that the Council suggested this empire-building to Gilgamesh as a means to control a wider area of humans through fewer middle-men.) Gilgamesh had to repeatedly used his mental abilities to convince Uruk's elder council to support this mission, but did manage to conquer the three nearby cities.
Gilgamesh's descendants managed to rule over these other cities only for a few more decades. The humans in the area engaged in a few hundred years of their cycle of subduing their neighbors, passing new laws, and trading religious ideas. By 2300 BC, Mesopotamia was chaotic enough again to cause concern to the Dragon Council, which was by this time shrinking in number and growing worried about its ability to influence human culture. The council selected an Alwyn, now known to human history as Sargon the First, to infiltrate Sumeria and try again to bring it under “control”. Sargon was not at all ashamed of his heritage, and certainly made no effort to hide it; in fact the first thing he declares about himself in his “biography” is that he was a member of the Morphicus clan on at least his mother's side. Sargon initially insinuated himself into a royal house, overthrew the king of that city, and proceeded to wage war on, and conquer not only all of Sumeria, but almost all of Mesopotamia. Under the guidance of the Dragon council, he and his descendants ruled the area for over a century, and even expanded their kingdom further, albeit temporarily.
Over the next several hundred years, humans demonstrated they had learned quite well from their Alwyn emperors, and began forming empires of their own. Notably, in the 16th century BC, a Babylonian named Hammurabi conquered a large area entirely without the help or influence of either the Dragon Council or Alwyn at all.
During this whole time, Egypt had been going through a repetitive cycle of leadership. About 3100BC, a Daemon named Narmar united Egypt into one kingdom. His family ruled, with the help of yet another Alywn priesthood, for about 200 hundred years, after which there were no heirs left who had inherited his powers. As a result, they were overthrown by human military leaders, who kept control of Egypt for about five hundred years. The Dragon council became frustrated with the lack of stability in the area, and sent another Daemon named Khasekem to again rally support and rule the area. His family ruled another hundred years or so – his descendants and the descendants of his brother built the now famous pyramids, when they weren't busy marrying their own sisters! This practice did manage to keep the Daemon genes in the family, pardon the pun, but eventually they ran out of obvious heirs, and a smaller branch of the family ruled for the last two hundred years or so during what human historians call the Sixth Dynasty. The last pharaoh of this line, Pepi II, did not manage to pass on his Daemon powers to any of his descendants. Human leaders fought for the throne for quite some time after Pepi II died, until the Council again got tired of not being having a reliable voice in the region, and selected yet another Daemon named Amenemhet, who had been using his powers to defeat enemies on the battlefield, and so impressed the Council. His line managed to hang onto the throne, and their powers for almost exactly 200 years before dying out.
The political chaos and war in Egypt was a great frustration to the Dragon Council. They had at this point no likely candidates to put forward (although recently discovered records indicate several unsuccessful attempts to do so had been made anyways). The Council had also pretty much lost control in Mesopotamia as well by this time. And so, the Dragons decided it was time to move on to a more peaceful area. And they chose what we today know as Greece.
Assignment
Assignment for this lesson:Many of the people mentioned in this lesson left their marks on human history as well. Can you find instances of human records that still hold the grains of truth about any of them?
Lesson 3: Greece and the Dragon Empire
Lesson 3: Ancient Greece
By the time the dragons and their Awlyn friends left Mesopotamia, they'd gotten a good handle on how to manipulate humans under the guise of religion. Bearing this in mind, they went first to a large island, now known as Crete, and promptly scammed the inhabitants into naming an Awlyn named Minos as their king. Minos was a Chaneque , whose wife was a werebull (a wonderful line that unfortunatel died out about 500AD). Knowing his sons had inherited their mother's abilities, thus binding them to the image of a bull, Minos made this his official symbol. He stood on a beach among a crowd of native Cretans, and prayed for a bull. A dragon who had been waiting underwater waiting for this, instantly morphed into a bull, who walked straight up to Minos. Having convinced the crowd he had divine favor, he rallied an army and attacked mainland Greece. After winning his battles there, he ordered each defeated area to send him their most “gifted” children as a tribute. The children were tested for Awlyn abilities upon arrival in Crete. Those found to be Awlyn were educated, the others were made to serve them. Once they were properly indoctrinated with the dragons' philosophy on managing civilization, they were sent out to manage colonies. Tributes were demanded on a regular basis; this practice worked quite well for a short period of time. However, about 1600 BC, a volcano on the island of Thera, which was governed by one of Minos' sons, had a cataclysmic eruption, and caused a great disruption in all civilization in the area. It also left the dragons a bit uneasy about remaining on an island (volcanoes weren't understood at all back then), so they decided to relocate themselves again, this time to the Greek mainland.
The Dragon Council settled near Mt. Olympus and set up another training center. This time, without a military victory to back them up, they could not demand tributes from their neighbors, and so they further played into the Greek religious beliefs. Instead, the Awlyn were sent out “
wandering” for a year or two at a time, seeking children with potential, who were taken back to Mt. Olympus for training. Others were assigned to “infiltrate” the priesthood, where they could monitor specific communities and manipulate the wishes of the gods. Any signs of trouble were reported to the Council, who generally sent a Deiticus to the area to settle things down. A notable side effect wandering, particularly in the case of the Morphocus clans, was a rise in the births of half-Awlyn children, after a young woman had been wooed with the something in the manner of “Hello, I'm Zeus and I can prove it.” Many of these children mingled with the communities of both parents and became legends in their own right, including Heracles and Pericles. The deeds and antics of the Awlyn in Greece, together with the preexisting beliefs, led to the formalization of the Olympic Pantheon, which has been immortalized in writings and art for thousands of years since.
This arrangement gave the Dragon Council about 500 years of relative peace. The first real interruption in this peace was the famous war in Troy. The Council probably would have chosen to ignore it, because the fighting itself took place clear across the Aegean Sea; they had been successfully ignoring wars in Mesopotamia and Egypt for quite some time by now. However, the length of the war resulted in much chaos in Greece, as well as the depletion of many men of fighting (and child producing) age. this complicated things for Awlyn men who were left at home, as they received a lot of guff for being “cowards”. A further complication was the discovery that the Trojan Paris was in fact a Daemonicus who had used his abilities to to “convince” Helen (who was half-Awlyn) to leave with him. The Council, feeling responsible for both Helen and Paris, at first sent an emissary to Troy to talk Paris into giving Helen up and returning to Mt. Olympus for training. When this was refused, the Council joined the war on the side of the Greeks, defeated the Trojans, and took all members of Paris' family back to Mt. Olympus.
After the war, the population of Greece had been seriously diminished. First there were battle casualties of 10 years of fighting, and those lost in sailing mishaps between Troy and Greece. These losses meant a general decline in the number of children born. Additionally, there was a sickness in Greece that killed many of those left behind. This made the Awlyn wary of their journeys, and reduced the chances of them finding potential recruits. The Council did pursue its recruiting practices, but hose in the priesthood shouldered most of this task from about 1200BC. About 900BC, the Council officially began to discourage the “producing” of new Awlyn through the “Hello, I'm Zeus” method, simply because they felt obligated to care for the offspring and the number occurrences was becoming embarrassing. However, the practice was never really entirely abandoned.
By 800 BC, the wanderers were having less success in finding new Awlyn, so the Council encouraged the creation of the original Olympic Games. This brought a large amount of warriors and athletes together in one place, and allowed the Council members to scout them, resulting in the identification of a large number of the Morphocus clan members. A nice side benefit was that the games also brought a three month long “Olympic truce” which game the area a short time when no battles were fought and thereby relieved some of the worries of the Council, albeit temporarily.
About this time was the first signs of official dissent among the Awlyn. A werewolf, whose name has unfortunately been lost to history, was assigned to go on a wandering expedition under the identity of Ares. This was expected to keep him away for many years, which posed a problem as he had recently married and his wife was pregnant. The Council refused to let him stay, so he and his family emigrated north into what is now Italy. His wife gave birth to twins, named Romulus and Remus, who grew to be accomplished warriors and leaders among the tribes they grew up in. Unfortunately Romulus was killed in battle around 750BC. Remus was so grief stricken he took on his
brother's name and identify for the remainder of his life. He then founded a town and let it be known that any Awlyn unhappy with the Council was welcome to settle there, which resulted in a large Greek-Awlyn population settling all over Italy. The immigrants and the natives had many disagreements as to who should rule and how; Remus was killed in one of these clashes. Following his death, the Awlyn attempted to set up their own version of the Council, led by a man named Lucomo, and then by his son-in-law Severius Tullius, who was the first Angelicus whose name has been recorded by history.
Back at Mt. Olympus, unrest continued. About 630BC, a daemon named Cylon had been recruited into the training center following one of the Olympic Games. After his training was completed, he was sent to wander and eventually arrived in Delphi. While there, he visited the Awlyn priestess to exchange news. The priestess suggested he proceed to Athens next, and for some reason Cylon took this suggestion to mean he was supposed to take over the rule of Athens. He convinced enough other people to back him that he did succeed in naming himself the city's ruler. Unfortunately, he wasn't particularly powerful and never managed to convince a significant portion of the Athenian population to accept him. Cylon fled back to Mount Olympus, where he was severely punished for his actions; his followers were killed at an altar in the Acropolis. This held religious implications to the Greeks, and the Awlyn in the area were greatly upset by the murders of their relatives. The resultant civil unrest was great enough that the Council felt they needed to directly intervene, and so sent one of the dragons (known only as Draco – the dragon) to establish law and order. He took this directive quite literally and created the first written Athenian code of law. These laws were quite harsh, this dragon did not think very highly of humans and declared the death penalty for a large number of transgressions. A few decades later, the council decided to lighten up the laws a bit, to prevent an outright rebellion. An Awlyn named Solon who lived in Athens was given the task, and then immediately told to go on a wandering mission. These new laws didn't eliminate the chaos either, and in 560BC a man named Peisistratus managed to gain control. Things settled down until his son Hippias took over. He was apparently close friends with a daemon who unwittingly caused Hippias to suffer paranoia which manifested itself in a series of executions and banishments. Things got bad enough that when the Spartans decided to attack the city , Athens was unable to protect itself. The Spartans DID manage to get rid of Hippias, but the Council backed Athens and helped chase them back out. The Council sent in more Awlyn and about 500BC managed to establish a government system that the human Athenians could live with.
The chaos didn't end there. Persia had been expanding steadily into Greek territory, and the Council was not happy with this. daemons were sent to the major Greek cities to help convince the leaders to work together against Persia. For about 10 years the Persians dominated the war, but in 490 at Marathon the Greeks finally managed to gain a victory. However, many Greek cities had been growing discontented with having to receive instructions from the Council, and either defected to Persia or tried to play both sides of the war. The Persians, after Marathon, took a brief break from attacking Greece, but began again in 486BC. Their procession across Greece included many great battles, including the Battle of Thermopylae. The Greek defeat here was so complete that Athens was evacuated and the Greek forces moved to the island of Salamis. While the Persians occupied the city, the Awlyn sent a daemon to the Persian king to convince him attack the Greek navy head on, rather than laying siege as he had planned. This was naturally a trap, and the Greeks defeated the Persians soundly, leaving thousands of them to drown. By 479BC, the Greeks had managed to regain control of their land.
At this point, Athens was still under the control of the Dragon Council, via well placed Awlyn in the Athenian government. Sparta, being further away, was less easily influenced. After the Persian Wars, Sparta tried to claim rule of Athens; this did not please the Council. Athens, naturally, refused to acknowledge this claim, and began formal alliances with other Greek cities, calling this the Delian League. However, many of the other cities also began to chafe at the Council's rules, and rebellions followed. In 457, a city called Doris, quite close to the Dragon Council's seat in Mt. Olympus, asked Sparta to help their rebellion. Athens and the Delian League were sent to stop them, and fighting went on for about 10 years before a 30 truce was called. Apparently some of the Awlyn fought on Sparta's side, for during the 14 years this truce lasted, the Athenians commissioned the friezes at the Parthenon depicting them fighting centaurs. The wars began again in 433 BC and continued on and off until 405BC, with the Persians lending the Spartans money to continue funding their forces. By this time, the Council was short on funds itself, having to also support the Awlyn training center. Worse, because of the Awlyn participation in the Spartan side of the war, the Council had committed a large amount of Awlyn to fighting on the Athenian side to counter them. The Spartan-Persian alliances managed to out-fund and outman the Athenian-Awlyn forces, and the Spartans officially defeated Athens in August of 405BC.
This loss both frightened and frustrated the Council. They had been calling the shots in Greece for over 1500 years, ruling through the Awlyn. Now the Awlyn and humans both were rebelling. The Council could not very well relocate again; the explored world was well divided by other empires at this time. In 396BC, they encouraged the Athenians to revolt, hoping to regain the military and official government seats of their power. This war lasted about another 10 years; at the end, both sides were out of resources and it was clear the Council's ability to rule through Athens was over. Whole subclans
of the Morphocus line had been wiped out in the wars, and it was no longer considered safe to bring new recruits to Mt. Olympus. The Dragon Council chose to settle with maintaining its influence over what areas it could, protecting it's home base at Mt. Olympus, and keeping its eyes open for a chance to turn things around.
Assignment
Assignment for lesson three: Give and example of how the Awlyn left an impact on Greek culture. I look forward to reading what you discover!
