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Map of the Unending Ocean

Map of Agony Island

A THUMBNAIL HISTORY

Long before recorded history, a massive volcano rose and erupted here with devastating explosive power. After the interior forces that created it were released, they quickly dissipated, leaving an 80x50 mile crater standing sentinel hundreds of feet above the surrounding ocean. As millennia passed, the central lava lake cooled, weathered into a barren valley, enriched by immigrant plant and bird life, and finally several species of small animals. It came to be known as Agonir.

From ancient times, Agonir was settled by a population of forest dwarves. Unlike their more commonly encountered mountain-dwelling cousins elsewhere on Drak, these people evolved a better tolerance for sunlight, and a love of the shady woodlands more commonly identified with elven cultures. Physically, they were of a particularly short stature. The body mass and strength required for life in a world of tunnels and stone was no longer required, and survival often required increased speed and agility to catch the local animal species. This group that has often been referred to as 'gnomes', but they differ only in their living habits and physical dimensions than in any other way from 'normal' dwarves. Studies of Agonites who have moved abroad and intermarried with dwarves and other races have proven that their physical differences tend to quickly disappear. For a number of genetic reasons, the birth rate among those who remain on the island is relatively low, and almost totally breeds true.

The island began to be called 'Agony' by visiting mariners because of the difficulty of getting up to the central crater from its only harbor. Agonites were, and still are a rather self-contained population that lack much of the desire for the wondrous products of other civilizations. Traders had to carry goods up long, steep paths, then seek out customers among the affable but rather indifferent population who seldom if ever settled on the narrow, low-lying coastal land at the base of the island massif. Indeed, even today, Bera's Town and Hjalmara's Sands are mostly settled by outsiders and their descendants who find this 'unwanted area' to be extremely attractive. Lack of other sheltered harbors to protect ships from the strong winds prevalent in this area are another reason why the population of the rest of the coastal areas is limited.

Bera's Town grew on the shores of the island's only harbor, which happens to be adjacent to the easiest access to the high plateau. Most of the non-dwarven population of Agony lives here, and it is the point where all trade takes place. Most buildings are of stone which is plentiful along the coasts. This is different from construction on the plateau which is very much dominated by wooden structures. It is also the only place on the island where there is a formal school for children, and where there is any interest in religion of any kind. (On the plateau, religion is considered to be "another foreign curiosity", meaningless to Agonites.) People trained in useful skills in Bera's Town can and do return to the plateau and become integrated into communities that accept them, but most are temporarily hired as teachers to impart their skills to local children.

Hjalmara's Sands is a tiny community that grew strictly to serve the needs of visitors to this somewhat exotic retreat, popular among citizens of Bera's Town and from abroad. The northeastern coast of Agony is warm, sunny, and has miles of clean, white sand beaches sheltered from prevailing winds by the overhanging cliffs. There is no sheltered port, though small rowed craft can land under the helm of an experienced sailor. Access to the plateau is via a steep 13 mile path to the town of Thorann.

Algira Wood, unlike most of the other forested areas of the plateau, is thick and very difficult to travel through. A large percentage of the trees are ancient, gigantic algirawoods that grow very close together, surrounded by dense underbrush. Algirawood trees, a species unique to Agony, commonly reach a height of 300 feet, and a diameter of 25-30 feet. The wood is abnormally hard, very heavy, and virtually fire-resistant. It can be cut, but it takes a great deal of effort and very sharp tools. The wood has a bluish-green cast to it when polished, and is highly prized abroad for sculpture and furniture. It is the primary export of Agony Island.

Algira, a very old town on the edge of the Algira Wood, has traditionally furnished almost all the algirawood for export and for use on the island.

Thorg is the capitol town of Agony, and decisions that affect the entire island are made here by councils of the wisest and most elderly women from all over Agony. Most decisions are made locally in the communities, however, and special discussions at Thorg are held very infrequently.

Westedge and Hreya, relatively new communities formed to harvest algirawood from woodlands on the west side of the island, mostly for export. In both cases, the nearly indestructible logs are floated down the nearby deep rivers that flow from Lake Konut over huge waterfalls and cascades down to the coast and into the Unending Sea where they are lashed firmly to the sides of trading ships that pay dearly for the right to claim them.

CULTURE

The island is a strict matriarchy, with women in control of all activities. Men tend to be prized for their strength, do most of the manual labor, but are mostly relegated to domestic and construction work. Although it varies with individuals, the men are not nearly as intelligent as women, and have a particularly non-aggressive nature. The culture of the island contributes to this. Education and individual initiative are not valued. To the outsider, Agony has a "hive mentality", with government based on a form of "consensus democracy" among the women. The good of the community always takes precedence over the desires, and often the needs, of the individual.

Coupling is considerably less formal than in most cultures, and is of a temporary nature. Men are chosen to father children because of favorable physical or mental traits, take no special part in raising their specific children, and are usually not even know to the children who seem to have little curiosity about them. Child rearing, especially after the child is walking and weaned, is a community effort. There is almost no importance to specific blood relationships, indeed, blood ties are so strong among all Agonites, after millennia of interbreeding, that everyone in the community is closely related. Even the relationship of child to mother, while known to the child, has little emotional content. Bonding, such as it is, is more likely to occur between child and the master to whom the child is apprenticed for training. This is probably the closest individual relationship Agonites form in their lives.

This culture has led to a historical tradition that seldom mentions the name of any particular leader. All achievements are achievements of 'the community'. Even the concept of 'tribe' does not enter into Agonite culture, with affiliation directed at the town or village within which the individual lives. Skills are learned by formal apprenticeships and young children are often sent away to other communities to learn and bring back specific skills to their own community.

Naming traditions among Agonites consist of a single name and the name of the community, such as Ghrol of Bjaldor, or Dana of Westedge. If a person, for one reason or another, should move from one community to another (usually initiated and dictated by agreements between the communities involved), names are automatically changed to reflect the new community and, if the person's single name is already in use in his or her new community, a new unique name is assigned by the community. No record of the old name is kept, and it is common for Agonites to actually forget in a matter of months what they had been called for 30 years. Studies have shown that this is not pretense. Their sense of individuality is so low, and naming so unimportant, that they honestly forget quickly, as others might forget an identification number or address soon after it is no longer current.

While this may seem a cold culture to those who value individual relationships, it is almost the reverse for well-adjusted Agonites, who feel terrifically lonely in the absence of an all-encompassing community. They find it difficult to understand why outsiders 'obsess' upon a few other individuals and treat the vast majority of people around them as strangers.

Individualists, people desiring education, and especially dissatisfied men, usually those with above-average intelligence, tend to leave the island and seek their fortunes elsewhere on Drak. Because of this trend, the male population is considerably smaller than the female population (about 2:1).

Those who leave the island seldom return. Even when they do, they are often unable to sufficiently shed their individuality enough to fit into the prevailing culture. The result is that they generally remain unhappy and outsiders. Most returnees end up living in Bera's Town.