A Brief History of the Cranath Kingdom
The Cranath number the years from the time when the god Wrothan breathed life into the Cranath people and entwined them with a Star-Spirit. This is said to have occurred many centuries ago during the reign of King Cranathin, after whom the Cranath are named.
In the second year of his reign, King Hurunthin had his chroniclers determine the date of that entwining. They established it had happened 429 years earlier. With that knowledge, King Hurunthin set the calendar which is still used in the realm. From that work we now know he reigned as king in the years 427-431.
By the mid-fifth century the plains of the Land held six significant kingdoms: Cranath, Marlbrook, Rubrich, Rednath, Bromsgrove, and Pruth. King Hurunthin’s grandson, King Cranan the Strong (460-542, r. 484-542), ruled the Cranath Kingdom. In 485 he entwined Feberga, Queen of the Kingdom of Marlbrook. This united the two largest kingdoms in the Land. Together, King Cranan and Queen Feberga reigned for nearly 60 years. The martial strength of their combined peoples, and the wisdom of King Cranath, enabled them to peacefully expand.
First, in 489, Cranan the Strong split the kingdom into three duchies: Morand Shores, Glaron Fields and Dorunth Uplands. Each duchess, or duke, of these three new Cranath Duchies must be an Ætheling – a member of the royal family who has a parent, grandparent or great-grandparent who reigned as monarch. The ruling monarch of the Cranath realm appoints an Ætheling when a vacancy occurs.
Then in the 490’s the Cranath Kingdom absorbed the smaller realms of Rubrich, Rednath, and Bromsgrove. King Cranan peacefully convinced the rulers of these smaller states to trade their independence for dukedoms within the Cranath realm. Rubrich became the fifth duchy in 492, Rednath followed in 493 and Bromsgrove joined the realm as the seventh Cranath Duchy in 497. King Cranan granted each of the subjugated kings, now dukes, a Councilor’s Rod which provided them a measure of power within the Cranath Kingdom.
In 509 King Cranan convened his Council of the Realm. They chose and anointed his daughter, Fruetha, as queen-in-waiting. It was a straightforward process. Fruetha, Cranan and Feberga’s daughter, was the only direct heir and thus the only person eligible to stand as a Claimant to the throne.
Shortly thereafter, an entwining was arranged between Queen-in-Waiting Fruetha and Munlar, a Pruthian prince. As part of the agreement, Namenlar, the aged King of Pruth, submitted to King Cranan and became Duke of Pruth – the eighth duchy in the Cranath realm. While the Duke of Pruth’s second child, Prince Munlar, would become king consort when Fruetha became queen, his eldest child would become the Second Duke of Pruth. The King of Pruth had become vassal to the King of the Cranath, but had assured his descendants of becoming rulers of the entire Kingdom.
The Land was at peace, united for the first time.
Since late in the reign of Diran II, known as Diran the Soft due to his plump figure, peace within the Cranath realm has been interrupted by occasional incursions of hostile tribesmen known as the Uklurakur; pale-skinned horsemen of the steppes far to the southeast of the Cranath Kingdom. The most recent of their incursions was into the broad Denesoma River valley during the summer of 772. The Cranath defeated the horsemen that hot summer day – but only barely. The Uklurakur fled from the battlefield on the Pelanfor Plain and returned to the steppes. The Cranath suffered terrible losses in 772 but the victory returned peace to the Land.