That's true.  But didn't the kingdom itself more or less fall apart some time after the Golden Age of Kings, with most regions becoming independent?  Maybe I got the dates wrong, but when this happens I think the Order will probably lose a lot of influence even if it doesn't break up completely.  I guess we'll see when we get around to doing that period of history. 

Well, I think most 'scholarly' magic in southern Sarvonia is based on more or less the same principles as Ximaxian magic, and could probably be considered sort of variations on the same system.  Ximax, well, as you say, its standards are probably already the highest amongst the schools.  However, it doesn't really make sense to exempt a school just because it is already doing well now.  What if, in the future, its standards drops below the minimum set by the regulations?  I think it would be more reasonable to say that Ximax is covered by the regulations as well, but isn't really affected by them because it already exceeds those standards, unlike the less competent schools and instructors that the regulations were meant to target. 

Hmm, could be interesting.  The centralised regulation of magic teaching can't last forever, probably until shortly after the end of the Golden Age of Kings at most, I would guess.  This could be the setup for later events that could weaken or even break up the Order.  However, maybe the parts about it getting a more serious character and attracting the attention of the Order could be moved to a later date, so they remain relatively unimportant for their first few decades?  Might be better that way if you don't want anything serious happening between them and the Order during Lysarian's reign. 

I'm a little confused here.  Why is the order establishing its own schools?  I thought its role was to regulate existing schools, such as the Academy of Ximax?  Also, do you mean grandmaster (of the Order)?  I'm not sure why a headmaster of a school would be performing those tasks. 

As for the new guild, I don't mind the concept itself, but what is its role in history meant to be?  It doesn't seem to be mentioned in the rest of the entry at all, so for now it mostly seems to be just trivia.  Do you have future plans for it? 

Is this really possible?  Since the Order is, if I understand it correctly, basically a branch of the government meant to enforce certain standards, won't having lower standards than the Order's be more or less illegal? 

Well, sort of.  Knowing how to do magic is one of their main assets, so a lot of mages probably find jobs that involve using magic to do something, or at least help with doing something.  On the other hand, Ximaxian magic is based on philosophy, so a trained mage could probably also find work involving philosophy, which in medieval times was a rather broad field, I think.  I've not thought very deeply about what specific jobs mages might do though.  Wondering if I should start a thread for brainstorming such ideas.  

 I'm not very comfortable with simply declaring that there were no other schools.  In any case, as you said, the issue is not whether there was any other schools, but the absence of quality control.  Let's say that everyone who was teaching magic, whether a school or an independent mage, set their own standards, so there was no common standard that was applicable to the kingdom as a whole, leading to quality control issues.  As for the testing of apprentices, I haven't really thought about how that would be carried out, but I think we can agree that after the reforms, they have to be able to meet the standards set bt the order regardless of where they were trained.  

Well, depends on what you mean by "lots".  As I understand it, magic users make up a very tiny portion of the overall population.  Although if the population is high enough, I guess that could still be quite a lot in absolute terms.  But yes, it's definitely a status thing to study at the Ximaxian Academy.  I wouldn't say that only Ximaxian mages are considered real mages, but it's definitely more prestigious. 

Happy birthday, Rayne.   

Well, the religious fanatic connotation makes me hesitate a little.  Maybe it could work, like you suggested, although I've not really thought about what the Ximaxian mages of that era were like.  It might be a good idea to get some imput from the other magic devs too. 

Anyway, I was thinking that whether we call it a guild or an order or something else, it's just a name, and what's really important is what it's suppose to do.  So let's focus on that for now.   

Well, standardised teaching definitely makes sense.  In particular, it means you can have a standard method for measuring the power and skill of a mage throughout the kingdom.  I'm not so sure about standarding jobs though.  Ximax has enough mages that it could probably have some specialised magic professions, but in other cities, I think they would probably join the guild for whatever job they are doing and just follow its regulations.  Possibly what Lysarian could do is to require that guilds make sure that magical work is of the same standard as non-magical work. 

So basically a sort of certification process for magic teachers?  Makes sense, and fits into the standardising of teaching you mentioned. 

Hmm, depending on what you mean by major town, there might not be enough mages who are qualified enough to staff them.  But do they really have to be staffed by mages, or even be specifically magic courts?  I think, for complaints, they can probably be handled by normal courts, and bring in qualified mages for expert testimony and such when needed. 

Well, probably some kind of secret informal apprenticeship immediately after the war, then more openly as magic becomes more acceptable again, and eventually formal schools start appearing.  Maybe the Ximaxian Academy is the first school after the war, maybe not, but it's hard to imagine it remaining the only school for long.  It might be possible for everyone who wants to be a mage to be sent to Ximax if the continent is unified, but that wasn't the case before Santhros.  Although Ximax was neutral for a significant part of its history, that was not the case for its first thousand years or so, and even when it was neutral, for most people (except Centoraurians during those periods Ximax was part of Centorauria), it would also mean having their mages be trained by another country.  There might be a certain prestige in being trained by Ximax, but I think most countries would want to have their own magic school if they could (and were not distrustful of magic). 

Banned?  I thought it just became unpopular.  If magic was completely banned, I'm not sure how the Ximaxian Academy could have been founded.  And yeah, it's a really long time ago. 

Hmm, yeah, possibly other schools with lower standards leading to problems.  That could work.  And maybe there were also some mages who were not associated with any school, so they weren't getting regulated at all.  But, as you mentioned, what about magic users like witches and druids?  They have a completely different style of magic (Thalambath at least has Ximax-like magic, if I remember correctly), so holding them to Ximax-style standards probably won't work.  Would the government simply ignore them though? 

What I meant is that being a mage is not really a job the way being a doctor or a stonemason is.  It just means you have been trained in how to do magic.  You could be a mage who is a doctor or stonemason or something. 

Argh, how did we miss this when we were doing the history of Ximax?  

An organisation for regulating magic use does seem to make sense in a united Santharia, and I can even see Ximax being in favour of it if they think they could play a major role within it.  However, I'm a little confused about the mention of Ximax no longer being the only school of magic.  I thought that there were already other magic schools; at the very least, didn't Fox put one in Thalambath or something like that?  Magic has been around for much longer than Ximax, so it seems like it might be a little strange if the Ximaxian founders were the only ones in South Sarvonia who came up with the idea of having a school for teaching magic.  

Also, as far as I can tell, guilds seem to historically have been unrelated city-based organisations rather than national organisations with branches in various cities.  And I'm not sure if "mage" is really a profession either; I've always thought of it as more of a term indicating that a person can do magic.  Maybe it could be called something else, like an order?  "Order of Magic" sounds rather nice to me.  Have the religious orders been founded at this time?  

Edit: Oh, yeah, we've discussed the possibility of Lysarian creating some sort of kingdom-wide guild before.  Totally forgot about that.  I still like the idea of possibly having a mage equivalent of the Orders though.   

Ah, so you're talking about Lysarian's reforms.  Well, I think knowing why he wanted to introduce the new currency would help in figuring out what sort of opposition he might face, and whether it would be necessary to force people to stop minting the old currencies. 

Maybe it would be useful to look at some real life examples.  Unfortunately, I can't really think of any good ones. 

Hmm, it's not something I've really thought about.  I don't remember any historical events that would result in those borders being changed.  It's probably alright to leave it vague for now. 

Well, it depends on how necessary it is to have a king managing such things.  Unfortunately, it's not something I've really read up on, so I'm mostly going to be guessing.  A more decentralised kingdom might have most of their administration done at a more local level, so there might not be much a king needs to do anyway, I think.  And for more centralised kingdoms, I think the king probably isn't the only one managing everything, and there would probably be bureaucrats and such who can handle most of the actual administrative work, only needing the king for things like approving new laws or making important decisions. 

Regarding the specific kingdoms, Erpheronia has the Council of Voldar.  They're only supposed to be advisory, but perhaps things can be different in practice.  Ximax already has its own government; joining Tharania, I think, shouldn't change much other than that they now have a king they need to answer to, so I think it fits into what I said above about a centralised administration.  I'm not very sure about Centorauria, but Thar's wife Curogana was the ruler before him, and might still be some kind of co-ruler; I don't know what Curgan intended.  I don't know much about Caltharia and Kyrania either, but it might be worth noting that before joining Tharania, the kings of both kingdoms had lost much of their power to the nobles. 

Hmm, a revolt?  What are your plans so far? 

Well, the government probably could force people to accept it as payment for goods and services the government is purchasing, but how much people would use the coins amongst themselves might depend on other factors.  In any case, having the government adopt a policy of paying for certain things using the new coins seems like a reasonable way to get them into circulation, and probably shouldn't make anyone upset unless the value of the coins are lower than what the government is trying to exchange them for.  Keeping the value (in this case, the amount of silver it contains) stable would probably help to keep the coins circulating by not giving any reason for people to stockpile or get rid of the coins.  Requiring that certain taxes be paid with the new coin, or giving preferential treatment to those that do so, might help the new coin be adopted by the people more quickly, since there is now something they need it for, but it will probably also annoy them. 

Don't really have any more ideas for now, although I think calling it the Thar sounds a little unimaginative.  Well, if there is a justification for it (eg. if it has an image of Thar on it), it could work.  I had a look at the etymologies of the names of various real coins, and if you go back far enough, it seems they're all pretty unimaginative.  Maybe it's some kind of nickname. 

Thar's entry has some details about the founding of Tharania:

First, in 492 b.S., Thar, who was already the king of Centorauria at the time, took the throne of Erpheronia, and people start calling the combined realms "Tharania".  In 483 b.S., Ximax, who was independent of Centorauria at the time, applies to join Tharania.  This causes the Kyranians to overthrow their unpopular king and ask to join Tharania too.  Then, the Caltharian king, who had mostly lost control over his nobles, decides to hand his kingdom over to Thar in exchange for retaining enough estates to live a comfortable life.  By 482 b.S., Thar had accepted these offers and Tharania was officially founded. 

Regarding Tharania's internal divisions, I think it would make sense for Centorauria, Erpheronia, Ximax, Kyrania, and Caltharia to all remain distinct entities in the kingdom, whether as provinces or as kingdoms under some kind of personal union arrangement.  Maybe some border changes can be made, if future dev work makes it necessary, but right now there's probably no need to further complicate things. 

As for old kings becoming dukes, assuming you mean those of the kingdoms that became Tharania, that might be a bit complicated.  Thar was simultaneously king of Centorauria and Erpheronia when Tharania was founded, so they didn't really change kings.  Ximax I'd say was a republic before that, so they don't have a former king either.  The former Caltharian king probably retains some kind of position, given the deal he made with Thar, so making him a duke might work.  As for Kyrania, the former king was killed in the revolt.  My plans for Xaramon also assume that by the time Xaramon was formed, the former Kyranian king's descendents, if there were any left, were not of high enough rank to automatically be chosen as thane, so it'd be great if you don't make them too powerful. 

Apparently, a bract.  

According to the caption for one of the pictures on Wikipedia's page on flowers:

Don't know how accurate it is or whether it was known during medieval times though.  

Edit: In hindsight, that didn't quite answer the question.  Well, I think you'll probably be understood if you just call it a single petal.  Maybe describe its shape a little to make it really clear. 

I only heard about the idea of forest gardening quite recently.  Here's the intro from Wikipedia's entry on it:
Apparently it's supposed to be an alternative to the usual agricultural practice of growing crops on open land, which might require clearing away forests and could negatively affect the environment.  But that's not the point of this post. 

I'm thinking this sounds like something that might be done by our elves, most of whom live in forests.  Clearing forests to grow crops doesn't sound like something they would do, at least not on a large scale.  There isn't a lot of detail about how elves get their food, but looking at the current tribes' entries, it seems there are two main ways:

1. Trading with other tribes.  This could be problematic, such as if they are at war with surrounding tribes, as has happened in the past.  It also seems like it would lead to a situation where the interior of the forests are a lot more sparsely populated than the edges, which feels a little odd to me. 

2. Hunting, or eating various plants that grow in the forests.  This seems to essentially make them hunter-gatherers, and some entries do call them that.  On the other hand, this doesn't seem to be incompatible with forest gardening if, instead of being completely wild, the plants are managed by the elves.  That would probably allow for a less nomadic lifestyle and greater population densities than hunting and gathering usually does, which puts them at a more even footing with humans in conflicts and general competition. 

I'm not familiar with elves, but I do know that they are supposed to be quite different from humans culturally, and it seems to me that having their default form of agriculture be very different from the human norm could help with that.  Anyway, it's not something I've thought very hard about, just an idea I happened to come across that I'm hoping might inspire some of you.   

Well, as far as Santharising the entry is concerned, how about expanding the Usages section with some culture-specific details?  Its range seems to overlap with the territory of the Caltharians, who are known for dying cloth.  How do they use it, or do they not?  Or perhaps there could be more details about the mixed dyes and paints it's used in?  Surely there is some regional or cultural variation in what is made, and how they're made?  What about the cultural significance of those dyes?  The plant itself seems pretty common, so I'm guessing the unmixed dye probably is too, but maybe it is an ingredient in an expensive dye or two? 

The same can apply to the foot odour treatment usage.  How widespread is it?  Is there any variation between who uses the alcohol variant and who uses the vinegar variant? 

Spotted a couple of what seems to be typos:

I guess I misinterpreted what the lines on your map was supposed to represent.  

Anyway, regarding routes between Cyhalloi and Sarvonia, I made a very quick map showing the two I was talking about in the last post, as well as one more I thought of later.  The coloured texts show approximately how much open ocean would have to be crossed.  

If sailing conditions are the same for all three routes, which isn't necessarily the case, the red route would probably be the safest, since it's divided into smaller and probably more managable chunks.  There's about 2800 strals of open ocean to cross in total, but also quite a bit of sailing along the coast and within island groups, so it's probably the slowest of the routes (again, assuming conditions are equal).  Also, like Talia said, there's the issue of the sea being frozen for long periods of time.  

The two southern routes are fairly similar.  They are probably frozen over less often, and shorter in general, but require much more non-stop sailing, which can be difficult.  Of the two, I'm not sure which is more likely.  Carbrand looks like a larger and more important city, and seems to have better access to inland areas via the river next to it, so it probably attracts more trade.  Margith is closer, but looks to me to be more like the sort of port that ships stop over at while on the way to somewhere else.  Which doesn't necessarily make less important as a port, although the fact that it is less prominent on the map suggest that less important as a city compared to Carbrand.  Well, if a ship sails to Margith, I'm guessing it's probably likely to head to Carbrand after that; I'm just wondering if ships sailing to or from Cyhalloi might choose to skip Margith entirely.  

Edit: Talia, what method did you use to find the distances?  I just noticed that, according to the numbers you gave, the distance between Carbrand and Lockette would be about 4275 strals, which is quite different from what I calculated.  I got my distances by first measuring the distance between Lorehaven and Klinsor on the Manthria map, which seemed to be close to the east-west distance of Waning Island, and using that to calculate the other distances on the world map.