Euthymius' History of Minmir

The best analogy is, I think, a gold-rush; that frenetic wave of immigration and interest following the first 'official' discovery of Arelith by the nation of Amn. That the elves had known about it almost thirty millennia was beside the point, and was hardly to humble the boasts of the great explorers of Athkatla.

There is much of interest to be said about those times, and just what it is about the isle of Arelith that held such appeal, yet in this work I intend to discuss only that the end of its first decade, the founding of the city of Kohlingen, in the new Triadic State of Minmir.

Of course the city itself had been under construction for much of the previous decade, it was only in the eighth year of what is now termed 'Arelith Reckoning' that the city-state was formally established.

Many of the fortune-seekers and adventurers to the isle had made such wealth that they were keen to establish castles and keeps to themselves in the virgin northern territories, and there were more than enough families to till the fields and manage the estates given the huge wave of immigration as tales of gold gripped many of the ports of the Sword Coast and Moonshae.

The city-state of Cordor, to the south, was growing also, but while the power of its king was no doubt great, he was by no means able to claim the greater isle only himself, and it was Minmir, with its promise of harsh triad law and discipline that held promise for many.

Of course when men have coin to protect they are all to willing to accept the rule and protection of incorruptible Triadic law, but it would be foolish believe all lived by those self same principles. There was a rush not only on land & livelihood but also status and title, and much of the new city was build by auctioning the many aristocratic titles this new nation was afforded by heraldic convention.

One such individual was the now infamous Earl Manfried, a wealthy wizard, who while having prospered from his time as adventurer on Arelith came to its shores with a large mercantile inheritance, and from a family all too keen to obtain some meaningful aristocratic title.

He was a personable, if eccentric young man, who did not shy away from the occult in his many researches of this isle's history, indeed his learning and insight was oft sought even by the most pious in Minmir.

The ugly story of his corruption is widely told, but I shall summarise it here for the sake of expediency.

Manfried would regularly commune with spirits and entities, whether to further his own studies, or more often to simply indulge his peers during the many parties held at his newly built Ch teau.

It was during such a s ance that he first unknowingly attracted the attention of some powerful undead entity from the Negative Plane, a trickster, that posed as many different beings, and spun an elaborate web of lies and promises to both drive the Earl insane, and convince him, finally, to commit the most dreadful of murders, and serve up his victim, garnished with flakes of that very entity's skin, to his party guests.

The ghoulish revelry that began that night spilt out into much of the surrounding countryside, a cloud of undeath surrounding the Ch teau for many miles, and raising the army of undead that marched upon the city of Kohlingen.

Yet much as the story of Manfried and his curse is so oft repeated as the cause for the fall of Minmir, it was, in truth, but one of a great many other catastrophic events that befell Kohlingen that night, culminating in an earthquake felt across the entire isle.

Few survivors made it out of that place, and those that did each shared a different tale of what they saw there.

The earthquake, those that followed it, plunged the city, and the much of the lands of Minmir beneath the waves of the Trackless Sea.

Minmir today comprises only a fraction of the original land. The chapeau, and its curse, holds to this day, but beyond it Minmir remains a tranquil and unspoilt land, possessing much of the very same beauty that attracted those earlier, ill-fated settlers.

Beyond the Banite Church, and the Fortress of the Radiant Heart, few people are to be found here besides the freemen in its east, the Border Reavers who make their home in the gap of Aeons.

Whatever beauty Minmir has, it will likely never be formally settled; the memory of common-folk is a long one, and so song as the land remains touched by evil, only the bravest of them will care to venture them.

As for Kohlingen, it appeared again, almost a century later, many miles out to sea, a far from its original position. A blasted ruin, that despite many efforts, steadfastly refuses to yield any clues as to its fall.

Yet, it is a fall we must now consider, as we enter a second great age of immigration.

As before, as words of Arelith spreads, many interest groups from across Faerun come to settle here, and as before, a new city is being.

The populace of Guldorand's Fortress City, would do well to consider Kohlingen and its mystery, as something, or someone, very powerful clearly did not care to see a second city-state establish itself on these shores.