Ktuvok empire
From Almeopedia
Ktuvoks attempt to create empires over the humans around them; in the current age, there are four:
- Kalténia (in Lebiscuri) and Gödulia (in Curym), which are both neolithic in technology (their human neighbors being hunter/gatherers)
- Kowon, in Curym, which has rainfall agriculture (amid hunter/gatherers and garden agriculturalists)
- Dhekhnam, in Ereláe, which is as advanced as most of its neighbors.
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Reproduction
Almean humans invariably describe the ktuvoks as evil and their human subjects as slaves; but the empires can be best understood as status displays. To understand this, we need to understand ktuvok reproduction.
Ktuvok males do not transmit a small amount of sperm to the female, but a sperm packet which takes more than a year to develop, and which weighs more than a newborn. The parental investment of ktuvok males is largely limited to this; ktuvok adults do not live together or help each other raise offspring.
Naturally, such an exchange is not taken lightly by either sex. Females are choosy about whose packet they accept: they attempt to reproduce with the richest males— those with the most impressive status displays. A ktuvok’s status is not directly determined by its size or strength, but by the size and richness of its territory— which in a ktuvok empire includes the number and wealth of his human subjects.
A male doesn’t begin to develop a sperm packet until he feels rich and secure. Thus, we might divide the male ktuvoks into four quartiles:
- Very successful ones; these will be courted by females, and can be fairly picky about who they choose. Over their lifetimes they will mate with several females (at long intervals).
- Moderately successful ones; these will have to approach females themselves, but are likely to find one in the period while the packet is still usable.
- Ktuvoks who overestimate their desirability; they will produce a packet that no one wants.
- Unsuccessful but realistic ktuvoks; these don’t even waste time producing a packet.
Females have an easier time of it, in that if they have an estate, they can always find a male to mate with. They will seek out the richest males, but if they’re not available they’ll settle for someone else.
Mathematically, we find that to maintain the population, each male who mates should mate with 2 females and produce 4 adult offspring-- that is, enough to replace himself, the two females, and another male who will never reproduce. In practice it'll be more, since quite a few ktuvoks don't survive till adulthood.
The ktuvok life cycle
Young ktuvoks live with their mothers for about fifteen years. In aboriginal conditions, they were forced to live on their own at this point— long before they were large or strong enough to be a threat to their mother— and would spent five to ten years mostly at sea, hunting the larger sea creatures. They would then establish their own territory in the wetlands and seek to mate. Both establishing a territory and mating would require fighting other ktuvoks— preferably in alliance with other ktuvoks.
In a ktuvok empire, young ktuvoks will play a role in the estate (Demoshi chrem) of their mother or father. They are not allowed near the mansion of the parent, but may establish one of their own in a remote territory; or they may be sent as warriors to help conquer new territory, or as emissaries or enforcers to other estates, or as inspectors and objects of worship among the human population.
In theory the young ktuvoks will inherit the estate on the death of the parent. In practice, it’s more accurate to say that they’re in a good position to try. A neighboring ktuvok may suggest a swap instead (leaving the youngster with a smaller territory); or a coalition of ktuvoks may attack and divide up the territory.
A single ktuvok rarely takes over another entire estate— a coalition would immediately be formed to oppose him. Direct attacks of any kind are rare, in fact; ktuvoks are masters of intrigue and coalition building, and are difficult to displace.
In a ktuvok empire, a single ktuvok does not have a continuous territory, but a large number of disconnected territories in various parts of the empire. This helps ensure that strong regional leaders or factions do not develop, and that each ktuvok has a stake in the entire empire. New territory is always conquered by coalitions of ktuvoks. (Leadership may be safely entrusted to a single ktuvok, since the general’s actions will be so closely scrutinized that he will be unable to favor his own chrem.)
Ruling humans
As for the humans, the general principle of the empire is to use groups against one another.
Humans know which chrem they belong to, and are taught to distrust humans from any other chrem. (There are emblems used for each, as well as distinctive clothing.) If ktuvoks go to war with each other, they use their estates’ humans as armies.
On a larger scale, ethnic groups are set against one another. Groups absorbed earlier dominate newer conquests. In Dhekhnam, for instance, the Demoshi are set above all other humans; the Carhinnoi have a position of respect; and the recently conquered Sarnáeans are oppressed by everyone. In general this helps keep dominant groups happy, and even the people on the bottom have the hope of improving their position when the empire expands.
Entire villages are sometimes moved: loyalist colonies are planted in newly conquered territories; distrusted peoples are scattered far away from their compatriots.
The institutions of conquered peoples are destroyed, or reworked to pose no threat. E.g., Caďinorian paganism has been repressed in Sarnáe: temples destroyed, holy places desecrated, copies of the Aďivro burned, all clerics above the lowest rank killed. The remaining temples were then allowed to re-open, so long as they preached subservience to the ktuvoks; a new loyalist hierarchy was installed. Humans were rewarded for reporting dissidence, such as priests who repeated the ancient Caďinorian denunciations of Munkhâsh.
Where possible the ktuvoks institute a new religion, which preaches that the ktuvoks are not only to be obeyed but worshipped. A recurrent feature of these religions is human sacrifice. Criminals and war captives are routinely sacrificed, but sometimes the victim is the son or daughter of a local notable; this brings great honor, and sometimes seems to be a prerequisite for important advancements.
Less dramatically, children may be taken from their parents to be trained for important positions; this also is considered an honor for the parents, and protects them from the repression of their ethnic group.
What’s in it for the humans?
It should not be assumed that the humans are unwilling subjects, or that ktuvok empires are hellish places to live in. The first humans dominated by the empires were neolithic, so the ktuvoks could offer them a much higher standard of living. In medieval times, it might be considered preferable to worship the ktuvoks than to be invaded by the nomads, who if they didn’t simply turn you off the land would steal your crops, burn down your house, and ravish your daughters.
The ktuvoks are not sadists; they enjoy human subservience, but they don’t starve or humiliate their subjects. Only if the rewards on offer don’t work will they resort to force and terror. The ktuvoks are not empowered madmen like Nero, Stalin, or Hitler; they would not massacre their own citizens any more than a farmer would kill off his own livestock for sport.
Ktuvok leadership
We call the ktuvok polities empires because they exercise a despotic control over humans; but their internal organization is oligarchical. Each ktuvok and each chrem is sovereign, and indeed ktuvoks normally do not even cross into each other's territories. Ktuvoks are not social animals who work out a pecking order; they are more like solitary cats or fish who defend as large an independent territory as they can.
For the same reason, there is no ktuvok emperor, and not even a formal council or legislature. Instead, imperial affairs are decided by shifting coalitions. A coalition (jrech) does have a leader, and is held together by the leader's personality, aided by common interests and tradition. The leader does not rule the members' estates, but he can commit the coalition's members and resources to a political or military goal. Individuals will seek to join the jrech of strong leader, and to abandon sinking ones. Leadership is rarely passed on to another; if a leader dies or is perceived as feeble, the coalition generally collapses. There are cases, however, where a strong challenger mounts a one-on-one fight to oust and replace a leader.
A coalition rarely amounts to more than 10% of the ktuvoks in the empire, and usually much less. A single leader can only maintain good relationships with a limited number of subordinates; and a coalition that grows too large will alarm others and prompt anti-coalitions. As more social animals have high skills in reading each other's emotions and intentions, ktuvoks are skilled at coalition politics, so good that civil war is vanishingly rare.
Ideally the empire's grand strategy is decided by all the coalitions via consensus. Total consensus is rare, and this is one reason ktuvok empires expand in spurts; large-scale external warfare is only possible when all coalitions come together. (Coalitions can of course agree on long-term policy that's to everyone's benefit, such as coordinating their rule over human populations.)
