Neinuoi

From Almeopedia

Neinuoi is a huge island to the east of Arcél. The northern half of the island is tropical, and shares Arcél's tropical crops; the southern half is temperate, but has developed its own biota independent of those of Arcél. Racially, Neinuoi's people are Melanke; they speak languages of the Neinuoian family. Geologically, the island is probably on a small plate shifting south, away from Curym.

Agriculture

The easy sea routes from Arcél to Neinuoi run through the tropical zone, so southern Neinuoi developed its own package of crops: rye, meigrass, bigbean, stoneroot, and long yam. A cotton-like plant called fluffleaf was used to provide cloth.

When contact with the Arcél temperate zone began in the 2200s, an interchange of crops occurred. Meigrass and long yam were particularly appreciated in Uytai. Most important to Neinuoi was the introduction of sheep, which allowed a herding lifestyle to develop in the highlands.

Social organization

Contact with Arcél spurred the creation of kingdom-level states in the southern half of the island. By about 3000 the chief of these had succeeded in uniting the southern coast and some areas of the north; its name Neinuoi was applied by outsiders, such as Verdurian traders, to the island, which had not needed a name to its inhabitants— it was the world. (The Uyseʔ name is Ħomswiʔnyounartai ‘big land surrounded by the sea’.)

Article begun by Adso de Fimnu, largely rewritten by Zompist