Rossans

Rossans

The spread of the Rossan diaspora across the archipelago.   La Rossa   131072+   65536+   32768+   32+   0+[1]
Total population
c. 6.5 million La Rossa: 5,900,000 Attu Archipelago: c. 500 thousand
Regions with significant populations
La Rossa	5,900,000
Utlia	150,000
Casea	92,000
Deysachin	89,000
Tietero	68,000
Okrit	54,000
Kalam	41,000
Akaria	16,000
T'vaqi	3,000
Tokšahalna	31[2]
Other	c. 20,000
[1] The numbers on this scale correspond to round values in an octal number system, which La Rossa uses. [2] Includes former Dux Vincenzo Barozzo di Tolia, who fled to Tokšahalna after his ousting.

Rossans, occasionally known as La Rossans, are the native inhabitants of La Rossa, or more broadly any people of Rossan descent. Although La Rossa has no laws defining citizenship (simply inhabiting the island places one under the rule and protection of the Dux), the term has come to primarily be used to denote the ethnic group that defined the culture of the island prior to Second Calming, or more aptly, the Rossan Opening, when the island made contact and established trade relations with the rest of the archipelago.

The shared Rossan identity, while based in the the island's history and culture, is in part synthetic. Prior to the Calming, distinctions were made on regional levels, usually according to the boundaries of the city-provinces, as the cities that composed the nation remained poorly connected throughout the centuries due to the surrounding geography. However, with the revelation of other islands existing beyond the Storm following the Calming, the Entrance Commission was established with the goal of preparing the island for contact with other governments. While such plans initially fell through due to internal turmoil, the Entrance Commission's advice led to the creation of national symbols (such as the adoption of the redbell), a flag, and a military for non-domestic matters. Even the nation's name, unneeded until this point, arose in this period.

Despite the identity's recent origins, Rossan nationalism has begun to manifest itself in a number of ways, and symbolism associated with it has been adopted widely across the island's society. Rossan conservatism, a group of beliefs centered around longing for the island's old aristocratic system, overthrown in the revolution of La Denunzia, has largely defined the internationalist movement in its early years, which was led largely by the Six Families, the past nobility. However, Mare, the party advocating for internationalism and free trade, has begun to distance itself from such a legacy. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Isola, the party of workers' rights that sees itself as an ideological descendant of the goals of La Denunzia, has held a firmly isolationist line over the years, marked with a distrust of foreign workers and international alliances. However, such influence has begun to wane with the election of Dux Giulio Moretti in 57 PC.

History

Early history

Little is known about Rossan culture prior to the rise of the first cities, although some traces of ancient settlements have been found in the hills of Montesuvia, the mountain range that spans the center of the island. Despite the harsh living conditions, low temperatures and poor soil, it is believed that the island's first people willingly chose to stay in the mountains due to fears of the Storm that surrounded the island. Throughout the many settlements that composed the small, mostly nomadic population, it is believed that lifestyle was preserved and kept through storytelling and religion. Tempestry, a wide-ranging set of beliefs encompassing the stories passed down through oral tradition on the island, was characterized by warnings against moving from the safety of the mountains to the dangerous, turbulent coastline.

In the fourth millennium before the Calming (denoted as the seventh in the Rossan octal numerical system), mostly dispersed groups of people and villages are believed to have over time assembled into townships, eventually leading to the establishment of Averno, the first city-state on the island, in approximately 3250 TT. The city also showed the first signs of organized governance, which likely arose over time in attempts to enforce social cohesion in face of an emergent class-based hierarchy. According to founding legends, as enforcement turned to persecution, peaking during the reign of Serberius, calls of abandoning Averno for the coastline led to the self-imposed exile of several hundred people, then a significant portion of the city's population. The exiles would eventually establish the city of Mineria, in a bay shielded from the Storm.

Rossan city-states

Main article: City-states of La Rossa The period of the Rossan city-states, lasting between the establishment of Mineria around 3000 TT and the Unification of La Rossa in 1044 TT, was characterized by a rapidly dispersive movement of people that quickly settled the coastline of the island. Despite the rapid expansion, travel between cities remained difficult, leading to a number of city-states establishing their own forms of governance and developing their cultures somewhat independently of each other. The beliefs of Tempestry began to subtly morph, from casting the Storm as an inconquerable enemy to one that can only be vanquished through human resistance to it. Despite the harsh winds and weather which largely prohibited travel by the coastline, the coastline was abundant in arable land, leading to an explosive growth in population.

Trade emerged as a driving force of the latter period, in parts owing to the daring voyages of Constanzo Miglio di Padeno, who set the standards others followed. Becoming the progenitor of a wealthy dynasty, he became part of an aristocratic system that was clearly coming to emerge over the years. A number of merchant families and dynasties had begun to establish themselves across the city-states of the island, coming to concentrate much of the regional wealth and power of the time. Discoveries of silver underneath the mountains led to a prolonged period of conflict which regularly flared up over regional disputes and rights to plots of land. Wars of conquest, agreements, and various forms of coercion would lead to the collapse of most of the city-states on the island, usually subsuming them into their larger, more ruthless neighbors. The culture of the lesser would then become a part of the greater.

Unification

The Unification of La Rossa, brought on by a peace deal brokered by the Giuseppe Giannone di Salino, would led to the establishment of a shared government between the Six Families that had survived past wars and skirmishes, created with the responsibility of preserving peace on the island. Reflective of the mutual distrust of the various city states, the alliance was limited in scope. The Dux, a leading figure central to the arrangement elected internally by the aristocracy, would nonetheless come to accummulate power over the centuries, as confidence in dividends of peace and free trade grew. The discovery of printing would quicken this process, with the model of shared governance becoming firmly rooted in the island's society within a few centuries, although Duxes continued to hold a mostly restrained approach to many aspects of local and regional governance.

The betterment of transportation and communications technologies improved connections over the island, making trade and distant arrangements easier to manage. Viewing risks to their own rule, the Rossan government would quickly hold onto the means of such communications, actively limiting freedom of expression on the island, allowing their use only in limited, regulated purposes. Despite such restrictions, the rise in such technologies led to a rise in calls for liberalization, spread through covert publishings of various texts, for instance. This would culminate in two rebellions, the Spirit Revolution (106 TT), which was violently supressed, though led to limited reform, and La Denunzia (1 PC - 5 PC), which overthrew the island's aristocracy.

Post-Calming

The chaotic times after the revolt were amplified by the Second Calming, which had occured only a few years after the dictatorship of Dux Giulio Falcone was established. Aiming to establish a life of equality on an island that was increasingly becoming drained of resources, the revelation of a wider world led to as much excitement as it did unease. The Entrance Commission was established in 9 PC, envisaged as an advisory body that aimed to examine how contact should be made with other islands. Although plans for contact ultimately did not go through, the Commission's actions and reports led to the creation of a variety of institutions and symbols, thought essential for the establishment of a strong national identity to protect the Rossan way of life while respectfully making contact with the rest of the archipelago. Most symbols currently used, including the very name of the country, have arisen synthetically during this period, although they came to be widely adopted as ways of distinguishing La Rossa from the other islands of the world. With a transition to democracy and internal turmoil, however, other priorities took hold, although such contact was not staved off for long. In 41 PC, the Rossan Opening would establish governmental and trade relations with the other islands.

After the Calming, a number of people had fled La Rossa for political or economic reasons. The Rossan Opening, with its emphasis on establishing trade, aimed to reverse this course, a goal in which it was largely successful. La Rossa has since then attracted a number of migrant workers, mostly from developing nations of the House of Light, an economic alliance it is part of. Due to a lack of laws and decrees surrounding citizenship, such migrants have been treated the same as inhabitants of La Rossa on a legal level, although various forms of discrimination began to arise after the spread of isolationism. Regardless, governments since the Opening have largely sought good relations with neighbors and fostered cultural exchange, although such actions were largely based on geopolitical grounds.

Economy

Main article: Economy of La Rossa

La Rossa practices an industrial, mixed social market economy. In recent decades, the country has practiced a form of state-market cooperation, with certain key industries, such as inter-island transportation, being heavily subsidized in order to prop up the rest of the economy. In addition, companies owned by the Six Families, some of the largest on the island, have closely cooperated with Duxes in questions of formulating and enforcing industrial policy. Opponents have cast such actions as corrupt, and efforts have been made to break up the largest companies to create more competitive markets. In the present day, most work exists in the realm of manufacturing, although a sizeable portion of service jobs have arisen. Since La Denunzia, La Rossa has been a welfare state with a substantial safety net, although efforts to fight poverty and enforce stricter labor laws have substantially declined since the Rossan Opening. Regardless, the economy has consistently grown with the influx of trade, disregarding a short, albeit unstable period imminently before the ousting of Dux Vincenzo Barozzo di Tolia.

Religion

Main article: Tempestry

Throughout history, religion in La Rossa was mostly defined through Tempestry or Storm-Worship, a largely unified but widely practiced set of diverse beliefs centered around fearful reverence of the Storm that enveloped the island. Most prevalent in the island's early history, its role in society morphed with the establishment of cities across La Rossa's coastline, moving from fear surrounding it as an unstoppable force of nature set on inflicting pain, towards a rivalling resentment as a foe humanity could challenge, and eventually tame. It is likely that the religion served as a strong motivator in the settlement of the coastline, working to limit losses of morale in spite of the conditions. While the religion is likely to have independently emerged in many places across the island, connections and trade are thought to have helped meld the various beliefs into a more coherent, though fractured religion.

As the island industrialized, and the Storm gradually became less of an existential threat, the beliefs began to slowly fade away, having been based in a challenging environment that was rapidly being replaced. The Calming struck a final blow that finally led to the waning religion's death. Nowadays, the island remains mostly irreligious, although minor groups have continued to hold onto religious fervor. The Cult of the Open Sky, born out of the Calming, has largely replaced a rivalry with the Storm with a hopeful appreciation of the clear skies that came after it, although the organization's membership is far from numerous. Religions from other islands, however, have made far more of an impact due to cultural exchange. Modhesianism, spread through missionaries and migrant workers, boasts a small, but significant base of believers on the island, including a rising number of native Rossans. Cuscorrado Papregoli, a Rossan Modhesianist, was significantly involved in the ousting of Dux Vincenzo Barozzo di Tolia.

Fashion

Necktie!

Art

Colscritto, or "knife-writing",