V is for Venice

V

I'm ashamed to admit that I didn't want to go to Venice.   Really.  Part of my History of Art degree involved spending three months in Venice and I fought tooth and nail to avoid this horrible fate.  Quite why I was so against the idea is now lost to me, but if I had the chance to go back I'd smack the 20 year old me pretty hard and tell her not to be such a daft baggage.  Luckily, I had no choice.  Got off the train at Santa Lucia station, looked across the canal and fell in love.  Reluctantly and irrevocably.  My telegram home to let my mother know I'd arrived safely was short and to the point.  "Damn."

So, what's to love so much?

Well, it's so practical for one thing.  For all the glamour of the palaces lining the Grand Canal, at bottom they are just flashy docks.  You can trace the history of Renaissance and Baroque architecture in those buildings.  All of them were built by great Venetian families with two purposes in mind.  Showing off outrageously and allowing easy access to storehouse space.

It hasn't really changed.  I think of Venice as a kind of hermit crab.  It is built on the sound principle of accretion.  Bits get stuck on here and there, but since the city can't expand, the basic structure and layout are the same as they were 900 years ago.

The Rialto Bridge is a comparative newcomer on the scene.  Prior to the stone one opened in 1591, there had been a wooden structure.  This eventually collapsed under the weight of a major procession, but can be seen in the picture below.

By Carpaccio (painted around 1490)

The replacement was the familiar thing still around today.

By Canaletto (c.1750)

Present day, courtesy of the Italian Tourist board

All of Venice is like this.  The street map would be just as familiar to Tintoretto as it is to any baffled tourist.

The hermit crab analogy holds up in another way too.  The Venetians were notorious as pickers up of unconsidered trifles to send home to La Serenissima.  A bronze horse here, a gold pillar there.  There is no particular rhyme or reason to it.  If it looked pretty, or was valuable or could show the world that Venetians had been there and done that, home it went.

Unlike, say, the beautifully organised Renaissance perfection of Vicenza down the road, Venice lacks any kind of unifying theme.  The result should be a mess, but like the hermit crab, it has a style all its own.  San Marco is the perfect representation of this and prompted Mark Twain to say that the basilica looked like a "vast bug taking a meditative walk."

Piazza San Marco (Canaletto again).  Note the magpie effusion of the basilica in the background.  Note also the huge campanile.  It fell down in 1902 and was lovingly rebuilt to recreate the 1514 original.  Amazingly nobody was hurt in the collapse and no buildings were destroyed.

It wasn't just pretty objects either.  Venice was well known as a melting pot of ideas and technology as well.  Many of them were picked up from the dangerous east and the Serenissima was regarded with permanent suspicion by rest of Europe.  Venice has been a haven for many outcasts as long as they were useful outcasts.  Practicality has always taken precedence over any need for orthodoxy.  Indeed,  the Venetians gave their real devotion to the Serenissima - that mythic aglomoration of ideas and place that combined government and city in one.

For the first time visitor, Venice is a hideously confusing city.  Although it is very small indeed (you can walk it end to end in an hour), it is also, without question, the easiest place in the world to get lost in.  Helpful signs on the walls mean nothing at all.  Wide (by Venetian standards) calle* peter out entirely or end in canals.  Narrow calle with no apparant exit open abruptly onto small unlabelled campi*.

At this point you can either consult your map and get even more confused or take the Red Queen's advice and walk in the opposite direction to the one you think you should be going in.  Doing so results in you finding your destination almost immediately.  If you're lucky, you may end up at Paolin, purveyers of the best ice cream I have ever tasted.

I've long wanted to build a campaign around Venice.  It is the perfect amalgam of the an urban setting with dangerous areas, Byzantine rules and mysterious people.  Writing this has reminded me of it and once Mikelmerck is slightly more concrete, this is where I will turn my attention.

Beautiful Venice.  You bizarre product of extreme pragmatism and magpie instinct.  I'd go back in a heartbeat.


* - calle.  The Venetian term for a street
* - campi.  Plural of campo (small square)

Source of much inspiration

Bolton Castle in Castle Bolton

Ah, Yorkshire Dales, how do I love thee.

We've lived here nearly ten years now, and I'm still stunned everytime I drive up into the Dales.  Yesterday, Castle Bolton was my destination.  I narrowly avoided being late for lunch with the Swaledale Festival team due to taking the wrong road out of Richmond and ending up going to Castle Bolton via Marske and Marrick rather than over the Bellerby tank road.

As it happened, that turned out to be a good wrong choice.  Coming down off the tops, there was just enough mist left over for the whole of Swaledale to be semi-hidden behind a kind of ethereal cloud.  This sounds (and is) fanciful, but it reminded me of exactly where the notion of Mikelmerck as a border country came from. 

Purpose of visit - to scout the place out as a possible venue for some kind of awesome community drama project for 2013.  Said project is the combined brainchild of me, old mate Chris and the artistic director of the Swaledale Festival. 

Bolton Castle (confusingly situated in the hamlet of Castle Bolton, which mostly consists of one small church and the castle), has a ton of potential.  Most conveniently, a lot of it is still intact.  Even more conveniently, the intact bits include some large rooms linked by corridors.  There is potential here for a wonderful promenade performance of something.

Swaledale's event organiser and I hopped from room to room squeaking with delight as we discovered plentiful power sockets and handy niches suitable for suspending lights, hiding cast members and generally setting up some blissfully immersive scenes.

Before long, we'd conjured the mental image of the audience walking through a ship wreck as drowned sailors and ship rigging whirled around them to the accompaniment of a sung lament.  To be followed by arrival on a sandy beach where they would be greeted by rambuctious fisherfolk salvaging the wreck.  To be followed by them being met by the king of the island and welcomed to a feast and a tourney.

We must looked have a right pair of idiots.

Now to get to work on some serious plans.

I want it to happen.

Mikelmerck - Thurizhelm

Thurizhelm is an oddity.  Consisting of three large circles, each linked by a broad processional way, it is the ancient meeting place for the old races of Mikelmerck.

The linking paths are lined with barrows - for only the greatly honoured were buried here.  In the early days of the Duchy, before humans got the upper hand, Fey, Dawners and giants met once a year on neutral ground.  Here they held Tynwald (discussion) and renewed their agreements about land and custom.

No blood is ever to be spilled in anger at Thurizhelm.  Much treasure may lie within its barrows, but none except the truly foolhardy would dream of venturing past its defences.

Mikelmerck - Markets and knitting

Markets are a regular feature of life in Strangmont.  While barter is the commonplace day to day currency, for anything more out of the way than sheep products, a market is the only sensible option.  Strangmont holds the marketing rights for Mikelmerck and makes full use of them.

Craftsmen gather each month to trade goods and information in equal measure.  Here one may purchase basic supplies as well, as other more exotic things.  Very occasionally, fey traders arrive and their stalls are regarded with a mixture of longing and deep suspicion.  There is, as everyone knows, no such thing as a good fey bargain.  Or at least none that is good for the recipient.

The Duchy crafters have their specialities.  Knitwear is a major source of income for many families.  Nor is it to be despised.  Due to the hardy nature of Mikelmerck sheep, clothing made from their wool has extraordinary durability.  Some say that it is better than armour.  It must be confessed, however, that wearing Mikelmerck wool next to the skin is not recommended for the weak.

Each garment is unique.  Families pass down their pattens and guard them jealously.  In some cases, those pattens have particular virtues.  Members of the Thwaith clan knit charms against the cold into their clothing, while those of the Culd family have a long history of knitting clear sight into their clothes.  Some knitters will make special clothing to order for favoured customers.

Water-warded scarf with additional fey protection.  From the private collection of Scrivener Wainwright

Mikelmerck - The Leap

A simple stone cairn on the edge of a cliff is known locally as the Leap.

Here a foolish noble did his best to prove his indestructability and all but succeeded.  Waylance Aske, scion of a noble house was determined to prove that the blood of the fey ran in his veins.  His chosen method was to ride his horse off the edge of the cliff - certain in his own mind that the fey would protect him.  In the event, gravity paid more attention than any passing fey and he landed with broken legs on his still more broken horse.  Rescued the following day, he claimed to the end of his life that his survival proved his fey blood.  He was not believed.

For all his foolishness, Waylance may have been right.  It is possible he simply misinterpreted an older and stranger story.  Long ago, it is said, poets and bards would take the Leap.  For the worthy, the fey would catch and hold them.  When they returned home, they would have the words of the fey in their ears ever after.  There was a price, of course.  Their ravings were couched in such terms that few could understand them.  If any leaped and survived, their names are unknown.  For those that did not, their bones still lie at the foot of the Leap.

Sometimes their spirits still walk.

Mikelmerck - the caves beneath Strangmont Castle

Top down view of the caves.

The above map shows some of the difficulties involved in finding the caves beneath the Castle.  It is not that they don't exist, but the entrances are many and most lead to nothing in particular.  Nor are those entrances easy to find. 

Seen from the ground, there is merely limestone cliff rising steeply.  Covered in trees and brambles, it is not inaccessible, but it is inhospitable.  None of the openings are visible either from the top of the cliffs or from ground level.  If one could fly, perhaps the chances would be greater - and indeed watching the nesting patterns of birds has so far offered the best clues to possible entrances.

If Walt Mukel ever fulfils his dreams of finding a useful entrance, he will be hard pressed to make any use of it.  He has neither the skills, nor, if the truth be told, the inclination to go burrowing among the rocks.  Such activity is far below his sense of self-worth.  Paying the intrepid is one option, but he would need to be very sure he could trust such a group.  After all, he has not spent the best part of his adult life looking for secrets to have them blabbed about by some random adventurer.

Mikelmerck - The Strangmont Seneschal (8th day of advent)

I have every intention of doing backdated posts for the 6th and 7th days as well, but this is what you get today.  

The position of Seneschal at Strangmont Castle is hereditary.  This is due to an error of wording in the original contract, but after 700 years it is a little late to be setting right a bureaucratic error.  In any case, to do so would be to bring down the wrath of the Mukel family.  Never a large clan, they are nonetheless important and have made themselves more so with their tenacious hold on the post of Seneschal.

As the years have gone by and the Castle's importance as a politcal seat has dwindled, so too have the duties declined.  In honesty, they are now mostly ceremonial and for most of the people of Strangmont, the Seneschal is a kind of local joke.  Naturally nobody says so outright, but the tolerant politeness shown to the current holder speaks for itself.

Walt Mukel - Hereditary Seneschal of Strangmont Castle

Walt Mukel is not happy about this and longs for the glory days.  Now in his early thirties and unmarried, he has a two great ambitions.  The first is to wed so the line can continue through him rather than some outlier cousin.  His second great ambition is to find the caves beneath the Castle.  To this end he spends much of his time searching the extensive records for clues.

Walt has been postponing the search for a wife mainly because he feels he simply cannot spare the time.  He is also uncertain quite how to broach the matter.  He is anxious to avoid marrying someone unable to appreciate the importance of his lineage.  Locally, Walt is reckoned a good catch - being a pompous bore is not a crime, after all. 

Walt is often to be found fulfilling his duty to walk the walls with obsessive interest.  He always takes a small hammer and a tape measure with him, but hides both when anyone comes into view.

Mickelmerck - Background to a borderland (1st day of advent)

Mikelmerck has always been borderland.

It borders the world of the fey and the mortal lands.
It borders the north and south of Albion, forming a barricade for both.
It borders fierce beauty and incredible danger.
Creativity and pragmatism.
Some say life and death.

Sleeping Older

For the followers of Cooshboth, the answers are simple.  Mikelmerck was created in the image of heaven and anyone who doesn't believe it can lump it.  Cooshboth is a latecomer however, and in the manner of latercomers, has simply appropriated what was already believed.

In reality, the Cooshboth answer is both the truth and not true enough.  Mikelmerck is the cauldron of the Older.  Here is where they made their first steps on the world and it contains the best and worst of their creation.  Here they marched on the land and made creatures.  Here they rest, waiting for the day when their creatures end their fumbling lives and they can start again.

The Older have no understanding of good and evil.  They simply are.  In mortal terms, the best you can say is that they have a sense of balance.  For now they rest, stirring only occasionally.  Such stirring is not a minor thing and their dreaming thoughts and shifts have profound effects on the landscape and the people. 

Straddling the mortal and fey worlds, the borders are thin.  Where the Olders sleep, the fey slip through.  Ever curious, they find Mikelmerck alluring.  It leads them to fresh places, new things.  Once, this was fey country, but they were driven back by the arrival of humans.

Stumbling into Mikelmerck, humans did what everyone who visits it has done.  They try to take it.  The history of Mikelmerck is a history of invasions.  None has succeeded.  The land lets them in and tames them, making each new arrival a part of itself.

Mikelmerck - Boothler Samael

Boothler Samael was a most unusual man.  Well known as Mikelmerck's foremost magician, he was also a noted entertainer.  Indeed performance was his first trade.  As a young man, he was called to duty in the court masques of the Sarathame kings and had a successful career as a noted dancer and orator.  His light comic touch was much admired and he was a favourite both on and off the stage.

Advancing rapidly in favour, he passed into the inner circle of the kings and thence to some of their closest secrets.  Records of this period are sparse and Samael himself revealed nothing of note in his autobiography.  What is certain is that he left the court and with the blessing of Rickart III, proposed and built a circuit of theatres around Mikelmerck.  All were on noted leyline points.  He and his troupe of actor-mages walked the circuit time and again bringing protection and amusement in equal measure.  Now, the only surviving venue is in Strangmont and it is here that Boothler Samael's ghost resides.

Like many of the great Mikelmerckian dead, his work continues after death and is likely to do so for some time.  He had no successor.  Subsequent Sarathames moved away from theatre and its protective magic and many of his secrets are lost.  Boothler Samael talents have not been forgotten, but his legacy at present is greatly diminished.  There are still actors, to be sure, but they perform for their own amusement.  The deeper meaning of their activities eludes them.  Even so, they are, unwittingly, maintaining his tradition and Samael's ghost has not given up hope that his protective magic may find a successor.

He sits in the gallery of the Strangmont theatre, kicking the boards at the rare good performance.  To be "kicked by Samael" is therefore a great compliment.  The old door keeper, Ym Rowsel knows the ghost well.  His eyes are ever on the alert for signs of true talent.  Boothler Samael is still waiting patiently to teach his skills and Ym's task is to find a suitable protege.

Mikelmerck - the Owd Man

Lead isn't what it was.  A thousand years of battling Mikelmerck are drawing to a close as the Owd Man takes over.  Back when the Cristarubrae started to settle and push aside the indigenous tribes, they delved deep into the dale.  Ever an efficient people, they ignored the old stories and were proved right for many years.  The emerging lead was of dramatically high quality, much exported and a source of riches to the Duchy.

The Owd Man took his time to respond to the rape of his mountains.  His breath alone took many.  Whole shafts could be closed down when the Owd Man's breath swept through the defenceless.  Birds and animals are quicker to sense his presence and many a miner blessed the day he took a sparrow into the shafts with him. 

Worse followed.  The precious lead seemed to withdraw, pulled further in and further away.  Dangerous enough to follow then, but made the worse by the Owd Man's voice.  Following his deceptive sound is nearly always fatal.  Some also say that if the brave follow, they will be taken to richer seams.  Some even claim to have found such seams, but it is hard to believe.  Even if they come back they are greatly changed.  Strangely distant from their loved ones, they seek only to return to the mines and the voice that lures them ever onwards.

There is still a small industry, but it falls to the truly desperate with no other recourse.  The Owd Man is regarded as one of the Older.  Little can be done to placate him as he wishes only to be left alone.  The need for survival may not let that happen, and the few who still work the mines say his voice is getting stronger.

Mikelmerck - the Roosh, the Washerwoman and the Duck Race

The Roosh is a dangerous river.  Never wide, it is nevertheless full of strong currents ready to trap the unwary.  Each year, visitors underestimate its power.  Running the whole length of Mikelmerck, the source lies high and tumbles relentlessly through the dale forming small waterfalls as it goes.  Notorious as one of the fastest rivers in Albion, it has been known to break its banks and flood, rendering the little arable land useless.

Jenny Greenteeth abandoned it long ago - Mikelmerckian children do not wander near its banks for her to entrap and she has been swept downstream herself too often.  Not so the Washerwoman.  She is seldom seen, but ever-present.  None bar a few of the powerful even know her name, but all fear her.  To see the Washerwoman is to see death.

When the river changes colour, the Washerwoman is at work.  She brings the floods and stirs the currents as she pummels the cloth of men's lives.  The Roosh is entirely her creature and she commands it.  For the many villages that run alongside the river, she is a being to be propitiated.

Customs and Places notes that in Strangmont they drop offerings from the Green Bridge every spring.  These are wooden waterfowl, lovingly made over the winter.  The wooden creatures are followed down the banks by the people as they race towards the finishing point.  The maker of the winning duck has the right to climb the Strangmont waterfall at midsummer and bath in the Roosh without harm.  Wainwright adds that this privilege is not often taken.  The number of surviving waterfowl is said to portend the likelyhood of flooding for the coming year, but Wainwright concludes that this is an unreliable method of prediction.

Mikelmerck - the Child's Path

Strangmont Castle is built on limestone.  Caves honeycomb the rocks beneath it and it is said that there are secret tunnels leading from the Castle to other places.

One such tunnel has been discovered, but with tragic consequences.  Some years ago, while digging the foundations of a new treasure house, soldiers uncovered a narrow passage running under the castle.  Unable to fit into this tunnel, they found a bold child and asked him to go down in their stead.  They planned to track his passage by his singing and at first all went well.  The trail lead them beyond the walls and along the banks of the Roosh, but at the boundary of Strangmont, the singing stopped.

No more was heard.  The bold child was never seen again.  Nowadays, the Child's Path is marked by a stone at the point he was last heard.  Every year, the townsfolk follow that ill-omened path asking the bold child for forgiveness.  According to Scrivener Wainwright, the ghostly voice of the  bold child can still be heard sometimes, singing and laughing below ground.  It is said that such sounds presage danger to Strangmont.

Mikelmerck - Strangmont Castle

Strangmont is the only town of real note in Mikelmerck.  It was made so by the Sarathame kings as a gesture of defiance to the older powers.  To do this, they built a majestic castle (most likely with fey help).  Set high on a limestone outcropping, overlooking the Roosh, Strangmont Castle has never been successfully attacked.

The town perforce grew up around it, since Goffroi Sarathame removed all rights to market from the surrounding area.  Enclosed by long-gone city walls, Strangmont was a stronghold and a statement in one.

In the present time, while still important in Mikelmerck, Strangmont is no longer the seat of Sarathame power.  It remains an important symbol to the family, and the Progress both begins and ends here.  Although a fever of activity marks that event, for the remainder of the year, the Seneschal's duties are light.  Most of them are symbolic. 

Every evening, the Seneschal must walk the circuit of the Castle to ensure that the walls yet hold.  Long ago, a local drunkard stumbled on a gap and found his way into the network of caves beneath.  There he claimed to have found sleepers and a horn waiting to waken them.  Few believed him, but the Seneschal's nightly walk gives some credence to the tale.

Mikelmerck - the Fend Goat

High on crags he tore his rags

Down by thorn he blew his horn

Hid in lee, brak' his knee

Over beck he brak' his neck

Under Fend we'll mak' his end

Each year as the Progress comes to its end, the villagers of Fend enact a curious ritual.  A visitor describes it like this.

"We arrived a week before the festival and the whole village was engrossed in the construction of an effigy.  Everyone contributed, whether clothing or stuffing, but only the smith makes the mask.  They call it the Goat and set it on display at the edge of the village facing out towards the moors.  Everyone who arrives at this time is expected to pay their respects - and maybe even leave a small gift.

After the three days of feasting and honour, the Goat is carried around the village and treated most regally.  At the smithy however, the Goat is adorned with his new mask and the villagers now start to drag him around their boundaries.  At each stopping point, the village gathers and chants a verse  before carrying the Goat to a bonfire and burning him.

I asked what was the origin of this tale and was told that it was very ancient and believed to have once been part of the king-making of Mikelmerck.  If this is the case, I am glad I did not live in such times!"

(from "Mikelmerck's Customs and Places" by Scrivener Wainwright)


Mr Wainwright's description is accurate.  He may have romanticised the mythic elements and it the opinion of most that the Goat represents nothing more than an opportunistic thief who met his end at the hands of the villagers of Fend.

Mikelmerck - The Drowned Seven

The lake of the Drowned Seven is a place of ill renown.  By day, it is true, some fishermen scoff at the old stories and pull in a good catch, but as night falls, they leave with relief.  Dawn and dusk are the most dangerous times, say the villagers.  The truly unlucky may hear the bells below the water and those that do are never quite the same.

The bells ring to waken the Drowned Seven.  As to whether their wakening is a good thing or a bad thing - much depends on who you speak to.  The priests of Cooshboth say that the Seven are angels, locked away until Mikelmerck is worthy to receive them.  Others are less optimistic. 

Regardless of who or what they are, the Drowned Seven have waited many, many centuries for their awakening.  Deep in their lake, they sometimes seem to stir a little, sending curious fish into the nets of the fisherfolk brave enough to cast there.  Sometimes too, pieces of stonework and even ancient gold have been cast up. 

Around the edges of the lake are rocks of strange sizes and shape.  According to the old tale, these are the remains of people who stayed to listen to the bells.  What is certain is that their number grows year on year.  One or two at a time, nothing to be overly worried about.

Mikelmerck and the guarding dead

One of the peculiarities of Mikelmerck is the belief that the dead earn their keep.  They are fully occupied in patrolling the thin boundaries and remain active.  Every family keeps some token of their ancestors in the house and on Cooshboth's Eve when the days grow darker, they bring them out to remind them of their duties.  The following day, All Heads, a few especially aged or honoured tokens are rewarded with retirement from their toil and are given a final send off with special cakes and good ale.

The hardheaded Mikelmerckens are slightly wary of continuing to work in their well-earned afterlife.  Because of this, it is not unknown for bargains to be struck before death for the length of time they will be expected to guard the boundaries.  Such bargains normally involve the transfer of property or sheep to compensate the living for the future loss of protection.  One of the prime duties of the traveling clergy is to adjudicate an appropriate length of service.  10 years is the norm, but in the case of particularly strong willed or powerful people, the family may ask for a longer protection.  In this case the negotiations can become protracted and messy, leading to unseemly squabbles.

Most of the truly powerful accept that they will spend a long period guarding the bounds of Mikelmerck.  Boothler Samael has not yet been granted respite after 300 years.  Nor is it likely he will be until another mage of similar strength appears.

The hidden terrors of Mikelmerck

Fabian has produced an elegant distillation of Mikelmerck here. 

We got on a bit of a roll again and batted more ideas around for what kind of dangers such a place might have.  Mechanically, adventuring sites are many.

Ruined (or inhabited) castles - this is border country
Out in the wilds - notoriously hard to run I find, but so much fun when they work
Village crawling and investigation - Mikelmerck has only two or three places that could properly be called towns
Fetch quests are a given in this far-flung land where ordinary people simply don't want to go away from whatever it is they'd rather be doing

Underpinning all of this is the sense of life going on.  Nothing much seems to happen on the surface in Mikelmerck - people get on with their lives and do the things they've always done.  It's a tough life, but the land is beautiful and the inhabitants feel deeply possessive of it.  All the time of course, they're holding the boundaries, but not in any very conscious way.

The festivals and events that hold life together are mostly local.  The Nine Men of Muriz happens every year, but the performances only concern the village of Telrick.

Performance of all kinds underpin many of the warding rituals.  Boothler Samael the mage understood this and built performance sites around Mikelmerck on specific nodes.  His traveling band of mages wandered the route performing as they went and keeping the boundaries true.  Not at all coincidentally, this was a period of stability and growing wealth for Mikelmerck.  Now all but one have long gone, and the last may be under threat.  Again, it is not coincidence that disease is breaking out more frequently and the needed visitors are not coming in such profusion.

Visitors matter to Mikelmerck.  How else is the glory of the Duchy to be maintained unless it is seen?