Jürgen Hubert
First Post
In this section of my homebrew setting, I have attempted to outline the basic structure of society.
Comments? Suggestions?
Class and Station
In most of Urbis, differences of class and station between members of the same society are readily apparent. The rich and powerful live at the top of the mightiest buildings, the poor scuttle in the shadows of the same buildings. The upper classes are always healthy and well-dressed, the lower classes are frequently diseased and often dressed in little more than rags. The slum-dwellers work themselves into an early grave, the movers and shakers of city-states getressurecteduntil their bodies finally succumb to old age.
It used to be that status was primarily determined by how much land a person owned. The more land a land owned, the wealthier and more influental he was. This system was often codified in aristocratic titles that were hereditary. But while remnants of this can still be seen in many places, land ceased to be the deciding factor in a person’s worth when the nexus towerscame into widespread use. Whoever controlled a city controlled its nexus towers, and their vast magical potential with them. But “control” of a city can be achieved through many different methods - through force of arms, control of vital resources, or skillful political alliances. No longer is one’s station in life fixed at birth - with enough determination, smarts, and plain good luck, anyone can claw his way to the top and proclaim himself ruler of a city.
At least, that’s the theory. But for most of the poor starving in a slum, the palatial estates of their rulers remain as out of reach as they did in earlier times.
Slaves and Serfs
Slaves and serfs have the lowest station of all people. They have in common that their lives are not their own. Even the poorest freeman can, at least in theory, emigrate from a city and try to make his fortune in another city. Not so slaves and serfs - they cannot move away without their master’s permission, they cannot marry without their master’s permission, and they cannot make a single life-altering choice without getting their master’s approval first.
Slaves are the actual property of another person. They can be bought and sold, and there is nothing they can legally do against this. Often, they can killed with impunity by their masters, and if another person kills them it is regarded as a crime against another person’s property, and not manslaughter. Some slaves have considerable freedom in going after their daily activities - but this is a privilege granted to them by their master, and not a right, and it can be revoked at any time. Slaves are either the children of slaves or were captured in a war or raid. Some people sell themselves into slavery (or are sold by others) to cover their debts.
Serfs are usually considered people by most legal systems, though usually with lesser rights than freemen. Their masters usually have some obligation towards them, like protecting them from attacks of monsters and other outsiders, or buying food for them in times of hunger, though these obligations are rarely enforced. Serfs are usually the children of other serfs - their ancestors pledged themselves to a ruler in exchange for protection. With the decline of the traditional feudal systems, such contracts become rarer. Another form of serfdom is used by certain churches - sometimes, the main money earner of a family dies while still in his prime, and leaves several dependents behind. These dependants then ask a church of have him raised.Since it would normally be impossible for a poor family to pay the money necessary for a Raise Dead spell, they agree to a generational contract- the family pledges to become serfs for a certain number of generations (eight is typical) in return for the spell.
Slavery and serfdom are becoming rarer in the world of Urbis, and these institutions are even outlawed in some of the more enlightened regions.
The Working Poor
Ever since an advanced understanding of the principles of agriculture and a massive use of magic have worked together to make bumper crops a regular occurrence, a much lower potion of the general population had to work in agriculture. In feudal times, nine out of ten people worked the fields. Today, only three out of ten people still do so.
Most can only work as menial laborers. They take on any job that was too low-paying for the guilds to bother with them - heavy lifting at the myriad construction sites that dot the cities, helping with the annual harvest, weaving, and so on. They can’t be chosy about their jobs, since they know that there are less jobs than poor people, they can be fired at any time, and there often a dozen people competing for the same job.
The truth is that many of these working poor are worse off than slaves in other regions. A slave can at least be assured a place to sleep, something to eat, and clothes to wear, no matter how low their quality. A member of the working poor has no such certainities - he has to pay for everything, and if he can’t pay, he will have to sleep on the streets, starve, and watch his clothes fall apart. A slave has at least some worth in the eyes of his owner. A poor man without a job is of no good to anyone.
Maintaining a stable of poor workers is also often cheaper and more effective for the wealthy than owning slaves - a fact that probably explains the decline of slavery better than any supposed moral enlightenment! A slave has certain needs that must be provided for, and when all is said and done he makes a poor worker because he has no better motivation for working than avoiding the whip. A working poor can be paid very low wages, made to spend them in the employer’s stores and dormitories, and he will still be motivated to work because he knows he could fall even further…
Other poor people want the “easy way out” and fall into a life of crime. Some work as beggars, pick-pockets, burglars or prostitutes, and others join criminal organisation. Most come to a bad end - they bleed to death in a small alley or rot away in the prisons. Still, there are enough tales of criminals who either retire wealthy after a spectacular coup or become crimelords and gain access to the halls of power in a city to inspire others to follow in their footpaths. And sometimes, these tales turn out to be true. And these chances, while low, are better than the misery that is guranteed to those who are poor and honest...
Craftsmen and Professionals
Keeping a city running smoothly requires more than just brute labor and a few people who tell others what to do. Creating high-quality items, trading goods to places far and near, or overseeing lesser workers, requires skills that can only be developed through years of training. The craftsmen and professionals have just these neccessary skills, and they are usually able to make a good living out of it. Since there is usually a high demand for their skills, they don't have to fear being fired and replaced like the unskilled workers do. They frequently organize into guilds to increase their power and set standards of quality, and to take care of the dependents of a guild member who dies. These guilds usually try to maintain a monopoly in their city through whatever means neccessary, be they fair or foul.
The upper ranks of many guilds are often considered part of the ruling classes - they certainly command enough money, resources and influence to make the rulers of a city take notice. And in some cities, the guild leaders are the rulers of a city.
All in all, while a guild member has to work long hours day after day, he is at least sure that he can earn a decent living for the foreseeable future. And there are worse fates in the world of Urbis.
The Ruling Classes
In some cities, a family of nobles rules. In others, a council of guild leaders or merchants determines the city's policies. And elsewhere, a ruthless despot and his circle of friends have slaughtered their way to the throne.
Regardless of the specific form the rulership of a city takes, all rulers have a few things in common. They must smart, skilled in the arts of politics, and ruthless in the application of their power. Those who don't meet these qualifications usually don't last long and are replaced by those who are smarter and more ruthless than they are.
The perks of being at the top are many. More gold than any sane person could possibly spend in his lifetime (but many rulers overspend nonetheless), easy access to Ressurection spells, and the powers of life and death to wield over lesser mortals. Yet a ruler has many enemies who want his power for themselves. People who will go to any length to slander him, steal his allies, and make sure that he stays dead after he is slain. There are many ways of attacking someone, whether through financial, political, or magical means. Anyone who wants to stay in power needs to be ready for all of them at all times.
This means that no ruler can survive without allies. A ruler at the very least needs a trusted circle of advisors who keep watch for any threats for him - but how is he supposed to know whether his advisors are trustworthy?
The most successful rulers form dynasties, where their descendants follow in their footsteps. The ruler's family knows that it must always present a united front to outside threats - no matter what their internal divisions might be. For if the ruler's enemies find any weak links in the family, they can bring the ruler down, and with him, the clan's power base is gone, and the ruler's relatives are rendered helpless. And it is traditional in these circumstances to kill all relatives, lest one of them return and make a claim for the throne...
The young in these families are usually either subjected to the strictest form of discipline to make sure they will work hard for the honor and glory of the family when they are older, or they are left to their own devices to scheme their way to rulership - which usually means killing off all contenders. In the first case, the adults will take on incredible hardships to advance the cause of their family and gain merit in the eyes of their elders. In the second case, the adults are master schemers without peer who can usually see any plots against them from miles away.
Ruling a city offers many advantages. But those who take on the mantle of rulership are often divorced in many ways from their fellow humans - their entire way of thinking is so alien that commoners can rarely understand their true motivations.
Comments? Suggestions?
