Gnolls

Gnolls have poor eyesight, but make up for it with their extremely keen senses of hearing and smell.

Before a gnoll undergoes a coming-of-age ritual or ceremony, the young do not have their own name.  All youth are simply called 'anak.'  When a gnoll comes of age - typically around age 8, though this can vary significantly by tribe and individual circumstance - they also earn their name.  Many gnoll names are deed-names that reference some action, deed or prominent personality trait that they exhibited before or during their coming-of-age.

By Melisa Cecilia Most gnoll societies, and especially the four unconquered tribes, are strict matriarchal dynasties. Their leaders are females since males usually don't stick around for too long in the same clan after they matured. Male gnolls tend to venture outside their clan and join a new clan after a while, this resulted in them having to start from zero in the new clan (similar to the "merantau" concept in Minagkabau Indonesia, Minang people are also matriarchies). In a rare case where a male gnoll decided to stick in their clan, was born from a "royalty line" and is the eldest child, he'll inherit the leadership status of his mother once she retired. For most clans, the eldest daughters tend to be the ones that take their mother leadership status. Due to this tendency, gnoll societies usually put more importance on their female offsprings.       Gnoll societies also don't run only on one dominant dynasty or clan like humans, rulers of gnoll tribes are made of alliances of dominant clans within those tribes. All of the dominant clans has the same level of status and they collectively shared power to run a gnoll society together. Sometimes when the previous clan leader has children that has the same level of power, they'll each create their own clan and rule together in an alliance. Although the higher ranks are shared, gnolls are very strict on hierarchy. Resources are shared not equally but proportionally according to each family ranks. The lower ranking clans has to stick with having much less resources than the higher ranking clans, especially when it comes to food. Better quality food are prioritized to the ruling clans and the lower ranking clans will still accept enough food although lesser in quality. Access to technology, magical and non common items are also restricted only to the ruling clans. Most lower ranking families tend to teach themselves nature magic due to limited access to more formal form of magic.

Much of gnoll history is troubled and fractured.  In the distant past, legends tell of a time when all of the gnoll tribes banded together under the mythical hero Kanahaha, but after the demonic threats were pushed back their Great Alliance fractured and the fourteen tribes, each led by one of the fourteen heroes, wandered and spread across the world.  Without the looming threats from the abyss to bring them together the tribes were often plagued with bickering, skirmishes, and raids on each others' territories.  When the human kingdom of of Cretis began its age of conquest, becoming the Cretesian Empire in the process, eight of the tribes were conquered and pressed into slavery and two of the tribes who refused to surrender were completely wiped out. When the empire collapsed, a period of decline spanning roughly 200 years, most gnolls were able to win back their freedom.  Today, there remains a significant cultural divide between the conquered tribes and the four that managed to evade the Cretesian conquest.  In many kingdoms that arose from the fracturing of the empire, gnolls continue to face discrimination even to the current day, which has led to most gnolls avoiding large cities and going back to a more nomadic way of life.  Among the unconquered tribes however, their society has evolved to produce modest-sized cities scattered across the savannas and forests that they call home.

The Gnolls of Dunia differ from gnolls spanning most of the rest of the D&D multiverse in that they never fell sway to the call of the demon lord Yeenoghu. Legends passed down through countless generations of oral tradition tell of a time in ages long past when great heroes walked the earth doing battle with even greater evils. There are a number of legends that tell the tale of Kanahaha (or variously Chanaka, Kanani, or Ankanaha, depending on the tribe) and The Devourer, an ancient evil with no name. Details of the story vary widely with the region, but the basic plot follows the demigod Kanahaha, her mortal half-sister and a small party of incidental characters who are tasked with confronting the Devourer. The evil god's followers gain power through grotesque cannibalistic rituals, but by remaining pure and with the aid of three holy artifacts of the gods themselves Kanahaha is able to fight through the debased cultists and confront the dark power, ultimately casting it into a bottomless chasm and sealing it by pushing a mountain over the opening. At some point in her journey (the order and importance of events depends on local tradition), she willingly blinds herself by burning out her nostrils with either a burning yew branch or a hot iron rod, which saves her from the temptations of the smell of flesh that the Devourer tries to use to make Kanahaha break her oaths and bind her spirit to itself.   Because of the stories of Kanahaha and the Devourer, eating any meat that comes from an intelligent creature is strictly forbidden in the vast majority of gnoll societies, and they are quick to stamp out any signs of cannibalism. The efforts seem to have worked, as the few interplanar scholars who have chanced upon Dunia have left amazed by the lack of demonic taint or influence in gnoll societies, and any gnoll who encountered one of Yeenoghu's twisted creations would surely be repulsed by such an abomination.