The sarrukh, a reptilian race known as the progenitors of the Scaled Ones, establish the first great civilization: the realm of Okoth, south of modern-day Mulhorand. Within a hundred years, the sarrukh are spread across the entire region of Faerûn.
History of Faerûn
Faerûn is an old land filled with a multitude of lost civilisations and countless wonders. Over tens of thousands of years, many great empires and a plethora of provincial powers have risen and fallen, leaving little but the dust of ruins and crumbs of lore, ultimately giving way to the Time of Humans, a conceited description of the last three to four millenia of Faerûn's history.
Ancient history extends back to the epochs of the creator races, interpreted from chronicles of the earliest nations of elves and dwarves and the legends and teachings of the primeval gods, so much of it is subjective and as likely to recount poetry as often as fact. Recent history is mostly the story of younger races, generally recorded more accurately by sages and archivists, some of whom have lived through centuries of Faerûn's history.
Whatever the truths and falsehoods, common folk generally have little knowledge of, and even less use for, the events of distant lands and ancient memories.
Days of Thunder
–35,000 to –30,000 DR
These are the earliest days of known history. The great Ice Age dwindles, exposing a single super-continent that comprises the lands eventually to be distinguished as Faerûn, Kara-Tur, Maztica, and Zakhara.
None of the civilized folk — elves, dwarves, halflings, gnomes — nor the savage peoples — goblins, orcs, ogres and their kin — exist, though primitive ape-like humanoids do inhabit some temperate parts of the land.
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-35000 DR
-34900 DR
Rise of the Sarrukh
Era beginning/end -
-34100 DR
-33500 DR
Fall of Sarrukh
Life, Death-34100 DR: After more than a century of civil strife that drives many sarrukh to the planes, the Okoth Empire collapses.
-33800 DR: Attempting to drown the Phaerlin (the Buried Realms in the Underdark) in a single stroke, Isstossef wizards reroute the Narrow Sea to run east to west, inundating the Tagorlar hills. Although successfully driving the phaerimms deep into the Underdark, massive ecological damage causes the Isstosseffifil empire to collapse.
–33500 DR: Sarrukh-ruled Mhairshaulk declines into somnolence, becoming the domain of the yuan-ti.
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-33000 DR
-31000 DR
Rise of the Batrachi
Revolution-33000 DR: The amphibious batrachi begin to attain dominance across the lands of Merrouroboros, attempting to suppress remnants of the sarrukh and, in particular, the yuan-ti of Mhairshaulk.
-31500 DR: Zhoukoudien, The High One, leads batrachi power to its zenith, but he wages war against the titans and is slain in battle by the titan thane Omo. Lacking an adequate successor, the titans begin to gain supremacy.
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-31000 DR
Sundered Abeir
Disaster / DestructionFacing annihilation from their war against the titans, batrachi desperately enact a profound summoning ritual that unleashes several imprisoned primordials, who immediately enact retribution. Devastating earthquakes, fires, floods and windstorms sweep across the continent, wiping out swathes of populations and redrawing the surface of Toril.
As the gods rise to oppose the primordials, Asgorath the World Shaper hurls an ice moon at Toril in order to destroy what she cannot have. Subsequently referred to as the Tearfall, this causes the four Inner Seas to merge and form the Sea of Fallen Stars, adding to the catastrophic climate chaos.
With destruction of the world seeming imminent, Ao the Hidden One intervenes, creating a twin of the planet and granting the primordials dominion over this new world, Abeir, and the gods control over Toril.
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-31000 DR
-30500 DR
Fall of the Batrachi
Life, DeathWith much of their civilisation decimated, and facing extreme environmental changes, the reign of the batrachi swiftly disintegrates. Many leave Toril for the plane of Limbo and are charged by their god, Ramenos, to serve his agenda. Those that remained insulated are vanquished by merfolk, sahuagin and tritons, and their society degenerates to barbarism.
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-31000 DR
-30000 DR
Rise of the Aearee
Revolution-31000 DR: Emerging from Aearee Enclaves on a massive island in the Silver Sea, the avian race charges into the void left by the demise of the batrachi and quickly establishes multiple empires across the newly formed continent of Faerûn, building grand aeries in mountains that are largely untouchable by other races.
–30700 DR: A thousand aearee-krocaa are slain by a much smaller force of lammasu. The aearee experiment with domesticated landwyrms, producing the first winged wyrms (wyverns) and begin to build armies of them.
–30400 DR: Gnoll shamans summon spirits of pestilence to blight aearee crops and spread a wasting plague among the avians. Many aearee turn to the demon lord Pazrael for salvation, but their population is decimated.
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-31000 DR
Coming of Dragons
Era beginning/endTens of thousands of dragon eggs scattered across Toril begin to hatch. Contemporary scholars claim these must have already been laid and climate change created perfect condition for mass hatchings, but the red dragons' creation myth (as compiled in the Book of the World) credits Asgorath for their distribution, and dragon descendants proclaim and revere Asgorath as creator of their race.
Dawn Ages
–30,000 DR to –24,000 DR
The empires and influence of the Creator Races fade into memory, ushering in a Time of Dragons and Giants — creatures far mightier than their brethren of current ages.
Dragons claim and mercilessly rule large swathes of territory, battling to suppress rivals and control all. Only giants are powerful enough to resist and the earth is rendered time and again by an endless cycle of ferocious conflicts, though even the great humanoids ultimately succumb to the hegemony of dragonkind.
Severely weakened after a thousand years of war, the giants are saved from complete annihilation when the fey intervene and use high magic to send the wyrms into a suicidal paroxysm of rage and destruction.
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-30000 DR
-29700 DR
Fall of the Aearee
Life, DeathThe Time of Dragons is ushered in as dragons across Faerûn gather and swarm in the first Flight of Dragons, assailing the aearee in the air, on land and beneath the ground. From the sky, they raze the home-nest of Viakoo, and wyrm-general Nagamat rampages through ancestral hatcheries of Shara in the caverns beneath the Orsraun Mountains, almost obliterating the avians entirely.
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-29700 DR
-29500 DR
Rise of the Dragons
Military actionAs some of the great reptiles reach maturity, the giants recognise these powerful and cunning interlopers as a threat to their very existence, and the dragons discern the only contenders formidable enough to resist them. They battle each other interminably, ultimately forcing giantkind to yield their holdings and flee north. Individual dragons and dragon clans proclaim dominion over large swaths of land, not only subjegating rivals but also enforcing devout compliance of all to the Draconic pantheon. "Lesser" races, including primitive humans and other demihumans, are brutally enslaved by the dragon lords.
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-29500 DR
Dragonfall War
Military: WarFollowers of Xymor (Bahamut) attack and slay Nagamat. In retribution, Tiamat, goddess of vengeance and a principal of the draconic pantheon, breeds and unleashes a multitide aberrant dragon-like beings against the followers of Bahamut. To counter, Bahamut, also a draconic principal, creates the dragonborn as his agents and soldiers.
Conflict between the two persists to this day.
With dragonkind engaged in an internal holy war, suppression of the giants and other oppressed races wanes. Some humanoids start to carve out their own civilizations.
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-28000 DR
Colossal Kingdom
Construction beginning/endDespite recurring conflicts with the dragons, giantkind now occupies the entirety of the northern glaciers and mountains, inoxerably expanding south to ultimately hold land to the Sea of Fallen Stars. Called Ostoria — father's seat — it will come to be known as the Colossal Kingdom as giants compete amongst themselves to create practical and artistic wonders: hill giants build a great stone circle that acts as a calendar and oracle, cloud giants construct immense floating cities, fire giants tame volcanoes of the southern territories and build cities of adamantine and mithral, and storm giants build great castles in the sky and mighty fortresses beneath the seas.
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-27000 DR
First Elves
Life, RelocationContinuing efforts to undermine dragon rule, the Fey open planar gates to allow the first elves to emigrate to Toril. These primitive green elves worship Faerie gods (not Seldarine, which was unknown at this time) and most contentedly live in scattered tribes, but one group negotiates with the dragons and builds the Ilythiiri civilisation in the south. The great capital at Atorrnash remains a beacon of elf culture for millennia.
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-26000 DR
-25000 DR
Thousand Years War
Military: WarDraconic philosophers propose that religious fighting is wasteful and that gods allowing such behavior makes them unworthy of worship. Thus begins dragonkind's apathy toward their deities, which will last for many thousands of years. Some of the draconic pantheon vanish from knowledge and memory.
An avatar of Garyx, chaotic evil dragon god of fire and destruction, leads red dragons in battle against the giants of Ostoria. This progressively enlarges to encompass all of dragonkind and the entire realm of the giants, and it rages on and off for a thousand years.
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-25400 DR
Elven Peoples
Life, RelocationFleeing destruction of the island kingdom of Tintageer on their world of Faerie, a circle of elves cast a divination to find a new home — Toril — and create a portal leading there. The refugees name their new homeland Faerûn, the One Land. Integrating into the native green elf communities, descendants of the gold elves of Tintageer will become known as sun elves and those of the sole silver elf refugee, Moonflower, will be moon elves.
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-25000 DR
Rage of Dragons
Plague / EpidemicThe giants reach a truce with dragonkind and the age of the Colossal Kingdom ends. Remnants of Ostoria now only occupy the northernmost edge of the continent (Great Glacier and the Cold Lands).
Elves create a great magic, Dracorage mythal, tying it to the appearance of the King-Killer Star over Faerûn. This powerful evocation provokes all dragon-blooded creatures to become agitated and reckless, then further devolve to madness and mindless destruction, turning them against each other, even their offspring, while the star is visible.
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-24500 DR
Elven Ascension
FoundingNew derivatives of Tiamat's dragonspawn continue to emerge, including kobolds and urds.
The two primary elf communities build cities rivalling the magnificence of ancient Atorrnash: Occidian of the sun elves is heralded as the new centre of elven culture, while the moon elf city of Sharlarion is unrivaled as the crossroads of trade and commerce.
Moon elf Kethryllia Amarillis travels to the Abyss and fights the demon Haeshkarr in the Demonweb Pits, drawing Lolth's attention to Toril for the first time; the Spider Queen begins to seduce dark elves. The elven city of Occidian is sacked by a horde of orcs led by the abyssal fiend Haeshkarr, which then attacks Sharlarion. Haeshkarr and its horde are defeated by the elves but at great cost.