The Verdante Trail

History

  Anhara has a long history with their forests, and Forest Law elevates them to a unique legal entity. The basis of the law is that forests may only be logged until a certain quota, designated by the lord upon who's land the law says it sits. Furthermore, the logging may only be done by specific citizens of the area, decided upon by the lord. This leaves most forests across Anhara in their primordial state, impenetrable and largely unwalked by man. The region of the nation where this set of laws comes into play the most is the Verdante, the thickest, largest, and oldest of Anhara's forests. Here, House Osage has ruled the land since Vestria herself bestowed it to them, and strictly control logging in the area.   The largest, and really one of the only, industries in the Verdante is forestry. While every tree in the Verdante falls under the control of Lord Osage, each logging town is designated a specific area in which they may conduct logging. This is very different from other regions of Anhara as House Osage both controls the forests as well as the Verdante, whereas elsewhere the legal owners of the forests are not necessarily the presently dominant house. That political issue was one of the causes of the Second Climbing War, seeing House Osage on the side of the conservatives.    

Original Verdante Trail

  Given the unique nature of forestry law in Anhara, and especially the Verdante, the region is the main provider of lumber to much of the nation, especially the sparsely forested capital region. However, the dense and impenetrable nature of the Verdante made transporting lumber to the capital difficult, as exportation from Sarnia, the region's capital, needed to go north, along the coast, to bypass the forests. The long nature of this route, and its requirement that workers be far from home for extended periods of time, led to the Verdante seeing itself as an uncorrupted form of Anhara where politicians are replaced by hard workers, and men get by on honesty and reputation, rather than a silver tongue.  

"I left Sarnia town 'bout the break of day,   and if I rightly remember, 'twas the third of Mae   We trusted to our wagon-master, tho' he was but small   for he knew all the stops on that wooded crawl." - Work Songs of The Verdante, "The Wooded Crawl"

  The Verdante Trail's influence on how the region sees itself has also translated into part of how Anhara sees the region. To others, especially the Coquet Heights, the Verdante is a wilderness, sparsely populated by a dirty, uneducated, ill-spoken people. The Rhetor for House Osage is often looked upon in the same light, as a less competent member of the Rostrum, full of home-spun wisdom and incapable of thinking things through. This led to a strong cultural rivalry between the Coquet Heights and the Verdante for much of Anhara's early history.    

Construction Begins

  In 250AR, however, all that would change with Lord Samuel Wilkeson Osage. It seemed obvious to Lord Osage that the present Verdante Trail was unnecessarily long, as well as making travel to the capital region difficult in general. As Port Castellion and Liraena are controlled by two separate houses, by the time goods finally arrive in the capital they have been forced to go through two different internal borders, putting trade and travel at risk in times of war or internal strife between houses. Thus, both the merchants in the capital and the officials of House Osage saw a profit in cutting through the Verdante's forest.  

"Low branch, everybody down   Low branch, we're coming to a town   And you'll always know your neighbor   And you'll always know your pal   If you've ever navigated on the Verdante Trail" - Work Songs of The Verdante, from Wooden Ways

  This was primordial forest, virgin and unseen by all since Mae herself planted it in the Creation, so going would be difficult and costly. However, the get-it-done attitude of the Verdante was well suited to such a task, and workers were eager to, for the right price, cut their way straight to the capital and show those Meridians what a true Anharan looks like. That is not to say the project lacked detractors, both inside the Verdante and without. House Castel and House Verdi were sternly opposed, as any circumvention of their territory could only be to their loss. Within House Osage's territory, however, there were the naysayers present for every great undertaking, those who thought this short-cut would weaken the moral fiber of their people, open them to attack from the east, or ruin their culture entirely. Despite these voices, progress marched ever forward.   The project took two years of repetitive work, and daily progress is not worth repeating here. However, a number of innovative methods were taken to speed progress along, such as the pulling down of trees with ropes tossed over the tops. Also invented was a stump puller, for stumps proved to be a major hindrance in flattening the area into a road. This machine took the form of two wooden wheels, sixteen feet in diameter, connected by an axle, with a wheel fourteen feet in diameter in the middle. This smaller wheel would be attached by rope to a team of horses, and using a chain connected from the axle to the stump, the torque obtained would rip the stumps from the ground.    

Current Verdante Trail

  With construction complete, the new and improved Verdante Trail started at Sarnia, went east along Helen's Stream to Blackrock, a small village which grew into a town with the influx of workers on the Trail. From Blackrock, on the north shore of Lake Helen, the trail winds its way northeast, around the base of the Coquet Heights, and back south to Meridia. A number of dangerous aspects of the original trail have been solved along its new course, with assorted stocked way-stations being added. These small structures are kept locked, with each wagon-master having a key, and while stocked with a small amount of provisions, they are generally used as rest-stops for the night or stormy weather.    

Caravans

  Caravans of the Verdante Trail are led by a wagon-master, a position requiring at least fifteen years of experience and an honorable reputation. There are about thirty wagon-masters at a time, all appointed by Lord Osage. These men act as leaders of the caravan, making decisions on when to stop, when to push on through a storm or other obstacle, but most uniquely, are also the executors of the Lord's justice on the Trail. In this capacity, they are the primary authority for traders when outside of towns, and their instruction is law.   Besides the normal drivers, manual laborers, and wagon-master, the largest of the caravans generally feature a bard, however songs are sung regardless of one's presence. Additionally, all members of a caravan are armed, as banditry, while waxing and waning depending on the actions of the local government, is a near constant feature.    

Cultural Results

  Two of the most wide-spread cultural items to come from the Verdante Trail are Work Songs of The Verdante, and Wooden Ways, romanticizing the image of the hard-working, practical, Verdante woodsman to the rest of Anhara. Wooden Ways, a book written by a former wagon-master, name unknown, was the first account of the culture of the Verdante to be written by one of its inhabitants, rather than a noble or academic. Work Songs of the Verdante, while repeating some aspects of Wooden Ways, is a record of many of the songs sung by caravans as they travel across the Trail.   These works are part of a larger anthology in Anhara, epitomized by Idyllic Living, the quintessential book of rural culture in the nation. These bucolic tales form the image of the Anharan countryside as the opposite of its cities, devoid of treacherous politicians, and home to familial, generous, nobles and hard-working, wise, every-day folk.