Encylopedia Ornia entry for Agog.

Agog reduced the number of serving troops to fewer than 100 active persons last year to economize, but short enlistments and and a semi mandatory militia reserve balances the low “on paper” numbers. The Prince Martial could call hundreds more to the colors instantly in a state of at least moderate training.

Agog.

Officially the Holiest Protectorate Proproedrate of House of Gog Magosh. It is a Nation of the Ornrian Disk located toward the Hot Zone (Amatublassu Quarter) of the Westward Rim. It is located East of Yarkistan, and the Foo-EE prefecture. To the south it shares a short fortified land border with the Sumartrian Empire. The land is surrounded on the East, North, and West by seas; the Western Shore is considered the northern reach of the Mosasaur Coast of the Pearlfoam Abyss. Cape Jubjoobeegog is the Northernmost point of land, and marks the opening of the Tintub Strait. This is the origin of the mariner’s “Jub-jub Beak” in the old hornpipe song, and the site of a critical lighthouse guiding ships towards Takara and other harbors of the Tintub Strait. 

It’s principle and only official language is Agogite, with some minorites speaking Foo-Eish, Gopher and Goshite are are regional dialects more than actual independent languages, and are officially suppressed.

Climate.

Climatically the country has small variation, but can be divided into four zones. The first zone is the cooler, humid Mosasaur Coast that enjoys relative comfort due to the cool draughts from the Great Titan Current of the Pearlfoam Abyss. Here the temperature in Winter scarcely dips below 70, and in Summer rarely climbs above 100.

The second zone is the Inland Zone.; A parched dusty dried mudstone desert of deep crevasses and low hard mesas, This zone sees one or two rainfalls per year from Pearlfoam storms, these storms last only a few hours at most, but can dump monsoon like rains that flash flood the deep aryos and canons and are extremely dangerous, loosed soils will slide and collapse, reshaping the strange yellow brown terrain into fantastic towers and toppling old forms into the canyons causing the muddy watercourses to shift and change. After the storm, very little water will remain, what does pool into basins makes precious temporary oasis that will, for a week or two, nurture such shrubbery and greenery as this zone will ever see, and becomes the haven for wild goats, vicunya, and the white desert panther. Temperatures in this zone can soar to 130 degrees, and the Westsmith Expedition claimed to have recorded 141 degrees in Swimuary.

Zone three is the Koonifer Plain beginning just north of Gulamesh and running south to Lotarsh, it’s an arid mudplain by nature, but millenia of human water management has turned it into an arid prairie. This carefully managed prairie is called the Brazen Granary and is among the most fertile land of the Ornrian Disk. Here some of the earliest known domestication of common vegetables occurred; the parsnip, the mustard plant, cucumbers, sunflowers, wheat, radish, lettuces, and many others. Three to four crops a year are commonplace.

The final Zone is the Tintub Shorewall. This is the rockiest and least habitable region of the land. A steep ridge or wall of rock curving around the western coast and blocking the cool zephyrs that blow out of Foo-EE, This wall-like ridge of rock is steep, unforgiving, harsh, but gives a view of nearly the entire Brazen Granery and has many ancient fortified sites upon it, and as they rise imperiously directly from the sea to the west they provide no haven for pirates or sea raiders in that direction, only the seabirds use these lonely rocky cliffs as nesting sites.

People.

Agog has been inhabited by a multiplicity of ethnicities over the ages. Possibly Agog is the very cradle of civilization, for recently archaeologists of the Gulamesh University working with a team from Krautberg Kollege uncovered what is believed to be the earliest known town on Ornria, consisting of mud brick and reed structures and palm wood streets, but without pottery, and with stone tools of sophisticated workmanship. The site, located near Frogesh is called after the slight rise it was found under; Hooglehananany.

The oldest named people of the region were called the Beerberzerks, or “Beer guzzlers” believed to be cognate with the “Beerjar Culture Horizon. In their wake came Sasanazi, thought to have begun the waterworks on the Brazen Prairie, and the Toolish, a goat herding group out of the Yarking Lowlands of Yarkistan, entering by way of Kinalabash and Lulubele. Possibly these herders were driven north into the hot dry and inhospitable desert by the ancestors of the Bogumbele peoples of the Sombu Blackjungle of modern Sumartria. It is thought the Toolish first brought metalworking to Agog, and the fusion of Toolish and Sasanazi technologies created the rise of proto city states on the Brazen Prairie. These states warred with one another fiercely and drove a period of technological innovation that came to an end when Omgugle I called “the Surrite”, unified the cities of the plain in the first Goshite Old Kingdom.

Surrite Dynastic leadership enshrined, literally, the monotheistic worship of Gog, the Queen Mother of the Goshite People. Possibly amalgamting her with Geshgurgeshgul the Toolish war goddess and the old Beerberzerk Smooshyshesh, a cow or beer goddess (Dr. V Lobitoff speculates the confusion here may be from the use of fermented milk as a beverage, and the famous beer being in actuality a kefir like drink).

(see Religion).

The Goshites dwelt thousands of years in the hot dry lowlands, building mudbrick villages, digging irrigation systems and growing the fruits of Mother Gog, In those centuries three dynastic periods passed; the Old Kingdom of Gosh, a GolGosh interreignum, the Neogosh Kingdom dynasty, and the Late Gosh dynasty. The Late Gosh dynasty was able to subdue the highlands people (the Gollygush tribes) and even reached into Sumartria. Gosh Kings were Powerful, and dominated the Southern nieghbors, even influencing the lands across the Tintub Straight, until the coming of the Vus.

The Vus organized the first sea-empire, trading across the Pearlfoam, hazarding it’s massive predators in flimsy wooden bird-ships to make themselves rich trading ores and raw metals, foodstuffs, pottery, minerals, even live animals. This is when camels and horses were first brought to Agog.

Though the Vus were never a single polity, they dominated the Western Pearlfoam coasts in the period of Early Metals. Vus mercenaries participated in a series of Gogite civil wars that destroyed the Late Gosh Kingdom, fracturing it and opening it to rival powers.

The Vus built, or rather, rebuilt Ururtan, as a miniature Dogchewygrad in mudbrick and stone rather than wood of the original, and created it’s first wharfs, breakwaters, and the great quay.

The Vus were traders, intent of commercial exploitation rather than political control, and prospered as a people. In fact individual Vus traders were still ethnically distinct into the early modern era. Nonetheless in time new seafarers bringing larger better ships came on the scene, displacing the old, a people known as the Sea Albs.

The Sea Albs were tribes from the south of modern Yarkistan, more violent than the Vus, they quickly displaced them and drove them out of the Southern Pearlfoam. They then attempted a suppression of Gogite culture in favor of Albish, but this effort was both a failure, as the Albs took on more Gosh-Agog influence than the reverse (Agog script is still used in the Alb language), and was interrupted by the predation of Gu pirates from Foo-EE.

Gu Piracy culminated in a short-lived Gu-Foo Kingdom in central Agog, though lasting only a few decades before Gogites rose and pulled down nearly all elements of Gu culture. This rebellion opened the coast to the Yarks, bitter enemies of the Sea Albs, and in this free for all Agog became a wild no mans land with political control being in the hands of warlords, many unable to speak Gogite at all, and holding sway over territory as small as a village, town, or even neighborhood. In this chaotic environment the Agog priesthood quietly rebuilt it’s power, and stealthily nurtured the smallholdings of the ancient temple monasteries, and making important alliances with Warlord families.

In the wake of the Great Tintub War a century and a half ago, the Foo-Ee marched in again and set about an exploitation programme; building railways, opening modern universities, and running the state through the Yarkish Kings Brusa Bodadter, Bhogdotzu, and BodadterII. The assassination of Bodadter II nearly 15 years ago, and the rising of the Gogites in the last decade has seen the Foo-Ee driven out of the land, and the rise of Mustafa Moustache a Gogite strongman claiming the title of Proproedrate. Under this Proproedrate has occurred a renaissance of Gogish culture, and the re-establishment of a vigorous Gog-Gosh state.

Government.

Agog is a Developing country, a former colony of Foo-EE with some remaining ties in the major cities. It’s form of government is a theocratic Counciliar Pro-Proedrate. This means Agogite Temple Councils chose regional leaders called Proedrates subject to popular veto by bloc, and bound by certain ethical and religious expectations, with the chiefmost duty to elect and support a “high governor”, the Proproderate. These lesser proderates once held great power over local affairs but the traditional duties were eroded away under the Foo-Ee Colonization and the chaotic warlord period following. They are being replaced in that respect by the Zargovers, a sort of vizier-like local governor chosen by the Proproedrate. This has weakend the more conservative theocratic aspect of the local governments somewhat but has made room for modernization programs to reach the common folk. 

Proproedrate Mustafa Moustache

Mustaffa Moustache is the current Proproderate, and could be described as a strong man or dictatorial leader, but seems in the main to be a rather benevolent example of the type with a minimum of factional resistance to his rule in the boundaries of Agog.  Buslopbia is another matter, and will be covered there.  Little can be said for certain about Mustafa Moustache.  He is a shadowy figure, rarely seen or photographed.  His visage is uncommon in the towns of Agog, and only three or four definite photos of him are known to be used in Agogite Newspapers, many of which wind up cut out, and framed in prominant places in private homes, but rarely seen in public.  Many rumors swirl about the man as if to fill the vacuum. Some are quite wild, involving self mutilation, on one extreme, to fathering a dozen hidden children on the other.  some are unlikely; in the aftermath of the Rose festival Earthquake it has been claimed that he single-handedly saved a dozen people from death by lifting an enormous weight of rubble, or of vehicles.   Other people claim Mr. Moustache invented vaccination, cured the plague, even stopped bullets with the power of his voice.  It is safe to say the man has been raised to the mythical height of culture hero in his land.   One thing can be said certainly; he was a brilliant guerilla leader who was the certain archetect of the expulsion of the Foo-Ee from the country, and his comrades and assistants have been quite happy to allow his mythos to overshadow thier own fame.

Agog currently semi-occupies Buslobpia, mostly an economic domination that has it’s roots in clever manipulation by the Proedrate in Buslopian media and government. Strategic investments in powerful Buslopian politicians has allowed Agog to avoid a military effort so far. Buslopian exploitation is a source of increasing economic strength but is fraught with future dangers to the regime.

Agog is not signatory to any alliances at this time, but has a standing enmity with Foo-Ee, Oppressorbad, Sumartria, and strangely; Gross Montaine, over what slight it seems difficult to determine.

Primary School education is now mandatory for minors, though the schools in many places are open air and lacking the most trivial of supplies. This growth in schooling has lead to a skyrocketing literacy rate. And with it a new industry producing popular periodicals and books written in classical Gogite Cuneiform has ushered in a flowering renaissance of Gogite cuneiform.

Economy.

The Official currency of Agog is the Ishminub, or “clay fish”. It is available in 1,6,12,180,and 360 Ishminub denominations. It is a small round clay coin roughly 10mm wide.

Industrialization remains limited, and efforts to build factories have previously come to naught due to the scarcity of raw materials for exploitation.

The Principle industry is food export. Fruits and Vegetables are shipped out daily in refrigerated bulk ships. The sea is source of much of the populations’ living. Free diving for pearl Oysters or Sponges provides a dangerous but lucrative occupation for the bravest coastal fishermen, while others seek Mosasaur Eggs, trawl for Xiphactines Minor, guide sportsfishers after big Arthrodires, and siene for shellfish, sardine and baitfish. Recently the Zargover of Gumph discovered a plastic mine, and inkwells sunk under the Foo-EE near Lotarsh have come under Agogite ownership, increasing the Agogite coffers enormously, and bankrolling several progressive initiatives. Agogite citizens now have universal health care, free education, new monastic libraries are building in all communities, and the new interlocking rail and bus mass transit system allows almost free personal transportation across the country. In addition the expansion of road and rail has included an expansion of the Agog Postal Service, complete with a modern railway mail car between Gulamesh and Astarte.

Modern rails and refrigeration plants bring iced fish from the wharfs of Ururtan to the great nationalized canning concerns Zushgug Inc. and Lalubablush Ltd. in Gulamesh. Agog tinned oysters, sea scorpions, sardines, and pickled mosasaur eggs are found under foreign labels in grocery stores all over the Ornrian Disk. Minor Factories in Astarte and Lotarsh produce canned, dried, and pickled vegetables and sauces. Mostly for domestic consumption, but a fair amount finds it’s way to tables in Guerat and Buslopbia. First class wheat is transported by rail to new grain towers in the port of Ururtan. The valuable Bulk Wheat of the lowland is finally raising farmers standards of living out of sheer peasantry, and underpins the new government’s campaign to end rural poverty.

Agog is the source of Crimzogite the special clay used by Foo Ee craftsmen for the production of world class pottery. White Chalk is found in abundance, and in the North are salt mines, still operated as a penal industry. Exploitation of the Ink Wells and the new Plastic mines might kickstart an Industrial boom, but only time will tell.

The Military.

The Agog Holy Army consists of the Land Army, Army Air Service and Army Marine Force, as well as Army State Provost (a state police). They are led by a Warpriest Prince Martial under the supervision of the Ministry of Defense and by the ProProedros as the supreme commander during wartime. In times of peace its powers are executed through the Prime Aldarate and the Defense Minister.

Prince Martial Bslam

The chief purpose of the armed forces of Agog is the defense of the independence, the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the country, but it does include participation in humanitarian, non-combat and peace support operations. Military service was mandatory, with the age of 15 being the legal minimum age for duty but reforms are underway and the Army is transitioning to an all volunteer force.

 The head of the Army is the Prince Marital Oghrus Lith Bslam, the Lion of Lotarsh.  He is acclaimed for his successful defense during the siege of Lotarsh by Foo-Ee, and the clever sortie assault delivered with makeshift armor and sheer guts. It is rumored that he is a first cousin of Mustafa, but that is unconfirmed.

The military now consists mainly of a small fleet of obsolete aircraft and small sea vessels. The country recently scrapped enormous amounts of obsolete hardware captured from Foo-EE, such as light tanks, military goat carts, primitive breech loading field guns, and Takaran split breech rifles.

The remaining armor force is tiny, believed to number less than 10 medium tanks of near obsolete types dating to the Tintub War. And the rifle deficit has not really been made up. Anonymous agents have recently approached the Gumghuner Rifle Works of Heavy Flashing inquiring about placing large orders for rifles of modern type, and it’s believed these agents are a front for Agog.

Military spending has generally been low, last year only 1.5% of the country's GDP. This is however, up from the previous decade. It has been observed that Agogite Army Officers have been taking long leaves of absence and enlisting in foreign armies presumably to receive training and learn modern war techniques. In addition the state is constructing new warehouses believed to be Army depots and seems to be laying in Wheat and stockpiling medical supplies.

Lastly, the Agog army now occupies and is reinforcing the FooEe underground fortifications along the Southern border with the Sumartrian Empire. This line is quite formidable, and features a mix of breadth based defense with forward posts, obstructions and concentration points, deep underground bunkers, heavy guns, tank traps and fougasses, and lanes of overlapping fire fields. The majority of the nation’s remaining stock of machineguns and artillery are invested in this line, sometimes called Moustafa’s Ditch.

     In addition to Moustafa's ditch, every settlement hosts a caeserne, usually a small house, hut, or in the biggest towns an actual, if tiny, fort where the local garrison is housed.  This caeserne serves as police station, post office, telegraph office, and often fire brigade, animal control, and city maintenance service. and is usually rather sleepily manned; a single officer with a one or two enlisted men is not uncommon, and it's believed some are in operation with a single NCO filling all roles, sometimes with family and children pitching in.

Ethnicity and Demographics

Agogite Ethnicity is a tangled and sensitive subject. By law all who receive Agog’s Three Rites (see Religion) are Agogites. The Government claims 98 percent of the population is ethnically Agogite. Under Foo Ee rule the Agog ethnic group was only 57 percent, the remainder made up of 6 percent Yarkic, 12 percent Albish, 10 percent Gu, and a hodge podge remainder. How to account for the differences? How do ethnic minorities feel about the legalities? We simply cannot say, as no survey has been permitted.

Culture.

Agog has a rich and ancient culture. It’s writing system was the first known, and as a consequence Agog has an incredible trove of ancient poetry, story, mythology, and letter writing, a richness that has influenced literature and myth over all of Ornria.

Agogite Cuisine is famous, and divided into two general types; the coastal cuisine is dominated by seafood, fresh vegetables , and acidic flavors from citron and lemons, while the highlands are famous for smoky goat and vicyuna dishes with flat-breads and yoghurt sauces.

Agogite music is distinctive; dominated by the Phorminx, a stringed instrument of great antiquity, the Crotalum, a sort of castanet, the Tibia, a very ancient double flute, the Cochillia, a seashell percussion instrument, the Salpix, a long trumpet-like bronze horn, and the sistrum. Percussion dominates, yet strangely, the drum is not represented classically, and even in modern Agogite music only the tambourine has made any headway. The music is quick, rhythmic, with a suppressed melody, especially in Shasshahaclavasha styles. This ancient form is well suited to the Temple and Festival dances which include whirling and jumping moves intended to bring on altered mental states in the participants.

Religion.

Agog is monotheistic; shrines, temples and monasteries bejewel the country. The entire citizenry is dedicated to the worship of Gog Goshgog; perhaps best translated as “Gog; the grandmother of all things” a truly National Deity. Gog is believed to be incarnated in the Gogpubu, a unique Baetylus, or “magic” stone housed in the holiest part of the Royal Gubaban Temple of Gulamesh. On the other hand, there is a widespread folk belief that the stone is actually her coprolite and Gog herself lives in a secret temple hidden in the mountains of the West from which she rules her realm.

Agog’s preisthood ,the Ghula, is entirely transgendered, and several phases or steps of ancient techniques of feminization or masculization are required to sacralize the prospective acolytes who may be either male or female on entry to the cult. Special divine favor is attributed to persons born with intersex characteristics, and these individuals are seen as possessing the divine favor, and are singled out for service in an order of sybillic oracles. The primary functions of the priesthood are to perform the Three Rites which all individual Agogites must have. In additon, they must maintain the Oracle Sites; the 23 “divine” locations where an oracular Sybyl holds court and delivers Delphic answers to questions posed.

The THREE RITES are required of all Agog citizens, and, circularly, define a person as an Agog Citizen. The first rite is the Rite of Shulzk, in which the participant must disrobe before the altar and be ritually cleansed in incense. The Second Rite is Abgal, in which the first work of a person’s profession are burned at the altar, and the ashes used to mark the supplicant that Gog might see them and prosper their labors. The Third Rite is called Nidudubudu, glossed as “the return of the great gift” traditionally this is a tithe to the temple, but can take other forms, it is believed by many commoners that Mustafa Moustache made nidudubudu with the blood of his breast mingled with the flesh of his own genitalia, a ritual act that in Gogite context represents an ultimate priestly dedication.

Secondarily the priesthood opens the 7 festivals and 5 fasts with a parade of ecstatic dancing and music. They form the councils that select the local Proedrates, and enforce the 3 Proscriptions (against Murder, Theft, and “insanitary” behavior), originally this involved a trial-like Asseveration of Fact followed usually by a punishment, ideally some sort of amends; or in more serious cases heavy labor, corporal punishment, or in cases of capital offenses calling down a stoning upon the transgressor, but in modern Agog this has become a formal apprehension of the suspect and delivery to the law enforcement arm of the army.

In addition to the priesthood there is an Abbotry or Monastic service to Agog. These Agog Monks do not undergo the physical transformation peculiar to the priesthood, rather they remove all hair from themselves and adopt a special mode of dress, the Shyndyt, a sort of linen kilt. This ritual hairlessness traditionally involved plucking and beeswaxing, but in modern times the razor has been generally adopted. Though waxing is still ritually required on the 7 festivals and 3 Fasts. The chief-most occupation of this monastic wing is recovering, copying and preserving all materials written in the Agogite script. As writing is seen to be a gift of Gog, it is believed by Agogites to be intrinsically holy and it is a doom to the mortal soul to destroy any written thing. Thus everything written in even the most humble home of Agog, no matter how mundane, is turned over to the monasteries during the 7 festivals. As one can imagine the monks preside over vast libraries, libraries which they endeavor to maintain by copying the most ancient materials before they deteriorate, organizing all new materials into collections, creating indexes and curating every single character of Agogite writing. This enormous task requires an almost insupportable army of monks.

It is part of the governments modernization drive to control the numbers of workers bled off into monasteries, and to that end has bought a 200 specially engineered cuneiform typewriters from Dactyle Brothers, of Heavy Flashing in the 2^nd Polyester Freestate. The Monastic establishment as can be imagined, is a heavy expense for the realm.

This labor drain is being somewhat offset by two monastic sidelines; government clerking, and monastic production of wheat beer under the Astartekas label. Since the monasteries are already a massive information processing system the government has turned over it’s bureaucracy to the care of this institution. Functions normally handled by a government agency in other states are a semi religious monastic interaction in Agog. For instance getting a driver’s license requires a trip to the local Army Caserne in the company of a local monk, to have the physical evaluation of skill, and then a trip to the local monastery to process the data and create the license proper.

Symbols.

As one might expect from so ancient a culture there are many important symbols indicative of Agog’s history, civilization, and beliefs. The colors Pink and Yellow are said to represent the evening sun and the golden grain. The traditional woolen kaunakes, a kilt like garment decorated with highly colored tufts of wool, is worn by both men (to the knee) and women (to the floor). The decorative tufting that gives a feathered appearance is thought to be a sort of textile prayer for rain. Men prize a Shoosh, a woven shawl decorated with embroidery and tassels, and a good fez. The Shoosh traditionally is crocheted by a mans mother, and contains in it’s knotted pattern stories of the man’s youth and his parents lives.

Both sexes wear the Opanak, a leather sandal like shoe with pointed toe, often decorated with colored wool tassels or pompoms. Each shoe’s arrangement of leather cording, tassel color, pom pom size, and tassel material can indicate marriage status, family, social rank, home neighborhood and even occupation.

The Wharse Rose is the national flower, a pink and ancient cultivar, intensely fragrant and used in spicery, perfumery, incense, candy, and attar making as well as simply being ornamental.

The National Standard of Agog features a ground of Wharse Rose pink, a color reckoned by Agogites to embody masculine strength and energy. With the twin figures of Agog herself, in her Horned Goddess form, representing the ascent of the Moon, meaning intelligence and wisdom, and depicted in the ancient malachite color blue-green, associated with water and with bronze making. Below Agog is Mudhibi the Gilish (scimitar) of Omgogle I. Mudhibi means something like smoking blood or steaming blood and is a mythological sword that burns liars and returns life to the dead. it’s a symbol of defense and royal protection. The swollow tailed pennant form of the flag represents the eternal fire Bilsugghar that burns before the Baelytus of Gog in the temple, and is in myth the origin and end of all earthly things, and the fate of all who are dishonest, unfaithful, and false. (the good being saved from this fate in the garden of Hoshgoshergolgargath.

Agog has a national motto, seen on it’s currency and on official buildings; “Gog Goshgog annûtu șalmū ēpišiya” meaning “Gog, Goddess of Creation, these are the figurines of my sorcerer” The opening line of the Epic of Zugajamaghosher. One of the great national stories.