Here's the next map in the Atlas Elyden series. Slowly but surely I'm filling out the lands around the Inner Sea 😀

This map details 3 regions with a close history - Ahrishen, Virahan and Baatan (from right to left, respectively). The seas of Elyden are slowly retreating, and this is one of the areas hit hard by the advancing coastline - so the map includes an inset map showing what the coastline looked like 1,000 years ago.

Ahrishen as we know it has existed for less than 250-years, though the region has a long history going back millennia, to the dawn of the Fifth Age. Until a thousand years ago the region bordered the Sea of Pyrea, an extension of the Sea of Propontis that allowed merchant and fishing fleets to ply their trade of the eastern Inner Sea, but the slow retreat of the Inner Sea saw the Sea of Pyrea dwindle, leaving behind a flat expanse of wetlands and saltpans in its wake. This destroyed the economy and way of life that had sustained the region for centuries. The region crumbled into disparate townships and no-less than a dozen separate states that struggled to survive in their changed world. Piracy and slave-raids from Korachan did not help the situation much, either.

This state lasted until the arrival of the so-called Child-Prince, an unageing infant of prodigious supranatural ability, who managed to unify the region in 3763 RM, supplanting an ancient sky-based religion with worship of its own unchanging form. Though its fleets were no-more, the region came to be dominated instead by the river Aresh, which flows for over 2,500 miles west, feeding already rich soils with nutrients due to its yearly flooding. This has led to the region’s adoption of farming of a pastoral and arable nature. Rich cities thrive along the floodplains of this river, each surrounded by dykes and canals that defend against flooding. Between cities live gigantic herds of wildlife, relatively untouched by mortal interference.

The Ahrisheni people have a reputation for hard-work and the land is known far-and-wide for its beauty, which is even recognised by the Korachani empire. Living on the doorstep of Korachan has seen Ahrishen fend off many crusades and incursions into its land, though it’s wet coastline makes invasion from the sea difficult.

#elyden, #fantasycartography, #atlaselyden, #vorropohaiah, #ahrishen, #virahan, #baatan

Remember you can get exclusives (like PSDs, texless, and high-res versions of the map on my Patreon.

more Atlas Maps!

So, I’ve got some more work done on the Atlas entries as well as some tweaks and minor adjustments that no-one other than myself is likely to even notice and I’m getting closer to finding a style I’m happy with (though I’m still torn about the mountains, though more on those later.

Of these new maps the most complex, by far is the one detailing twin nations of Ahrishen and Virahan. This is largely due to the many lakes, the relatively small scale (compare this map with the one of Ezasuth, for instance), and the fact that the regions to the west, south-east and east had already been mapped (Vârr, the Haréshk and Nakhé, respectively) so there was a lot of back and forth between this map and the older ones to make sure that everything (borders, coastlines, graticules) lined up and scaled together correctly.

Ahrishen and Virahan

I think I done a decent job (though it’s far from done…), though I realise that the maps are nothing much to look at at the moment and wont exactly be arty maps when they're done - they're political maps, detailing resources, roads, trade routes and such things and are functional rather than pretty,though I hope the Atlas can be seen as a work of art in some respects once its done. Also, the more maps I get done the more time-consuming the task gets. Also, the more maps I get done means the farther away from my comfort zone (Inner Sea) I get, which means more terra incognita: the lands around Korachan are very familiar as I’ve been working on them for coming up to a year now, though the farther afield I move the more unexplored certain regions become.

Take Ezasuth, for instance. This is all I have written about it:

Ezasuth: nation in Llachatul, just north of the Sea of Marden. Was home to explorers who settled lands in the far west of Llachatul, which would later become Ayad, Elat and Gyzha.

Ezasuth

That’s it. Pretty scary mapping a nation or which all I know is two sentences of background, apretty tame background at that. No flavour or characteristics that scream out as unique quite yet, but I’ll get there. I find a lot of the worldbuilding (or nationbuilding, as the case may be) comes from coming up with a rough vocabulary through which I can name regions and cities. History and background comes naturally as I flesh the geography out and I then build upon that. Of course creating neighbouring nations brings more history and synergy which sees a lot of back and forth as I figure out interactions between nations and peoples.

Azazem

Khamid

Laaskha

Mharokk

Naareth

Nakhe

Vaalk

Varr

Venthir

Of the above maps I think my favourites have to be Khamid, Venthir and Tzallrach since they represent neighbouring regions and the distinctive coastlines can be recognised from map to map, despite the differences in scale

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I’m still unsure about a few things though, largely the territories and borders (which appear in their most up-to-date form in the Korachan map I had posted) and mountains. The territories are fine, though I’d like something with a bit more texture. The mountains, however are getting me in a right pickle. Initially I’d though of something akin to the Dinotopia map below, which is true to the generic time period though not necessarily needed for these types of political maps. Though now I’m leaning towards something more akin to the Mediterranean map posted beneath it. Though that would entail a lot more work on my part and might make the maps more colourful and busier than I had originally intended. Decisions…

Dinotopia

Dinotopia detail - mountains and lettering