The history of Eastern Oerik, as a learned citizen of Greyhawk would tell it. Dates are in the Common Year (CY), the calendar the Great Kingdom imposed on the Flanaess; years before it are counted backward. The year is now 576 CY (NB: Elves keep their own far older calendar. Many only use/are aware of the Common Year when dealing with people of other cultures, and even then only if there would be significant consequences for not doing so). For the region as it stands today, see Lands of the Flanaess.
The four peoples
Almost every human in the Flanaess descends from one of four peoples, and most are some mix of them. What they look like is on Words of the Flanaess and in each realm’s entry on Lands of the Flanaess. Rough real-world counterparts are on Real-World Parallels.
- The Flan: the first humans here, long before the migrations. They were hunters and herders in scattered tribes, and never an empire. Their blood runs everywhere under the rest, purest in the Rovers of the Barrens, Tenh and the Pale.
- The Oeridians: fierce tribes from west of the great mountains, driven east by the Baklunish-Suloise wars and the hordes those wars let loose. (Some sages say they had lived between the two empires and fought as mercenaries for both.) They won most of the Flanaess by allying with the elves, dwarves, gnomes and Flan. Their strongest tribe, the Aerdi, built the Great Kingdom, and Oeridian houses still rule most of the middle and east: Furyondy, Nyrond, the Urnsts and Greyhawk itself.
- The Suloise: refugees of the empire burned in the Rain of Colorless Fire (see below). They were remembered as raiders and slavers, though not every house deserved that. They survive as the Barbarian Kingdoms of the far north, mixed with Oeridians in Keoland and the southwest, and as the secretive Scarlet Brotherhood in the deep south.
- The Baklunish: survivors of the other burned empire, who held on west of the mountains: Ket, Ekbir, Tusmit, Zeif and the nomads of the steppes. They keep their old faiths, customs and pride, and have little to do with the east.
Before the Flanaess had a name
Before any human kingdom, the land belonged to the elves, dwarves, gnomes and halflings, and to the Flan, the first humans here: bronze-skinned hunters in small, scattered tribes.
The Twin Cataclysms (about −485 to −422 CY)
Far to the west, beyond the great mountains, two empires went to war: the Baklunish of the northwestern plains and the Suloise of the southwest, both steeped in powerful arcane magic.
- About −485: the Baklunish-Suloise wars begin. Both sides hire humanoid hordes, orcs and worse, as mercenaries. The hordes spill out of the war and pillage north and east.
- About −458: the Oeridian tribes, driven east by the war and the hordes, pour into the Flanaess, pushing the Flan aside.
- About −447: the Suloise begin fleeing their own empire, through a pass in the southern mountains.
- −422: the end of both empires. Suloise wizards called down the Invoked Devastation on the Baklunish homeland. With their last breath, the Baklunish magi answered with the Rain of Colorless Fire, which burned the Suloise Empire to ash (NB: Scholars debate the order in which this happened, as noted below). That ash is the Sea of Dust. The Baklunish survivors held on in the west; the Suloise scattered.
Nobody knows exactly what magic did this, or even which empire unleashed its doom first. Some sages say the Suloise loosed the Invoked Devastation and the Baklunish answered with the Rain; others say the Rain fell first and the Devastation was Suloise revenge. Scholars argue about it, and treasure hunters still search the ruins. The thought of such magic in anyone’s hands today concerns those who know enough to know it is possible.
The Migrations (about −420 to −220 CY)
For two centuries, Oeridians and Suloise fought each other, the humanoid hordes, and anyone else that turned up in the region, for the heart of the Flanaess.
- The Oeridians won most of the territory. They made allies of the elves, dwarves, gnomes and halflings, and many Flan joined them as well. The Suloise, on the whole, were remembered as raiders and slavers.
- Some Suloise held on: the clans of the far north became the Barbarian Kingdoms, and two noble Suloise houses settled peacefully in the southwest and mixed with the Oeridians there, the beginnings of Keoland and its neighbors. Most of the rest were pushed to the far south and the jungles.
- That’s why the (human) population of the Flanaess is distributed the way it is: Oeridians across the middle and east, Suloise north and south, Baklunish in the west, and Flan everywhere.
The Great Kingdom (−217 to about 300 CY)
- −217: the strongest Oeridian tribe, the Aerdi, founds the Kingdom of Aerdy east of the Nyr Dyv.
- −110: Aerdy crushes the cavalry of Nyrond at the Battle of a Fortnight’s Length. From then on it is the Great Kingdom.
- 1 CY: the first Overking is crowned in Rauxes and declares peace across the whole realm, which now reaches as far as Greyhawk. The Common Year starts here.
- For two centuries the Great Kingdom is the greatest power the Flanaess has ever known: orderly, rich and, by its own account, good.
- 213 CY: the Age of Great Sorrow begins, and the empire starts to decline.
Breaking Away (about 300 to 450 CY)
- About 320 CY: the distant provinces declare themselves sovereign. Furyondy, Veluna and Perrenland go their own way, and nomads appear in the north.
- 356 CY: Nyrond breaks away and becomes a kingdom. In the southwest, Keoland is at the height of its power, ruling from the Pomarj to the borders of Ket.
- 437 to 446 CY: the Turmoil Between Crowns. An Overking is assassinated and the great houses fight a civil war for the Malachite Throne. House Naelax wins. Its first Overking, Ivid I, is the first to be openly evil, and the throne has been whispered about ever since.
- 446 CY: angered by Ivid’s cruelty, the southern states form the Iron League. Bandit lords sack the town of Trigol, and the Sea Princes rise in the south.
- 453 CY: Keoland’s new king, Tavish IV, ends its wars of conquest and lets its neighbors go free.
How Greyhawk Grew
- Long ago: Greyhawk starts as a trading post on the Selintan, in the age of the migrations. A local warlord builds a keep on the hill above it, taxes the river trade (and robs the occasional caravan of silver from the Cairn Hills barrows), and calls himself Landgraf of Selintan.
- His son marries the daughter of the sorceress-ruler of Hardby, and their line grows rich.
- About 375 CY: the city reaches its height under Zagig Yragerne, the Mad Archmage. He builds the sprawling Castle Greyhawk, founds the Guild of Wizardry, and pours money into the city to make it the Gem of the Flanaess. His reign is famously bizarre. One day, in a turn of events that surprises precisely no one, he simply vanishes.
- 498 CY: Greyhawk declares itself a Free City, ruled by its Directing Oligarchy. The same year, the County of Urnst comes under the Duchy of Urnst.
- Ever since, adventurers have hauled treasure out of the ruins of Castle Greyhawk and spent it in the city.
The Shadow Grows (479 to 576 CY)
- 479 CY: the might of Iuz grows in the north, and humanoid invasions become common.
- About 505 CY: Iuz disappears. Only much later does the truth come out: he was imprisoned beneath Castle Greyhawk, one of nine powers locked away there by the Mad Archmage.
- 513 CY: the Horned Society rises north of the Shield Lands, and humanoids take the Pomarj.
- 563 CY: the Bone March falls to humanoids.
- 569 CY: the Battle of Emridy Meadows. An alliance of Furyondy, Veluna, Verbobonc and Celene smashes the horde of Elemental Evil and besieges its Temple, which falls in a fortnight. A few of its masters escape.
- 570 CY: Iuz’s prison breaks open. He takes back his old domain within the year, and has been building an army ever since.
- 573 CY: the Scarlet Brotherhood is first heard of. Furyondy’s crown prince and the Provost of Veluna are kidnapped.
- 576 CY: now. The Great Kingdom is rotting, Iuz is rising, Elemental Evil is broken but not gone, and someone is smashing villages in Geoff and Sterich.
Drawn from the World of Greyhawk gazetteer (1980) and the 2024 Dungeon Master’s Guide*, © Wizards of the Coast, summarized under the Fan Content Policy.*