Game-Established Aerelon Culture
If you've read the intro blurbs on the other culture pages, this should be pretty self explanatory by now. Bunch of new Aerelon characters lately, cultural details go here, resource for other players, blah blah blah.
Mierce
Mierce is the indigenous 'language' of Aerelon, most commonly heard in the rural highlands. For more details, see Languages.
Places On Aerelon
Aerelon is primarily an agricultural world; it was said to be the 'breadbasket of the Twelve Colonies'. Despite the importance of that role, Aerelon is known as one of the five 'lesser colonies' thanks to the relative poverty of its citizens and lack of development compared to colonies like Caprica or Picon.
Details established in RP seem to show that Aerelon is divided into culturally distinct northern and southern areas. The northern area is culturally and geographically based on a mixture of the highlands of Northern England/Scotland and the small towns of the prairies of the American Midwest. Northern Aerelon is also home to the scratchy, guttural accent as demonstrated by Dr. Baltar in Dirty Hands.
Meanwhile, southern Aerelon appears to be principally based on the culture of the American South, accents and all.
Tarnock (Komnenos)
Tarnock is a small town just north the Tannerman Ocean on Aerelon's northern continent. The Tannerman is Aerelon's largest single body of water, though the tall, rocky cliffs overlooking the ocean in the vicinity of Tarnock means that little in the way of port facilities have developed there. Tarnock is more sleepy college/farming town than anything else; although the ocean cliffs and a local colonial park do a decent job of bringing tourists and their money to the town, the local economy owes far more to agriculture and the presence of the most prestigious of Aerelon's few colleges, Colchis University(more specifically, the influx of Colchis students with plenty of their parents' money to spend). As such, although you'll find the same mix of farmers and laborers on the outskirts of Tarnock as you would in any other small town on the planet, the city center is a more affluent place than one would find in most small towns on the colony; natives therefore tend to be just a little more cosmopolitan than the Aerelon stereotype. (Not much, though. The locals can still throw a barn party with the best of them.) During Aerelon's days of prohibition, many farmers in the area turned to home distillation rather than bootlegging or homebrewing. Before the attack on the colonies, the most renowned moonshiner in the vicinity of Tarnock was a canny old farmer named Ivan Komnenos.
Tarnock is relatively isolated; a major highway(A10) does run along the ocean and through the town, but the only other human settlements within 50 miles are the slightly smaller towns of Deronda, Stovall, and Ryker's Aerie. Most of the surrounding landscape consists of prairie and stretches of rolling hills, though the nearby Tarham Colonial Park holds a fairly substantial swath of forests as well as what passes for mountains in the area.
Caskhell Mountains (Tombs)
The Caskhell Mountain range, is very much akin to our own earth's Black Mountain in Kentucky, and from it come a rather hearty people. As such the culture here, is what one might expect to be poor. A mix of farmers and miners, with little towns stuck here and there. The people here enjoy cultural music, which sounds like our own bluegrass- and old time gospel esque songs. Tales tend to be of famous explorers or fighters and often pit man against numerous enemies, or the wilderness itself. During a time when Aerelon had a ban on whisky, and home made beers, the people in this range resorted to Bootlegging as means for extra income, and for their own drink. One of the larger townships is that of Seven Bridges, which takes about Seven bridges to get to. Mierce is more common here than standard-though often you will find the population speaking a mix. This is one of the areas in the south where a heavy population is just spread out.
The Dredges (Ezra)
The Dredges are in the far Northern reaches of the Colony. It is made famous for it's Salt Mines and for it's Stony people. The weather is rather inclimate- and one might put it in tune with our own Earth's Orkney Islands. The consider it a bride, like many Aerelonians to be from their place and in their colony. The CMC, and Navy often get many recruits from this inhospitable region.
Cultural Details By Person
Komnenos
- The people of northern Aerelon are generally staid and traditional, but without the ritualistic/superstitious bent that typifies Gemenese and Sagittaron culture. (For example, arranged marriages are extremely uncommon here)
- College education is rare; it's uncommon enough to find people with a community college class or three under their belts outside the major cities, much less an actual degree-holding professional. Because of the labor-intensive nature of agriculture and the relatively poor economic conditions, most young people in rural areas like Tarnock that don't or can't go in search of higher education stay at home and either work their family's land or hire themselves out as laborers on other people's land. Those residents of Tarnock that do achieve a college degree tend to, like Thorn, get the hell out.
- As mentioned above, the notorious 'Aerelon accent' is commonly found in this region. Mierce is also commonly heard, especially on the outskirts of town and the farms surrounding town.
- Pyramid is a favored pastime of the farmers and workers of northern Aerelon; nearly all the locals are fans of the Aerelon Archers, and blue, white, and gold(the team's colors) are popular all over the planet. The rivalry between the Archers and the Leonis Lions is something that most Aerelons take extremely seriously. (Think Cubs-Cardinals, baseball fans)
- Aerelon isn't the most religious of the Colonies, but Artemis, Apollo, and Hera all have devoted followings here.
- Tea, not coffee, is the hot morning beverage of choice in the region.
