Bīrō

A bīrō (Lacrean ⰁⰋⰓⰙ, plural ⰁⰋⰓⰙⰍ, bīrōk) was a member of the urban elite of medieval Lacre, beginning as authorised tax collectors and legal officials under the Secote Empire and subsequently developing into a class of landholding aristocrats and merchants resident in the cities. The title bīrō was banned in Great Neritsia following the War of the Pact of Osan, though bīrō families continued to be prominent in the cities of the Graviate of Lacre.

After the Secote conquest of Outer Joriscia and the collapse of the Chotarian order with the sack of Kozrat in 1052, the finely regulated system of consecrated land that characterised the Fifth Chotarian Empire was thrown into disorder. In the densely urbanised region of Old Chotar, and to a lesser extent in other central regions of the Fifth Empire, the Secotes installed a new political hierarchy to supervise the collection of taxes and enforce imperial authority. The bīrōk—literally 'possessors'—emerged as a class of native Lacrean officials appointed by the Steward of the Chotarians to assist in various capacities in the governance of the cities and their surrounding countryside, often rewarded for their service with minor usufructuary grants as the system of landholding was rearranged. Initially, the bīrōk formed loose local governments centred on the cities' temple administrations, supervised by the slave-priesthood acting as agents of the Stewards, and later of the Emperor of the Eastrons. As they consolidated their control over the remnants of the Fifth Empire's administrative system, the more successful bīrōk were able to significantly expand their landholdings and to use their privileges as tax collectors to involve themselves in the cities' commerce, becoming a powerful counterweight to imperial authority. Already in the 1110s the Secotes were forced to put down a substantial revolt of bīrōk in the Ten-City Rebuke.

The imperial victory on this occasion proved limited and temporary: beginning in the late twelfth century, with the emperors distracted by dynastic intrigues, bīrōk in many cities were able to restrict or even totally exclude the imperial slave-priests, practically asserting autonomy from the emperors and replacing the temple administrations with communal governments. Endemic warfare in Lacre itself, the growing influence of traders and mercenaries from the Rozmani cities over the Gulf of Joriscia, harassment from Heghta and Gergotea, and piratical depredations from Aushria on the sea all contributed to a defensive consolidation of bīrō rule over the course of the following century. A complex struggle unfolded among the bīrōk themselves and between the communes, the Secote nobility of High and Middle Lacre, the surrounding foreign powers, and the declining authority of the imperial throne. By the latter half of the 13th century, large parts of Lacre were dominated by leagues of communal cities and lesser towns and villages, effectively proto-combinations. At the same time, the Second Dawn of medieval Ishtinism revived many elements of classical Chotarian culture in the cities, leading to the establishment of courts and academies that contributed to the articulation of an autonomous bīrō identity. The adoption, to varying extents, of the flourishing culture of the bīrōk by the Secote nobles of the Lacrean interior brought about the emergence of the Pseudolacreans, whose consolidation of territorial principalities soon made them the main competitors of the bīrōk for social dominance within Lacre.

The invasions of Lacre by Mindaug of Laukuna early in the 14th century posed perhaps the most serious threat to Lacrean autonomy since the Secote conquest itself, and provoked the formation of the Combination of Lacre, officially the Honourable Combination of Bīrōk, an organisation that came to encompass virtually all of the great cities of Low Lacre and embodied the apogee of the power of the bīrō class. This hegemony was given an institutional form in the Boards of Secrets that emerged in the 1310s and became the normative administrative form of the Lacrean city-communes by the end of the century. The Combination proved fertile ground for the early spread of Vaestism after 1428, with Lacrean forces making up many of the Vaestic armies that prosecuted the Octadic Reclamation of 1444–53. The War of Knowledge of 1460–76 led to the formal adoption of Vaestism as the League's sole official cult, a religious purge of the bīrō class within the League, and the secession of Kish and Starigrad under Doyotian protection. Although the Combination's attempts to retain its role as a powerful and independent political player were scuppered by the murder of Fēṇe, the heretical Universal Prophet elected under its auspices, and its consequent incorporation into Great Neritsia in 1521, the bīrōk themselves continued to flourish under Great Neritsia—benefiting, in fact, from the lasting peace and stability provided by the emperors. Indeed, Neritsovid sumptuary ordinances allowed the Boards to conduct an extended campaign of persecution against their old enemies, the Pseudolacrean strongmen. After the War of the Pact of Osan, however, the Combination was forcibly dissolved and incorporated into the Graviate of Lacre under the terms of the Eternal Treaty of Nardash. The title of bīrō was committed to oblivion alongside the related title of bgheet.

The bīrōk are notable for including many women, in particular prior to the Neritsovid Misogynist dispute and the banning of female Scholars. The scope for women's involvement in trade and public life gradually decreased from the high point of Fēṇe's Prophecy, and was severely restricted by the measures taken after Osan.