Etherley
| Etherley | |
|---|---|
 Etherley: a view from above the Gaste, looking north-east towards Leadhill Castle | |
| Nickname(s): The Jewel in the Crown | |
| Country |  Elland |
| County | Etherley |
| First settlement | 803 (approx.) |
| National capital | 1479 |
| Population (2013) | |
| • City | 4,458,000 (estd.) |
| • Metro | 6,430,000 (estd.) |
Etherley is the capital and largest city of Elland, and is located in the north central region of the country, within the Central Ellish Plain on the banks of the river Gaste; the city centre lies a little way downstream of the river’s confluence with the smaller Gaune. The city and its wider metropolitan area have a combined current (Conservene 2016) estimated population of 6,430,000 (recorded at 6,328,117 as at the most recent census, in 2011).
Etymology
The name Etherley is attested to at least as early as 625 CE, when it is referred to as the village of Æþelingslēah, “prince’s clearing” in Old Ellish, in land surveys conducted during the Third Sabāmani Empire; the clearing referred to is thought to lie within the present-day Petty Demesne to the east of the city centre. The first reference to a more modern spelling Etheleigh dates from the early 15th century, and the name had become standardised as the present Etherley by 1529.
Geography
Etherley is located in the north-eastern part of present-day Elland, with the larger part of the historic city on the eastern bank of the river Gaste, which flows generally from south-west to north-east at this point in its course. The river Gaune runs through the city centre around the foot of the Leadhill, the site of the royal palace and for centuries the focal point of central Etherley.
The city lies in a naturally formed bowl in the landscape created by the Beale Hills to the south and east and the Cleye Hills to the north and west. In certain weather conditions – mainly periods of severe cold and minimal or no winds – this can lead to periods of intense fog known familiarly to Etherlines as “the Grey”. While these usually last only for one or two days, a period of almost a week in Nollonger 1987 saw an unusually severe bout, exacerbated by atmospheric pollution in and around the city; the Big Grey, as it became known, caused almost three thousand deaths, and almost ninety thousand people found it necessary to seek out medical attention.
History
Antiquity
Evidence of human habitation in what is today Etherley has been dated back with some confidence to some 50,000 years before the present, in the area around Leadhill. In the pre-Common Era period, the region was home to various scattered tribal groups, some of which were of sufficient lasting stature to be included in the Western League, a group of minor polities which held loose control of the area between the Gaste valley and the central Odannach highlands before later becoming absorbed into the expanding First Sabāmani Empire.
The area around modern Etherley was part of the kingdom of Catharia during the early first millennium CE, and the Catharian capital was located at the site of the present-day town of Kettlebridge, approximately fifty kilometres downriver from Etherley. Although more lightly settled at that time, Etherley was known more widely across the Cairan world through the Temple of Remesiana, a temple built on the site of a cairon nexus identified in the early third century. Catharia’s surrender to forces of the advancing Sabamanians after the Battle of Stisted in 311 CE brought it firmly under Sabamic control; the area would remain part of the Sabāmani domains for almost five hundred years.
The collapse of the empire in the face of assault by the invading Secote saw the horse-warriors sweep into the Central Ellish Plain at the beginning of the ninth century. While one wave turned westwards towards the Aphrasian mountains and the Siur country, a larger contingent spread south through the Gaste valley and towards southern Elland. Kettlebridge (Old Sabamic Castra Catharorum) was overrun and burned almost completely to the ground by the invaders in 803, with many of the inhabitants pushed upriver, where they found safety on higher ground around the present-day Leadhill. The encampment formed the beginnings of the modern city.
Secote dominance in the area would continue for more than three hundred years, although the former “invaders” became increasingly assimilated into local life. However, the antipathy and intransigence of the early Secote rulers towards the Cairan imperial argan and its ties to the civil authorities – the so-called “Ecclesiarchy” – saw the fragmentation and partial suppression of the faith in the area. Ellish Cairony would remain largely enfeebled and in disarray until the rise of Orange Revivalism and, ultimately, the re-establishment of a unified Argan of Elland in the late 15th century.
Post-Secote period
The Ellish lands’ traditional strength as a centre of agricultural production combined with Etherley’s enviable position on land- and river-borne trade routes to drive its development in the post-Secote centuries. The agricultural bounty of Elland attracted the attention of would-be builders of empire to the north, and the Montalbian Empire spread into most of northern and central Elland during the middle 13th century. The sword-noble Guiscard des Maëtschamps was granted lands around Etherley as a barony in 1222, and built the first Leadhill Castle close to the Temple of Remesiana between 1226 and 1230. Over the next two centuries the family name would be mutated into the form Middlechamp which it retained in future years. The city grew, mostly steadily, over the next two centuries, although its expansion was halted by reconstruction after the fire in 1284 which destroyed much of its centre.
The Kingdom of Elland was established in 1479 as Prince William of Middlechamp united his own lands with those of neighbouring Salles, elevating himself to the status of king and becoming Elland’s first monarch as William I. As the seat of William’s principality, Etherley became the new country’s capital; and as the home of the royal court, the city played an important part in the political and dynastic intrigues which swept across Elland and northern Messenia more generally in the ensuing centuries. It was the location of the Council of Etherley which arbitrated the dispute over the royal succession following the death of Stephen I in 1632.
As the battle for the facets of Cairony rampaged across northern Messenia during the Reform Wars of the 17th and 18th centuries, Etherley emerged as a bastion of the Orthodoxist cause, with the Holy Mother Victoria Bromyard (1670-1739), an Etherline by birth, one of the most vociferous in defence of the Cairan status quo. Bromyard was a key ally of her Savamese counterpart Téodora de Beldopoule as they pressured the wavering King Henry II into committing forces to the assault on Brocquie which began the First Reform War in 1732.
19th and 20th centuries
The incursion by Odannach forces during the Autumn War of 1867-68 saw Etherley come under direct attack, with shelling from Odannach mortar batteries reaching as far as Leadhill Castle, as well as Stargazers’ Hall, the site of Elland’s parliament. Although the parliament remained in session throughout the bombardment, King Peter III and the royal family were evacuated to Otway, in the central midlands region, for their own safety; it would not be until late 1874 that Peter persuaded the government to allow the family to return. It has been claimed that the invaders did not attempt to capture the city only because their immediate war aims – the recovery of the predominantly Dael-speaking areas in northern Elland – had been met, and that the Odannach army command recognised that an attack on the centre of Etherley would be vigorously defended and would lead to needless casualties.
The ceasefire established a new border on the Gaste itself, making Etherley one of the very few capital cities in world history to be located directly on a state border – a development which coloured much of the post-war relationship between the two countries. Although proposals were made for the administrative functions of government to be moved from Etherley to a more secure location, they were forced down in parliament. The frontier post on the Henry III Bridge between Etherley and Presborough (Dael Buirg an Preas) became one of the most closely monitored in Messenia during the period up to the beginning of the Long War. Although the degree of scrutiny was relaxed somewhat in the late 19th century as relations between Elland and Odann thawed, including the period of the two countries’ alliance against Savam in the Embute War of 1889-93, for the most part tensions and mutual suspicions remained present for most of the period up to the Ellish counter-invasion in support of Savam during the Gaste War of 1954-58.
Presborough and its suburbs were re-absorbed into greater Etherley in the wake of the reunification, although formal annexation did not take place until 1971. While the two parts of the city had never been quite as completely separated as the presence of an interordinate border might imply, they remained distinct, both socially and culturally, for perhaps a further two decades. The slang term “yonderer” for people from Presborough and other formerly Odannach districts is still heard occasionally in day-to-day speech in the city.
The city today
Modern Etherley has, for the most part, shaken off the remnants of its troubled recent past and has become once again a thriving and bustling capital city.
The district of Leadhill is the core of the original city, centred on the royal palace at Leadhill Castle and the nearby Temple of Remesiana. The district also plays host to the University of Leadhill, the country’s oldest educational institution, and in the recent past it has become the focal point of the city’s commercial life, particularly along the main shopping areas around Osterley Street and King Stephen’s Embankment.
Although Marjoribank had already been a centre for governmental activity, with the Ellish parliament meeting amid the 17th-century splendour of Stargazers’ Hall, many government offices shifted away from the riverside in the wake of defeat against Odann, making the district increasingly the heart of government. Neighbouring Pridewell is home to the Orthodox Argan of Elland, which relocated from the Temple of Remesiana to newer and more comfortable surroundings on Newmarch Road in 1821.
Administration
For administrative purposes the city of Etherley proper is divided into eighteen wards; this structure covers only that area specifically identified as the city, as opposed to its wider metropolitan area, much of which falls into the surrounding county of Middlechamp and is therefore administered from the county town of Austrey. The wards are (by order of postcode) Leadhill; Marjoribank; Pridewell; Quernstone; Crowley; Bromwich; Swanbrook; *Presborough; *Wagehall; *Swineshead; *Debstone; *Biddesley; *Pottermore; Shinwell; Mistlestone; Binpensey; Crestwood; New Mills. Those marked * are on the west bank of the Gaste and were Odannaigh territory between 1868 and 1958.
Economy
Elland was a comparative latecomer to the process of industrialisation which advanced across Messenia during the 19th and early 20th centuries, and even today Etherley is less heavily industrialised than comparable cities elsewhere in the subcontinent. That being said, it has since built strongly on its traditional bases as a clearing centre for Ellish agricultural business by developing a significant secondary base in manufacturing industry, including the tractor and agricultural plant manufacturer Agricola and GSR Engineering, headquartered in the south-eastern district of New Mills, which is one of Messenia’s largest builders of railway rolling stock. At a rather more rarefied level, the city is home to a number of specialist enterprises, including the celebrated and exclusive gunsmithing company Frederick Lumley & Sons, which occupies premises a short walk from the royal palace in Tracewater Street, Leadhill.
Transport
Etherley is well-served by public transport, with the city’s transport authority, Etherlines, operating an extensive network of buses and trams covering most parts of the city, as well as several suburban rail services. A large part of the city centre was closed to most vehicular traffic following urban improvement works during 2003-04, and this created two main transport interchanges within the central zone at Restoration Square and Clothmarket. A third interchange has been proposed for construction at Randwick Levels in Presborough, although funding for the project has not yet been secured and recent suggestions have emerged that this plan may be deferred until 2019.
The city is a central point for the widespread Ellish railway network, as well as a stopping point for most transordinate services through Elland, including the well-known Western Arrow service running on alternate days between Quesailles and Ostari. The recent growth of interordinate air travel within Messenia has seen an expansion of the city’s main airport, to the south in the outlying district of Birchgrove, which is scheduled for completion in early 2015.