Kesruba desert
The Kesruba desert (Carassic: ⰍⰅⰔⰓⰑⰁⰀ, Kesroba; Rashimic: ⰍⰊⰞⰓⰑⰖⰁ, Kĭšroub) is a desert region in Joriscia, falling largely within eastern Domradovid Joriscia and Azophin's Keshrub province. Small parts of the desert also fall within the borders of Zemay and Anabbah. The desert is mainly populated by Carassic-speaking Kesruba Secotes, who were traditionally nomadic. The Domradovids that nominally rule over the Confederacy come from this people, and their court of Selgorod is located in the desert.
Until the early 19th century, the Kesruba presented a formidable obstacle to armies passing through the region and to the projection of power by local states: the Secotes skirted around it in the course of their invasion of Outer Joriscia, and with the exception of a brief period in the late 16th and early 17th century where the Great Neritsovids exerted power on both sides of the desert (notably in Chuzastrana) and brought some of the inhabitants under their control, it marked the natural border of Vesnite expansion into the interior of the continent. However, with the development of new technologies, the Kesruba became increasingly more accessible and from the first expedition of the Bashty Party in 1799 it came under greater and greater influence from the surrounding powers. Azophin and Zemay, and to some extent the Lutoborsk, jockeyed for position in the steppes, leading to several skirmishes and proxy wars in the region, as part of the Race to the Centre. In 1841 an Azophine military-technological project to construct a railway - running through several small fortress-towns garrisonned by Azophine troops - across the Keshruba to Chuzastrana began, effectively bringing large portions of the desert under Azophine control.
In the early 20th century, significant oil deposits were discovered in the desert; both Azophin and Zemay operate oil wells within the Commandery which were the focus of the Zemayan-Azophine 157-day Battle of the Veweesh in the Littorean War during the Long War.