Tékumel

Tékumel is a fantasy world created by M. A. R. Barker over the course of several decades from around 1940.^[1] With time, Barker also created the role-playing game Empire of the Petal Throne, set in the Tékumel fictional universe, and first published in 1975 by TSR, Inc. In this imaginary world, huge, tradition-bound empires with medieval levels of technology vie for control using magic, large standing armies, and ancient technological devices.

Sources

Barker's legendarium, like that of the better-known J. R. R. Tolkien, considered not just the creation of a fantasy world but also an in-depth development of the societies and languages of the world. In other words, the setting also provided a context for Barker's constructed languages which were developed in parallel from the mid-to-late 1940s, long before the mass-market publication of his works in roleplaying game and book form.^[1][2][3]

The most significant language created by Barker for his setting is Tsolyáni, which resembles Urdu, Pushtu and Mayan. Tsolyáni has had grammatical guides, dictionaries, pronunciation recordings, and even a complete language course developed for it. In order for his imaginary languages to have this type of depth, Barker developed entire cultures, histories, dress fashions, architectural styles, weapons, armor, tactical styles, legal codes, demographics and more, inspired by Indian, Middle Eastern, Egyptian and Meso-American mythology in contrast to the majority of such fantasy settings, which draw primarily on European mythologies.

Setting

The world of Tékumel, Nu Ophiuchi d (a.k.a. Sinistra d), was first settled by humans exploring the galaxy about 60,000 years in the future, along with several other alien species. Their extensive terraforming of the inhospitable environment, including changing the planet's orbit and rotation rate to create a 365.25-day year, disrupted local ecologies and banished most of the local flora and fauna (including some intelligent species) to small reservations in the corners of their own world, resulting in a golden age of technology and prosperity for humankind and its allies. Tékumel became a resort world, where the wealthy from a thousand other stars could while away their time next to its warm seas.

Suddenly,^[4] and for reasons unknown, Tékumel and its star system (Tékumel's two moons, Gayél and Káshi, its sun, Tuléng, and four other planets, Ülétl, Riruchél, Shíchel, and Zirúna) were cast out of our reality into a "pocket dimension" (known as a béthorm in Tsolyáni), in which there were no other star systems. One hypothesis is that this isolation happened through hostile action on the part of an unknown party or group. Another is that the cosmic cataclysm was due to over-use of a faster than light drive which warped the fabric of space. No one knows, but the inhabitants of Tékumel, both human, native, and representatives of the other starfaring races, were now isolated and alone.

Severed from vital interplanetary trade routes (Tékumel is a world very poor in heavy metals) and in the midst of a massive gravitic upheaval due to the lines of gravitational force between the stars being suddenly cut, civilization was thrown into chaos. The intelligent native species, the Hlüss and the Ssú, broke free from their reservations and wars as destructive as the massive geographic changes ravaged the planet. Several other significant changes took place due to the crisis: mankind discovered it could now tap into ultraplanar energies that were seen as magical forces, the stars were gone from the sky, dimensional nexi were uncovered and pacts with "demons" (inhabitants of dimensions near in n-dimensional space to Tékumel's pocket dimension) were made and a complex pantheon of "Gods" (powerful extra-dimensional or multi-dimensional alien beings) discovered. Science began to stagnate until ultimately knowledge became grounded in traditions handed down from generations long ago, the belief that the universe was ultimately understandable slowly faded, and a Time of Darkness descended over the planet.

Much of Barker's writing concerns a time approximately 50,000 years after Tékumel has entered its pocket dimension.^[5] Five vast tradition-oriented civilizations occupy a large portion of the northern continent. These five human empires, along with various non-human allies who are descended from other star faring races, vie to control resources, including other planar "magical powers" and ancient technology, as they vie for survival and supremacy among themselves as well as hostile and other non-human races.

Much of the gaming materials and other writings focus particularly on these Five Empires which control much of the world's northern continent (only about an eighth of the planet's surface has published maps).

Languages

Tsolyáni is one of several languages spoken on the world of Tékumel, and was the first conlang published as part of a role-playing game. It is inspired by Urdu, Pushtu and Mayan, the latter influence can be seen in the inclusion of the sounds hl /ɬ/ and tl /tɬ/.

As could be expected, Barker put great effort into the languages of Tékumel. Although Tsolyáni is the only Tekumeláni language that has had a full grammar book, dictionary, pronunciation tapes (on CD) and a primer, publicly released, it is not the only language for this world that Barker developed.

Also available are grammar guides for the Yán Koryáni and Livyáni languages which are spoken in two other of the "Five Empires" of the known parts of Tékumel, as well as grammar books for Engsvanyáli and Sunúz. These two languages are now extinct, dead languages. Engsvanyáli is of use as it is the root language for Tsolyáni and many of the other currently spoken languages of the known parts of Tékumel. Sunúz is of interest because, although it is obscure, it is quite useful for sorcerous purposes. For instance, Sunúz contains terms to describe movement in a six dimensional multi-planar space, something of use to beings who visit the other planar realms where "demons" live.

Barker also published extensively on scripts for other languages of Tékumel.

Published works

Roleplaying

Barker was a Professor of Urdu and South Asian Studies at the University of Minnesota during the period when David Arneson, Gary Gygax and a handful of others were developing the first role-playing games in the Twin Cities and Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. Barker tapped into this tradition and the setting he had developed from his childhood fantasies (much as H. G. Wells had done for his Floor Games leading into the better-known follow-up, Little Wars) to further explore and develop Tékumel. His "Thursday Night Groups" were amongst the first roleplaying sessions anywhere and provided what was, at the time, an unusually detailed week-by-week development of the setting.

In 1975, Tactical Studies Rules, Inc., the publishers of Dungeons & Dragons, published Barker's roleplaying game and setting as a standalone game under the title of The Empire of the Petal Throne (a synonym for the Tsolyáni Empire), rather than as a "supplement" to the original D&D rules.^[6] Bringing a level of detail and quality to the concept of a campaign setting which had previously been unknown in the nascent RPG industry's publications it could be considered a qualitative reimagining, less heavily entrenched in the tactical mass-combat, wargaming roots of D&D. The game was the subject of articles in early issues of Dragon Magazine, but factors including inconsistent support from TSR led to its decline in popularity. Over the subsequent thirty years several new games based on the Tékumel setting were published, but to date none have met with commercial success. While published as fantasy, the game is sometimes classified as science fantasy or, debatably, as science fiction.

TSR was locked into a deal that made the financial end of the game unpalatable to them. They had agreed to pay a "finders fee" on sales in addition to royalties as well as to certain expensive overrides. As a result, the product was more expensive and thus less profitable. In addition, Barker was perceived as having a very strong ego. (Note that when DAW published his first book he was able to obtain the "Superstar" imprint for it, resulting in other authors - many who had more than one Hugo - requesting the same and a great deal of discontent). Whether the perception is fair or not, it would later plague Barker's acceptance and reputation.

Tékumel has spawned four professionally-published roleplaying games over the course of the years:

• Empire of the Petal Throne, published in 1975 as a boxed set by TSR, Inc. and reprinted later as a single book by Different Worlds Publications in 1987.^[7]
• Swords & Glory, published in 1983/4 in two volumes by Gamescience.^[8]
• Gardasiyal: Adventures in Tekumel, published in 1994 by Theater of the Mind Enterprises.^[9]
• Tekumel: Empire of the Petal Throne, published in 2005 by Guardians of Order.^[10]

There have been a wide variety of materials of all sorts published over the years to further details this world. As well as the language materials, these include Deeds of the Ever Glorious —a History of the Tsolyani Legions, The Tékumel Bestiary, and The Book of Ebon Bindings, a guide to the demonic beings that are known to the Tsolyáni, and a six volume series of booklets that details the armies of each of the Five Empires as well as surrounding states and the vast lands of the reptilian Shén. There have also been various wargames rules as well as small scale metal miniatures to represent the various races and legions. Miniatures for the world are currently being produced in 28mm scale under license by Eureka miniatures of Australia

As interest in the game is driven to a large extent by a highly devoted, small number of enthusiasts, there have also been several non-commercially published rules as well as systems to adapt the Tékumel setting to other pre-existing, commercially available role playing rules including RuneQuest, GURPS and third edition Dungeons and Dragons. Many of these are available on the internet.

Novels

In 1984, DAW Books published Barker's Tékumel novel The Man of Gold. This was followed by Flamesong in 1985. In 2003, Zottola Publishing published three additional novels: Prince of Skulls, Lords of Tsámra, and A Death of Kings. In 2004 Zottola Publishing produced the two-volume set Mitlanyál, which deals with the Tsolyáni pantheon and provides much background regarding the Tsolyáni culture.

The chronological order of the novels (as opposed to their order of publication) is as follows:

• The Man of Gold
• Flamesong
• Lords of Tsámra
• Prince of Skulls
• A Death of Kings

References

External links

• Tékumel: The World of the Petal Throne
• Tékumel FAQ
• Omniglot: Tékumel writing systems
• French Wiktionary: Tsolyáni entries (in French)

There are several Yahoo! Groups devoted to Tékumel and various aspects of Tékumel.

Further reading

• Gary Fine, Shared Fantasy: Role Playing Games As Social Worlds, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 1983.