| Issue Two: The Dark Ages |
| The Dark Ages This was a period of time following the fall of the Roman Empire, and was actually titled as the "Dark Ages" by a popular writer in the Victorian era. It has stuck ever since, and for the convenience of your young minds I will refer to them as you have learned to refer to them. The Dark Ages were an interesting time, especially in comparison to modern nights. This was the time that most Kindred dream of. Vampires ruled openly for the first part of this Era. It was apparently not uncommon for a Tzimisce lord to walk into the nearest town and begin taking blood from people with no consideration for the modern night Masquerade. Vampires in the Dark Ages were a well-known quantity among humans, and they just learned to live with us. In fact, until the Catholic Church sprung into existence, humans were simply food. The Church changed all that. After several years the Church began to actively pursue information regarding supernatural creatures. After accumulating a sufficient amount of information, they instituted the now feared Inquisition. This group of humans managed to drive fear into even the most alien and powerful fiend. Thousands of mortals and immortals alike went into the flame, all to cure the world from the supernatural taint that had swept across the land and threatened to ensnare humanity forever. Vampire fought back in every manner that they could, but many found that their personal influence over the Church and other mortal institutions was significantly less than they had previously assumed; their contacts had been eliminated because they were "tainted." Another important thing happened during this time; our clan sprung into existence. House Tremere As I hope your sire has already informed you, we were not always immortal beings. We came, in fact, from a powerful group of wizards that exist to this day. In the Dark Ages, we were known as House Tremere, not Clan Tremere, and were part of a powerful cabal of sorcerers called the Order of Hermes. When the House of Tremere proposed to its fellow council members that they investigate the vampiric condition, they were told that this course of study would not be permitted. It was at this point our honoured founder broke away from the rest of the council, and began to conduct his own experiments with his most promising student, Goratrix. Together they spent years studying the vampiric nature, and ultimately learned how to transform humans into vampires via magik. To transform themselves they used to blood of a Tzimisce lord, which is the cause of our war between our two clans to this present night. The two warlocks spent even more time tracking down the body of one of the original thirteen vampires, a creature called Saulot. This pitiful being spent most of his time complaining about its condition, so Tremere absorbed its soul into himself, causing the House of Tremere to become a full-fledged Clan. Of course, following this act there was a lengthy time during which the new Tremere Clan was at odds with the rest of the vampiric population of Europe, though this has resolved itself almost completely by modern nights. There was one other truly massive event that took place in the world following the creation of our clan. Follow me now into the terrors of the Anarch revolt. |