The current year in Oceana is 2005 Common Era, (today) although Oceana uses a different calander. Oceana primarily uses the Greek calander with regards to the years. The months are based upon local names. This website generally uses Earth names for months to keep things simple.
Oceana was initially settled in 800 BCE by Egyptian humans, Elves, and Dwarves. Orcs, Goblins, Kobolds and similar sentiant "monsters" might have been transported at the same time, but there are no written or oral records. Since that time a few other large groups of humans have come over from Earth. Additional groups of similar sizes were settled on Oceana in the centuries that followed. In addition, very small groups of 1 to 25 people have showed up fairly frequently.
Oceana started off with a very small population base compared to Earth. The groups that came over were fairly small, with the largest probably not much more than 3000 people. Oceana's geography kept population fairly compact. Unlike Earth, it took a specific effort to colonize another island as opposed to slowly expanding on Earth's continents. See the article on colonization for details. Early expansion was mostly peaceful. All of Oceana was lightly settled, and the monster tribes had little sea going capabiltiy. Most colonies were settled not far from their mother country, and generally considered part of the originial city-state.
Those colonies that were further afield were totally independent, although there were trade and family ties. Even then, it was easy to avoid settling on islands occupied by the monster tribes. Monsters on nearby islands could usally be bought off by trade goods or by playing one tribe against another.
Oceana never had any major political or geographic empires, unlike Earth. The island geography made it very expensive to fight wars of conquest. See Oceana Warfare for details on warfare. The closests thing to an empire would have been the Egyptians. The Egyptians only controlled one island, but it is the single largest known landmass on Oceana. The other cultural groups tended to have confederations and independent city-states or kingdoms with much more decentralized political power, if not outright war between islands.
The Egyptians stayed on their island for the first 600 or more years after they arrived on Oceana. The Elves did expand to a few new islands, but their slow population growth rate kept them from settling to many. The Dwarves have a higher growth rate than Elves, but have trouble moving across the water. As such, the Dwarves tended to heavily settle an island before moving on. It wasn't until the Greeks arrived on Oceana and started their voyages of exploration that the world was explored and the various races were put in contact with each other.
For roughly 1,000 years, from 375 BCE until 600 CE, humans and the human friendly races expanded across Oceana. There was a steady expansion westward from the starting places in the eastern parts of the archipeligo. Humans and their allies fought a steady war against the humanoid monster tribes of Orcs, Bugbears, Goblins, Gnolls and Kobolds. The monster races were enslaved or killed. There was some technological progess, and more importanly, a lot of magical progress. A steady import of slaves built great cities, provided luxery for many of the upper classes.
Around 600 CE expansion basically stopped. Humans had enough for a while. They turned inwards and way from conquest and exploration. People tended not to want to join the army, since for many life was good or they were not eligiable. The prospect of making ones fortune by settling new island had essentially vanished. The developed city-states and islands offered enough rewards, and new islands offered little chance for real advancement.
Life wasn't all good during this first age. Slave revolts were a regular occurance on many islands. The use of slaves, mostly monsters, pushed free humans off their lands. In those areas that were under a single govenment, corruption grew and oppresed the people. Taxes were heavy on the peons. There were civil wars in most areas during this 2000 year period. Minor kingdoms rose in fell in a regular fashion.
Around 800 CE Oceana entered a Dark Age. this dark age lasted until 1200 CE. society collapsed again 1600. in 1900 society started it's climb back.
In about 850 CE another group of humans arrived on Oceana, the Norwegians or Norse. With them came ideas of feudal government and a different form of justice. They jumped started colonization after another hundred years as they grew in numbers. It was they that created most of the Border Land areas that were over run 700 years later.
Everything changed in 1600 CE. A plague broke out that killed many humans, nekojin and some dwarves. The disease had no effect on the monsters, and little to no efect on the still small Elven population.
Feudalism, or a form of feudalism, had been introduced on Oceana as a way of controlling the monster tribes. The tribal structure of the various monsters required that if the chief of the tribe submitted, he'd be the vassel of the conquerer. Oceana's version of feudalism also provided the usual benifit of providing a means of ruling over a territory with little to no central government expense of garrison troops.
On Earth a combination of barbarian invasions and plague gutted the urban culture of the Roman Empire. While war and disease had often temporarily reduce populations, the fall of the Roman Empire seems to have been different. The barbarians from northern Europe, once they penetrated the borders of the Empire had easy access to Rome and the other Roman cities. This access was both easy overland travel, but also no significant military forces were kept in the heart of the Empire. As the plagues decimated the population, the barbarian armies mostly just moved in. In addition, the Roman Empire had a policy of settling barbarians in the outlying areas of the Empire as cheap way to protect the area. The barbarians were familiar with Roman weapsons and tactices from serving in, or as the Roman Legion.
Oceana never lost it's urban culture once it was established. Oceana has a series of urban cultures, descended from the Greeks and Egyptian. All of these are basically in the olive and wine belt. The northern lands were, and mostly remain, very rurual. While plague reduced the populations of many islands on many occasions, the dominant urban culture remained. Barbarian invasions had trouble sacking developed islands in sufficient numbers to destroy the culture. Even if one island was sacked or even over run by monsters or barbarians, the next island was a major leap. Barbarians could raid, but occupation was tougher, and it was occupation that was needed to break the culture. The barbarians and monsters would have to not just sack one island, they would have to sack all the islands within a short (decades) period of time to destroy the culture by force.
In the centuries before the Plague of Monsters, travel was very common for the rich. Greek derived city-states provided most of the travelers.
Oceana is currently coming out of a long period when Humans, Dwarves, Elves and Nekojin have been on the defensive. Monsters such as Orcs, Goblins and Kobolds had over run large portions of the known world. The monsters started to gain ascendancy about 600 years ago and ushered in s sort of Dark Ages on Oceana. The Dark Ages began about 600 years ago (1400's) when a major plague decimated the human, elf, dwarf, and nekojin populations. This is somewhat similar to the Bubonic Plague that destroyed Europe in the mid-1300s. Population dropped dramatically, an average of 60%. Some areas were totally wiped out. Some outlying islands were abandoned, and the survivors migrated back towards cities that were not so bad off. As population fell, towns & cities lost people who were needed to raise food distribute it and generally run the city or town. Outlying towns faced the same problems, except that with smaller populations to start with, the effects were felt faster. People from outlying towns generally migrated to the cities. The Plague only affected humans, elves, dwarves and nekojin. The monsterous races (Orcs, Kobolds, Goblins, etc) were immune. This lead to a series of slave and client state revolts across Oceana.
Those towns and islands that survived the swarms of monsters and revolt of their monster slaves fell into manoralism / feudalism similar to Earth's midieval period. This was also the time that more and more colonies revolted. Partially to avoid taxes (normally lead by nobles from the outlying areas) or peasant revolts. Also, colonies that had been traded in war from culture to culture also revolted.
city fires can burn out an entire city or town.
Delian League - ancient Athens create the leauge to keep Athens and allies safe from Persia. there were annual dues to maintain a Navy. city-states that did not want to join the league were forced to because they were getting the beniftis anyways. eventually these city-states revolted.
Black Death broke empires on Oceana. Limited travel. Fishing yes, trade no. Islands defend selves,break away from home islands.Monsters invade. note that Orcs, Kobolds, Goblins are immune to the Plague.
Some islands are big enough to have more than one city-state. Some are at war, but most are isolated enough not to be concerned with each other.
Oceana still has not had the Enlightenment? No discovery of scientific method?
Divine right of kings? no revolts or civil wars in egypt since gods have to approve the rulers. doesn't apply to many of the out islands or greece. greeks elect people, out islands are straight descent.
There is limited concept of national sovreignty. There is plenty of land that is not associated with any country. There has been no Treaty of Westphalia.
These are more than broad events that have had a major impact on Oceana's history and development. Some of these are have no specifically identfiable start and stop time, beyond pointing to a century or decade. Earth examples would be the Industrial Revolution, Communism, the fall of the Roman Empire and similar.
While transdimensional groups provided the various cultures and races on Oceana, there were also individuals or small groups that were transported to Oceana. Most individuals either died or fell to slavers fairly quickly. It is the exceptional individual that made an impact. Often the impact was a matter of technology they were able to recreate that Oceana didn't previously have. For those societies that still have slavery, transdimensional travellers are highly valued, at least initially. Many an individual or city-states fortune could be made from the ideas a single transdimensional traveller could bring.
| Common Era Dates | Since Greek 1st Olympic |
| 2004 | 2780 |
| 2000 | 2776 |
| 0 | 776 |
| 753 BCE | 23 |
| 776 BCE | 0 |
| 3760 BCE | -2986 |