Lepidopterum

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Planting of Lepidopterum
[[|125px|Flag of Lepidopterum|frameless]] Flag [[|85px|Coat of Arms of Lepidopterum|frameless]] Coat of Arms
Motto: Sub umbrā terrae flōrēmus (We flourish in the shade of the earth)
Anthem: none
Map versions	16.3.5-present
Capital	Lepidopterum
Largest city	Lepdiopterum
Official language(s)	Benacian English (official) Nezeni
Official religion(s)	Ketherism, Subducted Minarborealism
Demonym	Lepidopteran
- Adjective	Lepidopteran
Government	Autonomous protectorate
- Lady Protector	Prethil Nal
- Holgrave	Varanidus Kai
- Legislature	n/a
Establishment	1668 AN
Area	~69,500 sq.km
Population	~130,000
Active population	-
Currency	Kalgarrand
Calendar
Time zone(s)
Mains electricity
Driving side
Track gauge
National website	-
National forum	-
National animal	n/a
National food	n/a
National drink	n/a
National tree	n/a
Abbreviation	n/a

The Planting of Lepidopterum, also known (particularly externally) as the Protectorate of Lepidopterum, is a small state in central Benacia. A protectorate of Kalgachia, its government reports to that state's Council of Perfecti and is subject to its military protection and foreign policy, but is largely autonomous in its domestic affairs and is not subject to the Oktavyan Code.

A Lieutenancy of Kalgachia for some twenty-eight years, many of those born in Lepidopterum during the period - most of them Nezeni - still maintain a Kalgachi identity, and cultural links with the mother country remain strong, reinforced by their largely uninterrupted economic ties. In recent years, however, the picture has been abruptly complicated by the return of the Deep Singers from their sojourn underground.

Geography

The area of Lepidopterum lies southwesterly and downstream of the western Octavian highlands in Kalgachia proper. The north and east of the protectorate is dominated by rolling hills, which descend and flatten toward the southwest. Most of the land lies in the basin of the Lepidopterum River, though a strip in the east lies along the Plastron, which forms much of Lepidopterum's border with the Republic of Inner Benacia. Lepidopterum's northern tip, meanwhile, downstream from the Kalgachi city of Warburg, is separated from the rest of the protectorate by a relatively low but nonetheless geographically inconvenient ridge. Given that this piece of land represents most of that currently under cultivation in Lepidopterum, and that there are no paved roads directly connecting it to the heart of the protectorate, most agricultural products arrive directly or indirectly from Kalgachia.

At the time that it was originally annexed by Minarboria, the area was not as humid as it now is, especially in the lowlands, and was dominated by grasslands. The Deep Singers used their prowess in eco-engineering to enclose the region in what is now known as the Litovine Forest, which comprises the majority of Lepidopterum's land area - the major exceptions being the previously-mentioned northern tip, and the pale of habitation between the Gravelbottom-Lepidopterum railway (which closely follows the north bank of the Lepidopterum River) and the Gravelbottom-Lepidopterum road (which curves west before approaching Lepidopterum city from the north).

Even in the area between these two transportation corridors, which is kept clear of tee-als and other annoyances, settlement is relatively sparse, and the landscape is dominated by somewhat lower-density forest interspersed with meadows, famous for their springtime profusion of flowers. The bulk of the population lives in and around the city of Lepidopterum itself, which lies slightly downstream of the confluence of its namesake river and the Plastron, near the southwestern border.

Government

The Lady Protector

The Lepidopteran head of state is the Lord or Lady Protector, appointed by and responsible to the Kalgachi Council of Perfecti; the first, and thus far only, Lady Protector is Prethil Nal. Within Lepidopterum, the Lady Protector is technically an autocrat in that there is no particular legal check upon her power; but while she maintains and uses wide latitude to interfere with affairs of state, in practice much of the day-to-day administration of the government is in the hands of a group of appointed officials referred to as the Congeries, over which the Lady Protector presides.

The Congeries

The senior member of the Congeries is the Holgrave, who serves as the Lady Protector's chief administrator and effective head of government. Named for an office prevalent in the area between the fall of Minarboria and the Lieutenancy period - a kind of elder of a community burrow - the Holgrave's main responsibility is to translate the Lady Protector's directives into concrete actions and, along with the rest of the Congeries, to see them carried out.

Other members of the Congeries are:

• The Agister General, head of the Agistry. An office created during the Lieutenancy period, the Agister General is responsible for overseeing the Litovine Forest, human interaction with it, and its flora and fauna - for reasons both of ecological balance and of defense. While the area of the Forest is no longer completely closed to settlement, most such settlements are constructed almost entirely underground and are not subject to the authority of the Agister General.
• The Proctor General, head of the Bureau of Administration. The ongoing disentanglement of the Church of Kalgachia from governance has resulted in the reassignment of the Proctors, the local civil administrators, to their own branch of government, headed by a Proctor General.
• The Natalist General, head of the Bureau of Natal Development. The Natalist General is responsible for overseeing reproductive health, a sphere of particular importance to both Nezeni and Deep Singers. The Bureau provides genetic counseling and family planning services, administers artificial gestation facilities and gene banks, and is responsible for obstetric, prenatal, and immediate postnatal care.
• The Umbral Nexus, head of the Umbra. Even in the context of an ongoing localization of government structure, the Umbra is a new branch whose role has not been extensively publicised. Rumors of close cooperation with Kalgachia's Prefects and Troglodyti, and of strenuous attempts to recruit Singer psionic and biomantic adepts, have proven difficult to put to rest.

History

The area of Lepidopterum once corresponded to western Litovina in Ashkenatzi times, and the city itself to the site of Litkov. The land remained in the Green for many years before the growing nation of Minarboria annexed it during a major westward expansion around 110 AL, when it was gifted to the Singer stronghold of Whisperwood. The land was not immediately settled in any significant fashion, as years of population-control policies had kept the Singers from requiring any more living space; the picture was, however, abruptly altered by the arrival of the Singers of Shimmerspring, led by Celestine the Broodmother, fleeing from Nationalist-Humanist elements in Shireroth. Their Minarborian brethren, having just recently acquired a swathe of empty territory, found it convenient to settle the refugees there. While the warm, dry plains represented a refreshing change in the short term, the Singers much preferred the cover of trees. Over the next thirty years, they began planting trees and altering existing vegetation in a multistep process intended to transform the region into a forest, and largely concentrated on this process even as Minarboria began to collapse around them.

Most of them, unfortunately, did not remain to see their efforts bear fruit. In 140 AL, nearly all pure-blooded Singers mysteriously vanished, frantically digging into the ground and collapsing the tunnels behind them, to the enduring bafflement and panic of those they left behind - almost all of them children of Singers who, during the relaxation of reproductive law toward the end of the Empire, had interbred with other Minarborians. While many of these Nezeni, as they came to be called, lived closer to the mountains that formed the heart of the emerging Kalgachia and came under its sway, those around Lepidopterum were left to the Green.