All About Amn

AMN
Ruled by the Council of Six (and The Shadow Thieves, the Council are anonymous.
Arcane spellcasters are feared and reviled while divine casters are respected if their work brings money to Amn.
The people are obsessed with wealth.
Powerful merchant families control the guilds, and there is a guild for everything.
Shadow Thieves prohibit any thieving in Crimmor.
CP= fandar, SP= taran, EP= decime/centaur, GP= danter, PP= roldon/pearl

Calishite - Avaricious, lazy, decadent, corrupt to outsiders but simply enjoying life. Shorter and slighter built than most humans and have dusky brown skin, hair, and eyes. They are usually very ethnocentric and see other cultures as short-lived barbarians. They enjoy comforts and respect from peers. Many Calimshans love wealth and have no problems with slavery. Calimshan is dominated by a great desert in the west, is a coastal nation, and many exotic spices and magics are exported from the country. They speak Alzhedo (Thorass).

Tethyrian - Fiercely independent and protective of their freedom. Suspicious of royalty and nobles. Dusky skin, brown hair, blue eyes getting paler as you head north. Considered a "melting pot" of other ethnic groups (Illuskan, Calishite, Chondothan), their skin ranges from dusky to fair and their hair and eye color vary widely. They are of medium build and height. These people are proud of their diverse heritage and have a strong independent streak. They speak Chondathan (Thorass).

Chondathan -They are slender and tawny skinned with various shades of light and dark brown hair (with an occasional blond or black). They are usually tall and common eye colors are green and brown. Many Chondathans are risk takers and merchants (on land and in the Sea of Fallen Stars). Often, the peoples of these areas have a deep respect for nature. They speak Chondathan (Thorass).

Known the Realms over as “The Merchants’ Domain,” Amn is among the youngest of nations on the southern Sword Coast. If the adage “Follow the money, and ye shall find answers to many mysteries” were true, every investigator and adventurer would end up in Amn, since money flows there as to no other country. (Sembians might take umbrage at this point, but it is true.) Nearly every merchant either does business with Amn or passes through it during the course of a year’s business deals.
Amn’s location benefits its mercantile nature, as it is the springboard for Calishite and Tethyrian products heading north to the Heartlands. The country’s rich natural resources and its peoples’ knack for business soon led Amn to seize its premier status as one of the most important centers of trade in the Realms. Amn is as important as Sembia and Waterdeep even in their own respective geographic markets, and all three countries have long-established rivalries.
Amn’s future is uncertain at best, with bright and dark strains. Its merchants and priests have discovered a new country to the west, Maztica, which Amn is colonizing and exploiting-producing trouble at home and abroad. Amn’s neighbor to the south, Tethyr, has finally stabilized into a rich, promising trading partner. However, some Amnian cities are on the verge of rebellion, aiming to join Tethyr. Rumors of monstrous armies are often heard of late. As always, power groups inside Amn and elsewhere vie for supremacy, so much so that outsiders view Amn as a stew pot of conspiracy and chaos. For the natives, however, it matters little who is in power so long as business continues to run uninterrupted.
Fate and fortune has delivered you into the hot sun of the south and the city of Athkatla on the Sword Coast and capital city of Amn.
This thriving port rests within the shadows of mountains to the North.
The call of traders and the stench of the heat is a constant bombardment, especially in the dock areas where long boats of the north, three masted caravels of the Dragon Sea, the triangular sails of the south and the narrow sleek ships of the far east share harbor with fat galleons of the sword coast. Only Waterdeep to the North is said to have a busier port.
The sights, smells and sounds in every ancient street are an eclectic blend brought from all both North and South of the Sword Coast and further inland where wagons rumble along the old cobbles and every street is packed with herds being driven to market and caravans clattering towards the docks and merchant districts to and from all of Faerun’s reaches. Calishites dressed in silk with dark skin and brightly colored turbans do business with broad ring mail and fur clad Illuskans from the North and tall Chondathans from the Heartlands. Dusky skinned Tethyrians can be heard hawking and passionately haggling in their rapid and rhythmic language as they shout their trade in markets and bazaars chaotic with the sound of many languages trading in exotic animals, sweet perfumes, pungent spices, delicate silks, brightly painted jewelry and pots, spicy foods, expensive wines, colorful carpets and gold from far off Maztica across the Sea of Swords.
The dusky skinned folk move through the bustling markets going about their servitude, business and day from loud workshops to fancy pagodas and pavilions offering strange and foreign trade within.
You rub shoulders with silk clad nobles and dirty beggar children. Gilded litters and palanquins are carried along narrow streets, some guarded by weathered mercenaries from familiar lands or escorted by Calishite brutes with fancy decorated curved swords and golden turbans.
It is here that you have found your home amongst the bustling streets, sprawling bazaars and sweaty back alleys that offer more than a filthy stench to the unwary traveler out after dark.

Country & Climate
The borders of Amn have remained stable for the past few centuries, though recent events within Tethyr have brought some areas into contention. For now, Amn’s southern border is still taken to be the Tethir Road.
Shilmista, the Forest of Shadows, marks the easternmost expanse of Amn’s territory, and the Sea of Swords, of course, borders Amn on the west. The northern extent of Amn officially ends at the northernmost slopes of the Cloud Peaks and the northern farms of Nashkel on the Green Fields.
While not nearly as mild as Tethyr and the lands farther south, the climate for most of Amn’s territories is pleasant nearly all year around. It is slightly warmer along the western and northwestem shores of Lake Esmel, at the rectangular country’s center, because of the hot springs that heat the ground water around the lakeside city of Esmeltaran. The majority of Amn is exceptional for agriculture of all types, from root crops to grains and fruits, providing more than enough surplus each harvest to guarantee lucrative trade agreements with needy or populous countries.
The country is geographically diverse, with highlands and three mountain ranges directing runoff water toward Lake Esmel and the flood plains along the coast. An elevation around Amnwater and Crimmor in the north created Lake Weng. Amn’s highest point, Mount Speartop, is nearly 3 miles above Amn’s lowest point at the seaport city of Murann.
Bracketed by mountains on nearly all sides, Amn has a comfortable climate except during the rainy season from Uktar (late fall) through early Tarsakh (spring). Rainfall averages 25-30 inches per year; summers have the least rainfall of any season. Winters are mild, with short freezes and minor snowfall expected in all cities but warm Esmeltaran. Rivers freeze over in the midwinter month of Hammer, but it is risky to travel across the ice with wagons. Melting mountain snow feeds the many rivers of Amn all year long, and the higher passes of the northwestern Cloud Peaks can become blocked by blizzards during winter, isolating Nashkel from Athkatla, the coastal capital, for months at a time, resulting in the former city’s reputation for self-sufficiency.

Social Customs
Money talks. If you understand that, you understand the principle that drives Amnian society. Siamorphe, the demigoddess of nobility, does not grant an Amnian power and status (money does!), but nobility can be gained if one has enough gold and perseverance. Success is measured by the amount of material wealth a person has or displays through action and example. Throwing lavish, expensive parties and celebrations are a standard practice for Amnians who wish to commemorate successful business years or other events. It matters little that someone nearly bankrupts himself on such a gala, as the party-giver’s status is raised and cemented in place for the immediate future in everyone’s eyes. Those from elsewhere in Faerûn think Amnians spend too much time having parties to honor given events, with the sole apparent purpose to throw money at people. Other examples of exhibiting wealth include giving opulent gifts, exorbitant samples (to potential customers), and overblown gratuities for services rendered or during trade negotiations with clients.
Another of the most important status symbols in Amn is where a person lives. The center of all activity in Amn is its capital, Athkatla, and having an address within its walls is a sure sign of superiority. Landowning itself is not a mark of status as it is in Tethyr; which land, where it is located, and what is done with it are all factors that determine land’s status potential.
For example, a woman buys lakefront property on Lake Esmel away from the main roads, close to the Fishery District of Esmeltaran. Her friends lament her loss of status until (surprise!) she opens an upscale underwater festhall with seafood delicacies. Multiple dwellings are expected of a successful merchant family, and multiple estates are the norm for each of the major merchant houses. The finest dwellings are in Athkatla’s Gem District, while the best estates surround Lake Esmel.
A person can also display status and rank by the gaudiness and complexity of his apparel. Befitting the population’s Calishite roots, ornate turbans are common on women and infrequent on older men; the more elaborate the turban, the better (i.e., the higher the implied status). Embroidery of gold, silver, or platinum threads is a status symbol used by many up-andcoming merchants and traders. Capes, cloaks, sashes, and decorative baldrics of the finest metal-embroidered silks and satins are popular with both sexes. A recent affectation in Amnian fashion is the use of rare furs from the far north, worn in stylish open vests or as cloaks, regardless of how warm the weather is.
Jewelry also represents affluence. In fact, it is unusual for an Amnian to wear less than two precious metal rings, usually with inset gems. The preferred jewels in fashion among Amnians of late are pearls: the smaller and more numerous, the better, though an exceedingly rare black pearl can outdo any number of white pearls. Despite this pomp, the richest Amnian merchant houses disdain ‘petty status-climbing,’ dressing instead in simple but perfectly tailored garb with a minimum of jeweled decoration (meaning one or two rings per hand).

Education and knowledge, physical prowess, artistic talent, and other signs of success known elsewhere in the Realms are unimportant here, unless they serve to gain monetary wealth.
If a person with such skills does not use them to gain money and power, an Amnian considers that person a failure or a fool.
Even the idea of performing hard work and constant labor to gain wealth is met with a touch of contempt, since the pursuit of money is seen primarily as a task of negotiation and strategy rather than a chore of exertion and dedication.
Amn is a class-based society wherein those with the most money are accorded the best treatment. Wealth proves to society that a person deserves better treatment solely on the merit of having such riches. Rather than using terms such as noble or high-born, people in Amn refer to social status in terms of precious metals, from the lowest (“ore”) to the highest (“mithral”). Despite their preoccupation with wealth and status, Amnians of vast means use charity donations as yet another sign of status: The more you give, the better off you (and the poor) are. Of course, some charities put their effort toward helping the destitute, while others help themselves to profit.

Etiquette and protocol in Amn are highly involved and difficult for outsiders to discern. However, like all else in Amn, they follow the Golden Rule: “The one with the gold makes all the rules.” Social gaffes are common if one doesn’t follow the quick changes in status, such that more weight is given to those with the most recent and liberally spent fortunes.
If a hostess was recently outbid in business by one of her guests, the dress and behavior for the party is established by that guest over the hostess, in which case the hostess can save face by declaring the party to be in honor of her esteemed and prosperous guest.
Amnians are quite open with and tolerant of races and creeds with whom they do business. Everyone is a potential customer or client, and deserves to be treated as such within the normal bounds of propriety. A richly dressed illithid gets better treatment than a shabby dwarf any day. Of course, this openness is guarded, and an Amnian of means always has an escort of at least two guards. Tolerance for the sake of business is never overshadowed by fear of the dangers of a deal gone wrong.

Languages
As a merchant nation, Amn hears every tongue of the Realms (and some other worlds and planes) in its markets. It rarely takes more than an hour in Amn to find someone who can translate any language spoken in the past few centuries for a fee, of course. Still, merchants doing business in Amn must brush up on the ancient trade tongue of Thorass, long abandoned elsewhere for today’s common language. All documents, contracts, court proceedings, and official scripts and speeches used by Amnian merchant houses or the government use Thorass. While an understanding of many languages is certainly helpful, the further one goes in Amnian politics or trade, the less one needs any tongue other than Thorass.
Agrarian folk living outside Amn’s cities, being simple laborers and farmers, rarely use Thorass and speak a pidgin form of common, like the common tongue in Tethyr. “Amnian common” is frequently and indiscriminately peppered with Thorass constructions and terms, most often those referring to cities or the merchants therein.


(Quality); Implied Meanings
Ore (Bad) Lowest rank, worst quality, unrefined, filthy, criminal.
Bronze (Poor)Working class; also, low-rank imposter posing as high, cheap alloy.
Copper (Acceptable) Good worker, low but .pure. status, potential for business.
Steel (Good) Highest rank for working class, used in reference to elite military units; reliable, tough. (solid as steel).
Silver (Very Good) Up-and-coming merchant, potential for greatness.
Gold (Fine) Inherited money (or higher rank with little business sense).
Platinum (Very Fine) Heads of mercantile houses, consistently fine quality.
Adamantine (Excellent)Self-made successes. highest rank, first-generation money at highest rank; alloy status implies that, despite wealth or success, it is not the best.
Mithral (Exceptional) Highest quality and rank, untarnished, old money. with great talent, pure and perfect.



Religion
While the focus of every Amnian’s life is the procurement of wealth, religion still plays an important role that is free of direct government control. Amn’s rulers, the Council of Six, act against churches in Amn only when a temple or a member of it speaks out against the Six or interferes with business at hand. Guilty parties are dealt with swiftly and with extreme prejudice, a fate that goes unquestioned in this land.
Despite this, all religions known across the Realms can be found here with temples, shrines, and holy places of all sizes.
No official state religion exists, nor do elite merchant families have a consensus on the most proper gods to worship.
Unless it disrupts business or the Council’s will, religious freedom is paramount in Amn.
With the wide range of religious beliefs found in Amn, it is not surprising that nearly every Amnian pays lip service to every god known. Gods are commonly invoked without ceremony to give them their due in whatever business one conducts.
As in other lands, sea traders mutter prayers to the gods Valkur and Umberlee for protection and appeasement, while caravan workers whisper personal prayers to Shaundakul for safe travel, Waukeen for good business, and Helm for protection on the road. This does not make an Amnian a worshiper of all gods, but a shrewd person who covers all the angles of his actions. The following gods are the most popular in Amn, those for whom the majority of Amnians bear true piety and devotion.

Waukeen, despite her recent divine difficulties, has lost little
ground in Amn as its premier deity. The faithful are now more fervent, as the style of worship led by the priests at Goldspires lends itself directly to an Amnian’s social upbringing. Temple services are now almost all parties, with the faithful contributing to far more lavish banquets and revels than any could afford alone.

Lliira’s power in Amn has risen due to her regency over Waukeen’s church. Though Lliira was the goddess granting spells to the priests, Waukeen is still the primary venerated power. Despite this, Lliira’s influence and true worshipers are on the rise and could supplant Sune’s worship among the hedonistic upper classes of Athkatla and Esmeltaran.

Sune, the goddess of beauty and love, fits easily into the superficial, status-driven society of Amn. With the weight of importance placed on showing wealth through clothing and accoutrements, Sune’s followers feel more at home in Amn with their typically flamboyant mode of dress than they do in other countries. Due to the warmer climes and the need to have their beauty noticed, Sune’s Amnian clergy are often found in more provocative, revealing silks and satins than they might wear in Waterdeep.

Amn, like Tethyr, reveres Chauntea because the backbones of their economies rest on agricultural surpluses. Bad harvests hurt everyone, and Chauntea’s few temples see much merchant-house traffic in the days approaching the harvests each year. While most merchants acknowledge Chauntea’s gifts infrequently, the lower class and farm workers fervently revere her.
In Amn, as in Tethyr, the bulk of Chauntea’s worship takes place in small shrines among the fields or beside trade roads. Itinerant priests of Chauntea wander across the south to aid crops where needed.

Selûne’s power, overshadowed in Amn by Waukeen and Sune since the country’s early centuries, remains steady. Her place of power and reverence in Amn is in the port city of Murann, where native and foreign sailors and sea traders always pay a visit to the city’s Moonmaiden’s Hall.

Cyric became an Amnian power with the deaths of Bane, Myrkul, and Bhaal, whose worshipers Cyric took for himself, though it took years to gain any cooperation between them. The Shadow Thieves’ influence as Cyric worshipers permeates Amnian society. Many temples of Bane fell to Cyric’s followers when the zealous Dark Master Tellvon Bloodshoulder, formerly of Tethyr, heard of the Banedeath in 1362 DR (a year after it started in the North). He killed or converted many high-ranking clergy to Cyric before dying himself during his crusade.

Helm and Ilmater are revered but not worshiped in most cities in Amn. Worship is limited to the city of Trademeet and lands east of the Tejarn Hills. These faiths are often seen as offshoots of Tethyr’s strong love of these deities.

The Council Of Six
The mysterious, crepe-shrouded faces of the Council of Six inspire respect and fear in those who manage to gain an audience with this body. The anonymity of the six leaders was paramount to establish peace 30 years ago, but the Council, like the Lords of Waterdeep, soon found that order was best maintained when people don’t know who they can kill, bribe, or manipulate (especially in Amn, where a handshake deal without a palmed coin is tantamount to an insult). The deception is now law, and to write or speak the name or reveal the identity of a Council member results in slow torture and death, usually before the eyes of the Council.
Few ever see the inside of the drab, windowless, fortresslike Council House in Athkatla, an extremely old building dating from the days of the Shoon. Extensive dungeons and tunnels lie beneath it, leading all over the city and to estates in the countryside.

Council Structure & Members
The Council members are each known by particular titles, not their names, even when they are among themselves and know each others’ true identity. While the public believes the Six represent the most powerful merchant houses and families, no one (aside from the Council and their advisors within their old houses) knows for certain which houses or families have seats on the Council. Thus, all the merchant families and houses are accorded respect beyond that normally given for their status.
The members of the Council from highest to lowest rank are the Meisarch, the Tessarch, the Namarch, the Iltarch, the Pommarch, and the Dahaunarch. Each rank’s heir is the following rank, so the death of the Meisarch moves everyone up one rank, and a new Dahaunarch is elected to join the Council from the ranks of the powerful houses of Amn (though a new Dahaunarch is not always from Athkatla, which would surprise many an Amnian who believe this city to be the pinnacle of success). The Meisarch is the primary speaker for the Council and his seat is subtly perceived as the senior, leader’s position. Still, despite the deference to the experience and craftiness of the Meisarch, each of the six has important roles to perform within the government.
Though the Council’s membership has changed dramatically of late, Amn has only had 11 rulers in 30 years. Strong rule, steady trade, and peace supports the practices of the Council.
In recent years since the upset in Tethyr, Amn has elected to copy Waterdeep and unmask one of the Lords as the face of the council. The Open Lord of Athkatla is currently the Dahaunarch Phellus and he has taken to the role with much gusto, reveling in the attention, good and bad.



The Cloud Peaks Region
The northwestern quadrant of the Merchant’s Kingdom is marked by highlands and the lofty pinnacles of the Cloud Peaks. With the exception of some parts of Shilmista, this is the coolest area in Amn, thanks to its elevation; the mountains are snow covered much of the year. The elevated ridge that forms the drainage to Lake Weng usually keeps the Eshpurta Road dry and passable, though early spring floods along the Alandor River make this sloping road muddy and treacherous.
The region is best known for Amn’s largest city, Athkatla, the City of Coins, and the business it brings in by caravans or ships. The lands south of the Alandor River provide much grazing land for cattle and horse ranches. Other major products of the area are fish from Lake Weng, sheep’s wool and lamb meat from the highlands around the lake and north of the river, and distilled ciders from the berries and fruits in the mountains.

The Cloud Peaks
While they are not the highest mountains in the area, the Cloud Peaks form a respectable wall on Amn’s northern border. The view from the cliffs overlooking the enclosing hills and the bluffs, on which many sheep and goats graze, caps an exciting afternoon of rock climbing for the idle rich of Athkatla.
Nashkel and the two Citadels are relatively autonomous in their day-to-day operations, thanks to the nature of the high, twisting passes through the Cloud Peaks. Many steep ravines and sudden drops lie along the paths in the Cloud Peaks, and flight is not advised unless one can tame the winds that whip through these mountains. The rolling hills also hide many pleasures. Few experience the kind hospitality of the pious folks in St. Carwell’s Vale or the springtime beauty of the Sharyn Bluffs.
Dragons’ Lairs: Two dragons’ lairs in the Cloud Peaks are known. In the high reaches of Mount Speartop is the cave of Icehauptannarthanyx, a 1,270-year-old ancient white wyrm that rarely leaves its lair. A great red used to live north of Citadel Amnur, but its recent assault on the Citadel left it exhausted and open to attack; Araugauthos the Bluetalon slew the red and absorbed its treasure

The Fangs:
The Fangs are a pair of steep crags along the Trade Way. Fang Pass runs directly between the two sheer stone needles, and a smaller standing stone on the western cliff face marks Fang Pass: Border of Amn though Nashkel is still considered part of Amn. Two decades ago, adventurers slew a remorhaz in the mountains just to the north of the pass, though its lair remains a mystery to this day. However, reports over the past few winters mark that remorhaz attacks (or something carnivorous that only acts during the winter) are on the rise along this pass.

The Hamlar Hills:
The hills around the Cloud Peaks are sparsely forested and used by farmers for grazing. Many abandoned vineyards have gone wild in these hills, after Lord Vol Qirger failed to breed new sorts of grapes from transplants from the North and the Purple Hills over 40 years ago. Now, the hills are home to many poor vagrants chased out of Athkatla, living in caves and stealing sheep to survive.
Though Hamlar Hills is used by cartographers to refer to all the foothills of the Cloud Peaks, it properly refers only to the hills south and west of the range itself (the old House Hamlar lands, of which House Qirger was a lesser family).

Mount Speartop:
Mount Speartop is the highest mountain in the Cloud Peaks and among the 20 tallest in southern Faerûn, stabbing into the sky nearly 15,000 feet above sea level. Easily spotted 20 miles away in Athkatla, the spire is such an impressive sight that “I swear on Speartop!” is a common oath among Amnians. A white wyrm, Icehauptannarthanyx, once laired here in a cave within 800 feet of the peak.

The Mountain of Skulls:
This place is reached only by walking at ground level 10 miles east of the Fangs and 4 miles into the ridge through a long, twisted, illusion-cloaked path. From here, entrants walk into the bottom of a 100-foot-wide, l-mile-deep ravine, to face the Mountain of Skulls, a skullshaped cave entrance into the Cloud Peaks. Within the central chamber of this new temple to Bane (which fell into Cyric worshipers’ hands when the Banedeath arrived here in 1362 DR) is a literal mountain of skulls, set as an idol to worship and a warning not to cross the church.

The Ridge:
This miles-long exposed fault line is little higher than many foothills, reaching no more than 300 feet, but its craggy surface and sparse vegetation make it a difficult walk. The Ridge is the most extensively mined area in Amn. Every major metal and mineral strike was made here; even veins of gems are found, mostly diamonds of a blue-purple hue, though unexpected strikes of rubies and garnets have occurred in past years.