Tékumel


Tékumel is a fantasy world created by M. A. R. Barker over the course of several decades from around 1940. 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. In time, Barker created the role-playing game Empire of the Petal Throne, set in the Tékumel fictional universe, and first published in 1975 by TSR, Inc. Later, Barker wrote a series of five novels set in Tékumel, beginning with The Man of Gold, first published by DAW Books in 1984.

Setting

The world of Tékumel, a fictional planet around star Nu Ophiuchi, 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-day year, disrupted local ecologies and banished most of the local flora and fauna to small reservations in the corners of their own world, resulting in a golden age of technology and prosperity for Mankind 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.

Layout

Suddenly, in the 1120th century and for reasons unknown, Tékumel and its star system were cast out of our reality into a "pocket dimension", 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 star-faring races, were now isolated and alone. The novels contain vague clues as to what might have happened.
Severed from vital interplanetary trade routes 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 Hlǘss 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" were made and a complex pantheon of "gods" 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. 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.

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. 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 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

Board games

Barker designed War of Wizards, a combat-oriented board game, based on his world of Tékumel, published by TSR in 1975.

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 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, rather than as a "supplement" to the original D&D rules.
Tékumel has spawned five professionally published roleplaying games over the course of the years:
There have been a wide variety of materials of all sorts published over the years to further detail 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 were formerly produced in 28mm scale under license by Eureka miniatures of Australia, but are now being made by a smaller, fan-driven company in Canada called The Tekumel Project.
Other materials involving the setting include The Tomb Complex of Nereshánbo, A Jakállan Intrigue, The Tsolyáni Language, Qadardalikoi, The Armies of Tékumel, and EPT Miniatures.
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 & 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 is as follows:
1) The Man of Gold
2) Flamesong
3) Lords of Tsámra
4) Prince of Skulls
5) A Death of Kings

The Tékumel Journal

The Journal of Tékumel Affairs was a magazine published by Tékumel Games that began publication in 1977, devoted to the Empire of the Petal Throne and Swords & Glory role-playing systems.
Frederick Paul Kiesche III reviewed The Journal of Tékumel Affairs in Space Gamer No. 71. Kiesche commented that "In sum, a useful item, especially if the company can overcome production and transition problems and start putting out an item of higher production quality. Well worth looking at."