#Historical Worldbuilding

[ahb-writes]

Fantasy Worldbuilding Questions (History)

Historical Worldbuilding Questions:

What are the most important events in this world’s history that impact how it is today (e.g. conflicts, disasters, discoveries, revolutions)?

What subjects would historians in a library dedicated to this world specialize in (what topics are most important to your world’s history)?

Who remembers the most about the past, versus the least, and why?

Who are important figures from this world’s history who would be taught about in schools (will their importance be revised over the story’s course as new information comes to light)?

Where are historical records kept or how are they disseminated (in writing, or more in oral culture and storytelling)?

Where are the most significant landmarks that are remnants of this world’s history?

When do characters find out historical facts about their world previously unknown to them in the story? How does this new knowledge affect them?

When were the key turning points in this world’s history? What prompted change?

Why would someone study this world’s history, what would it teach them?

Why might characters want to find out more about this world’s history? How would this knowledge aid their goals?

❯ ❯ ❯ Read other writing masterposts in this series: Worldbuilding Questions for Deeper Settings

[daisywords]

One of my biggest nitpicks in fiction concerns the feeding of babies. Mothers dying during/shortly after childbirth or the baby being separated form the mother shortly after birth is pretty common in fiction. It is/was also common enough in real life, which is why I think a lot of writers/readers don't think too hard about this. however. Historically, the only reason the vast majority of babies survived being separated from their mother was because there was at least one other woman around to breastfeed them. Before modern formula, yes, people did use other substitutes, but they were rarely, if ever, nutritionally sufficient.

Newborns can't eat adult food. They can't really survive on animal milk. If your story takes place in a world before/without formula, a baby separated from its mother is going to either be nursed by someone else, or starve.

It doesn't have to be a huge plot point, but idk at least don't explicitly describe the situation as excluding the possibility of a wetnurse. "The father or the great grandmother or the neighbor man or the older sibling took and raised the baby completely alone in a cave for a year." Nope. That baby is dead I'm sorry. "The baby was kidnapped shortly after birth by a wizard and hidden away in a secret tower" um quick question was the wizard lactating? "The mother refused to see or touch her child after birth so the baby was left to the care of the ailing grandfather" the grandfather who made the necessary arrangements with women in the neighborhood, right? right? OR THAT GREAT OFFENDER "A newborn baby was left on the doorstep and they brought it in and took care of it no issues" What Are You Going to Feed That Baby. Hello?

Like. It's not impossible, but arrangements are going to have to be made. There are some logistics.

[grandkhan221b]

I've been slowly obsessing more and more about asoiaf fashion in the past 6 month, and really developing in details how it would look in different regions, classes, etc (the North being the one I have the most complete picture on). And I wanted to put some of this to paper instead of endlessly turning it in my head before I go to sleep. Usually when I costume design it is confined to a specific character, I've never done like worldbuilding fashion design, but idk asoiaf really gets me going.

So here's the North ! I could have kept going and added more stuff, but if I try to spew all the shit that's in my head I'm never gonna finish this x) So I focused mostly on great houses/nobles fashion for this. Maybe I'll do a sheet for smallfolk or practical clothing like battle armour after I'm done with all the kindoms. I already have to continue the anti AI quest...

More asoiaf fashion

[whereserpentswalk]

There was, once in the ancient days, when Rome had conquered the Britians, a faerie prince had left for the day the realms of fae, where all the faeries danced, he left his tree stump palace and his subjects of kobolds and sprits, and his fellow lords of the fae, and he came to the great villas and groves of England and chose to give the ultimate power of unseelie vengeance, to the mortals he'd consider most in need of such things.

And within his quest, he had found two souls more oppressed than most would ever be in their lives, two slaves, who had lived their entire lives mining tin within the mountains. One red haired, one yellow haired, and neither their names recorded by time.

And the faerie came to the two slaves, with moth's wings on his back, and the horns of a great stag, and an armored exoskeleton shining black-green on his body, with fire in his great golden eyes. And he told the two slaves shivering in the cold before him, "Greetings subjects of humanity, have no fear, for I bring today great fortune in exchange for my sweet entertainment. Choose whoever you believe holds the most of gifts deprived from you, and I shall swap your place with them, and you shall live your lives in their luxury and them in your misfortune. and take what time you need to select who stands highest above you, and whose deserves most to be brought down to your place."

After a few moments putting their pickaxes down, thinking about who could be most privileged, and who their greatest oppressor was, the red headed slave suggested, "Well I don't think kindly of the slaves in the gladiator pits now do I! They have it all good, fighting and winning praise down in Rome, while us real slaves up here are working hard for the empire. If we'd swap places with them they'd learn what work really was!"

The faerie, having in all his studies of humanity learned that humans do not like being stabbed, nor chopped into pieces asked, "Our you sure that the slaves in the fighting pits are the most privileged of people you can think of, I'll give you time if you must need it."

The yellow haired slave raised his hand, "The harem slaves! Oh, the harem slaves. They get to live right in the roman's mansions, all prettied up with perfume, all they have to do is lay back and make love. Never had to work a day in their lives!"

The faerie, having in all his studies or humanity known rape to be a crime worse than murder to most, tried to suggest something else; "The romans! Your masters! Yes, you've mentioned them. The people who enslaved you. Consider that perhaps they may factor into any discussion of your oppression, and who stands above you..."

The red haired slave answered, "Well of course! We've worked so hard for the Romans, and because of those slaves more privileged then us, demanding so much in regard to resources and attention, we get treated like dirt. If all slaves were miners and farmers, the Romans would treat us so well."

And the yellow haired slave added, "We keep the empire running. The empire could survive without the fighting pits and harem boys, but they need us for their metals! The Romans should be proud of us! Great Constantine himself, bless his soul, said that hard working men like us would stand with him in heaven..." (That final comment lead into an argument between the yellow haired Catholic and the red headed Arian, as to who was a heretic, and whose hard work would surely be recognized into heaven, the argument being too long and useless to write down here.)

Eventually, the faerie stopped them both, "Have you ever considered what it would be like to not be slaves? I heard that there were some places where slavery doesn't exist at all."

The red headed slave yelled, "Don't you go insulting us slaves, talking about a world without us!"

The yellow haired slave added, "Yes! We're proud and hard working! My father was a slave, and his father, and his father, and his... well his father was a warrior in the army of Boudica, but you get the point don't you."

The faerie said blankly, "I think I do." And, thinking his entertainment was boring him quite a lot, told them, "Just tell me quickly, who you think is more privileged than you, and I'll swap you with them."

And before the yellow haired slave could contradict him, the red headed slave cried out, "The slaves of Alexandria! That city is paved with gold, with pyramids at every street. I've never been there but I've known some slaves who have. Some of the slaves there are even teachers to the roman's children, able to read and write and all that, and its never even winter. Swap us with them, and we'll be the most privileged slaves in the world!"

And so, the faerie did. And so, the red headed slave and the yellow haired slave found themselves in the boiling streets of Alexandria, ready to be shipped off to a copper mine in lower Egypt. The faerie lord had learned too well that one cannot be freed unless the wish to be. And before the faerie stood two slaves from Alexandria, and hoping there were some people within the world of mortals who knew their own oppression, he asked them, "Greetings subjects of humanity, have no fear, for I bring today great fortune in exchange for my sweet entertainment..."

[seefasters]

i do want to know who the fuck is painting all those paintings in severance. are they severed too? do they have a severed propagandist department? how much information are they allowed to have about the things they're painting?

[okaydrawboy]

[episyn]

>"winter event with winter themed items"

>look inside

>it's literally just christmas

[insert that image of a cat staring at the camera really close up]

[anxiousapplepie]

I really wanna know more about Lapis’s hearing, and how voice sounds/colors work in general!

*happy hand flapping* you guys are spoiling me by asking me questions about my RK world and ocs stopppp!! <333 Okay, so before I get into voices, I gotta give you a small crumb about colors! Color is a MAJOR theme in the RK world, and not only does it represent your personality/emotional health/mental health and magical skills and age, it's also how other people perceive and interact with you on a social level. All color is technically valid, but there's a lot of stupid rules and expectations to follow if you want to be accepted wholeheartedly into any Rose social group. If you don't match up to expectations, you've got little hope of anyone taking you seriously. And presenting the color you are (or the color you want) has to be done in EVERYTHING. Your hair, your clothes, and even stuff like your voice. The color of a "voice" is a little more flexible, though. It's a good social tool, being able to connect with someone more easily or calming someone down by talking in a similar "color". But there's a stigma about being too good at blending in with anybody and everybody. That's a different story, though. "Color" isn't so much of a sound, and more like a vibe. A vibe that every race in the RK world can learn and understand! But if you don't have any inherit magic, trying to 'hear' a color would be like asking a human to see colors like a shrimp. And on that note! Lapis has perfectly normal, very average hearing. So very normal and functional ears. By human standards, anyway. It's a pity she's not surrounded by humans anymore, isn't it? XD

[milkyfederation]

I just thought of a funny idea. Space archeologists vs space construction contractors.

You're happily doing your job colonizing a planet, making plans to terraform it for human habitability when, "Oh shit, not again...", ruins of an ancient alien civilization.

So of course the space archeologists stop the project until they can unearth the mysteries of unknown alien cultures. Typical!

[chere-indolente-plays]

Couligny - Le Mesnil

[marzipanandminutiae]

a book series that makes use of "anachronistic" language in a way that really feels organic for the period, IMO, is Piratica by Tanith Lee

set in an explicitly alternate universe c. 1810, the first book managed to include the sentence "Well, groovy, thou art a klutz," and make it sound 100% Golden Age of PiracyTM. even though the author used words from wildly different eras, she captured the cadence of 18th/early 19th century working-class/criminal slang so well that I literally just had to look up whether "groovy" was an older word than I previously thought

god those books were so good. I should reread them

[lostintawantinsuyu]

November 27, 12:12 PM

I don’t know what came over me, but curiosity got the better of caution. I’ve crept closer to the city below—still keeping a safe distance—and found a spot behind a large boulder overlooking what looks like a bustling marketplace.

From here, I can see the people. They’re dressed in colorful woven fabrics, their patterns intricate and vibrant. Some carry baskets on their backs; others are arranging clay pots and what look like corn and potatoes on blankets. Children dart between the stalls, laughing, while older men and women speak in tones I can’t understand. There’s a rhythm to their movements, a harmony that feels ancient and unshakable.

I can also see a large stone structure dominating the plaza—maybe a temple? There’s smoke rising from its peak, and I think I heard a deep, resonating hum earlier, like chanting. I can’t shake the feeling that whatever they’re doing is sacred. I don’t belong here.

But I can’t leave yet. Not without learning more.

For now, I’ve sketched what I can see (messy, I know—I’m shaking). I’ll stay hidden and watch a little longer. I need to figure out if it’s safe to approach—or if they’ll see me as some kind of intruder. My biggest fear? They won’t understand my language… or worse, they will.

I’ll decide what to do next once I feel less like a deer caught in headlights.

[See attached sketch.]

[beneathsilverstars]

i do love a good solid bit of realistically logical and consistent worldbuilding, but i love other things more, like making characters cry in each other's arms. so sometimes i have to remind myself that the less time i spend on the former, the more time i can spend on the latter...

[whereserpentswalk]

All of these are at around the same power level. None of them look fully human, though some look more human than others. Sorted from eldest to youngest.

[chamerionwrites]

I'm going to say something a tiny bit mean here, and I need people to understand that it's not a criticism of any particular work (in fact at the individual level the thing I'm criticizing can be interesting and good), but of a pattern that I find frustrating specifically as a cumulative pattern. Anyway @ people writing fictional resistance movements: the French Resistance was cool and all, but for the love of god read another [history] book.

[amanitus]

do you guys have any advice or tips for people looking to make something as immersive one day? how did yall manage to nail the verisimilitude so well/what would yall say are the most crucial elements to get right?

Oh, good question. You can have two answers!

From Hom: I would say the accuracy depends on the research you are willing to perform.. so it'd be good if you pick a setting you do have a genuine interest in and can enjoy such a process!!!

Besides that.. the most crucial element might just be the vibes.. so if you can get that down you may even just be able to wing it and make it seem convincing regardless of accuracy 🤭

From me: Figure out what's important to your characters (hobbies, books, film) and research them - they'll lead to more ideas. Watch movies made in your target time period (or for fantasy, things that have your target atmosphere). Most of all figure out your characters' mindset and worldview, and decide how that's shaped by their society - worldbuilding and characterisation are so deeply connected!

Good luck and have fun 🙏 and we're glad you found our tale immersive so far!