Graecia

Graecia (officially the Fourth Empire of Graecia, as of 6e38), colloquially referred to as the 'Fatherland' or the 'Golden Country', is an old country and the birthplace of the Breton people, who would colonize much of the Benthic seaboard. Democracy was founded as an ideology in Hurc's First Empire of Graecia. Graecia is one of the oldest modern nations, with the many tribes of the Ancient Benthic mainland being united under the banner of the First Empire at the turn of the First Era.

The modern system of time measurement, the Divine Calendar, was created by the early government of the First Empire, in an effort to regulate the farming season. As a result, the first year of the first Era (1e01) roughly coincides with the founding of the First Empire.

Early History
Ancient Benth, comprised of the Southern region of the Continent of Benth and a number of peninsulae protruding from it, was long inhabited by a number of smaller tribal societies. Most notably of these groups were the Vacadonians, the Marengoths and the Graecs, the latter of which would conquer the region. Hurc, a man born into the Marengoth people, would become the leader of the Graecs years after they had the Marengoth peninsula. The Graecs went on to unite all of Ancient Benth upon the decline of the earlier Imperium of Vacadonia, upon which much of Graecian culture is based.

List of Graecian Tribes

 * The Graecs
 * The Taerecs
 * The Vacadonians
 * The Marengoths
 * The Antuites

The First Empire
The Graecian Empire, through its various incarnations, has a history of military conquest as long as the history of the country itself. Through the First Era, Graecia fought against its neighbors, taking control of most of the Breton peninsula. Graecia was the sole power on the peninsula from the beginning of the First Era until the Graecian Civil War (1e148-1e153), when the empire was split in half and the territory of Waxwaerlia seceded and became an independent power, a resolution brokered by Caesar Maxuel Ward and Senator John Waxwiller (leader of the Manus Alba Confederacy) in the treaty known as the Vacation Concordat. Caesar Maxuel Ward died some years later, in 1e169. The first era concluded with his death, as he commanded the Covenant of Pedianity to mark it so upon his death.

The early trappings of Graecian culture were established during the First Era. The early anteimperial architectural style coined by the Covenant of Pedianity in Bret culture was expanded upon in this period, and from this, the squared and blocky architecture synonymous with old Breton cities was born. Early playwrights and visual artists also emerged in this period, the later of which were influenced by the political tension that surrounded everyday life in the cities.

The Second Empire
After the War and the subsequent death of Ward and turn of the Second Era, the Graecian Senate voted to relabel the nation as the Second Empire of Graecia, and looked beyond the Sea. After years of tension, the relations between the now-coexistent Bretons and Islandics slowly broke down into the the colossal Breton-Islandic War (2e113-2e260). It ended, ultimately, in a Graecian victory and the establishment of the earliest Breton colonies in the Southern Sea of Benth, along the Saladaic Isles.

In search of more exotic places, Graecian explorers set sail along the Southern coast of the Breton peninsula, discovering the Katian peninsula and making early contact with the people of Setei. This was during the period of the Seteise Empire, and thus the two groups got along amicably and established a strong trading network.