Name:Â The Elmtree Village
Families:Â Ghria, Dhava, several others that I'm trying to keep open for the sake of others retconning in characters.
Location:Â Central Shroud.
Sexual Mores:Â Typically monogamous partnership. The village was only around for a couple generations, so this was rather nebulously established. Eldest children are sent out, once they learn a trade, to find a partner among other tribes or groups, while younger children stay back (as a hypothetical pool of partners for nomadic Miqo'te, and to help support their elders with the trades that they learn.) The eldest children were meant to join up with other tribes/clans and thus keep the families from inbreeding, while outsiders were to be welcomed in as new members of the village. Males keep their surnames if they wish, but it is common for them to take on the surname of the woman they marry, and that surname is passed to any children. Homosexuality is accepted, but there is still an expectation for individuals to find a partner and raise children- whether this means marrying a beard for the purpose of childrearing or adopting children with a partner incapable of having offspring.
Traditions: The families gathered in the Elmtree Village lasted only a brief few generations before the Calamity scattered them to the four winds, so "tradition" is used mildly. They were a disparate bunch of Keepers, descended from a collection of young friends who wanted to settle down and become members of Gridania's guilds without giving up a sense of Keeper identity- compromising between forest and city by building their community on the edges of Gridania in the Central Shroud. The founders and the children born to them became farmers, merchants, and most of all members of the noteworthy guilds of Gridania- conjurers, archers, lancers, leatherworkers, carpenters, botanists. At 15 years of age, children are sent to join one of these guilds, and upon mastering their craft become a full-fledged adult, contributing to the welfare of the village- or, if they're the eldest son or daughter of a family, traveling afield to find a mate and settle amongst other collections of Keepers. Another odd tradition, born of the eclectic mix of families making up the village, was the names they used for their sons. Most mothers in the community only had one or two children of their own, so the suffixes given to male children were spread across all of the families, rather than just the children of one. This meant that though there could be children with the suffix 'a, 'to, 'li, 'sae, and so on, they wouldn't be brothers by blood, but rather by naming and by the bonds of spirit between their families.
Of course, all of this is rather esoteric now- the Calamity destroyed the lives and livelihoods of many members of this village, and their whole social structure collapsed in the years following Dalamud's fall. Any Keepers of Elmtree still living are scattered across Eorzea, far from their home village.
Families:Â Ghria, Dhava, several others that I'm trying to keep open for the sake of others retconning in characters.
Location:Â Central Shroud.
Sexual Mores:Â Typically monogamous partnership. The village was only around for a couple generations, so this was rather nebulously established. Eldest children are sent out, once they learn a trade, to find a partner among other tribes or groups, while younger children stay back (as a hypothetical pool of partners for nomadic Miqo'te, and to help support their elders with the trades that they learn.) The eldest children were meant to join up with other tribes/clans and thus keep the families from inbreeding, while outsiders were to be welcomed in as new members of the village. Males keep their surnames if they wish, but it is common for them to take on the surname of the woman they marry, and that surname is passed to any children. Homosexuality is accepted, but there is still an expectation for individuals to find a partner and raise children- whether this means marrying a beard for the purpose of childrearing or adopting children with a partner incapable of having offspring.
Traditions: The families gathered in the Elmtree Village lasted only a brief few generations before the Calamity scattered them to the four winds, so "tradition" is used mildly. They were a disparate bunch of Keepers, descended from a collection of young friends who wanted to settle down and become members of Gridania's guilds without giving up a sense of Keeper identity- compromising between forest and city by building their community on the edges of Gridania in the Central Shroud. The founders and the children born to them became farmers, merchants, and most of all members of the noteworthy guilds of Gridania- conjurers, archers, lancers, leatherworkers, carpenters, botanists. At 15 years of age, children are sent to join one of these guilds, and upon mastering their craft become a full-fledged adult, contributing to the welfare of the village- or, if they're the eldest son or daughter of a family, traveling afield to find a mate and settle amongst other collections of Keepers. Another odd tradition, born of the eclectic mix of families making up the village, was the names they used for their sons. Most mothers in the community only had one or two children of their own, so the suffixes given to male children were spread across all of the families, rather than just the children of one. This meant that though there could be children with the suffix 'a, 'to, 'li, 'sae, and so on, they wouldn't be brothers by blood, but rather by naming and by the bonds of spirit between their families.
Of course, all of this is rather esoteric now- the Calamity destroyed the lives and livelihoods of many members of this village, and their whole social structure collapsed in the years following Dalamud's fall. Any Keepers of Elmtree still living are scattered across Eorzea, far from their home village.
