Vanaheim

Vanaheim is a country of the Hyborian Age.

It's a part of Nordheim.

Geography

History and politics

The red-haired Vanir often battle against the blond Aesir. Eventually, a wandering band of Vanir will overthrow the evil aristocracy of Stygia and found Pharaonic Egypt. They are red-haired because Ancient Egyptian legends state Egypt was founded by "red-haired" conquerors from outside. With Vanaheim having a coastline, unlike landlocked Asgard, most sea-faring vikings in the Hyborian world are probably Vanir. There is no reason to view the Vanir as the "evil" Nordics, as opposed to the "good" Aesir.

See Nordheim#Population_and_culture.

Notable Places in Vanaheim

Vanaheim is similar in culture with Asgard, although it has something which the neighboring kingdom lacks: a coastline. Having no interest in farming, their ships become the source of a Vanir's wealth, trading all the way down the coast to Zingara and even Argos. However, this is how they behave when in civilized coastal waters. On the southern coast of Vanaheim, these dragon-prowed ships stalk their own shores, mostly preying upon one another with raids on their small seaside towns. Occasionally, they'll even brave the Pictish Wilderness. There isn't much of worth there to warrant the trouble, and generally they are driven back whenever their trespasses grow too bold.

Vanir settlements in Pictland have inevitably vanished, so they have long since abandoned any claim to those dense forests, save for raids on the edges for lumber. In the south, Vanaheim is bounded by the Eiglophian mountain range, which keeps the Cimmerians mostly to themselves, and this is probably for the best. The occasions where the Vanir sought wealth from the Cimmerian lands have ended with intense resistance from these fierce hillmen, a wrath they couldn't be tolerated by for long.

Ottarshogen Mounds

Located near the coast, this series of great mounds were raised in honor of a powerful and influential king of Vanaheim named Ottar. So respected was he that upon his death, his entire household, huscarls, wife, servants, and even his war-band all went to death with him; now buried within Ottar’s longship in a series of elogated mounds. Should a brave graverobber enter one of these mounds, they will find cavernous interiors in which rest a fleet of longships, caparisoned as if for sea-battle. Armed and armored Vanir warriors sit upright upon the benches they manned in life, and their corpses are unnaturally stiff, frozen solid by Nordheim’s perpetual chill... though perhaps they are unnaturally cold and well-preserved. Their war-gear is fine and chased in gold, burnished and blued steel, polished wood, with shields painted as if yesterday. They show none of the decay or bloating from decomposition.

Warnings are carved into stones surrounding the burial mounds, and though the mounds show no sign of being looted or disturbed, this is far from the case. The graves themselves are never silent, as Ottar and his band fare forth, wandering the lands at night or even sailing their ships in phantom form to ply the darkened seas of the North. Woe to anyone who disturbs such a sleep.

Snow Ape Caverns

Located in a region uninhabitable by humans, Snow Ape Caverns is in the uttermost desolation of Vanaheim, the mountain range separating it from Asgard. This labyrinth of caves, caverns, tunnels, and mountain crevasses contains a terrifying number of snow apes, once dominant throughout all of Nordheim, before being driven northward centuries ago. The cycle of descent into savagery and the rise towards civilization exhibited throughout history is all-the-more present here, with the snow apes achieving a rough, primitive semblance of intelligence, taking on the sketched outlines of a culture. Though they have not yet mastered tool use, they are nonetheless able to create primitive art, pile stones to form rough walls or furniture, hold court of a rude sort, have the briefest form of a social structure, and all worship an ape god that is perhaps another guise of the Pictish ape-god Gullah. Visitors to their territory may be captured by these fearsome creatures and be offered up as sacrifices to it.

Stories set in Vanaheim

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