Vandarch

The Vandarch is an inland sea which constitutes the dominant geographical feature of northwestern Levantia. Bounded by many nations and fed by many rivers, the sea has played a key role in the cultures of its coastal peoples from antiquity to the present day. The sea is hydrologically a lake, as until the completion of the Grand Vandarch Canal in 1975 it was isolated from the Kilikas Sea by the impassable marshes of the Pervalian Isthmus. It was not however an endorheic basin until this time, as the Pervalian marshes do drain the Vandarch into the Kilikas. As the construction of the Carolina Grand Canal caused the River Urce to flow into the lake rather than draw water out, much of southern Levantia also falls within the Vandarch's catchment area. Despite its historic isolation from the world's oceans and its relatively fresh water even after the completion of the Grand Vandarch Canal, the Vandarch was (and is) generally considered a sea by its inhabitants due to its sheer size.

Gothic
Two competing etymologies exist for the Gothic name Wandark (Wandák in modern Hendalarskisch orthography), with both agreeing that the Wand element represents the Gothic word for "wall, barrier".

The first, chiefly propounded by Yonderian linguists, sees the -ark suffix as stemming from an East Gothic word with the meaning "surrounding/encompassing". Although not found in other Gothic languages, this particle is well-attested in the recorded history of East Gothic. In this theory, the complete name "Wandark" can be understood as meaning either "the encompassing wall" or "that [sea] which the wall encompasses", both in reference to the Vandarch being totally surrounded by land until the 20th century.

The second, favoured in Hendalarsk, treats the -ark suffix as an evolution of the Old Central Gothic word rak, meaning "straight" (itself from Proto-Gothic rakkjan, "to straighten"). Evidence for this can be found in the Werdacher name for the sea, Vandrakk, which apparently preserves the older form of the word. In this account, "Wandark" therefore means something akin to "the straight, walled [sea]", referring both to the sea's geological status as a lake for most of its history and the sea's relatively straight northwest-southeast orientation.

Both theories converge on the idea of the sea as enclosed by land rather than opening up into a wider ocean, a notion which implies a high level of seafaring knowledge among the Gothic peoples of the southern Vandarch coast well into the ancient past.

Gaelic
In the Fhainnin Gaelic mythos, the Vandarch is the result of the fall of an ancient god, though the name associated with this belief (English: Godsgrave; Fhasen: Déithaigh) has in part given way to a Fhasen reinterpretation of the Gothic name 'The Barrier' (Fhasen: Tá Bacain) following the Christianization of the Ninerivers region. The term 'Mar Déithaigh' has made a resurgence in recent decades under Faneria's government's cultural conservation programs.

=History=

Formation
Prior to the last Ice Age, the Vandarch formed a large bay of the Kilikas Sea known as the Urvandarch Gulf and was much saltier than it is in the present day. It also shrank dramatically during the Ice Age, in line with global sea levels in that period, as Levantia to its north was trapped under an enormous ice sheet - as was the Kupferberg to its south - formed from previously liquid fresh water. Much of its current surface area, along with much of what is now Hendalarsk, Eldmora-Regulus and Yonderre, remained ice-free but was reduced to barren tundra by the combination of extreme cold and lack of moisture, forming the erstwhile Vandarch Desert (Hendalarskisch: Wandáschwöste).

As the ice began to recede, two related processes took place. The influx of enormous quantities of fresh water into the shrunken Vandarch dramatically lowered its salt concentration relative to the global oceanic norm (even before the Ice Age, water circulation into and out of the Gulf was much lower than elsewhere in the world-ocean), while the post-glacial rebound caused by the sudden removal of the enormous weight of ice from northern Levantia caused the Pervalian Isthmus to rise to sea-level. The Vandarch remains much less brackish in its southern extremes than its northern parts to this day, as circulation of water within the lake is relatively low and many of the rivers which drain into it are located in more southerly areas, while the influence of backlow through the Pervalian Isthmus is, despite the construction of the Grand Vandarch Canal, relatively limited. This difference in hydrological conditions in different areas of the Vandarch has resulted in noteworthy ecological differences across the length of the sea.

Prehistory
=Environment=

Islands
The Vandarch contains many tens of thousands of small islands along its coastline, which have long presented a major challenge for shipping. By far the most important island cluster in the sea is however the Kestrel Isles, which are politically divided between Hendalarsk, Faneria and Yonderre. Composed of nine larger islands and hundreds of smaller ones, the archipelago separates the larger northwestern portion of the Vandarch (almost entirely under the control of Hendalarsk and Faneria) from the southeastern sector and represents a substantial barrier to navigation without the assistance of an experienced pilot. This challenging geography played a major role in the rise of the Pentapolis and the wider Great Trade League of the Vandarch, since merchants overseeing the flow of goods to and from northwestern Levantia had to either find a way through the Kestrels or else risk much longer, much slower and even more dangerous overland journeys. Beyond the trading communities of the League, pirates based in the Vandarch's many bays and inlets were also not slow to recognise the opportunities for plunder and slaving posed by the Kestrels' straits.

Many other islands in the sea have long histories of habitation. Hendalarskara Christianity has a strong monastic tradition, and the Vandarch's windswept islands are natural retreats for spiritual communities and even hermits. Among the most notable is the community of Ísenhav, which despite repeated raids by pirates and slavers in centuries past has been continuously inhabited by monks for almost 1,000 years, and the nunnery of Delkeisch, whose mussels (farmed by the nuns) are a byword for quality in Hendalarsk.

Hazards
=Human Use=