A REVISIONIST PERSPECITVE
For many years, established
histories and theories have held sway both within and without the Keeper Compound. Our doctrines feature the need for a
continual review of seeming truths, and so what is regarded as the
authoritative history of the Order of the Hammer must be reviewed in the light
of new truths. Following in the
trail-blazing footsteps of Keeper Orowelle, it is time for a revisionist
perspective on the history of the Order.
Conventional wisdom holds that the Hammerites were a small, outspoken group for much of their existence, until they were brought into wider society by a Baron. There they underwent a series of rises and declines, culminating in the decline that the Order experiences today. This view is essentially close to what must now be regarded as the truth, but differs in key aspects. It mistakes the degree of integration into secular society undergone by the Order, and overstates the amount of conflict with the governing and political structures of the City. While it is true that conflict did exist, it was not serious, and was restricted to only a few points in the long relationship between the Hammerites and the City.
The origins of the Order of the Hammer seem to be a mystery to
even the most knowledgeable of that Order.
It appears to have emerged as a means of opposition to the paganistic
elements present in early society. The
vehement hatred for pagans that prevails throughout the Order is one of its
defining characteristics. Some suggest
that its roots go back to Karath-Din and a small group of mystics from a
society called the “Guild of Enlightenment” charged with protecting the
Emperor’s tower. A body of scholarly
opinion is behind this view. Upon
discovery of Karath-Din many Mechanists identified artefacts as being “the
ancient power used by our Order to benefit all of humankind”. The rudimentary magical abilities of Hammerite
priests might be derivations of spells used by the Guild, which appears to have
had priests who could wield magic. The
focus of the Guild on defending the building from natural forces might have
been directed, as the passing years dulled the memory of those adherents,
towards a protection of all buildings from natural forces. This thesis is controversial, but not
inherently unrealistic.
It is much more likely that the Order emerged as a primitive religion
following a charismatic man who resisted the darkness and fear in the time
after the fall of Karath-Din. His name
may have come down to us – a certain Jeremyn who was responsible for either the
production or collation of what has become the Book of the Nail, one of the
fundamental foundations of Hammerite doctrine and theology. For many years the Hammerites remained a
minority religion. Their affinity for
construction and engineering naturally led builders and other related trades to
grow interested in them and join the Order.
It acted as a form of guild, or a place where the trades could meet and
talk. With the attraction of its own
robes, customs and even theology, this meant that by the time history starts in
the City the Order is known to be a small, outspoken religion that is also a
guild with a monopoly on construction in the City.
With economic growth came increased construction of buildings and
other urban development. The Order was
swelled by new blood, and its monopoly on the building trade meant that it soon
became a powerful voice in the City.
The profits gained from its activities were used to glorify the Builder,
resulting in an ostentatious display of wealth that attracted many people to the
Order. They wanted a share of this wealth,
and part of the power and respect that being a member of the Order gave. People donated or bequeathed lands to the
Order, which grew in size and wealth until the Baron felt that it represented a
substantial threat to his authority and control of the City.
The solution he adopted was inspired. He managed to force his election as High Priest of the Order by
the Master Forgers, giving him complete control over its activities. He gained the revenues from the Order, as
well as a means of controlling a substantial proportion of the population. Most importantly, he gained a core of
well-trained warriors that formed the basis of the City’s army for the next few
centuries, and a police force to patrol the streets. The militaristic nature of Hammerite ideology was perfectly
suited for these tasks, and in concert with the secular judiciary the Hammers
were soon engaged in a full-scale assault on street crime in the City.
They won widespread popularity for making the streets safe, as
well as the various sanitary facilities they constructed. Sewers, drains, water and power conduits –
all of these were gradually installed throughout the City. Their most important contribution to the
City, however, was Cragscleft. A name
feared by many criminals, it was built by the Hammerites in the most
inaccessible location available – an abandoned quarry deep in the
mountains. Gaols had not been a feature
of the City before – punishments were carried out immediately, and usually
involved such measures as branding, pillorying, or execution. Cragscleft was feared for its harsh regime
under the Hammerites, which involved toil in worked-out gold mines until the
encroachment of the undead forced the Hammers back to the upper, habitable
levels of the compound.
All these measures brought prosperity within the time of the
Baron, and he was anxious to pass on such benefits to his son. Using his position and power, he forced the
Master Forgers to agree to elect his son to the post of High Priest upon his
death. They were understandably
reluctant – it set an undesirable precedent, for the High Priest had previously
been chosen from among the ranks of the Master Forgers. However, they could not resist the strength
of the Baron’s will, and acceded to his demands. When the next Baron in turn came to the end of his life, he
forced the election of his own son.
Gradually this became an established precedent, and later barons had no
need to struggle against the Order.
The harmonisation of relationships within the City led to many years
of prosperity and peace. Trade boomed,
and urban development was hailed by the Hammerites as the triumph of the Master
Builder over the forces of paganism.
The Order settled into a comfortable routine, patrolling the streets and
arresting criminals, and handing them over to the secular judiciary for
trial. Cragscleft was the destination
of the worst offenders, as well as pagans and heretics that were tried
exclusively in Hammerite courts. The
Hammers manned the pumps and machines that dealt with the City’s sewage, and
brought power to the homes of those that could afford to make use of it.
Hammerite influence spread into the commercial and industrial
sector, where the technology of the Order was produced and sold to other cities
in the region. The Order grew wealthy,
leading to the barons becoming wealthier.
They were able to engage in aggressive expansion, leading an army of
Hammerites, local militia and mercenaries against neighbouring nobles. The City expanded its possessions, capturing
the Northern Territories from Blackbrook and placing them under a
Governor. Great buildings were erected
throughout the City, including a magnificent cathedral in the Old Quarter that
became the hub of Hammerite worship and a repository for relics, knowledge and
new technologies.
However, after several centuries this beneficial concord was
fraying at the edges. Some within the
Order of the Hammer were unhappy at the direction the Order was moving in, and
sought in instigate a Reformation that would end what they saw as corrupt and
unholy practices. They were not
revolutionaries, but radicals who sought to return the Order to its original
religious, pious, militaristic roots.
They were attacked as heretics within the Order, and many were sent to
Cragscleft, but support for them began to grow as more and more Hammerites
became disillusioned with the state of the Order. It seemed that the Order had gone from a noble aim of suppressing
the Pagans to becoming more concerned with mundane matters of sewage and policing
while the Pagans lived outside in the woods around the City. In addition, they resented the corruption
that had crept into the Order from the Baron, with posts becoming increasingly
politicised, and the Master Forgers engaging more in affairs of court than
caring for the religious well being of their wards. They were unhappy at the City courts, which seemed to be
acquitting known criminals and otherwise drifting from the path of
righteousness that the Hammerites moved along.
As this new reforming movement gained hold, it started to splinter
the Order. Most wished to reform the
Order from within – a few were so intent on a reforming move that they were
unconcerned whether their efforts created a schism. Eventually the Master Forgers were converted – forcibly or
voluntarily – to the reforming movement, and saw the only way of accomplishing
it was the break with the secular structure of the City entirely. Thus, when the time came for the Baron to
nominate his successor he was refused.
Astonished, he attempted to force his claim in a more emphatic manner,
using all his authority as High Priest, but the Master Forgers stood firm and
nominated one of their number. The
Baron’s efforts escalated the seriousness of the situation, and, fearing an
assault, the Hammerites recalled their warriors from the army and threatened
the Baron in response.
Forced to chose between further unrest or a humiliating submission
to the Hammerite demands, the Baron eventually chose the latter, relinquishing
his post as High Priest, but keeping the lands that his post had granted
him. The Order was allowed to go its
own way, keeping Cragscleft and much of the land and wealth granted to the
Order rather than the post of High Priest, which was filled by the nominated
Master Forger. They abandoned their
duties at the pumps and the streets, causing the Baron to have to create the
Department of Public Works to run the City’s infrastructure, and set up a
police force to keep down the street crime that plagued the City. They also abandoned their businesses,
rejecting involvement with the secular world, and selling them to enterprising
businessmen in the City.
However, conflict continued over
a matter at the heart of the City’s functioning. As the former police of the City the Order felt entitled, and
duty-bound, to continue to arrest, try and punish criminals. The Baron was not prepared to relinquish
this prerogative right that had existed before the growth of the Order, and
which gave him control over the citizens and plebes of the City. In addition, the reform of the Order had
caused it to become more ascetic, strict and rigid, which the Baron realised
would lead to increased arrests and prosecutions, and thus undesirable civic
unrest. He and the Order faced each
other down in the issue, and skirmishes between Hammerites and members of the
City Guard became common.
The issue was only resolved
through the intervention of the nobles.
The Hammerite objective did not just encroach on the Baron’s
prerogatives – it threatened the nobles and the power they obtained from being
in control of the City’s judiciary. In
an alliance with the Baron, they formed a coalition that was powerful enough to
subdue the Order. The judiciary
remained secular; the judicial apparatus that the Hammerites set up to use were
converted into a means of trying heretics within the Order. Although this has
not stopped them from arresting citizens and trying them under their own laws,
this is an increasingly rare circumstance.
Deprived of his former revenues,
the Baron was forced to raise taxes, contributing to the general decline that
the City was undergoing. The Order was
subject to this decline, its ascetic lifestyle drawing fewer acolytes and the
plight of the City causing more people to think of bread and wages than of the
Master Builder. The loss of the
Hammerite Cathedral contributed to this decline. Described elsewhere, it was a powerful blow that deprived the
Hammerites of their most vivid symbol.
Its loss was seen as a sign of the displeasure of the Master Builder,
causing the Order to become even stricter in its interpretation of doctrine,
and thus even more unattractive to potential converts. This led to a severe manpower shortage that
continues to this day. Although
Cragscleft continues to produce sledgehammers, a lack of manpower elsewhere
means that the Order is increasingly forced to contract out the production of
weaponry to secular agents.
The Order of the Hammer is in
dire straits. Although it seems united
and powerful, with a strong grip on the affairs of the City, it is increasingly
becoming marginalized and fragmented.
The Order possesses little influence in the functioning of the City, and
its small force of warriors cannot compete with the standing army and militia
under the command of the Baron. Its
wealth is declining as bequests dry up, and as numbers of conversions fall the
Hammerites no longer have the manpower to exert a meaningful presence on the
streets of the City. The current High
Priest, Markander, is a weak man who is unable to prevent the factionalism that
has spread through the Order. Some
Hammerites believe that the Order must gain the Master Builder’s blessing by
continuing to purify itself and follow the strictest laws of conduct. Others believe that the Order must relax its
doctrines and adapt itself to the modern, secular world.
It is a sad decline for the
Order of the Hammer, and one that we must slow until it has completed its
work. It is needed as an ally against the
Trickster and his nefarious plans, but once he is dead and the Metal Age is
upon us it is difficult to see how the Order will be able to resist the
pressures, both internal and external, that will be thrust upon it.
KEEPER JOREBEE
ADDMENDUM: THE ORDER OF THE
HAMMER AND THE METAL AGE
The past year has seen many events. The fall of the Woodsie Lord has upset the Balance, as we knew it
would, and the forces of order and progress now threaten to overwhelm the
scales. As was predicted, the Order of the
Hammer has been unable to resist the changes that this has involved, and is now
a shadow of even its former, deteriorated self.
In the course of the destruction of the Trickster, the Hammerite
Temple, the centre of the Order since the fall of the Cathedral, was ruined and
desecrated by his minions. Many
Hammerites were slaughtered, among them some of the most learned and most
senior of the Order. The desecration of
the Temple, and the failure of the Order to prevent this, led to a plunge in
morale that left the Hammers at their lowest ebb since the loss of the
Cathedral. The crisis had the effect of
encouraging the development of the factions already within the Order, who had
widely varying ideas for the future course of Hammerite practice. Some, looking back to the days of
co-operation with the Baron, wanted a renewal of these links. Others took the events as a sign from the
Master Builder, and wanted increased devotion and piety, and an even stricter
adherence to doctrine than ever before contemplated. Still more wanted the Order to place increasing emphasis on the
development of technology to give an advantage that could be exploited
economically, and attract adherents interested in the mechanical arts.
The High Priest, Markander, a weak man in any case, and
traumatised by his experiences at the hands of the Trickster’s beasts, was
incapable of suppressing these factions.
Splinter groups began to form that fragmented the Order. Markander was increasingly limited in his
options, possessing neither the power nor the authority to suppress these
groups. Most burnt out of their own
accord, but one proved the spark that completed the fall of the Order of the
Hammer. Brother Karras, a fervent
believer in the value of technology, gathered a group of likeminded Hammerites
around him, and set up a splinter group he called the Mechanists. Through research and development in the
neglected fields of alchemy and clockwork his order developed new technologies
that could be sold at a considerable profit.
These new inventions were eagerly snapped up by the nobility, ever
willing for impressive baubles with which to outdo each other. The Mechanist Order grew rich, and gained
the protection of several powerful nobles.
Markander was unable to suppress it, and Karras’s order was swelled by
Hammerites disillusioned with the strict lifestyle of their former order. The growing wealth and power of the
Mechanists attracted many others from amongst the population, and as they grew
in power the Hammerites continued to decline.
The situation has now been reached where the Order of the Hammer,
despite its long, distinguished history, is on the verge of collapse. Acolytes are few, and talented acolytes even
fewer. Cragscleft remains operational,
but with a skeleton staff. There are no
enough Hammerites to patrol the gaol, let alone patrol the streets. Money is at an absolute premium, and most of
the Hammerite temples and chapels throughout the City have been closed or sold
off to raise enough to keep those still open running. The lack of competent staff has meant that the Order no longer
produce their own hammers, but contract out all of their limited business to
the secular armourers. The vast
revenues that the Order used to gain have gone as land is sold to provide
funds, and a bare trickle of money comes in from the few who remain
faithful. Usually such people are old
and poor, meaning that income from this source is minimal.
The Order of the Hammer balances on a knife-edge. If it cannot weather this dramatic fall in
its fortunes that it will undoubtedly collapse and vanish completely. Threatened from all sides, its doctrines are
increasingly inadequate to deal with the modern world. The Order has entered terminal decline, and
it remains to be seen what, if anything, can reverse this trend.
KEEPER JOREBEE