All dates have been translated into the Omnet standard system, which are then translated to your local calendar.
This is a summary of the history of the Codoj home zone. Many details have been left out. For a fuller account of each age or of the history of particular ship-states, contact your nearest Codoj embassy.
876B.C. - 475B.C.
Records from this period, before the first resource wars, are fragmentary at best. At the time all ship-states lived in the vicinity of Neomis. Crude images of the rings of Neomis, scratched in stonewood on Wanoe, indicate that they were still almost entirely uncolonized. Only a few ship-states from that time still survive, among them Shehhen, Wanoe, and Pagdaha. Others, such as the legendary Paian, were destroyed in the first resource wars or in the two and a half millenium since that time.
During this age the major factions had not yet been formed, and it is known that Shehhen, Wanoe, and Pagdaha engaged in trade and commerce with one another. It was only near the end of this age, just before the first resource wars, that they began to differentiate.
Pagdaha was the first ship-state to leave Neomis, and its warnings to the others regarding the imminent depletion of Neomis' rings are among the best preserved documents from that time. By leaving to scavenge asteroids from the inner system, Pagdaha avoided the worst of what was to come. As Neomis' rings became more and more crowded, Wanoe drifted more and more into raiding other ship-states for their resources, causing chaos among the more unprepared ship-states. Wanoe's statement of the Warrior Philosophy is the last surviving document from right before the first resource wars.
475B.C. - 79B.C.
Virtually no records survive from the first resource wars, which ran from 475B.C. - 411B.C. The wars were terrible though, because fully 60% of the known ship-states from the Age of Blissful Ignorance never appeared again, including the legendary Paian, greatest of the first ship-states. When records resume Shehhen had emerged to balance Wanoe's power, along with the Wonderer Philosophy, which at that time included the wanderer ideas of searching out new sources of resources as well as searching for new ways to conserve and recycle mass.
During the Age of Slow Awakening Shehhen and the other wonderers, among them Pagdaha, cleaned out the inner system, stripping it of asteroids and founding Ersoaieusre, Bewrbe, and Elgyrae, among others. Wanoe, meanwhile, continued to prey on the remaining ship-states around Neomis.
The beginning of the end of this age was Elgyrae's conversion to the warrior philosophy. Up until that time the warriors had never strayed far from Neomis, and the wonderers had been resonably safe. Elgyrae's initial depredations went virtually unchecked, and by the time Shehhen became aware of the situation Wanoe had left Neomis and entered the inner system too. Unable to protect more than Ersoaieusre and Bewrbe, Shehhen was forced to leave the other ship-states to defend themselves. Pagdaha, already inside its asteroidal crust, was best equipped to deal with the threat, and stopped Elgyrae cold in 83B.C. It is not this event that marks the end of the age, but Shehhen's development four years later of the Pirorpeh tree and the subsequent vast improvements in light sails that allowed the efficient exploration of the outer system for the first time.
79B.C. - 1039A.D.
The Age of Exploration was a relatively stable time, despite the continuous expansion that characterised the period. The wonderers and warriors were effectively balanced, and Shehhen's skillful manipulations kept the warriors at each other's throats more often than not. Thousands of new ship-states were born during this age, as one comet after another was colonized by the wonderers. It was these ship-states that would eventually formulate the Wanderer Philosophy, at the beginning of the next age. Among the ship-states founded was Amshlitingsa, which later became a major center of trade between the wanderers and wonderers.
In 111A.D. the first explorer from another zone was discovered. The ship was derelict, and its records were undeciferable, but it generated a lot of excitement. Travel to another star system was possible! The excitement faded after a decade of frustrated attempts to figure out the method by which the derelict had travelled, and no more contact was made for another 170 years. During this time hundreds of theories were put forward to explain the origins of the mummified remains of the crew, the reason for their fate, and their alien technology.
In 282A.D. the first living explorers from another zone were rescued. They were a group of humans in a slow colony ship, aiming to escape their dying world and colonize another planet, and had just crossed their first quantum wall. Utterly disoriented by the failure of their technology and the sudden contact with an immense alien ship, they adapted surprisingly well. These colonists formed the original Elmuesn culture, and it was from their ship that birds were introduced into the Codoj. The ship-states, meanwhile, struggled to understand the elmuesn and their technology, and especially their account of crossing the quantum wall. This was mostly believed to have been incorrect until the quantum wall was encountered and documented by one of the wanderer ship-states. In the years that followed the extent of the wall was mapped, and several ship-states were lost in failed attempts to cross the wall. Several more explorers were rescued as well, and they continued to arrive at irregular intervals right up to the arrival of Omnet.
In 1039A.D. Shehhen and the other original wonderers decided that the attempts to cross the quantum wall were futile, and that the resources available from exploration were therefore limited. This provoked the split of the wanderer and wonderer factions. Shehhen and the other wonderers retreated to the inner system to concentrate fully on conservation and recycling, and the wanderers remained convinced that enough comets remained to keep them going until a way to cross the quantum wall could be found.
1039A.D. - 1977A.D.
This age was characterised by an inward turning of the wonderers, and even the warriors were affected as they were forced to consider the fact that eventually there would be no prey left. Pagdaha established its current reputation as the inscrutable Exception, the wanderers diversified, and failed, over and over, to cross the quantum wall, and Amshlitingsa grew into its role as a center of trade and commerce. The wonderers founded Amitshe in order to study the possibility of seeding Neomis' upper atmosphere with tiny floating plants which could be harvested at a later date, but met with limited succes. The frequency of warrior raids declined significantly.
The second-to-last recorded contact with Aitn the Lost was in 1970A.D., just before the arrival of the first Omnet waverunner in 1977A.D.
1977A.D. - present
The arrival of the first Omnet waverunners in 1977A.D. brought a flood of changes to the Dominions. The waverunners brought with them not just biolinks and synths, but news of a new form of galactic civilization, and with it renewed hope that a way could be found to cross the quantum wall. The news triggered a massive research effort, which resulted in biolinks being adopted by virtually every ship-state, and in the development of optical computers in an attempt to replicate synths. The improvements in communication brought about by the final destruction of the language barrier and by the introduction of the computer net led to an acceleration of development, and were probably responsible for the better diplomatic relations of the period which eventually led to the creation of the Coalition of Dominions of Jath.
This is not to say that the last 138 years have been all fun and games. 63 years ago Omnet declared the Codoj home zone to be abberant, since none of their waverunners or outriders had ever returned, and began warning off all further exploratory expeditions. This event led directly to the second resource wars, when in 2057A.D. Wanoe suddenly attacked Kehtie after almost a century of inactivity. The damage to Kehtie was so severe that the ship-state was broken into several fragments, which were salvaged by Wanoe and turned into independant warrior ship-states. This led to full scale war between the wonderer and warrior factions. Pagdaha, as usual, remained aloof. When Shehhen attempted to enlist Pagdaha's aid, Wanoe arrived to attempt to convert Pagdaha to its side, and battle was joined. Pagdaha then attacked both sides, causing heavy damage and forcing them both to retreat. Pagdaha remained neutral for the rest of the wars.
The second resource wars lasted 53 years. During this period the wanderers continued their attempts to cross the quantum wall, with no more success than they had had for the previous millenium. They were hindered by the loss of the last remaining synths to various covert sabotage missions from the fighting factions, who wanted to prevent the synths from becoming involved in the wars.
Only five years ago, at the biannual gathering of elmuesn on Amshlitingsa, the wanderer ship-state Baudetvenfe brought news of an astonishing event. Aitn, a ship-state that had gone eccentric several years before the arrival of the first Omnet waverunner, had discovered a new avenue of research that promised to lead to a way to cross the quantum wall. Indeed, it was believed that Aitn had already successfully crossed the quantum wall!
Within two years the second resource wars were ended. The wonderers and wanderers were finally convinced of the possibility of crossing the quantum wall by a careful campaign led by Nurol, the last living Omnet waverunner in the zone. He successfully argued that both factions could be sustained indefinitely by importing comets and asteroids from surrounding zones. His trek from ship-state to ship-state through the inner system is already becoming the stuff of legend, fueled by the intense media coverage after his tragic death just before the first successful crossing was made.
After the first successful crossing two years ago (barring Aitn the Lost, if that ship-state in fact managed a successful crossing) the most suitable neighboring zone, a Particle/Willpower zone completely devoid of life but with plentiful asteroids in its dead systems, began to be exploited for resources. The three neighboring zones proved not to have any native civilizations of their own, although two had native life. The Omnet warning beacons around our zone were automated, and not until last month did the wanderer ship-state Segne finally make first contact with an Omnet cruiser on a routine beacon maintenance patrol.