Vezias

Vezias, City of Scholars

Vezias is the second oldest city in the nation. A group of Vision Crone priestesses first took themselves to the forest for contemplation in 254 YoQ. A religious community grew up there, taking as a name Vezias, an old word meaning "visionaries." By the late 300s, it had lost much of its religious character but none of its scholarship. In 430, Good King Aelfric chartered the university there and encouraged all who would be scholars to go there. Attracted by the students, businesses came to offer goods and services to the growing community. Now, 110 years later, it is a thriving center of learning and trade.

Geography

The Vision priestesses of old chose a secluded, wooded spot in the forest that occupies central Saromatia. Much land has been cleared for the city and around it, to support farming, but the place maintains an arboreal feel. Streams and ponds are plentiful in the area.

Notable Sights

The University is the most impressive sight in Vezias. The Old University, built at the behest of the Good King, today houses halls where learned women teach the basics fundamentals of higher knowledge to students - logic, rhetoric, and grammar, as well as music, geometry, astronomy, and history. The buildings are made from the fine, dark oak wood provided by the surrounding forest. The School of Theology is a small one and newly grown; it is a few houses on the edges of the Old University. Most who are interested in religion turn to the temples. But it is the School of Medicine, resplendent in granite blocks and iron railings, for which Vezias is most justly famous. The lore of healing was taught here since the first, and the creation of the Old University spurred those who passed on physicker skills to standarize themselves as well.

The Book House is another marvel of this place. The grotto where the Vision clergy first dwelled was converted by those worthy women to a home for books in the early 300s. Further, any doctor - or one with a note of passage from a doctor - may enter to peruse the librams. The Crones who remain only smile ruefully and shake their heads when questioned about the tomes of forbidden knowledge which are supposed to lie hidden in dim caverns deep within the grotto. The elder students tell the new ones the same tales, every year.

The Apothecary is reputed to be the most well-stocked alchemical laboratory in Saromatia - or at least, the largest. Students of the School of Medicine use its facilities to learn to create various drugs and remedies, and their elders tinker with improving or refining the old cures.

Vezias has become ever more boisterous with age, rather than quieter and more reflective. There are more theatres, taverns, auditoria, and other places of amusement per block than anywhere else save Joyeuse.

Temples

Outside of the Book House is a shrine to the Vision Crone. She is venerated as a font of wisdom and is widely considered to be the patroness of Vezias. The city could easily support a temple, except that the Crones are disinclined to build and maintain one. The Book House and shrine, they say, serve them fine.

There is a small temple to the Spring Maiden, in her capacity as healer and life-bringer. There is also one to the Death Crone/Stone Lord pair. Doctors and students of medicine constitute the most regular patrons of both.

There is no priestess of Fortuna regularly in residence in Vezias, but the popular whim of students seems to have consecrated a fountain on the grounds of the Old University to her cause. Small offerings are often left there around the examination times. The Air Lord, ever beloved by the young and vivacious, has a shrine attended by several priests here. The High Priest of Air usually stops in here for a couple of months out of every year.

Government

As a religious community in the wilderness, Vezias managed to stay under its own power for some time. Between the mid-300s and 430, control of the scholarly town passed from the hands of the priestesses, to a chancellor, to a lady, to a council of scholars, and back to a chancellor. When Aelfric signed the University's charter, he also decreed the governance for the area. Vezias would be a royal city, which was only proper, owing its great age and virtue. A committee composed of the five most senior academics, the five most senior townswomen, and a priestess of each temple or shrine in the city should choose a chancellor every five years. At least two academics and two townswomen must agree on the chancellor, so that one side cannot overthrow entirely the interests of the other. Once the chancellor is installed, these worthies become her advisors. Afte five years, they may keep her or reinstall her as they see fit, so it behooves her to do a good job governing the city.

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