>The basic Orlanthi grouping is the clan. This is headed by a chieftain.
Hmm. The basic grouping seems to be the hearth, really, up to a grouping of steads, able to form a simple wyter.
I tend to insist on this because there are Orlanthi-influenced and - -descended regions where the clan has disappeared, mostly. Like Otkorion or Naskorion in Ralios, and likely the Ditali lands and Jonatela, where there are strong non-Orlanthi rulers usurping most of the clan's tasks.
I admit that I have some problems with superimposing Orlanthi clan structures with basic Western "feudal" structures (actually some imitation of Germanic military and judicial groupings like the Hundreds of the Domesday Book or the Ships in the Norwegian haerfolge (sp?)) in my Heortland campaign.
IMG the plateau region of Heortland (all the lands west of the royal highway connecting Jansholm, Durengard and Mt. Passant, and extending somewhat beyond that into the foothills of the Storm Mountains) is divided into Hundreds, a few of which are gathered together in Shires. A Hundred has a chieftain-like thegn at its head, who is responsible for fielding a military leader, not necessarily himself. (The term Hundred is derived from its composition of 100 Hides, with one Hide being about 0.25 km^2, or 25 hektars. One Hide supports one full Ceorl, or a couple of half-ceorls or more cottars, using the Heortling terminology from KoS.)
Clans are still existant, but have diminished in their organisational importance. Some clans stretch over more than one hundred, while other clans have to join to make up a Hundred. The clans now have mainly a bloodline character, since the actual gouvernment has been taken away from the clans. Some clans are reminiscent of noble families plus entourage, while other clans are little more than a farming community.
>In most Orlanthi areas, clans group together into tribes, led by a king.
Following Alakoring's reintroduction of small tribes.
>In a few areas, tribes join into confederations or kingdoms, ruled by a king,
>or, in the most famous example (Sartar), Prince.
In other, adjacent regions, few tribes join into confederations. Tarsh was formed from one tribe, and seems to have admitted a few branches into its kingdom (the Aldachuri, some Quivini). Heortland has once been said to consist of four Orlanthi tribes. Sylila was "conquered" by Hwarin Dalthippa by marrying just one powerful tribal king, which must have given her a household troop sufficient to quench even opposing alliances, so I doubt she encountered many small tribes there.
IMG three of the four Heortland tribes (Solthoni, Bandori, Hendreiki and one yet unnamed southern tribe around the Minthos River) were formed as tribal confederations in defense against the Aeolian Hendriki tribe which had turned into a feudal kingdom around 1260 after prolonged contact with Ralian/Manirian Trader Princes and a change in the Aeolian Church. The unification occurred too late, though, to prevent Hendreiki dominance, and the other tribes degenerated into sub-kingdoms, then duchies.
Back to Hendriki-dominated Heortland and its structure IMG:
Shires are led by ealdormen (in case of rural shires) or eorls (city shires), and are in turn responding to the dukes (of Jansholm, Mt. Passant, and Durengard) in military issues (the dukes doubling as eorls of their respective city shires). These people are quite close in power and office to Sartarite tribal kings. Their offices are generally handed down in their bloodlines, though only with the approvals of king and folkmoot. Some shires have rival bloodlines competing for the ealdormanhood, and sometimes alternating bloodlines in power.
The hills of Heortland are somewhat subject to this feudal scheme, but the Sartarite/Heortling clan becomes more prominent. The Hundreds are no longer district organisations, but describe clan land instead, their thegn being the clan chieftain. There are a few upland shires which have their own tribal structure intact, the ealdorman being basically the same as a Sartarite king, and called king, too. (I believe that there are two quite different words in Manirian Theyalan for tribal _king_ and national _king_. Like in Latin mediaeval sources which have a nice way to differentiate kings of a country (rex) and kings of a tribe (regulus); however using these terms consistently would lead to the subcult of Orlanth Regulus installed by Alakoring, replacing the former non-canonified Rex aspect of kings like those in Broken Council, with tribes significantly larger than even the Colymar.)
The upper valleys of the Storm Mountains, about the height of the tree border, but still way below the Wind Child eyries, are inhabited by yet more primitive Orlanthi who barely have the sophistication of more backward Sartarite tribes or independent clans around the third generation of resettlement of Dragon Pass. They often are led by shamanic chieftains or warrior chiefs accepting the Hendriki king just as some powerful priest in some downland fortress, with more warriors than they can field, but no real power over them. They serve in his host mainly as volunteers in for the plunder, if at all, and their small numbers (maybe 1 percent of the total kingdom populace) don't make a real difference, considering their minimalistic equipment for battle.
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