> >> >The Cities [...] appear on the list, suggesting that they count as
> >> >Tribes for some purposes (Voting, etc.?).
>
> >> They don't.
>
> >At the very least, they must count for maintenance of the royal
> >household ...
>
> In what way?
They provide goods only available in cities, such as quality smithing, libraries, specialists of various kinds, and any other vast benefit to the Prince as discussed by Socrates in Plato's Republic, which otherwise might end up in the back yards of the Tribal Kings.
> The Cities are the focus of tribal confederations.
> Thus counting them as tribes in their own right would be nonsensical
> to the Sartarites.
I agree that they don't count as Tribes per se. That would be a good recipe for severe civil unrest, actually.
> >It also appears that there are Sartarite clans (maybe just families,
> >called "clans" for legal reasons ?) who belong to cities, not
> >Tribes.
>
> I doubt that any such clans exist. Why on earth would
> anybody on the City Ring pay attention to them?
Because if not, they would riot, and otherwise disrupt the smooth workings of Orlanthi city politics?
City politics in Sartar are probably not so advanced that there's a sophisticated Guild/Client system, or any other organisation of wealth into a few super rich families. But the Cults exist, and the Prince would certainly make sure that the Gustbran smiths tithed directly to him, rather than via the Tribes. Also if healing were needed, he'd go straight to the CA temple. So the city godi, at least, are probably partially independant of Tribal politics.
And we *know* that membership in cults tends to run in families ...
> A clan is much larger than 500 people.
Not in WB&RM it isn't ...
Some clans are very, very small, actually, because they live on poor land, have suffered Plague, or for various other causes. Perhaps not the typical clan, but clans nevertheless.
> There's no palace of the Tribal King of Boldhome
> in Boldhome.
These are probably the city Mayors we're talking about, you know, as Jane pointed out.
> Such people are more trouble than they are worth as they challenge
> the King's _own_ authority.
ALL Orlanthi are more trouble than they're worth ...
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