Interregnum

A popular opera which originated on New Sardinia c. 3200 CE.

The most popular piece in the opera is a scene in which Orabella sings to her departing lover:

And though we shall be parted by a galaxy or more,
Yet ever in each others' hearts we'll stay.
And you shall live out your life, and I shall live out mine,
Until arrives some distant dire day,
When troubles gather all around and I am sore beset,
And for your help and succor I must pray.
Then winging as my token, to call you to my side,
Shall a rose from Old Terra come your way.

A loose, decentralized hegemony, somewhat like a cross between the Hanseatic League and the Roma, operating across the entire Galaxy during the Interregnum. The Traders were nomadic, operating from large tachyon-drive starships with plenty of ancillary vessels.

The Independent Traders, who were protected by treaties with most major power groups, were one of the primary sources of Galactic unity during the Interregnum.

This ancient verse gives the names of the worlds encountered on the last leg of the Geled-to-Terra run:

Bluewhite Barebia, barns and barrows;
Tethys teeming, seastones sing and sigh;
Kell creeps, keeping careful clockwork;
Tut triumphal, tombs and towers;
Yonder Euphrates, Kentaurus crucial.
Ship, swing silent, slide soilward;
Manhome magnificent.

Following 30,000 HE, Human population stabilized at about 2 million, primarily on Terra and a handful of other worlds.

Years are counted in CE.

Months

1. Enero
2. Febrero
3. Marzo
4. Abrilo
5. Mayo
6. Junio
7. Julio
8. Agosto
9. Septiembre
10. Octubre
11. Voviembre
12. Deciembre

There are five intercalary days, which have borne different names throughout the Interregnum.

Days

1. Dimmdi
2. Lunndi
3. Marrdi
4. Mercdi
5. Giodi
6. Venedi
7. Sabedi
8. Sonndi
9. Esteldi
10. Monndi

Human philosophical/spiritual movement founded by Grigor Haentil (Loreca) c. 7900 CE.

About 7900 CE, in the Credixian Imperium, the Imperator was on the outs with both the Meletian clergy and Kaalian churches. Devotees of Brandix were following a course of neutrality which began about 6000 CE.

Then came Loreca. Born Grigor Haentil of Amny, he studied at the Brandixian School on Amny until he was about 30. Then, being a student of alien philosophy, he persuaded a Galactic Rider to take him to Nephestal, where he eventually found his way into a Daamin philosophy group.

Grigor Haentil was of a Kala Phenkae branch that produced Schiller-Hertzfeld scores in the high 500s. With drugs, he was able to virtually imitate the Daamin Forever Dreams and their peculiar nonlinear causality.

In 7932 CE, when he was 56, Haentil returned to Amny. He got a lecturing post at the Brandixian School there and started on the philosophies that formed the basis of the Book of Loreca. By the time the Book was published (7943 CE), there was a growing community of Haentil's disciples on Amny and even throughout the Imperium.

In 7943 CE, at a pre-publication conference on Amny, Grigor Haentil took the pseudonym Loreca and began calling his movement Lorecanism. In part it was based on scraps of Daamin philosophy, in part on the Wakmarel disciplines, in part on pure Brandixian contrariness. But Loreca was no fool, and subsequent history has shown that he charted the right course for his movement to increase and prosper.

Mass communication played a part in the spread of Lorecanism, and the Book of Loreca became something of an undergorund bestseller. But the key to the movement was the induction of a state of awareness called kedankat, a mixture of Wakmarrel obdumat and Daamin Forever Dream, not too effective for those with low Schiller-Hertzfeld scores. The introduction of kedankat had to be done in person.

Indeed, Loreca had styled Lorecanism somewhat like a mystery religion, with kedankat in the role of the central mystery.

During his life, Loreca had two audiences with the Imperator, and in 7948 CE the Imperator gifted the movement with Credixian land and buildings that later formed the nexus of Circe Mater.

Lorecanism maintained friendly relations with the Brandixian Church, and less-than-friendly ones with the cults of Meletia and Kaal. This fact alone tied Lorecanism to the Throne, for the Imperator saw a chance to counterbalanace the power of the other Churches.

And in the course of time, Lorecanism spread through the Galaxy and became the state religion of the Second Terran Empire.

Primary scriptural source of the Lorecanism movement, published in 7943 CE).

The Book of Loreca is a philosophical treatise; the movement of Lorecanism was more akin to a poltical expansion.

One thing is certain: Loreca himself exploited the state of kedankat until he was very nearly precognitive. And it must not be forgotten that his Schiller-Hertzfeld score was very high. And it is certain that one of Loreca's close associates, perhaps even lover, was Kirl Ventag, a programmer with access to the powerful AIs of Amny's Brandixian School.

Loreca left programs and personal writings that charted a good deal of the future of Lorecanism. All of his successors as Grand Primate, for six hundred years, were identified in enough detail that there were no succession crises to weaken the early Movement.

One of the most beautiful passages in the Book of Loreca is the Hymn to the Rising Sun, a solo, almost a lament, to the rising sun and the indomitable principle of Light, of the driving force of Human ingenuity.

Lorecanist mental state akin to the Forever Dreams of the Daamin. Kedankat, which involves a limited form of precognition, is most effective for individuals with high Schiller-Hertzfeld scores.

The state cannot be effectively taught by any means other than in person.

Developed about 4300 CE in the Credixian Imperium, the Schiller-Hertzfeld scale measured a Human psi ability that became known as Schiller-Hertzfeld Ability. The scale begins at 1; the highest recorded score was slightly over 1,125. Average scores across an entire Human population hovered in the 50-75 range.

Schiller-Hertzfeld Ability allows an individual to sense chaotic patterns and predict their outcome with fair accuracy. Someone with a Schiller-Hertzfeld score in excess of 750 would easily be able to watch a butterfly flap its wings and then predict major events that would ultimate take place as a consequence.

Schiller-Hertzfeld Ability is not true precognition, although its effects can be akin. The predicted events are more easily predicted when they deal with more people; the destruction of a planet or fall of an empire would be more easily foreseen than a wedding or the price of a stock.

High Schiller-Hertzfeld scores are often associated with mental disorders. Those who suffer so seem to be unable to close their minds to the consequences of simple actions taking place around them; the resulting strain can cause schizophrenia or total mental collapse. Wakmarrel training and, later, Lorecanist kedankat conditioning, can be of great help to these individuals.

Independent Trader ship destroyed during the Geled-Natal War. The ship's destruction was the catalyst that led to the Council of Escen.