LMINSTER offers a fund of information on several unique, festivals celebrated throughout The Vast. These tend to be more energetically celebrated in the country, and paid less attention in the cities.

The Arming (the fourth day of Tarkash) commemorates the rise of the farmers and merchants to defeat raids of tribesmen from the mountains south of Ravens Bluff, orc raids along The North Road, and brigand and pirate attacks throughout The Vast. On this day militias are mustered and inspected, weapons are worn proudly and well polished, youths of both sexes are given gifts of weapons or armour, weaponry contests abound, and feasts are held in which the ballads of the heroes are sung, and the tales of deeds of valour are told.

The Plowing (Mirtul 6th) is a day when the ground is broken for planting all over The Vast. Local teams travel about to break ground wherever desired, for free. Casks of beer aged over the winter are opened in an evening feast, and the free plowing continues for four days if necessary.

Hornrnoot (Kythorn 14th) is the traditional first trading day of spring between humans and dwarves. The dwarves once blew horns in the mountains to signal their coming, and men replied with horn-calls of their own if their settlements wanted to trade. Dwarves still come to these moots – and monthly ones from Kythorn through Eleint, always on the 14th of the month each year, but each year there are fewer dwarves. Traders still come from as far away as Amn to get good axes and swords from the Stout Folk at these moots.

The Bone Dance (Highsun 9th) is a hunting festival. Clerics of Malar hold feasts after dark. These include pageants where bones of huge stags and other beasts are magically animated to enact hunts; very young and very old hunters in each community take the parts of the slaying hunters. Much food and drink is consumed, and on the next morning expeditions set forth to track down and slay any predators or dangerous monsters known to be active in the vicinity.

Elminster Ed Greenwood

Hunting

Boar, deer, and black-masked bear roam the forests of The Vast, and can be found, well roasted, on local tables. The Vast is known around the Inner Sea lands for roast stag, the meat being of the highest quality and size. Traditionally, this dish is served on large platters, the first bearing the full rack of antlers to the table, surrounded by sweetmeats and choice cuts. Hunters say that game has remained surprisingly plentiful over the years. Most sages specializing in such things believe that the High Country has acted as something of a protected breeding ground, and only the rich food offered by farm plantings brings the choice game down into the farmlands, where the woodlots and wilderland groves offer shelter between feasts.

Most hunting is done in the wooded areas, either a few archers on foot, or four or more stout men armed with spears, daggers, and clubs, hunting with trained dogs. The first method requires more skill and delivers game in better condition. Hunting in the foothills and on the wooded mountain flanks always has been a more dangerous game, undertaken only by large, well-armed bands.

Wolves, orcs, brigands, and monstrous creatures have always attacked overbold hunters in the hills. In the fey, mist-cloaked marshes of the Flooded Forest, on the northern edge of The Vast, strange and dangerous creatures have recently begun to appear. Owl-bears, stirges, and other, rarer creatures that local hunters have never seen before and that have no local names have increasingly been met. Hunting near Ylraphon is now done in large, well-armed bands, who never camp the night over in the woods, but return by torchlight with ready swords. Folk in The Vast tend to keep to themselves, and see themselves as one with the land they inhabit. The countryside is beautiful but dangerous, and from their earliest days humans in the rural Vast go armed. Even the youngest child allowed out of mother’s reach has a sling or darts, and a belt knife.

Elminster Ed Greenwood

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