How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Questions about the locations mentioned in the series; and those about the backstory not seen in the games.
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MegafaunaB.krieg
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How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by MegafaunaB.krieg »

Harmonia? And quite recently to boot? Somebody stole my copies of 1 and 2, years ago, so I can't check these things but, the Scarlet Moon Empire was formed within 1 lifetime-ago from Suikoden 1, when they killed some Runger person? How old was this Runger's kingdom? Was it also 1 or a few generations old? I mean, Gregminster is in the middle/north of the Toran area, which is south of the Dunan area, Harmonia is pretty far away from there.

It stands to reason then that Harmonia used to control basically all of the main continent for the suikoden games? Or did they just sort of have their capital city down there, away from the rest of their country, begging for an attack? The Runger kingdom must have lasted a long time, since the whole rest of the Toran and Dunan areas also had to be lost to Harmonia between Suikoden 1 and whenever this was.

Most of you are probably saying "duh" but, in one of the articles I read here it refers to Harmonia losing Gregminster/Scarlet Moon Empire forming as recent events. Which...Scarlet Moon? Did they keep the same name when Barbarossa took it over? Now I am more confused, I should wait to post this until I can go see where I read all that, but for funsies I won't.

I just read the timeline for the first time and it says "230 - Scarlet Moon Empire Established". I can't find the line I saw about Harmonia recent events, that included the Scarlet Moon Empire so I either imagined it or it was just a tiny error anyways.

But, Barbarossa really kept the name the same when he took over? The timeline seemed to indicate it was a succession issue within the existing country (either that or it was talking about Falena, I couldn't tell) but playing the game seemed to indicate that Barbarossa and them did exactly what Tir does, rebel and tear down an existing, corrupt nation? As far as I remembered anyways. It did always bug me that his nation became corrupt in only 10-20 years.

I'm still reading things on here, and it says Gregminster was destroyed during the war 7 years ago, how does Barbarossa build that huge city in 7 years? It was destroyed so bad that even the Sindar ruins are gone.

Lemmy's edit: Please don't double or triple post, you can use the edit button to the bottom right of your post if you have anything to add. Title clarified also.
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Lemmy Claypool
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Lemmy Claypool »

The Succession War, the war in which Barbarossa Rugner came to power in the SME, began in the year 446, 216 years after the establishment of the Empire in 230. Barbarossa was deposed in 457 (the end of the first Suikoden). This is all in the timeline.

As for your geographical question, when Gregminster was under Harmonian control it was called Rupanda. Barbarossa's ancestor Kranach Rugner rebelled, took over and renamed it Gregminster. Source.

200-odd years is plenty of time to lose two countries' worth of territory I'd say.
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Raww Le Klueze
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Raww Le Klueze »

Harmonia never controlled the Dunan area.
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MegafaunaB.krieg
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by MegafaunaB.krieg »

Be interesting to see a map of territory over the ages. Or heck, even a regular map all posted together. I just have a vague version in my head, the world map from 1, then above that, mostly directly above it as I think South Window is in the middle, and lines up with the border forts in 1, would be the world map for 2. Off to the east of that is the Highland area, and North of that would be Harmonia (how far in each direction?) and then west of that and north of Muse area would be the grass lands, stretching over to Tinto/the coast with Zexen land. Then somewhere off in the SW would be the who cares islands from 4.

Raww are you saying that Harmonian territory sort of went south through the highlands, skipped the majority of the Dunan area, but then had the Toran area, so the Dunan area would be sort of in the middle of a backwords C, the C being harmonian territory? Or did Harmonia ever really have the Northeast section of the Toran area, with Gregminster? So their territory would look something like a long southward line bleeding out from their main land mass and going south towards the bottom half of the continent?

Like this?

|Harmonia|
__________
|
D |
U |
N |
A |
N |
|
|
|
Rupanda


Obviously Harmonia would be a little more east so maybe that should be a line going diagonal from NE to S/SW, this was my first ever ascii forgive me m(_ _)m for the sake of this diagram Muse is not pictured and this would be the far eastern fringes of Dunan area bordering the Highlands area.
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Raww Le Klueze
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Raww Le Klueze »

Yeah, cause it's impossible for a country to have territory that's not connected via a landmass. It's not like Britain had colonies in India, Africa or America or anything... oh, wait...
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Rooks
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Rooks »

Well, I always pictured the Jowston / Dunan region as being northwest of Gregminster. Mostly because in Suikoden II, you travel south to Banner village, then mostly east through the Banner pass to reach Varkas at the gate to Toran. Though, obviously from there it is left up the the player's imagination.

To answer the question, I see the old Harmonia -before the Scarlet Moon Empire cut itself off- as bending around Dunan, the way that Spain bends around Portugal. And yes, I am still terribly bitter about British Colonialism too.
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Antimatzist »

Raww Le Klueze wrote:Harmonia never controlled the Dunan area.
My own speculation with no back-up or anything: In a very distant past, Harmonia controlled also Dunan, but it became independent, so they only had the Toran region left.
Somehow similar to the German Reich after WW I with the area around Königsberg.

But since we can take facts as granted.. yeah, Harmonia never controlled the Dunan Region.

Btw: Was Gregminster really Harmonias capital? Then I find it hard to believe that there could have been a rebellion directly at the capital, but the state (Harmonia) still exists somewhere else.
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by MegafaunaB.krieg »

Raww Le Klueze wrote:Yeah, cause it's impossible for a country to have territory that's not connected via a landmass. It's not like Britain had colonies in India, Africa or America or anything... oh, wait...
I was actually attempting to see if I understood what you were saying, not attacking you, why so upset buddy?

I will point out though, that having a colony is one thing. Have your capital completely separated from your main controlled land is quite different. Britain didn't move the queen to India when it had a colony there, and leave her surrounded by hostile/unconquered territory.
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Raww Le Klueze
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Raww Le Klueze »

Obvious flaw in your logic is that you're assuming that the Toran region is the colony and not the main controlled land.
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MegafaunaB.krieg
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by MegafaunaB.krieg »

No, actually I am not. It seems like you are though. Toran can't be the capital and the colony. I am not disputing that it was the capital. I am saying it just seems an unlikely choice. So far nobody has given a good answer on how much of Toran Harmonia controlled, I suppose no one has an answer to give. But if they didn't control Dunan ever as you say, then even if they controlled all of Toran area (the whole world map from S1) the majority of their controlled land would still be far from their capital, with the Highlands, the modern Harmonia areas which are supposed to be *HUUUUUUUUUUGE*, and everything connecting them to Gregminster area.

If they didn't control the entire Toran area then their capital would be surrounded on all sides. Even if they did they still have a large portion of their controlled areas extremely vulnerable to attacks by...whoever controls the Dunan/Jowston area. Can you imagine them trying to send the army from Gregminster to respond to an incident in the Crystal Valley? Yeesh.

Maybe this explains why Hikusaak allowed his capital to be taken over, since it is so far removed from his main area of control?


I don't know how accurate this is, apparently it's based off map that came as a pre-order bonus.

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt ... CBIQ9QEwAA

If this is accurate, there is no way in hell Harmonia didn't control some/all of Dunan. They would also have to control the North/west portion of Toran in addition to the area around Gregminster, unless they are magically teleporting people...maybe Viki is an ancient Harmonian travel mage, and they had fleets of people like here teleporting people from the capital to the Crystal Valley/the main portion of Harmonia?
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Rooks
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Rooks »

Well, first off, no one knows what makes Raww the way he is. If he is bugging you, then ignore him.

Also, where exactly does it say that Rupanda was the capitol of Harmonia. Indeed, Rupanda was a Holy City, but considering Hikusaak's pension for calling himself and things he controls "holy," then maybe there were several "holy" cities, while the capital remained in the Crystal Valley.

Regardless, if Rupanda was the capitol, it would be difficult to move the capital across water to the Crystal Valley after the fall of Rupanda. I cannot think of any actual historical example of something like this. There have been capitals that have fallen, leaving the state to establish a new capital. Kansas during the American Civil war comes to mind, when they lost Kansas City to the slave state of Missouri, they moved the capitol to Topeka. but never have I heard of an across-water move.

This leaves some questions: If Rupanda was the capitol, then how did they move after the loss without Hikusaak's leadership? This tough to swallow without some kind of land bridge to the Crystal Valley.
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Hirathien
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Hirathien »

There are plenty things we don't know about the Suikoden world, even less we know about the old stuff.

Interesting speculations though.
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by Vextor »

Rupanda has never been referenced as Harmonia's capital. Merely as the "Holy City of Rupanda."

Also, it is referenced within the game that getting from the Highland area to Toran is fairly quick by sea compared to reaching there by land. Dunan is a land-locked area which is surrounded by somewhat treacherous terrain, while you can reach even lake Toran via the sea route. Sheena takes a ship from Gregminster to Highland and says it took two weeks, while traveling by land from Toran to Dunan takes 6 months (Viktor and Flik's travel) unless you use the Banner pass, which isn't fit for travel by a large force. It's probably pretty easy to get from Harmonia to Toran by sea.

Dunan itself had it's own monarchy by the year 110, and there's no mention of Harmonia ever claiming any land within Dunan.
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by freshmetal »

MegafaunaB.krieg wrote:No, actually I am not. It seems like you are though. Toran can't be the capital and the colony. I am not disputing that it was the capital. I am saying it just seems an unlikely choice. So far nobody has given a good answer on how much of Toran Harmonia controlled, I suppose no one has an answer to give. But if they didn't control Dunan ever as you say, then even if they controlled all of Toran area (the whole world map from S1) the majority of their controlled land would still be far from their capital, with the Highlands, the modern Harmonia areas which are supposed to be *HUUUUUUUUUUGE*, and everything connecting them to Gregminster area.

If they didn't control the entire Toran area then their capital would be surrounded on all sides. Even if they did they still have a large portion of their controlled areas extremely vulnerable to attacks by...whoever controls the Dunan/Jowston area. Can you imagine them trying to send the army from Gregminster to respond to an incident in the Crystal Valley? Yeesh.

Maybe this explains why Hikusaak allowed his capital to be taken over, since it is so far removed from his main area of control?


I don't know how accurate this is, apparently it's based off map that came as a pre-order bonus.

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=htt ... CBIQ9QEwAA

If this is accurate, there is no way in hell Harmonia didn't control some/all of Dunan. They would also have to control the North/west portion of Toran in addition to the area around Gregminster, unless they are magically teleporting people...maybe Viki is an ancient Harmonian travel mage, and they had fleets of people like here teleporting people from the capital to the Crystal Valley/the main portion of Harmonia?

Going by the map, which I believe the be the most accurate map of the Suikoden world, Harmonia must have controlled most of the eastern edge of the continent (if not more). The obviously had their current land plus the Highland region, maybe the eastern Muse area (east of Toto and Radat), and most of what is now Toran, which would have made the Dunan river and lake a natural western border. If I recall correctly, Harmonia's advance made it as far south as the Warriors Village, where the Harmonian Army was repelled by Cliff the Crusader and his warriors.

What I didn't know was that Gregminster was the Harmonian capital. Is that true? I imagined that the capital had always been the One Palace in the Crystal Valley.

With a little bit of Photoshop, you can get a better idea of what Harmonia may have looked like before the civil war the lead to the creation of the Scarlet Moon Empire. Here's a map that I edited showing a larger Harmonia reaching into Toran.

http://i173.photobucket.com/albums/w69/ ... 80/map.jpg

Judging from this map, Gregminster doesn't seem like a really bad spot for Harmonia's capital depending on how far south Harmonia goes. Of course there's also the issue of how far NORTH Harmonia goes too.
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Re: How was Gregminster the capital of Harmonia?

Post by LanceHeart »

As Vextor said, controlling the eastern bank of land wouldn't have been useful for military nor civilian movement. Even if they did, most people would obviously opt for the maritime route rather than trudging through very mountainous lands.

Also: There have been many historical instances in Far East Asia where imperial capitals were moved between large cities more than a few days apart through either conquest, the whimsy of the emperor or a calculated, strategic change. Japan is one such country (on a smaller scale), having moved the capital many times due to all three reasons I listed.
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