The Renaissance. (extract taken from Understanding the past, a school textbook by Prof. Mufudazi Flowers) "Chapter 10. The years after the war were hard for the aristocrats. Their province-states had been shattered; their houses were in ruins and the countryside was under Exian control. In fact, the Exian fighting force had disbanded as soon as it arrived back in Ex, and many of the fighters had no idea that they were imagined to be 'in charge' of the country. They had achieved their aim: Ex had fulfilled its historical obligation to its founder. What now? Slowly, they turned to see what they had left in their destructive wake. Most Umbagollians were bewildered. Hundreds of years of normal life had been swept aside as if tradition carried no weight at all. Old barriers had disappeared. The country had been opened up from one end to the other. A person could cross the North-West Flatlands without falling foul of petty local Lords and their border disputes. People began to see this change as an improvement. No longer were you expected to hate your next door neighbours just because they lived in a different state. It was as if the country had been allowed to let out its collective breath. Contemporary writings speak of a sense of euphoria. While the remains of the noble families were fleeing to the cities to lick their wounds, their former citizens held ecstatic riots, dancing and singing by the light of enormous bonfires made from the families' abandoned possessions. The poet and singer Kongal-ol Cleft wrote his first really fine poem about one of these parties. Talented people were no longer confined to one small area: their work and their reputations were free to travel across the country. For the first time, the average inhabitant got a sense of themselves as part of an immense, accomplished entity. They were no longer exclusively Goolooians or Jailites or The Citizens of the Estate of Fighammer (or Glass or Small or Faraway.) They were Umbagollians. The impact that this had on people is difficult to imagine today. Within a few years, the country was producing geniuses such as Shinji Oblong, the clockwork botanist, and Renata Body, whose pithily written insights into the parallels between objects and history leave present-day Connections scholars filled with awestruck inspiration. Caleb Sighwater, the legendary diplomat who calmed the relationship between Ex and the newly conquered Gum Gooloo Gum Jublet, is a good example of someone who found their true calling thanks to the changes that fuelled our Renaissance. While this was going on, the Governor of Ex discovered that he was supposed to be running the country, and panicked. Emil Rodheart's friends left accounts of a "shy man, so quiet he almost dissolved into the chair," but this shy man's response to his predicament was to issue a steady stream of draconian rules coupled with threats of terrible punishment if any of them were ignored. In reality there was very little the Exians could do. There was not enough of them in the field to police their new citizens, so they let the rules slide. Somehow, however, news of the Governor's edicts leaked out. The response was an outburst of rebellious behaviour. Exians were beaten to death in the Falling Hills and the culprits were hunted down and killed. Not all of the dead prisoners were guilty: their families and friends went after the Exians and the executors became the executed. Retaliation followed retaliation. Other non-Exians continued to flaunt their disregard for the new laws. Their real target was not Exians, but the Governor who was by now hated by his own city as well as the people outside it. After years of this, the Exians redeemed themselves in the eyes of the country by storming their Governor's home and throwing him out of a window. His body was tossed into the Bay of Ex. Rodheart's death signalled an end to the extravagant turbulance that characterised the aftermath of the war. Genius continued to flourish, but the sudden explosion of talent had slowed to a steady trickle. " Go back to the Timeline or ahead to the next chapter, The Cumber Poidy Prison.