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[Fardreamer]

Apologies for making several new thread recently, but with the forums closing this month I want to get my thoughts out.

All the civilizations in Thedas follow themes of real world civilizations.

Fereldan - English influences
Orlais - French influences
Tevinter - Roman Empire influences
Antiva - Spanish/Portuguese influences
Avvar - Viking/Scandinavian influences
Qunari - Muslim invasions of Europe influences

Chasind - Germanic barbarians influences

Rivain - Influences of the era of the Caribbean pirates

Anderfels - ?

Nevarra - Hard to say, the little we know about it might suggest an Egyptian influence with the mummification their dead, and some art pieces showing lots of obelisks in their architecture.

Free Marches - I would say they are heavily influenced by the Greek city-states, but what we saw in Kirkwall didn't seem to reflect that much.

I'm not sure what the Dwarves and Danish are influenced by. Perhaps theyre just modeled after traditional fantasy roles for those races.

My question is, what influence do you think Those From Across the Sea will follow. From the extremely little information we know about them I'm betting on an Orient influence, but thats pure speculation. There are no ethnic Asians in the DA series, but there are representatives of every other ethniticy.

You can make Asian looking characters, but you never encounter any in game.

Thoughts?

[Serza]

Theoretically, Free Marches would be central Europe on the map. Look on the map of Thedas upside down and start matching locations. It is also rather exact, except for Orlais/France and the notable lack of Scandinavian-like things (though the Avvar do not seem to be completely unlike these, and they inhabit the south edge of Ferelden/the Frostbacks).

 

If you look, Cassandra (a Pentaghast, who are a renowned Nevarran dynasty) seems to have an accent similar to that Germans speaking English use. People of the Anderfels and Tevinter tend to be darker in skin tones and more "southern" looking (Dorian, Duncan), Marchers seem to be a wide variety of things, as seen with Starkhaven, who seem to be more towards the Swiss side of things, and Kirkwall, who appear much more British (Angles, Saxons and Jutes came to England from Dutch and German coast, actually). Next up, the blaring things - Antivans and Rivaini are easily recognized as similar to the Spanish (the Spanish Armada was only defeated by the Royal Navy in 1588, so there's your Felicisima Armada.

 

I'm sure there's more, but it's really late (or early, both apply) and a nap is in order.

[Seraphim24]

Hawaiians

[vbibbi]

I want to say Tevinter is modeled more on the later Byzantine Empire rather than the Roman Empire. Perhaps ancient Tevinter was more like Rome.

 

I think Antiva is a mixture of Italy and Spanish influences. It's known for its wine, is really a conglomeration of city states loosely held together.

 

Rivain might be more Spanish, since Spain had significant Moorish influences as well as Christian and Jewish and Basque, and was multicultural fairly early on.

 

The Dalish can be seen to represent both Jews and Romani (Gypsies) in that they are a people in diaspora searching for a new home.

 

I could see the Free Marches as central northern Europe, with the city states of the Holy Roman Empire being a loose confederation.

 

I honestly don't think we get enough information about the Chasind to classify their culture. I would say that the Anderfels are more related to Germanic influence, as they're a stern and disciplined people who are fiercely loyal to their local rulers.

 

Nevarra is hard to pin down as we know little of its culture other than its death practices. It was part of the Free Marches and became its own power, getting into border disputes with Orlais and Tevinter, so maybe one of the stronger city states within the Holy Roman Empire?

 

As for the lands beyond the sea, all that we really know is that the Executors seem to be culturally advanced enough to travel to Thedas when Thedosians can't manage to cross the same ocean, and that they have been spying on the nations for long enough to establish a spy network. So that could be comparable to ancient China, which was years ahead of Europe in its technology, or India.

[fdrty]

I don't think we'll ever see their culture but they might be something completely alien, possibly either far eastern or Native American/Mayan/Aztec in design

 

When you think about it, Thedas is just like Rome and the tribes Rome subjugated.

 

Not sure that Qunari are like muslims. All that shirtlessness would make most Imam's heads explode. They're more like medieval communist tribal africans.

[Fardreamer]

You're confusing what influence means. Its not a carbon copy. That would be boring. They're influenced by the ancient Muslim invasions of Europe.

A foreign religion invades the Andraste (Christian) world. Their science is more advanced and they made major strides into the known world before being halted.

If you know anything about history, you know the Qunari are strongly influenced by that culture.

[Gervaise]

It should also be remembered that back in DAO the codex on the Qunari said they had very robust silver armour that they wore into battle.   It made sense that the Arishok and his group in Kirkwall did not have this since they had been shipwrecked and in any case had been on more of a diplomatic mission.    However, previous lore concerning the Qunari seemed to be thrown out of the window when DAI, and in particularly the Spoils of the Qunari, came around.   Suddenly the Qunari rely totally on Vitaar and their naturally tougher skins and don't seem to need armour at all.   I was rather disappointed as I had been looking forward to seeing real Qunari armour as described in DAO.   

 

However, the Qunari are only similar by the way Islam spread, in particular the Ottoman Empire, but there is very little resemblance to Islam in any other way.  The way it spread could equally be said of Communism, particularly the Russian version, and the uneasy peace accord with the southern states very much like the Cold War, with the Qun spreading by subterfuge rather than open warfare.   As a political philosophy/religion with the State as god, the Qun is much closer to Communism, with Koslun far more like Karl Marx than Mohammed.

 

As for "Those Across the Sea", they may not amount to anything in the future.   If they do, it is hard to anticipate who they will most resemble.   The Qunari originally came from across the seas and must have been fleeing something. I suppose they could be based on the Chinese (in culture if not appearance) considering that the Chinese invented gunpowder and the Qunari brought this knowledge westwards with them.   Still if you were basing it literally on how the rest of Thedas works, you would need to turn the map upside down  and that would make Those Across the Sea based on western civilisations, like the Aztecs, but none of these were ever advanced enough to travel outside of their own region.   I suppose, if they do use them at some point, we'll just have to wait and see.