Tulaytullah

This article is about the ancient city-state in Sumeru. For other uses, see Tulaytullah (Disambiguation).

Tulaytullah
Type	Lore Ancient Civilizations
Region	Sumeru
Subregion	Great Red Sand
Area	Hypostyle Desert

Tulaytullah, the City of Sapphire, was an ancient city-state in the Hypostyle Desert, Great Red Sand, Sumeru. Its prominence in history began with the priest Hermanubis, who established the original Temple of Silence there and led it to become known as a city of wisdom. However, the subsequent wars between city-states and Eremite tribes after the collapse of King Deshret's civilization caused the members of the Temple of Silence to abandon Tulaytullah. With their departure, Tulaytullah was drawn into the violence; it eventually reached dominance through military conquest, but this soon led to its own downfall.

It was located at what is now the Garden of Endless Pillars.

History

It is said that Tulaytullah arose from Nabu Malikata's tears in the period following the fall of her fellow Angels. By the time of Parvezravan's reign, it was recorded as being a city that paid annual tribute to Gurabad in recognition of its status as King Deshret's primary vassal kingdom.

After King Deshret's Death

Thousands of years ago, forbidden knowledge was inadvertently introduced to King Deshret's civilization, causing his people great suffering; Greater Lord Rukkhadevata expended a great deal of her power to seal it away and when that proved insufficient, King Deshret ultimately sacrificed himself to save his people. His civilization subsequently fell and splintered into many smaller, human-led city-states. Among them was Tulaytullah, which became renowned as a city of wisdom after the Tighnarian priest Hermanubis brought his followers and the other Tighnarian priests to the city and established the original Temple of Silence. Thoth refers to this as Hermanubis founding the city, and states that he took in "many who had nowhere else to go." The Temple of Silence retained all the knowledge that survived the fall of King Deshret's civilization, while Hermanubis used his powers to keep the remnants of forbidden knowledge at bay. Over time, the Tighnarians became associated with Tulaytullah and were known as the Tulaytullah Tighnarians (they actually originated from a location called Tighnar, and had left to serve Deshret in the desert before his death).

Even in the tumult that followed the death of King Deshret, Tulaytullah was known as a city of wisdom and prosperity. It was described as having a lattice of shimmering canals, sapphire-domed buildings, and lush emerald gardens filled with Padisarahs and pomegranates.

Temple of Silence

Little more than a hundred years after Deshret's death, war engulfed the desert. The Tighnarians provided a "guiding hand" to Tulaytullah, which allowed them to avoid conflict for some time, but this did not last. In the Temple of Silence's history, a certain king of Gurabad laid siege to Tulaytullah, to some success, and demanded that they give up the Temple of Silence to prove his victory. The ruling elite of Tulaytullah colluded with him in order to retain power, depicting the knowledge held by the Temple of Silence as the true cause of corruption and attempting to turn the people against it.

By this point, Hermanubis had expended his power trying to keep forbidden knowledge at bay. To save the Temple of Silence, he broke his being into many pieces and started a ritual which would bestow his power and knowledge onto his mortal followers. This allowed the Temple of Silence to defeat the invading army, but witnessing this strange power caused the other people of Tulaytullah to fear and shun them. No longer welcome in their own home, the members of the Temple of Silence and the Tulaytullah Tighnarians decided to leave the city for good, choosing to make a new life for themselves in the rainforest. Their departure eventually spelled the city's doom, as its elite warriors were soon overrun and war broke out all over the desert.

Given the numerous gaps in the desert's recorded history, the relative placement of the Temple of Silence's history and the identity of the king of Gurabad is uncertain. Since the Tighnarians are said to have helped Tulaytullah stave off war, it likely happened early on, before the various conflicts involving Tulaytullah which are alluded to by other sources.

Cities of the Seven Towers

At some point, a man known as Shah Ramshahr built seven towers in seven areas, each with a "great sage," and the cities around them were known as the Cities of the Seven Towers. Tulaytullah, which was led by King Humayun during that time, was one of the seven cities; it and the other cities were declared to be subordinate to the "king of kings" Ramshahr. After Ramshahr's death, Humayun took Ramshahr's princess as his wife and became known as Humayun Gurkan. Some years later, however, Humayun himself was decapitated at the city of Saleh during an event known as the Jinn Uprising, with the former ruler of Ay-Khanoum, Garshāsp, taking power over the Cities of the Seven Towers afterwards. Despite Humayun's death, Tulaytullah was stable enough that a few years later, refugees from Garshāsp's unnamed capital city flocked to Tulaytullah after Garshāsp's death.

King Saleb Dowleh, originally known as Goudarz, was somehow involved with Tulaytullah before his rise as king, seemingly to fight against a group of "rebels who falsely [flew] the flag of a Khagan" there. Saleb Dowleh evidently succeeded, as he is recorded as later leaving Tulaytullah with "great pomp" to establish his capital in (a rebuilt) Gurabad, becoming king over the people of the Cities of the Seven Towers. Saleb Dowleh made an alliance with the port city of Orghana in Dharma Forest (now known as Port Ormos), although one of its Deys, Muzaffar, would later turn his back on both sides, killing Saleb Dowleh and his entire bloodline and deciding to permanently reside in the desert instead of returning to Orghana.

Golden Age and Downfall

While no mention of Tulaytullah is made in relation to Muzaffar's successor, Zumurud, the city is related to the downfall of Zumurud's successor, Badanah. By this point, Tulaytullah had become one of the largest and most powerful city-states of the desert and was ruled by an elite class of nobles and scholars. However, the city's golden age came from violent conquest: Badanah's predecessors led military campaigns to subjugate the other desert cities and kingdoms, enslaving their citizens; Badanah himself, as well as his loyal retainer, continued this practice. The city-state of Saleh was known to be under their control at this time.

To keep Badanah's favor, Tulaytullah's elites paid tribute to him in various ways, such as delivering Makhaira to him as a concubine. Bearing a grudge against the obese, war-mongering tyrant for his ancestry — which had caused the destruction of her homeland and enslaved her ancestors, the Jinn — Makhaira conspired with her lover Faramarz, Badanah's son, to assassinate the vassal king. They successfully slew him and passed off his death as an unfortunate accident.

A power struggle ensued following Badanah's death, with Makhaira constantly switching allegiances and lovers as the queen regent. One of those lovers (her third known lover, after Xiphos and Faramarz) was Balash, Faramarz's uncle and the new master of Tulaytullah. He was presumably slain by Goraz, another one of Faramarz's uncles, who then took Makhaira as his own wife; when Tulaytullah rebelled to avenge Balash, Makhaira appeased the rebels by giving them the slain Goraz's head. After being exiled and restored to power three times, with various conflicts and power struggles emerging each time, Faramarz finally grew weary of Makhaira's shifting loyalties and assassinated her with a viper's venom. However, a conspiracy between the slave-warriors and city dwellers led Faramarz to be ousted one final time, after which he was exiled to the rainforest.

Meanwhile, Makhaira's first lover, Xiphos, was the prince of a fallen kingdom who had embarked on a journey to revive his kingdom using the Key of Khaj-Nisut. Wielding a certain blade indwelt by a Jinni, Xiphos became Tulaytullah's protector, famed as the Blade of Tulaytullah. However, his acclaim earned him enmity from both kings of other cities and the rulers of Tulaytullah themselves. Faramarz, following his final exile from the throne, became a mercenary and accepted blood money to kill Xiphos. The two did battle, with Faramarz emerging victorious and disappearing into the rainforest with the money he had earned. Without Xiphos' protection, Tulaytullah withered away.

Legacy

All that remains of Tulaytullah in the present is its garden, which is preserved in the Garden of Endless Pillars.

Aaru Village was founded by refugees from Tulaytullah and other declining desert kingdoms. One of the leading figures among the refugees was a blind poet from Tulaytullah who was involved with many of its most important figures: he once served as a general under Badanah, helping him conquer other desert kingdoms; he was present during Faramarz's childhood; and he was later responsible for mentoring Xiphos.

Other refugees would spread to the four winds across Sumeru, and their descendants survive to the present day. Layla's blue hair and pointed ears mark her lineage as one of those descended from Tulaytullah.

Trivia

Etymology

• Tulaytullah is the Arabic name for Toledo, Spain, while it was part of al-Andalus.

Other Languages

Language	Official Name
English	Tulaytullah
Chinese (Simplified)	图莱杜拉 Túláidùlā
Chinese (Traditional)	圖萊杜拉 Túláidùlā
Japanese	トゥライトゥーラ Turaituura
Korean	툴레이툴라 Tulleitulla
Spanish	Tulaytulah
French	Tulaytullah
Russian	Тулайтулла Tulaytulla
Thai	Tulaytullah
Vietnamese	Tulaytullah
German	Tulaytullah
Indonesian	Tulaytullah
Portuguese	Tulaytullah
Turkish	Tulaytullah
Italian	Tulaytullah

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See Also

• Gurabad
• Port Ormos (Orghana)
• Saleh