Samanohuwa

Samanohuwa, officially the Kingdom of Samanohuwa (: Aupuni Mōʻī o Samanohuwa, "Royal State of Samanohuwa") is a  in southern Jungju, located in the Gara archipelago and occupying most of its western third. It borders Kendan to its north, Latog and Nagara Dipa to its northeast, Thrumbo to its east and southeast, Malu'i to its south, and Lhokseumwae to its northwest. It borders the Western Ocean to its south and west, which is referred to as the Samanohuwan Sea in older maps and some regional languages.

Paleoarchaeological evidence indicates that the easternmost island of Lanuinui was settled by between 60,000 and 45,000 BCE, with the rest of the archipelago being colonized by no later than 30,000 BCE. The majority of this initial wave of migration came from the rest of Gara, though a significant amount is believed to have come from the north as well. Subsequent waves of primarily came from the north, but Samanohuwa's population remained disproportionately low by regional standards until the end of the, though some scholars believe it was much higher and evidence thereof simply did not survive the ravages of time. Samanohuwa's population began to increase noticeably around 1500 BCE with immigration largely from Haegye islanders from the Eastern and Southern Oceans, who settled in the south and rapidly spread throughout the entire archipelago.

The chiefdom that would ultimately become Samanohuwa was founded some time in the fifth or fourth century BCE. The exact date is unknown; much of the ancient city of Kaneloa was destroyed in the 6th century CE and written language did not become widespread in Samanohuwa until the middle of the third century BCE. The island of Samanohuwa proper, the centermost of the inner archipelago, was united under Ahuahu by 287 BCE, and by his death he had expanded his chiefdom's territory to most of the smaller surrounding islands and was beginning campaigns to conquer the nearest of the Inner Four to the east, 'Ewa. Further expansion campaigns by later kings would see the entire inner archipelago united by the mid-2nd century CE, by which time Samanohuwa began to be noticed as an existent state by nations beyond southern Jungju. The largely uninhabited atolls and islets to the west were colonized over the next three hundred years, during which time relations with the island nation of Lanuinui began to degrade. This would culminate in a sixteen-year war that resulted in Lanuinui's total (and permanent) annexation by Samanohuwa, and the establishment of 'Aho'eiku on its western shore. Despite numerous periods of instability and expansionism, Samanohuwa's borders have remained largely the same ever since.

Samanohuwa entered a period of semi-stability, where the king ruled in theory but in practice the nobility were often free to do as they wished. In this period, Samanohuwans gained a reputation as raiders and pirates. Samanohuwan sailing ships raided, pillaged, traded, and in some cases settled all over the Western and Southern Oceans, reaching as far as Matobo, though no Samanohuwan settlement ever lasted long as an independent entity. Over time, this evolved into a true trading network, and Samanohuwa began to establish itself as a true regional power. Apart from a short civil war in the 14th century, Samanohuwa remained as such, and maintained its independence even during the ascendancy of Sinju's colonial empires. During this period, a combination of corrupt governance and a multitude of islands made Samanohuwa yet again a hotbed for piracy. This pirate activity culminated in Samanohuwa forcibly being made a protectorate of Fusen on 28 Chirwol 1737, widely considered a major factor in the decline of the Golden Age of Piracy, if not the end of it.

Fusen's control of Samanohuwa is seen as contentious by modern-day Samanohuwans: it brought, , and to the country, along with  as the 19th century wore on. However, Fusen made every attempt to force its culture and societal laws on Samanohuwa, and it freely manipulated Samanohuwa's election system to stuff the country's new parliament with pro-Fusen members. Fusenese control of Samanohuwa began to erode over the latter half of the 19th century. Even as Fusen began to expand its colonial empire elsewhere, Samanohuwa was essentially independent by the 1880s, and officially independent by 1895. Samanohuwa spent the next several decades building up infrastructure, strengthening industry, and modernizing its military, though it was still somewhat unprepared for the Great Eulhae War. Despite this, it emerged from the war with relatively light damage compared to other participants, and benefitted greatly from the economic changes of decolonization.

Modern-day Samanohuwa is a and a, in which the monarch, called the Moa, wields considerably more executive power than the Prime Minister, who is largely a head of state. A rising, the recent discovery of vast deposits in Lanuinui and an increasingly diverse economy are expected to further increase the strength of its economy. The majority of the country consists of hot and humid islands ranging from less than one to hundreds of square kilometers and scrubby savannahs to dense jungles, though Lanuinui's highest peaks are tall enough for snow and even glaciers. Biodiversity in Samanohuwa is among the highest in Tiandi, and the current government has taken major strides to ensure it stays that way. Tourism is a major industry in Samanohuwa, and it is one of the most frequently visited countries in southern Jeongmi. While Samanohuwa's army is relatively small, and it lacks a separate air force entirely, the Royal Samanohuwan Navy is one of the largest of any non-Great Power, and actively participates in Congress of Nations operations, of which Samanohuwa is a founding member.

Etymology
"Samanohuwa" roughly translates to "Land of the Friendly Sharks." The smallest of the Inner Four islands is also named Samanohuwa, and has been referred to as such long before the kingdom that is now the Kingdom of Samanohuwa occupied its entirety. In official documentation, this island is referred to as "The Island of Samanohuwa" or "Samanohuwa Island" to distinguish it from the country; colloquially Samanohuwans usually refer to the island as simply "the Island".

Prehistoric Samanohuwa
The 21st century revealed evidence of inhabitation of Samanohuwa by and  as early as 1 mya and 450,000 BCE, respectively, though there is no evidence either species settled on the islands beyond the northern coasts of Lanuinui. The sites found further indicate that archaic humanity never stayed long; the sites showed little evidence of being used for more than half of the year. did not arrive in Samanohuwa until 60,000 BCE at the earliest and 45,000 BCE at the latest, with the entire archipelago being colonized by no later than 30,000 BCE. No evidence exists of them contacting other human species, let alone reusing their sites, so it is likely that the archipelago had been entirely abandoned. At this time, Samanohuwa was populated by several species of megafauna, including ratites, several species of

These first inhabitants did not penetrate the jungle interiors of Lanuinui or the Inner Four by more than a few dozen kilometers, preferring sites with easy access to the ocean. Little is known about the specifics of their culture, but they are believed to have been similar to other prehistoric Garan cultures. These populations had dark skin, curly hair, and short statures, though genetic evidence points to no greater relation to Mijuan ethnicities than the rest of Gara. These populations are genetically distinct from modern Samanohuwans, but most modern Samanohuwans have some percentage of ancestry from these groups.

The high degree of assimilation among these groups indicate that the "conquest" of Samanohuwa was largely a mythical construction of later, more warlike, Samanohuwan states, and that the actual "Haegye Invasion" was largely peaceful. Indeed, in some cases and areas, it was the indigenous hunter-gatherer groups who assimilated the incoming Haegyeans, not the other way around. Regardless of the exact details, however, the Haegye settlers swiftly reduced the indigenous population to a minority, and pushed farther inland than they ever had, and it is this "invasion" that is considered to mark the end of the prehistoric period of Samanohuwan history.

Ancient Samanohuwa
By around 1000 BCE, Haegye immigration into Samanohuwa began to slow down, for reasons presently unknown. By the start of the Haegye Invasion, the original indigenous population had just begun to use copper, by the end of it, the petty kingdoms and chiefdoms that covered the archipelago had begun to experiment with bronze, especially on Samanohuwa Island and on Lanuinui. The settlement that would become Kaneloa was founded during this period, centered around a tin mine, though it would not become an independent chiefdom until the 340 BCE ±8. Many of these small kingdoms became quite prosperous indeed, trading with each other, the central Gara archipelago, and the Taema Peninsula, from whence the methods to utilize iron ultimately came. Iron weapons came at the same time in the form of two invasion attempts, neither of which were successful in conquering the archipelago. These attempts did result in the unification of Lanuinui, however.

The introduction of iron weapons and iron mining in Samanohuwa brought about a radical shift in the political geography. Kingdoms that had access to iron swiftly began to annex those that did not, either through economic pressure or outright war. Kaneloa, lacking any immediate iron deposits, was nearly destroyed by one such attempt by the larger "kingdom" of Faleu, but in a series of semi-apocryphal battles managed to not only stave off defeat, but seize control of the invaders' iron mines.

Age of Unification
The chief of Kaneloa at the time of its first great victory over Faleu died within the decade, but his plans for further expansion were taken up by his son, Ahuahu I. Under his reign, the entire island of Samanohuwa was united by 287 BCE, at which point he renamed his entire kingdom after the island. The rest of his reign was spent expanding his control to the smaller islands immediately surrounding Samanohuwa Island, and his death put a temporary hold on the conquest of 'Ewa to the immediate east. Neither his son, nor his grandson, would live to see the completion of its conquest, though his grandson, [name TBD], would, and he would live to conquer Kaliua, the island directly to the north.

Pu'uloa, with its many choke points and river crossings, would take the longest of any of the major islands of Samanohuwa to conquer, with its annexation taking nearly three centuries. Only part of this was due to geography - the island nations had maintained good relations with the Kingdom of Samanohuwa all throughout its conquests of the other two inner islands, and the kingdoms therein were powerful, well-armed, and well-trained. The annexation of Pu'uloa was a slow, gradual process, achieved as much via treaty and soft power as by combat and attrition.

Pu'uloa's conquest marked the end of the first main phase of the Age of Unification. The second phase was, compared to the phases that bookended it, bloodless. The Samanohuwan Archipelago includes thousands of islands and islets, some less than a kilometer long, and many did not - and still do not - have so much as a hut, let alone a village. Most that did accepted the rule of the Kingdom of Samanohuwa with little open complaint, and on the kingdom's part, most were too small and remote to be worth substantial interference besides the usual deference to their new monarch. It was during this period that Samanohuwa came to begin trading, to a limited degree, with the wider world beyond its immediate surroundings - there is evidence that both Samanohuwa and Lanuinui traded, mostly indirectly, with Cheonje and Seogwan starting in this period.

This second phase was the longest of the three phases of the Age of Unification, and some of the earliest Samanohuwan epics either come from or are set in this period. It was immediately followed by the conquest of Lanuinui. Up until this point, Lanuinui had developed independent of the rest of the Samanohuwan archipelago, and shared more in common culturally with the Taema Peninsula to the north and the islands of Nagara Dipa and Thrumbo to the east. It was entirely unified and had been for centuries, and the island was nearly as large as the rest of the archipelago combined.

In the latter half of the second phase, Samanohuwa and Lanuinui both engaged in a great deal of political posturing, saber-rattling, and deals both with each other and with nearby nations. Both nations were officially at peace, yet both nations also knew that war was inevitable. Much like the victory over Faleu, the exact cause of the war is lost to history with only several semi-mythical explanations remaining. Whatever the cause, it is clear that Samanohuwa attacked first, attacking several of Lanuinui's largest cities at once. This slowed the initial phase of the invasion, but was ultimately beneficial. Despite its size, unlike Pu'uloa Lanuinui's mountains and rivers provided little impedance to the Samanohuwan advance, and Kuitakui's campaign of conquest proceeded with few strategic setbacks.

His death near the end of the siege of Lanuinui's last stronghold came as a shock to the kingdom, but by that point in the war Samanohuwa's victory was irreversible. Lanuinui surrendered the following morning, and a new capital city was founded on its western shore facing Kaliua, to replace Kaneloa which had been severely damaged by a typhoon a few years prior to the war.