Creature:Othenican

The Othenican species is a carbon-based, feathered, bipedal, winged lifeform, standing an average of five and a half feet tall, and weighing in at an average of one-hundred and fifteen pounds. On their forearms, they posses a complex biological weapon that launches a caustic venom. Their coloration is diverse. They eat plants.

The vegetarianism is a biological requirement, but it eventually inspired a prominent philosophy, that life is sacred, and should not be taken, except at great need.

The cultural history of the Othenicans (Or the Othenians, as they are now known) is dominated by two city-states, and their historical relations with each other: The titular Nation-State of Othens, and across their largest sea, the Militant Nation-State of Lacon.

Othens was a nation-state whose culture was oriented around an almost religious deference to philosophy, and later, the sciences,and a deep respect for the environment. The earliest stable civilization to form on the world of Arthe, they became the relatively peaceful center of learning and, eventually, scientific development on the world. Their interactions with the burgeoning nationalities around them was always defined by their consummate diplomacy, although certain Othenian historians point out that it helped that the later civilizations that formed around Othens were often somewhat in awe of their more developed neighbor, and the feats of architecture that defined Othenian culture, as well as being more than a little influenced by Othenian culture.

Lacon's story is as different as it is possible to be. In Arthe's prehistoric days, a small group of Othenicus made use of the planet's jetstream to travel to the largest continent on their world. When that offshoot of the species gained sentience, (Some three hundred years after the founding of Othens,)it was a much more brutal time for them, as all around, tribes of Othenicus were fighting for land and resources. one such tribe, by dint of the discovery of the longbow, and the judicious use of superior tactics, managed to create the first stable civilization, the Protectorate of Lacon. The Protectorate proceeded to steadily gain military control of the northern half of the Westernmost continent.

{Coming Soon: Othens meets Lacon. How will they ever get along?)