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Warhammer Fantasy Total War Strygos Crest

The icon of Strygos as depicted in Total War: Warhammer II.

Strygos, also spelled Strigos, was a Human empire originally built within the Strigos Valley by the mad shaman Kadon, then ruled by Ushoran and his bloodline of Strigoi Vampires from the city of Mourkain, before it fell to the machinations of the Lahmian Vampire Neferata and the onslaught of Greenskins she helped to unleash upon it. The fall of Strygos led to the wanderings of the nomadic Strigany people, who once called Strygos home.

History[]

"Old Mourkain was a land of honey and milk
The pigs lived in houses, peasants wore silk
The land was so rich it bore three crops a year
And there was nothing but joy from cradle to bier
Our lords were as fair as our land was fine
As wise as our petru and as strong as our kine
Their beautiful lives were of such elegant grace
That all clambered out for the joy of their embrace
"

The Song of Mourkain, Strigany folk song[1f]

Although the Greenskins have conquered much of the northern and eastern Badlands as their own, they are still competing with the tribes of Men that still held sway to the territories to the south. In the very distant past, the territories that would comprise much of the southern Badlands was originally dominated by Human tribes who were subjects to the priest-kings of Nehekhara following the conquest of King Setep of Khemri some 1,200 years before the birth of Sigmar and the founding of the Empire of Man. However, following the destruction of Nehekhara at the hands of the Great Necromancer Nagash, the tribes of Men living around the Badlands were united under the charismatic leadership of a powerful local shaman named Kadon.[1a]

As a young man, Kadon was a shaman, and also the young chieftain of the Lodringen tribe. The rise of power and popularity of Kadon came about when the shaman found the deceased and bloated remains of Alcadizaar the Conqueror, the last king of the Nehekharan city-state of Khemri upon the banks of the Blind River. In his hand lay an ominous crown of iron known to history as the Crown of Sorcery. Taking the crown for his own, and soon corrupted by its malignant influence, Kadon commanded his people to build a magnificent tomb for Alcadizaar. Around that tomb, their settlement evolved into a city that came to be called Mourkain. As both he and his people began to grow powerful, Kadon initiated a campaign of conquest against the Greenskin tribes of the northern Badlands, pushing the Greenskins out of their territories and claiming all the land from Mourkain to the Black Gulf as his own, founding a new realm called Strygos.[1a]

Warhammer Mourkain

The ruins of the Strygos capital of Mourkain, now called Morgheim, in the Marsh of Madness.

With the covert assistance of Ushoran, the first of the Strigoi bloodline of Vampires, Kadon saw the city of Mourkain grow over the years into an empire which, at its height, stretched from the Marshes of Madness all the way to the Black Gulf. Kadon developed and refined the art of necromancy to further Nagash's work, and he created several powerful magical artefacts dedicated to the raising and controlling of the Undead. After some time, Kadon was usurped by Ushoran, who became the new leader of Strygos, even as his Strigoi became the realm's new Undead nobility. The rapid expansion of the Strygos civilisation drove many Greenskins out of their settlements in the Badlands and into the World's Edge Mountains.[1a]

The bellicose Orcs could not ignore this encroachment onto their territory forever. Eventually, the Orc tribes united in a massive Waaagh! under a mighty Orcish warlord named Dork Redeye and marched upon the city of Mourkain with a huge and imposing army. Despite being well-schooled in the necromantic arts, both the Strigany, the people of Strygos, and the Strigoi Vampires were no match for the amassed might of the fearsome Greenskins. The people of Strygos and their Vampire rulers were slaughtered wholesale, their cities and villages burned to the ground.[1a]

A massive battle was fought outside the gates of Mourkain itself, during which Ushoran was slain by the Orc warlord, although the Crown of Sorcery he had inherited from Kadon was taken by his chief acolyte and spirited away before Ushoran's army was defeated. The Strygos Empire was destroyed entirely, so much so that the only indication of it ever existing are the eerie, cursed ruins of Mourkain that haunt the Marsh of Madness, now called Morgheim.[1a]

With their homelands lost, the Strigany people wandered north into the Old World, living a nomadic existence amongst the kingdoms of Men that had been established there.[1a]

Sources[]

  • 1: Blood in the Badlands (7th Edition)
  • 2: Ancient Blood (Novel) by Robert Earl
    • 2a: Ch. 13
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