Landholders' Council
Kotari settlements are typically composed of a group of fortified manor houses, each of which protects a scattered collection of farmsteads. This arrangement is brought about by the Land Code of Kotar; which states that to lay claim to land you must be able to defend it and that if your land is defended by another then you must swear fealty to him. Thus in Kotar the noble Landholders must also be keen warriors – ensuring the safety of a number of nearby farms that pay them a tithe in return. Every farmer owns his own land, but only one who defends his neighbours and recieves their fealty in return can declare himself a Landholder.
The Landholders’ Council meets in Vendoko on the East coast of Kotar. In theory any Landholder can join the council and lay claim to an equal vote in its decisions but in practice it is unfeasible for the great majority of Landholders to abandon their holdings for any period of time. Thus in actuality the Council is composed of a small group of the richest and most powerful Landholders who can rely on their underlings to care for the day to day running of their estates. These rich Landholders then receive the backing of smaller Landholders in their area and cast their votes for them – on the understanding that they will act for the general good of the area. In a few areas this trend is upset by unions of poorer Landholders who take turns to sit on the Council while their fellows guard their land, but this fashion has yet to catch on through the majority of Kotar.
The Council takes a tithe from all Landholders and uses its resources to pay for public works such as roads and bridges and also to fund Kotar’s small standing army. This army is used by the Council to tackle especially large or dangerous groups of bandits, to track and kill dangerous animals that have crossed the mountains from the West and to put down riots, revolts or unsanctioned settlements (i.e. those that have no Landholder to defend them).
Although Kotar has no enemies abroad and little domestic strife the Council finds some trouble from the various religious cults that thrive on the island. In recent years there have been several small conflicts with the Church of the Bright Path in the West of the nation where the Church opposed the Council taking action against various small settlements in the mountains. In the end the Church has established itself as Landholder for various unsanctioned settlements in the region of the Aoleth Mountains and this worrying trend looks as though it may soon spread to the country’s smaller cults also.
