Aukalnia and Sartland

Aukalnia and Sartland, formally the United Republics of Aukalnia and Sartland (: Aukalnijos ir Sartijos jungtinės respublikos, : Aukalnijas un Sartijas Apvienotās republikas), often known informally as simply Aukalnia, is a located in Eastern Artemia. With an area of 101,996 km2 (39,381 sq miles), Aukalnia and Sartland is administratively divided into the two respective republics of Aukalnia and Sartland, the Autonomous Community of Švėkšna, and a single at Ažytėnai on the Boreal coast. Aukalnia and Sartland borders Gardarike to the south, Yarova to the east and Kironia to the west. In 2018, the estimated population of the country was 14.3 million people. The two official languages of the state, Aukalnian and Sartish, are the only two living languages in the of the  language family.

Etymology
The country’s name comes from the two historic regions of Aukalnia and Sartland. Aukalnia, or Aukalnija in the Aukalnian language, derives its name from aukštas kalnas meaning ‘high mountain’ and the common suffix –ija is often added as a descriptor of place names. Whereas Sartland’s native name of Sartija stems from the word sārts meaning ‘ruddy’, which is most widely believed to originate from the country’s iron-rich terrain. In older texts, dating back to the 13th century, Sartland was known as Sartve or Sartvi, the latter being the name of an ancient.

Early history
Human settlement in most parts of Aukalnia and Sartland only became possible following the thawing of ice from the last glacial era some 12,000-10,000 years ago. However, has determined numerous prehistoric villages along the River Skaidrus within the southern interior of the country, such as Kazimierava, were first settled by  approximately 25,000 years ago. These earliest inhabitants of Aukalnia and Sartland would have relied on subsistence methods of survival, namely hunting, gathering and fishing in nearby bodies of water. Between the period of 1000-500 BCE, a transition from hunting-gathering-fishing subsistence to single farm-based settlement began.

During the middle, the Aukalnians and Sarts warred with each other, as well as with the , , and with the expanding to the south-east. Accordingly, it was during this time that the indigenous peoples of the region started to organise into political units. Throughout the early centuries CE, the Aukalnians and Sarts fought with Slavic Christians who waged a series of  in the East Boreal region.

Grand Duchy of Aukalnia
The Grand Duchy of Aukalnia was an Eastern Artemian state that existed from the 13th century CE to 1801, when the establishment was toppled during the Aukalnian Rebellion with the support of the Vojiskiy Empire. The Grand Duchy was founded by Aukalnians but went on to include Sartland, Kryzhelovschina, and parts of Peremorovka and Gardarike. For most of its existence, it was the greatest rival of the Vojiskiy Empire and one of its antecedents, the Peremorovkan Hetmanate. In the late-14th century CE, Grand Duke Vitalijus the Strong-kneed converted to and adopted Catholic King of Aukalnia as his secondary title.

Throughout the 15th century and 16th centuries, the Grand Duchy expanded territorially, unifying with Sartland in 1431, Kryzhelovschina in 1483, and pushing the Peremorovkars east of the River Bily in 1576, following their victory at the end of the Aukalnian-Peremorovkan War. The dynastic union of the Peremorovkan Hetmanate and the Tsardom of Yarova in 1692 proved to be a major security risk to the Grand Duchy, however, the Plantations of the Dzyunakaz in the 17th century postponed any immediate advance from the now-united enemies. Grand Duke Modestas II of Aukalnia failed in his attempts of achieving a nonaggression pact with the Vojiskiy war machine and, in 1734, within weeks of crushing the last-standing strongholds of the Dzyunakaz, Yarova invaded Kryzhelovschina.

The Grand Duchy suffered a decisive defeat in a conflict now known as the Four Day War, and the entirety of the Kryzhelov traditional homeland was ceded to the Vojiskiy Empire. After this, the Grand Duchy fell into gradual, yet considerable decline, losing control over swathes of land to Gardarike from the mid-18th century onwards. In a strategic ploy to gain access to the Boreal Ocean and pull the Grand Duchy into Yarova’s, the Vojiskiy Empire started to provide weaponry and ammunition to Aukalnian and Sartish rebels on the outset of the peasant Aukalnian Rebellion of 1801. In the winter of that year, the Vojiskiys also dispatched a sizeable expeditionary force of 25,000 troops and, fighting alongside rebels of various ethnic groups, Grand Duke Modestas II was dethroned after the Fall of Ažytėnai on 21 December 1801.

Crown Protectorate of Aukalnia and Sartland
The period in the aftermath of the Grand Duchy's collapse consisted of significant Yarovan presence in Aukalnian affairs. In 1802, Aukalnia and Sartland became a Yarovan crown protectorate and Tsar Fridrik I personally selected Uladzimir Gromyko, a with ties to Yarovan unionism and loyalism. Gromyko styled himself Prince of the Aukalnians and Sarts. Controversially, the former capital of Ažytėnai (renamed Benediktgrad), which was more than 80% ethnic Aukalnian, was ceded to Yarova, and in its place, the Sartish city of Ruchava was declared the protectorate's new administrative centre. Although Ažytėnai did not share any contiguous land border with Yarova Proper, the city was considered crucial in opening up Yarovan trade connectivity with other Boreal nations, such as Thuyiquakliq. In addition to Benediktgrad, Yarova annexed the Boreal islands of Pakalnė (renamed Ostrov Zelënyy) and Gaidsalė (renamed Ostrov Korolevskiy.)

Meanwhile, plantation-like settlements, much like the ones observed in Kartvelia, were being established by ethnic and  in the frontier regions of Pernarava, Griškabūdis, and Švėkšna. In the years between 1805 and 1815, Švėkšna was recorded to have underwent a population increase from 14,450 to 91,315. In an identical manner to the Dzyunakaz settlement model, the Yarovar migrants were offered incentives by the Vojiskiy government to migrate to the undeveloped prairies of southeastern Aukalnia, including titles of and monetary rewards. However, tensions between indigenous Aukalnians and the new settlers reached breaking point by the late 1820s, with skirmishes becoming commonplace between them.

A heightened military presence in the borderlands stirred intense suspicion among the general populace of the protectorate, with fears that Švėkšna, in particular, would be officially annexed by Yarova. In 1853, Tsar Fridrik II authorised the realisation of this, and the Vojiskiy Empire took direct possession of the Švėkšna region. Švėkšna was renamed Shvekshna (Швекшна) and lingered as a symbol of contention between the Aukalnians and Yarovars for over a century. Aukalnian writers and intellectuals were inspired by the surge in among peoples under Vojiskiy imperial rule through the course of the 19th century. Fearing separatism in 1862, in Shvekshna, the tsar implemented strict measures to suppress the speaking and study of the Aukalnian and Kryzhelov languages.

Around this time, in the early 1860s, Prince Stanislaŭ Gromyko launched an initially nonviolent campaign to convert the Aukalnian peasantry from Western Catholicism to the. Impoverished agriculturists were attracted to the concept owing to the guarantee of tax breaks and supplies of grain. However, more affluent communities, with links to the former elite of the Grand Duchy, were staunchly opposed to the prince's efforts. One altercation between a Western Catholic priest and a group of Orthodox campaigners resulted in a nationwide revolt in 1866, which was promptly shut down by Vojiskiy forces. The strong presence of large Yarovar loyalist communities gave the Vojiskiy Empire a firm grasp over the protectorate. By 1870, approximately 60% of Benediktgrad's population of 135,397 were ethnic Yarovars. After 1866, deep divisions between the Aukalnian and Sartish nationalist movements stunted any further attempts to successfully overthrow the protectorate during this period of substantial.

Aukalnian Civil War (1926)
Following the collapse of the Vojiskiy Empire in the Second Yarovan Civil War (Vojiskiy War) in 1926, the protectorate struggled to maintain control and Aukalnia and Sartland was plunged into its own civil war. During the Grand Campaigns, surfaced and was perceived by sections of the peasantry as a credible alternative to the largely unpopular rule of the pro-Vojiskiy Gromykos and the status quo. The events leading up to the September Revolution and foundation of the Socialist Republic of Teutonenland in 1924 captured the imagination of many literary, artistic and military minds within the protectorate. Liudvikas Vainikonis, a  and fervent, emerged as a revolutionary leader of the Raudonasis Judėjimas or ‘Red Movement’, which garnered far-reaching support from 1922 onwards. It is estimated that by the start of the Vojiskiy War in July 1924, the Raudonasis Judėjimas boasted almost 50,000 active members across the protectorate of various ethnic backgrounds. This figure is thought to have doubled by January 1926, with the storming of the Imperial Palace in Shchyokhov motivating Aukalnians and Sarts to work together and ignite a so-called ‘Red Revolution.’

The civil war first erupted in the rural interior of the protectorate in April 1926 and quickly reached Ruchava within a month. The velocity of the insurrection, coupled with the absence of outside Yarovan support, provided the Gromykites with very little time to organise a counter-attack. Fighting between Raudonasis Judėjimas combatants and royalists in and around the city of Ruchava lasted for three weeks, when the communist rebels eventually captured the capital. Attention was then swiftly focused on Benediktgrad in June, which had descended into a state of chaos due to the collapse of the Vojiskiy establishment. The port city was heavily abandoned by Yarovar settlers, however, a considerable proportion decided to remain and resisted the communist advance. Benediktgrad finally fell to the communists on 13 July 1926 and was declared the capital of the People's Socialist Boreal Republics of Aukalnia and Sartland, as Ažytėnai. Not long afterwards, the communists went on to regain control of Pakalnė and Gaidsalė.

Communist era (1926-1998)
The Raudonasis Judėjimas’ victory in the civil war brought about the formation of the and the appointment of Liudvikas Vainikonis as the transitional chairman. Vainikonis stood unopposed in the country’s first general election held in September 1926. The democratic process was reported to have mirrored the April general elections observed in the United Federated Districts of Yarova, however, the new communist state did not possess a multi-party system and Vainikonis dominated the Raudonasis Judėjimas and its political wing, known as the People's Socialist Party (Liaudies socialistų partija.) Early rivals within the movement, such as Pranas Kunskas and Sartish military officer Klavs Sarkanbardis, were rumoured to have been threatened by Vainikonis supporters (known as Vainikonites) to not contend the leadership. However, this was always denied vehemently by Vainikonis and his confidantes.

Towards the end of the civil war, the first President of Yarova Vitaliy Simakin, a vociferous, provided military support to the Raudonasis Judėjimas. Simakin had intended for the United Federated Districts to become a communist one-party state, however, his efforts were met with forceful opposition by allies and rivals alike. Vainikonis had hoped that the demise of the Vojiskiy Empire would usher in a new era of healthy and especially close diplomatic relations between Aukalnia and Yarova but following Simakin's sudden death in September 1926, both countries embarked in a starkly different political direction. Simakin's successor, Rusya Tarasovich, identified as a and expressed his unwillingness to hand back Shvekshna unless a majority of its inhabitants demonstrated a decisive desire to do so. In response to this, with the knowledge that Shvekshna's population was virtually Yarovar in its entirety, Vainikonis' government severed all trade, commercial and diplomatic relations with Yarova. Furthermore, Aukalnia and Sartland lay territorial claim to Shvekshna (Švėkšna) in its. This erupted into the Shvekshna territorial dispute (also known as the Švėkšna territorial dispute), which played a central role in the relationship between the two countries for the remainder of the 20th century. During the 1920s and 1930s, the ethnic Yarovar and Peremorovkar populations were systematically repressed by the communist government, with many forcibly deported to Yarova and others sent to labour camps. The national media presented the nation of Yarova as a nemesis of Aukalnia and peddled the notion that the two countries were in a state of war.

Every aspect of Aukalnian daily life was altered under the communist government, from education to leisure. A strict curriculum was set in place to teach schoolchildren solely about the ideology of communism and a clandestine special task force of the police ensured that educators were not critical of Vainikonis' regime. Communism was also heavily featured in art, literature and music at this time, as a means to normalise the ideology and the preservation of the state through. Vainikonis was glorified by many Aukalnian artists and his well-known portrait was commonly found framed and displayed in the average Aukalnian household. The absence of term limits on his premiership allowed Vainikonis to continually stand in uncontested elections and he dominated political and cultural life in the country for almost three decades. The official state policy of promoted the idea of purging the country of the, and this resulted in substantial  and the persecution of such people.